Easy Translations - Glenn Conjurske
Easy Translations
by Glenn Conjurske
One of the strong arguments of the advocates of the modern Bible versions is that the old version is too difficult to understand. It is taken for granted by them that the great need of the hour is an easier translation—-or rather, an easy translation. The result of this is that we have a vast array of new translations, in “basic English,” “today’s English,” “modern English,” “common English,” “contemporary English,” “up-to-date English,” “the language of modern America,” “the language of the newspaper,” etc., etc.
Now the reader will observe that in most of this terminology the primary suggestion is the elimination of the archaic English. If that were all that were meant by it, I would still find it objectionable, but judging from the nature of the new translations, that is certainly not all that is meant. The modern translations go much beyond the removal of archaic language, and actually alter the nature of Scripture itself, and the easier the translation desired, the more the nature of Scripture must be altered to attain it.
But evidently the makers of the new Bibles have never thought of this. They are bent on making an easy translation, and it is taken for granted that this is the proper thing to do. Everything else must give way before this. Their course, however, is as directly against the nature of Scripture, as it is against the ways of God. But the modern church knows almost nothing of the ways of God. Its course is dictated by the spirit of the age, an age in which everything must be made easy, an age which has done all that science, technology, and wisdom can do to reverse and annul the old proverb which says, “Gold lies deep in the mountain, dirt on the highway.” This age has determined to strew the gold on the highway, to give everything to every man on a silver platter, to eliminate as far as possible any necessity either to work or to think. The whole age is “consumer oriented.” Every product on the market must be “user friendly”—-and I apologize for lowering the dignity of this magazine with such terminology. Children must have “math made easy”—-”as easy as watching television.” Everything must be done for us, at the touch of a button—-or done automatically, without so much as a thought on our part.
And as it is in the world, so it is in the church. We must have a translation that every careless, lukewarm sinner may understand at first reading, without diligence, effort, or study. Every hurdle must be removed out of the way. A correspondent grants that people can overcome the difficulties in the old translation, but adds, “They should not have to.”
I am of another mind, and it is my firm persuasion that God is of another mind. The nature of Scripture itself presents great and numerous difficulties which must be overcome if we are to understand the book. The ways of God, in both the natural and spiritual realms, have placed the gold deep in the mountain, to be dug out by labor and diligence. “Easy come, easy go,” says another old proverb, and this is a simple fact of human experience. Whatever is easily attained is lightly esteemed and loosely held. God knows this, and God makes nothing easy. To do so would be in fact to destroy all the strength and vitality of his people. This is evident throughout the church of God today. An easy gospel and an easy Christian life, which demand nothing of self-denial, nothing of taking up the cross, nothing of reproach or persecution, have destroyed the very life of the church. And easy translations are but one more plank in the same platform.
And here as elsewhere, “The children of this world are wiser in their own kind than the children of light.” (Luke 16:8). Paul says, “Every man that striveth for the mastery is temperate in all things.” They deny themselves and labor to the utmost of their strength, to win a game or a gold medal. “Now they do it to obtain a corruptible crown, but we an incorruptible.” (I Cor. 9:25). But the modern church is wiser than Paul, and thinks to obtain all without either labor or self-denial. This is the spirit of the age, and it is against the ways of God.
The Bible says, “The soul of the sluggard desireth, and hath nothing: but the soul of the diligent shall be made fat.” (Prov. 13:4). God himself has ordained it so, and this is in precise accordance with his wisdom and his will. He would not have it otherwise. It is not his will to put the things of God within reach of the sluggard, who will not labor for them, and who does not so much as desire them. These are reserved for the diligent.
If any man ever needed an easy translation, that man was Gipsy Smith, who never went to school for a day in his life, who could not read at all when he was converted, and who could scarcely do so when he began to preach. He says, “My first books were the Bible, an English Dictionary, and Professor Eadie’s Biblical Dictionary. That last volume was given to me by a lady. I expect my father had told her that I desired to preach. These three mighty volumes—-for they were mighty to me—-I used to carry about under my arm. My sisters and brothers laughed at me, but I did not mind. ‘I am going to read them some day,’ I said, ‘and to preach, too.’ I lost no opportunity of self-improvement and was always asking questions. I still believe in continually asking questions. If I came across anything I did not understand, I asked what it meant—-I did not mind. If I heard a new word I used to flee to my dictionary. I always kept it beside me when I read or tried to read.”
