I’ve had a Thompson’s Chain Reference and a 1611 KJV and a few others but at present for hard copy I use a Scofield KJV. For more comparative studies and commentaries, translations, chain referencing etc I use E-Sword, a pretty much free on-line app. I wrote “pretty much” because although Rick Meyers, the developer of the app, wanted everything to be free but unfortunately a couple translations such as the NIV demand $ to download the version. Whilst I used to have and lug around a very extensive library, I found that E-Sword is the most complete study system I have ever seen. After a bit of a testing period with the app, I gave nearly all of my hard copy to the Holmes Bible College library in Greenville, S.C.
You do not have to own a Bible if you have access to one. Surely, there are a couple of versions that are readily available to you at the home. Which translations do they have for the residents?
I have a KJV that belonged to my daughter, along with her Better Homes and Garden Junior Cookbook. Never look at them, just keep for sentimental reasons
I have several different versions. I got my mom's old Catholic bible when she decided she no longer believed in God. It's easier to read but it's huge. I prefer the New Living Translation because it's easier for me to understand. I want to understand what I'm reading because it's important to me if I want to build my relationship with God.
Honestly is not used on a regular basis either. But is in the living room, for a quick "check and see" if those who spout what they think they know is true. and your Welcome Mr. Bill
I just now received The Evidence Study Bible, which is an NKJV version with commentary by Ray Comfort. I am not sure why I bought it because it's not like I have been riveted by Ray Comfort. I haven't seen him in a few years but he used to have a show where he would approach people on the street with the evidence of the Bible, and the show seemed a bit contrived. Everyone he approached was either persuaded by his testimony or left at a loss for words, and they clearly had edited out the large number of people who told him where he could go with it. True, every television show is going to be edited but his show gave the appearance that it was far easier than it would actually be to persuade someone on the street about the truth of the Bible, and that put me off some. Nevertheless, I bought the book, still wrapped in plastic so I haven't gone through it yet, as it literally just arrived moments ago.
Oh, I have several other bibles too. When I answered in post 6, I thought the OP meant what bible do we use on a daily or weekly basis.. So I mentioned those two. I occasionally use The Message, and also the Life Application Study Bible, called the New Living Translation, also I use my wife's NIV study bible at times. In fact, because I used to get so many Jehovah Witnesses coming by my house, I even bought one of their New World Translation bibles so I could better prepare myself to discuss our differences. I tried to be nice with them, but they wouldn't tell me who the editors were, who the publisher was or any details about those things, because they were "not released". I, on the other hand showed them the editor, the chairman of the editorial committee, and all the other eight men and their qualifications for assembling the Scofield Bible. But when they come, we always get into a heated battle over John1:1. My bible says the Word is God. Their bible says the Word is a god. (a very wrong mistranslation) So soon after that, and me disagreeing with other things, they usually leave very frustrated. I
I have several bibles in my collection, including this one: https://www.academia.edu/8669497/Go...or_a_Septuagint_based_GothicVersion_of_Exodus (Translation to Gothic in the 4th century.) My studies and teaching of medieval German involved bible translations. Also, you might be interested in this: https://archive.org/details/Prof.BartEhrman-MisquotingJesus
Sorry, I used to like Bart Ehrman, until he became an atheist. Now I dismiss anything he writes. He said not too long ago: “Christians are dead wrong; I know because I used to be one before I became enlightened.”
Well, now, I see there is much more going on when it comes to"BibleStudy" than merely reading the scriptures. Just reading the extracurricular comments and references to what is said in the scriptures makes one realize there is a whole new demention at play in the study of transtation of the Latin and the Greek as related to the meaning of the scriptures. If I were not so old I think I would thourghly enjoy a through Bible Study in which case I would also need four or five bibles as well as some good study helps. Thank you all.
We have to consider that the Bible was passed on by copying handwritten texts until the printing press came along, two and half millennia. The Gothic bible I mentioned above was translated from a Greek version that is different from what we have.
So what are you saying? Is one Greek translation better or more reliable than the other? Which one would be correct and how do we know this? It seems to me we may be stuck with what we have. Who among us know the translation from the Latin to the Greek was the best translation or which translation from the Greek as you suggest, might be the better. I think I can say as long as I have been going to church, and I started at a young age, preachers have been blaming translations for what they couldn't otherwise explain, usually with phrases like, phrases from the original Greek say so and so. Is there serious contradictions or does some think they have a better eduction than others that in this day of our Lord they can say the bible is incorrect because the Greek translation here in a certain scripture is incorrect because in the original Greek it was translated otherwise. I mean scholors before us have done the best they could with translations considering what they must have had to work with. I suggest we are stepping out on an unreliable limb to question anything as far back as the original translations from the original Latin to the Greek and/or a translation from the original Greek to what we have today. Makes me want to say, Come a day, come a day, help me somebody. How do it know?
Some translations or added verses were agenda-driven, such as the JW's New World Edition, and there was a passage that may have been added a long time back, that made it into several translations, that was intended to bolster the concept of the Trinity (which, I think, can be supported without that text), and the publishers of the NIV came up with a politically correct version known as Today's NIV that soured me on even using the original NIV, which I had previously liked. However, most of the differences between the various translations are simply linguistic, consisting of little more than a different way of saying the same thing. Meanings can change when a word or a phrase can be interpreted in more than one way. I don't do a whole lot of in-depth Bible study anymore but when I did, I would use multiple translations, which led to my collection of translations and versions. Beginning with the concept that the Bible was intended to be consistent and uncontradictory, one passage of Scripture shouldn't directly contradict another, and if it seems to do so, there should be a reason for it, such as differing points of view between human authors, varying target audiences, the time difference between the writing of the two passages, or perhaps someone got something wrong, which is where it's nice to have alternative translations handy. I haven't come across any troublesome passages that I would consider salvational or even essential, except in some of the translations that should probably be ignored, such as one translation that I have of the New Testament, where the translator said that he relied on visions in his head in order to come to the true meaning of a word. Perhaps his version was the one true Word of God, and I'm doing him a disservice, but I doubt it. While I might accept that of a Bible author, I'd rather the translator actually be able to translate the words.