New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures

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New World Translation
New World Translation
Full nameNew World Translation of the Holy Scriptures
AbbreviationNWT
Complete Bible
published		1961 (1950 NT)
Translation typeliteral; semi-legal
CopyrightCopyright 1950 Watchtower Society
Genesis 1:1–3
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth proved to be formless and waste and there was darkness upon the surface of the watery deep; and God's active force was moving to and fro over the surface of the waters. And God proceeded to say: "Let light come to be." Then there came to be light.
John 3:16
For God loved the world so much that he gave his only-begotten Son, in order that everyone exercising faith in him might not be destroyed but have everlasting life.
The Bible in English
Main category: Bible translations into English
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The New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (NWT) is a modern-language translation of the Bible published by the Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, Inc. and the International Bible Students Association of Brooklyn, New York. It was not the first translation to be published by them, but it was their very first original translation of the original Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic texts.

History

Until the release of the NWT in 1950, Jehovah's Witnesses in English-speaking countries generally used the King James Version or American Standard Version of the Bible. In the literature they have produced, Jehovah's Witnesses have quoted liberally from the King James Version and many other translations of the Bible over the years.

According to the publishers, one of the main reasons for producing a new translation was that the majority of existing Bible versions in common use employed archaic language. The English language has undergone significant changes since 1611, when the Authorised (King James) Version was first published and many words in the KJV are no longer in common use today, or are used in a sense different from that in which the translators intended them.[1] The stated intention was to produce a fresh translation, free of archaisms.

Additionally, according to the publishers, over the centuries since the King James version was produced, more copies of earlier manuscripts of the original texts in the Hebrew and Greek languages have become available. In their view, better manuscript evidence has made it possible to determine with greater accuracy what the original writers intended, particularly in more obscure passages. Additionally, they feel that certain aspects of the original Hebrew and Greek languages are perhaps better understood by linguists today than they were previously.

In October 1946, the president of the Watch Tower Society, Nathan H. Knorr, proposed a fresh translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures. Work got under way on December 2, 1947 when the "New World Bible Translation Committee" was formed. On September 3, 1949, Knorr convened a joint meeting of the board of directors of both the Watch Tower Society's New York and Pennsylvania corporations to announce that work on a modern-language English translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures was completed and had been turned over to the Society for printing. It was assigned to the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania for publication.

The translators wished to remain anonymous, their stated intent being "to honor Jehovah God, the Divine Author of his inspired Word". This fact is very frequently cited by critics of the translation in order to suggest that its scholarship is of inferior quality, as the credentials of the translators could never be verified.

The New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures (New Testament) was released at a convention of Jehovah's Witnesses at Yankee Stadium, New York, on August 2, 1950. The translation of the Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament) was released in five volumes in 1953, 1955, 1957, 1958, and 1960, and the complete New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures was released as a single volume in 1961. Since then, it has undergone minor revisions on a number of occasions, most recently in 1984. The 1984 edition is in much the same style as previous editions, the primary difference being the revised marginal (cross) references. These had been included in the six volumes released between 1950 - 1960 but were not included in the single volume editions from 1961 onward.[2] The basic layout style much resembles the American Standard Version 1901 edition.

Characteristics of the translation

The Old Testament as found in the New World Translation is based on Codex Leningradensis B 19A as published in Rudolf Kittel's Biblia Hebraica (7th, 8th, and 9th ed.), while the New Testament is based on Westcott and Hort's The New Testament in the Original Greek. Also considered were texts by Bover, Merk, and Nestle. Newer editions make use of newer texts, such as Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (1967/1977) and Novum Testamentum Graece (1983), as well as newer lexicons and dictionaries such as Zorell's Lexicon Hebraicum Veteris Testamenti (1984).

The New World Translation is a formal equivalence translation rather than a paraphrase.[3] To a very great extent, one English word has been selected for each Greek, Hebrew or Aramaic word and effort has been made to adhere to this rendering, context allowing. Some maintain that this makes the translation sound wooden, stiff or verbose, whereas others feel that it favors accuracy, facilitates cross-reference work and helps preserve the flavor of the original texts.[citation needed]

The translation does not contain any of the Apocryphal books, as the translators believed that any claim for canonicity on the part of these writings is without solid foundation. But it does give additional information proceeding Job 42:17 which is in the Greek Septuagint version. This additional information is only available in the reference version of the New World Translation. All the disputed parts of the New Testament are contained such as the long and short conclusion proceeding Mark 16:8 and the woman caught in adultery at John 7:53 - 8:1-11. Most Bibles alert the reader of the spurious nature of these two passages mentioned and the NWT is no different in that regard.