Of a later time, when he had begun to preach, he writes, “When I was called upon to conduct a service alone I had to face a very serious difficulty—-how to deal with the lessons. I had spent as much time as I could find in learning to read, but my leisure and my opportunities were very severely limited, and I was still far from perfection in this art.
I certainly could not read a chapter from Scripture right through. What was I to do with the big words? First of all, I thought I would ask a good brother to read the lessons for me. ‘No,’ I said, ‘that would never do. I think that the people would prefer me to read them myself.’ Then I thought I should get over the difficulty by spelling out to them any word that was too difficult for me. But I felt this would be like an open surrender. The plan I adopted was this—-I went on reading slowly and carefully until I saw a long word coming into sight. Then I stopped and made some comments, after the comments I began to read again, but took care to begin on the other side of the long word. I used to struggle night after night in my lodgings over the hard words and names in the Bible.”
Here was a man who thirsted, and who was therefore diligent, and the soul of the diligent was made fat, with no easy translation to help him. If the same thirst and the same diligence existed in the church today, I believe the clamor for easy translations would cease tomorrow. Moreover, I believe that that thirst and that diligence would actually answer the end desired, while an easy translation will not answer it at all.
God says, “If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.” (John 7:37). God says, “And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” (Rev. 22:17). That thirst is the necessary condition, but the modern church has determined to make it easy for all to drink, though they have no thirst at all.
God says, “If any man is willing to do his will, he shall know of the doctrine” (John 7:17), but the modern church has determined that it must be easy for all to know, whether they have any desire to do the will of God or not.
God says, “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him; neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (I Cor. 2:14), but the modern church has determined to make it easy for “the man in the street”—-”the average American”—-that is, “the natural man,” to understand the things of God.
Before we yield to the popular clamor for an easy Bible version, we ought to pause long enough to ask why “the average person” cannot understand the old one. The plain fact is, he has no interest in it. He has none of that thirst which must be the foundation of our coming to Christ, and of every step we take in the path of faith. He has no will to do the will of God, and so no will to understand his word. Till his heart is changed he cannot understand it. A few years ago I was out knocking on doors, and had some conversation with an ungodly young woman. She agreed, at my prodding, to begin to read the Bible. I told her to begin with the New Testament. In two weeks I went to see her again, and asked her if she had read the Bible. She told me, “I started to. I read about a dozen verses, and all it said was ‘begat, begat, begat,’ so I threw the Bible across the room, and never looked at it again.” Such a woman would doubtless be held up by the modern church as an example of one who tried to understand the Bible, and could not. Yet the plain fact is, she never tried at all. She had no interest in the word of God. She did not stumble over the translation, but over the substance. The easiest translation would not have helped her an iota. Yet I am pretty sure that if she had had some smutty romance in her hands, containing impure portions which were purposely written in veiled or cryptic language, she would have read and reread and studied those very portions, in order to understand them and feast her impure soul upon them. Men will understand what they wish to.
But we must look at the nature of Scripture itself, and in so doing we will find it to be an exact reflection of the ways of God in general. The plain fact is, God never wrote an easy-to-understand Bible. He plainly affirms that “the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, …neither can he know them.” It ought to go without saying, then, that “the average American” and “the man in the street” cannot understand the Bible as God gave it. It is none of our business to make a Bible which they can understand.
The Lord himself had no such concern. He operated upon just the opposite plan. He purposely concealed the truth from the lukewarm and careless multitudes. His disciples did not understand this. “And his disciples came, and said unto him, Why speakest thou unto them in parables? He answered and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, BUT TO THEM IT IS NOT GIVEN. For whosoever hath, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance; but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away even that he hath. THEREFORE speak I unto them in parables, because they seeing see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. … For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed, lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.” (Matt. 13:10-15).
