Thursday, December 21

Lost in Translation

My pastor, James MacDonald, has released a book collecting different teaching times he has done through the book of Proverbs.

James once wrote regarding the ESV . . . well, never mind. Here's the quote from www.esv.org.

But the new book has the Holman Christian Standard Bible. I know his other books published by Lifeway (Gripped By The Greatness & Downpour) used the ESV. While I've been at Harvest, we've used the NKJV, the NASU95, and the ESV. Also, ESV translation committee member and managing editor David Jones serves as James' research assistant.

Anyone who has heard James speak on this topic knows that he's *not* a bible translation guy. (Insert "King James Only" joke here.) Thankfully, he avoids the carelessness of "I use whatever translation fits what I'm trying to tell you."

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I figure a pastor should read the original languages and not be obstructed by translations. How else can they critique them. I'm curious, what exactly does the research assistant do for a pastor like james?

Matthew Westerholm said...

Brett -

James knows his originals, although, like almost all, his Greek is stronger than his Hebrew.

David only works one day a week for James, and spends the rest of his time as Academic Dean for the Harvest School of Ministry, training church planters for H. B. Fellowship.

http://www.harvestbiblefellowship.us/Content.aspx?content_id=21619&site_id=10058