Also, the translation refers to the Old Testament as "Hebrew-Aramaic Scriptures", and the New Testament as "Christian Greek Scriptures", the latter terminology is used in order not to get confused with the Septuagint or Greek Bible. Unlike mainstream Bibles, it goes immediately into Matthew (first book of the New Testament) without any page breaks.

Jehovah in the Old Testament

The most common proper name of God, the Tetragrammaton ("YHWH"), is found in Masoretic versions of the Old Testament 6,828 times. Most English translations of the Old Testament follow the standard convention of rendering the Tetragrammaton as "LORD" in all capitals. [4][5] A few versions render the Tetragrammaton as either "Jehovah" or "Yahweh" only a handful of times.[6] The New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (NWT) differs significantly here from most other English Bibles by consistently rendering the Hebrew Tetragrammaton (divine name) as "Jehovah" in 6,827 instances.[7][8] They chose the translation "Jehovah" because they believe that "Jehovah is the best known English pronunciation of the divine name."[9]

In addition to the 6,827 times the Tetragrammaton is translated "Jehovah", the NWT translators cite 146 more instances where they believe the Tetragrammaton was originally found. They cite the works of C.D. Ginsburg (1831-1914) as authority for 141 instances.[10] The other 5 instances are based on readings in the LXX and footnotes in BHK and BHS.[11] Thus God's personal name appears 6,973 times in the translation of the Hebrew text portion of the NWT. Such use of the name is done out of what they believe to be a deep respect for the "Author of our salvation".[12][13]

Jehovah in the New Testament

The New World Bible Translation Committee built on the theory that the divine name was removed from NT manuscripts after the first century. This view has been controversial. However, Professor George Howard, of the University of Georgia, U.S.A., made this comment: "When the Septuagint which the New Testament church used and quoted contained the Hebrew form of the divine name, the New Testament writers no doubt included the Tetragrammaton in their quotations."[14] With this in mind, they used the divine name 237 times in the New Testament. In 223 of the 237 Jehovah references the Greek word Kyrios is used. In 13 other instances the word is Theos. The Committee cited several reasons as justification for the inclusion:

  • Passages where the NT writers quote Old Testament Scriptures that contain the divine name. There are seventy-eight passages where this occurs.[15]
  • New Testament scriptures that suggest, according to Jehovah's Witnesses, that the name would be there if 1st century manuscripts were discovered, most notably Jesus' words as recorded at John 17:6, "I have made your name manifest to the men you gave me out of the world..."[16]
  • A first century B.C. Septuagint copy of the Book of Deuteronomy contains the Tetragrammaton in paleo-Hebraic script within the Greek text.[17] The Name was indeed known by some Greek speaking Jews of the time, albeit not readable to the average Greek reader.[citation needed]
  • The Watchtower cites 28 Hebrew translations (ranging from 1533 A.D. to present) of the New Testament that contain the Divine name, commonly known as the "J texts". Because the practice of using the tetragrammaton (YHWH) in the New Testament was particularly common in translations of the NT into Hebrew, these texts are cited to show where other translators also believed the tetragrammaton should belong in the New Testament.[18]
  • Four instances in the book of Revelation contain a transliterated Hebrew word: "Hallelujah!" (Literally: "Praise Jah!") (Revelation 19:1, 3, 4, 6). "Hallelujah" does not contain the full tetragrammaton (YHWH), although "Jah" (YH) is the abbreviated form of "Jehovah".[19]

The Watchtower Society's view is that the perpetuation of Jewish superstition[20] to render the proper name as an ambiguous title culminates into the quasi-consistent use of "God" (or "LORD") throughout the Old and New Testaments of other Bible translations. "Quasi-consistent" means that many of these mainstream translations do render the name, in some form, in a handful of Old Testament passages, thus they are not entirely consistent in either usage. Dr. BeDuhn (Truth in Translation pg. 170) wrote of the mainstream practice of making the Old Testament conform to the New in its use of "Lord" and of the NWT practice of making the New Testament conform to the Old in it use of "Jehovah": "Both practices violate accuracy in favor of denominationally preferred expressions for God."

See also: Tetragrammaton in the New Testament.