The Lord here takes just the opposite ground from that taken by the modern church. If we have a generation whose heart is waxed gross, and their ears dull of hearing, the modern church says, “Give them an easier translation.” The Lord said, “Speak to them in parables, so that they cannot understand.” “All these things spake Jesus unto the multitude in parables; and without a parable spake he not unto them.” (Matt. 13:34). And observe, it was not merely the higher truths of revelation which he thus concealed from them, but the very gospel.
The modern church has turned “the great and terrible God” into a bleeding-heart liberal, softer than Santa Claus, who freely lavishes all things upon the evil and undeserving, without stint or condition. He lavishes his salvation upon the impenitent, and his truth upon the careless, who neither thirst, nor fear God, nor will to do his will. It is this liberal and man-centered thinking which has produced the clamor for easy translations of the Bible. The Lord’s thoughts run a contrary way. He says, “Unto you”—-who thirst for the things of God, who have taken up the cross and forsaken all to follow me—-”Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God, but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables, that seeing they may see, AND NOT PERCEIVE, and hearing they may hear, AND NOT UNDERSTAND, lest at any time they should be converted, and their sins be forgiven them.” (Mark 4:11-12). And once more, “Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to others in parables; that SEEING THEY MIGHT NOT SEE, and HEARING THEY MIGHT NOT UNDERSTAND.” (Luke 8:10). These are awfully solemn words, but they clearly set forth the ways of God. Those ways are unknown to the present soft and man-centered age, and they have apparently never once entered the minds of the makers of the easy Bible versions. These solemn words teach us that God is not mocked—-that man may not sow to the flesh and reap of the Spirit—-that he may not live in careless lukewarmness, and yet understand the word of God. God himself has secured, by the very nature of his own word and doctrine, that the careless and lukewarm shall not understand it.
But further, God never wrote a Bible which was easy for his own saints to understand. Peter tells us plainly, concerning Paul’s epistles and the other Scriptures, “As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures, unto their own destruction.” (II Pet. 3:16). Surely God could have inspired a book which was not hard to be understood, but he chose not to do so. He surely knew that men would wrest those hard-to-be-understood things to their own destruction, but that did not move him to alter the nature of the book. It remains “hard to be understood”—-things in all of Paul’s epistles, and also the other Scriptures.
Those who are determined to make an easy translation of all this, “in common speech,” such as “the common man” can easily understand, demonstrate only how far their thoughts are from the thoughts of God. The only way they can make an easy translation is to alter the nature of the book. And that most of the modern translations have freely done. The easier the translation, the less there is of translation in it, and the more of explanation, or paraphrase. Many of the modern translations consist largely of rewriting the Bible instead of translating it.
Now consider. The truths which I have set forth above, concerning the ways of God and the nature of Scripture are crystal clear in the King James Version, as indeed they are in the modern versions also. How is it that the modern church is so entirely ignorant of them? How is it that pastors of churches, Bible school professors, missionaries and all are generally ignorant of these simple principles, which are so clear in the word of God? One thing we may say for certain is that the difficulty of the translation has nothing to do with the matter. The reasons lie in the lukewarmness, apathy, shallowness, worldliness, lack of diligence, lack of meditation, and lack of prayer in the modern church. “An ill workman quarrels with his tools,” when he ought to blame himself. In better hands the tools which he blames would prove perfectly adequate. And do we not have an ocular demonstration before our very eyes that an easy translation is not the need of the church? We have easy translations on the market, enough to fill a bushel basket. What good have they done in the church of God? The plain fact is, as a general rule, those who are addicted to the new versions know less of the ways of God, and are every way farther from the spirit of Christianity, than those who adhere to the old one. The liberals, the Neo-evangelicals, the unspiritual intellectuals—-all these will almost invariably be found toting some new and easy version, but it has not helped their knowledge of the ways of God or their spiritual condition a whit.
The advocates of a Bible in common English of course contend that the New Testament was originally written in the common language of the day—-what is called the koinh Greek, which means the common Greek. We deny the truth of this. The New Testament was written in a language of its own, a combination of the common Greek of the day with the language of the Septuagint. But I have fully treated that subject before, and will not repeat myself here.
