Southern Baptists, Bible Translations, and the Condemnation of the NIV

A majority of the men at the Southern Baptist Convention today condemned the New International Version on the basis that it is not a faithful translation of the word of God.

At issue is whether men must translate with something like “goodwill to men” rather than “goodwill to people,” or whether men must translate that God wants all men to be saved rather than all people, or whether we must always refer to the Israelites as the “sons of Israel” instead of “children of Israel.”

In formal Greek linguistic categories, the nouns and pronouns in question are in the masculine, but nonetheless convey the inclusion of women. The NIV does not always render these nouns and pronouns with their corresponding masculine forms, but rather with English words which convey the same meaning as the Greek.

Because of NIV’s tendency to render the meaning of the Greek rather than slavishly reproducing formal masculine linguistic categories, certain influential men brought their case against the NIV before the Southern Baptist brethren. The resolution narrowly passed by the votes of a few men.

Ironically, the version most closely associated with Southern Baptist is the HCSB which translates many of these same passages similarly as NIV.

The fault lies with a handful of men, sometimes scholarly ones, who innocently say, “I prefer a more literal version such as the ESV.” Well intentioned laymen and pastors combine this innocent statement with their rightly placed belief in inerrancy, and conclude, mistakenly, that literal versions are theologically preferable, while anything less is liberal.

Let those men who study these issues be more cautious about how they promote certain Bible versions. There’s no such thing as the one best version. There is, however, such a thing as the best version for a particular need:

• literal versions are to be preferred for exact and detailed study involving vocabulary and syntax (ESV ASV NASU)

• dynamic equivalent versions are to be preferred for lengthy or protracted or speed reading, such as reading-the-Bible-in-a-year programs, or for evangelizing men (NLT TEV)

• middle-of-the-road translations for Bible memorization or for public reading (NIV NRSV)

We men who teach the Bible need to stop saying that “literal translations are best for those men who believe in inerrancy.”

Scholarly men need to stop providing fodder for the demagoguery of translation theory, because what they say will produce misguided resolutions such as what was passed at the Southern Baptist Convention today. This is so unfortunate because misguided resolutions trivialize other resolutions that good men might pass at the convention. For example, the men of the Southern Baptist Convention rightly reaffirmed their belief in hell, but they did so while condemning the NIV. How can men take one resolution seriously when the other is so unfounded?

Another unintended consequence of this misguided resolution is to reinforce the KJV-only laymen and churches in their suspicion against “untrustworthy” versions. The resolution sets back churches at least a year or two in the effort to get into the hands of our churchmen a more accurate translation than the 400 year old linguistically outdated KJV.

Just for clarification, all of my aforementioned references to “men” are meant to imply women as well and are included to illustrate that men don’t talk the way that the authors of the resolution expect men to translate.

Gender Neutrality and Bible Translation

First, let it be clear that I think it is silly for us to have to change language in order to appease the squeaky wheel.

I think that if someone says, "If any man would follow me, let him take up his cross and follow me," everyone knows that he is talking generically. There is no need to say, "If any person would follow me, let him OR HER take up his OR HER cross and follow me."

However, let me point out that those who claim that gender-neutral translations are inaccurate do so on weak grounds. The complaint is that gender-neutral translations change the wording of the Bible. This simply isn't true.

Here is the crucial question: if the Greek uses a masculine pronoun, does it always mean male only, or can it include both genders? The answer to this is, of course, that it can include both genders.

This being the case, then the question arises, Which pronoun in English is best to use in order to convey the inclusion of both genders?

My answer, as indicated in the first couple of paragraphs above, is that the masculine gender is perfectly capable of conveying the inclusion of both genders. However, if an English translation does indeed use some means of conveying the inclusion of both genders, it does not follow that the genderless translation is inaccurate.

If the genderless translation reads, "If any person would follow me, let him OR HER take up his OR HER cross and follow me," it may be cumbersome and pedantic, but it is nonetheless accurate. The same is true for, "If anyone would follow me, let them take up their cross and follow me."

If we want to criticise NLT, NRSV, TNIV, etc., for something, let us criticise them for being so committed to appealing to the spirit of the day as to produce awkward translations. But we cannot criticise them for producing inaccurate translations.

And let us not forget that even the ESV, which in its sales propaganda criticises these other versions for their gender neutrality, consistently translates the Hebrew phrase for "the sons of Israel" as "the children of Israel"--which boggles my mind given the ESV translation philosophy.