Other characteristics

  • It translates the word "staurós", rendered as "cross"[21] in almost all other translations of the New Testament, as "torture stake". (Jehovah's Witnesses, and certain scholars, maintain that "staurós" refers to a single piece of timber or pole rather than a cross.)[22].
  • It leaves untranslated the words "sheol", "hades", "gehenna", and "tartarus", where other translations predominantly use "hell" for some, or all, of the above.
  • It uses "presence" as the equivalent of Greek Παρουσία Parousia.
  • It consistently uses "soul" for the Hebrew word ne'phesh and the Greek word ψυχή psykhē.
  • Unlike many Bibles, it does not use subheadings. Only running heads used at the top of the pages are given.
  • Because the word "you" in English can be both singular and plural, the New World Translation uses "YOU" printed in all capital letters for the plural form and "you" in lower case for the singular form. This is done for greater clarity. [23]

Editions and languages

As of 2007 the NWT has been published in 64 languages. Translation into other languages is based on the English text, possible because of the literal nature of the English translation itself, supplemented by comparison with the Hebrew and Greek.[24]

The complete translation the Holy Scriptures is available in Afrikaans, Albanian, Arabic, Cebuano, Chinese (standard, simplified, Pin Yin), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English (also Braille), Finnish, French, Georgian, German, Greek, Hungarian, Iloko, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Macedonian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (also Braille), Romanian, Serbian (Cyrillic and Latin scripts), Sesotho, Shona, Slovakian, Spanish (also Braille), Swahili, Swedish, Tagalog, Tsonga, Tswana, Xhosa, Yoruba, and Zulu.

The Christian Greek Scriptures (commonly known as the New Testament) is available in American Sign Language, Armenian, Bulgarian, Chichewa, Cibemba, Efik, Igbo, Italian Braille, Lingala, Malagasy, Maltese, Russian, Sepedi, Sinhala, Slovenian, Sranantongo, Turkish, Twi, and Ukrainian.

Criticism

See also: Controversies regarding Jehovah's Witnesses § Bible translation

The New World Translation is claimed by Jehovah's Witnesses to be the most accurate translation of the original manuscripts to date in Japanese [25].[citation needed] However, some scholars have accused the translation of containing significant theological bias[26]. A recent book by Jason BeDuhn[27] states: “While it is difficult to quantify this sort of analysis, it can be said the NW[T] emerges as the most accurate of the translations compared.” [28]

Although the members of the committee that translated the NWT wished to remain anonymous, Raymond Franz, a disfellowshipped former member of the Governing Body[29], has stated that the translation committee consisted of 5 members:[30]

William Cetnar, a former Witness who resigned from the international headquarters in 1958 and was disfellowshipped from the religion for apostasy in 1962[31], also included Milton Henschel as a member of the translation committee.[32]

It has been argued that the NWT translators were insufficiently qualified to translate the Bible, with only Franz having formal education in Biblical languages. It has also been argued that the size of the translation committee was very small compared to the number of translators involved in producing most other English translations.[33] These criticisms are disputed by Witnesses, who state that the translation should be examined on its own merits, not on the speculated credentials of its translators.[34]