Another of the strong arguments of the advocates of easy translations is that children cannot understand the old version. This argument is plausible, but false. The plain fact is, children cannot understand “See Dick run” unless they are taught to, and they can be taught to understand the old version just as easily as they can be taught to understand a new one. I recall an incident which took place twenty years ago, when my oldest daughter was six or seven years old. We went to the house of a couple of young women for supper. They were sisters, daughters of missionaries in Japan. They were Reformed Baptists, and it was their custom after supper to read the Bible at the supper table. They “read around,” each taking a verse in turn. We joined with them, and my daughter Timia read her verses as did the rest of us. One of the verses which fell to her lot contained the word “righteousness.” While she was reading the verse, one of our hosts was poised and ready to help her over the word “righteousness,” but Timia read it as though it had been “Run, Dick, run.” Our host was amazed, and commented on it afterwards. But the plain fact is, a child may be taught to read the word “righteousness,” and to understand it too, with the same ease that they may be taught any other word. Watts and Wesley each wrote hymns for children. In comparing them someone has said that Watts’s hymns will leave children children, while Wesley’s will make them men. We do not want a Bible which will leave children children, but one which will make them men. Much less do we want a Bible which will make children of men.
And observe, if we give the child an “easy” translation, it will yet contain the word “righteousness.” If it does not, the book ought by all means to be thrown in the waste basket. Nay more, it is a plain fact that the modern translations, so often recommended for the sake of the children, actually contain numerous hard expressions of which the old version is entirely innocent. This is the fruit of the unspiritual intellectualism which has played so largely in their production. To take one example only, in Romans 1:20 the old version’s “the invisible things of him” is turned into “his invisible attributes” in the NASV and the NKJV, while the NIV and the Berkeley version convert it to “God’s invisible qualities.” Such examples might be multiplied. We fear that the argument in favor of the new versions for the sake of the children is mostly ignorance and empty rhetoric.
Nevertheless, we grant that there is some difficulty with the archaic words and ancient grammatical forms. It is a small difficulty, however, and such as may be easily overcome by the thirsty and the diligent.
But this brings us to another of the grave misunderstandings which lie beneath the clamor for easy translations of the Bible. The cry is for a Bible which every man, and every child, may understand independently, without the aid of anyone to teach him. It is thought to replace the evangelist and the teacher with the Bible, a thing which God certainly never intended. The evangelist and the teacher are as much the gifts of God as the Bible is, and they are not useless or unnecessary gifts. Yet if it had been God’s intention that every lost sinner should read and understand the Bible for himself, what were the use of the evangelist? If it had been God’s intention that every saint should read and understand the Bible independently of any human teacher, why did he give teachers to the church? The gifts of God are not mistakes, nor useless appendages either. They are necessary for the prosperity of his work, and the very existence of evangelists, pastors, and teachers is proof enough that God never intended that the Bible should be understood by everybody without them.
But I must delve a little deeper here. The principle that every man is able to understand the Bible independently is one of the most detrimental of all those involved in this question. It is the fruit of the unholy principles of democracy, and their accompanying pride, which have taken possession of the world in these latter days. But in spite of all the prevailing notions of democracy and independence, the fact remains that as a general rule it is not possible to fully and rightly understand the Bible in independence of the gifts which God has set in his church. God himself has filled his book with things hard to be understood—-things which are to be understood only by deep spiritual experience, by long meditation, and by habitual walking with God. Those who have that experience and that understanding he sets in the church as pastors and teachers, to lead the others in the right way. But when democratic principles and democratic pride prevail, and every man thinks himself competent to understand the Bible independently, the result is ten thousand opinions and ten thousand sects, all of them wandering in the mazes of error, while all of them are filled with the conceit that they have the truth.
I do not contend that no man can ever understand the Bible without the aid of a human teacher. In some rare cases this doubtless actually occurs, especially in cases of uncommon thirst and diligence. But then it is a certainty that the independent acquisition of the truth will be a very long and arduous process, the work of decades and not months, the issue of long walking with God and being scourged by his hand, and certainly not something to be brought about by the reading of an easy translation.