References

  1. ^ http://www.pronetisp.net/~diana/wcm.html list of KJV words and their modern meanings or counterparts.
  2. ^ Foreword, New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures, 1984.
  3. ^ Introduction to the NWT Reference Edition page 7.
  4. ^ J. M. Powis Smith's and Edgar J. Goodspeed's translation of the Bible in 1935, explained in a preface: “In this translation we have followed the orthodox Jewish tradition and substituted ‘the Lord’ for the name ‘Yahweh’ and the phrase ‘the Lord God’ for the phrase ‘the Lord Yahweh.’ In all cases where ‘Lord’ or ‘God’ represents an original ‘Yahweh’ small capitals are employed.”
  5. ^ The preface to the Revised Standard Version: “For two reasons the Committee has returned to the more familiar usage of the King James Version [omitting the name of God]: (1) the word ‘Jehovah’ does not accurately represent any form of the Name ever used in Hebrew; and (2) the use of any proper name for the one and only God, as though there were other gods from whom he had to be distinguished, was discontinued in Judaism before the Christian era and is entirely inappropriate for the universal faith of the Christian Church.”
  6. ^ Such as the King James (At Exodus 6:3, Psalm 83:18, Isaiah 12:2, and Isaiah 26:4.), The Living Bible, and the Holman Christian Standard Bible
  7. ^ In similar manner to Young's Literal Translation, Rotherham's Emphasized Bible, Darby, Jay Green's Modern KJV, the American Standard Version and the Catholic Jerusalem Bible.
  8. ^ New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures with References (1984) Appendix 1A, p. 1561, par. 8.
  9. ^ Insight on the Scriptures Vol 2 p. 5
  10. ^ New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures with References (1984) Appendix 1B, p. 1562.
  11. ^ New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures with References (1984) Appendix 1A, p. 1561, par. 9, 10.
  12. ^ The Watchtower, January 1, 2004 pg 9 para 3
  13. ^ http://watchtower.org/e/bible/re/chapter_019.htm?bk=Re;chp=19;vs=1;citation#bk1
  14. ^ (Biblical Archaeology Review, March 1978, page 14)
  15. ^ BeDuhn, Truth in Translation, pg. 174: "There are actually seventy-eight passages where a New Testament author rather directly quotes an Old Testament passage in which YHWH appears in the original Hebrew."
  16. ^ New World Translation w/ References, Appendix 1D pg. 1564
  17. ^ LXXP (Septuagint) Fouad Inv. 266 renders the divine name by the Tetragrammaton written in square Hebrew characters 49 times in identified places in Deuteronomy. In addition, in this collection the Tetragrammaton occurs three times in unidentified fragments, namely, in fragments 116, 117 and 123. This papyrus, found in Egypt, was dated to the first century B.C.E.
  18. ^ In the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures — With References, 1984, p. 1565, the translators state: "To avoid overstepping the bounds of a translator into the field of exegesis, we have been most cautious about rendering the divine name in the Christian Greek Scriptures, always carefully considering the Hebrew Scriptures [i.e. the Old Testament] as a background. We have looked for agreement from the Hebrew versions to confirm our rendering." (Italics added.)
  19. ^ Smith's Bible Dictionary for "Jah": "“Jah” means Jehovah - Jah: the abbreviated form of Jehovah, used only in poetry."
  20. ^ Watchtower reference online
  21. ^ The standard lexicographical work of the Greek language, while giving "cross" as one meaning of this word, indicates that its basic meaning is an "upright pale or stake" or a "pile" driven in to serve as a foundation (see Liddell and Scott: σταυρός
  22. ^ John Denham Parsons - The Non-Christian Cross. Vine's Expository Dictionary of New Testament Words says, "STAUROS denotes, primarily, an upright pole or stake...Both the noun and the verb stauroo, to fasten to a stake or pole, are originally to be distinguished from the ecclesiastical form of a two-beamed cross. The shape of the latter had its origin in ancient Chaldea (Babylon), and was used as the symbol of the god Tammuz (being in the shape of the mystic Tau, the initial of his name)...By the middle of the 3rd century A.D. the churches had either departed from, certain doctrines of the Christian faith. In order to increase the pretige of the apostate ecclesiastical system pagans were received into the churches apart from regeneration by faith, and were permitted largely to retain their pagan signs and symbols. Hence the Tau or T, in its most frequent form, with the cross piece lowered, was adopted..."
  23. ^ New World Translation p. 1547
  24. ^ Jehovah’s Witnesses—Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom (1993) Chap. 27 p.611 subheading Translation Into Other Languages.
  25. ^ 1987 Yearbook of Jehovah's Witnesses, page 10
  26. ^ See Ankerberg, John and John Weldon, 2003, The New World Translation of the Jehovah's Witnesses, accessible from this site, which quotes a number of scholars regarding alleged theological bias of the New World Translation.
  27. ^ BeDuhn, Jason D. Truth in Translation: Accuracy and Bias in English Translations of the New Testament, 2004
  28. ^ Truth in Translation: Accuracy and Bias in English Translations of the New Testament, p.163
  29. ^ http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,922767-2,00.html
  30. ^ http://www.forananswer.org/Top_JW/FranzNWT.htm
  31. ^ "The Four Presidents of the Watch Tower Society (Jehovah's Witnesses)" by Edmond C. Gruss
  32. ^ http://www.focusonthefaulty.com/Pages/jehovahs.html
  33. ^ See this page
  34. ^ Reasoning from the Scriptures, Brooklyn, 1989, p. 277

Related Sources

Supportive

  • Stafford, Greg: Jehovah's Witnesses Defended. [ISBN 0-9659814-7-9]
  • Furuli, Rolf: The Role of Theology and Bias in Bible Translation: With a special look at the New World Translation of Jehovah's Witnesses, 1999. [ISBN 0-9659814-9-5]
  • Byatt, Anthony and Flemings, Hal (editors): ‘Your Word is Truth’, Essays in Celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (1950, 1953), 2004. [ISBN 0-9506212-6-9]
  • In Defense of The New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures
  • The Coptic Evidence

Neutral

Critical

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