But I must address one final question. Granting that the Bible itself, as given of God, is not easy to understand, it will be said that the translation ought not to be more difficult than the original. The King James Version, it will be said, because of its archaic language, is actually more difficult than the original. I grant the force of this objection. I am not against a revision of the old version. I could endorse a conservative and competent revision. I am only against a liberal and incompetent revision, and I am fully persuaded that the present generation can produce no other kind. Neither is the ease or difficulty of the translation the most important thing to be considered in its revision. There are numerous things more important than this, but I have dealt largely with those elsewhere. Moreover, I believe that the difficulty of the old version is very much exaggerated by the present liberal generation, as it is the way of liberals always to magnify difficulties. It may be that the old version will actually become unintelligible in time, but that time is a long way off.
The quarrel which the present generation has with the old version is a simple matter of an ill workman quarrelling with his tools. So far as vocabulary and grammar are concerned—-I do not speak of its spiritual substance—-I believe that the most shallow and ignorant among us can understand most of the old version, though I grant that there are some archaic forms which will require the use of a dictionary—-a thing which we suppose must be avoided at all cost by a generation which must have gold strewn on the highway. But even here it is a fact that most of the archaic forms in the old version are self-explanatory in their context, and if not in one context, then in another, so that what is actually unintelligible in the old version will boil down to almost nothing, if the book is seriously studied. If a man has no helps or teachers at all, and must therefore spend his whole earthly life in ignorance of those few and insignificant things which are actually lost to him because of the unintelligibility of the old version, he will be very little inconvenienced by it. His spirituality and usefulness will not suffer if he cannot tell what ouches and taches are, or if he cannot tell the exact meaning of “Woe worth the day.”
When the clamor for a new version began to be heard, about a century and a half ago, it was seriously suggested that the result of a revision would be a revival. An article in The Edinburgh Review in 1855 says, “With all our anxiety to witness the issue of a corrected translation of the Sacred Scriptures, which, we believe, would most powerfully serve to direct attention to them, and produce among us the most wholesome kind of religious revival; we should deeply regret to find it attempted without authority,” &c. And again, “By the help of Divine Providence to the labours of so competent a body, we might reasonably hope to find ourselves eventually in possession of such a version of the Bible as should correctly represent the sense of its inspired authors; and we do most seriously believe, that the piety of the people would increase, and their unchristian differences diminish, as the sense of the authorities to which they all appeal was set more fully and distinctly and accurately before them.” But frankly, in the light of subsequent events, the serious belief of this editor appears to be nothing short of ridiculous. This was no more than another case of an ill workman quarrelling with his tools—-as though he did not already have in his hands a Bible which correctly represented the sense of its inspired authors, and as though the old version was the thing which stood in the way of the coveted revival. At any rate, since that day we have had almost innumerable revisions of the Bible, all of them professedly more accurate and more intelligible than the old one, and no revival has followed. As an almost invariable rule, such revivals as have existed in the church have been brought into being by the use of the old version.
A dozen years earlier another advocate of revision had written, “But we contend for the translation of these terms [‘baptize’ and ‘baptism’], in order that the people of God may be united in one holy brotherhood” —-that is to say, that the whole body of English Christians might be Baptists, and so the unity of the church be secured. So it is the old version which stands in the way of the unity of the church! The author fails to tell us, however, whether this unified body would be Strict Baptists, General Baptists, Free-Will Baptists, Six-Principle Baptists, Seventh-Day Baptists, Anti-Missions Baptists, Campbellites, or something else. All these hold immersion, but where is their unity? The plain fact is, anybody who expects any substantial gain, whether of unity, or revival, or sound doctrine, by means of a revision of the Scriptures, is greatly deceived. The problems in the church are not due to the current translation of the Bible, and will not be solved, or any way affected, by revising it.
Today we have a whole bushel of new versions—-all easier, more accurate, and more intelligible than the old one, if we are to believe their makers—-and yet the church is farther than ever from revival, farther from sound doctrine, and farther from the spirit of Christianity. Verily, those who expect to work wonders—-and those who expect any substantial gain at all—-by securing an easier version of the Bible, are barking up the wrong tree, while those who seek an easy version of the Bible actually stand against the ways of God and the nature of Scripture itself.
Glenn Conjurske