What are the best and worst Bible translations?

Answer 1

Answer

It depends on what language your question refers to but, assuming it is English . . . it is widely accepted by most historians and religious scholors of the majority of Christian sects that the most accurate ENGLISH translation of the Holy Bible is considered to the be the "King James Version." There are too many "bad" translations to name specifically. However, if you consider the King James Version to be the most correct or "best" translation, then all other versions would need to be considered "bad" by comparison.

King James Version

Although it is often referred to as the King James Version, particularly in the United States, the only active part King James took in the translation was lifting the death penalty attached to its translation and setting very reasonable guidelines for the translation process, such as prohibiting partisan scholarship and footnotes. It is more commonly known as the "Authorized Version" in the United Kingdom

Much a matter of opinion

Different people prefer different translations. Many find the New International Version to be easy to read, while others have a problem with alleged "new age" language. Some feel that the King James Version is the only correct translation, while others have difficulty reading 17th century British in the 21st century USA.

Many modern translations use sources discovered after the King James Version was written, so may represent a better idea of some of the original words. Paraphrases, such as The Living Bibleor The Message, will play around with the exact wording, but can represent idiomatic phrases in ways that are more understandable to today's society.

Answer

To be able to answer your question objectively, we must first have to study all the version and history of each bible, which is an impossibility.

The Alexandrian version, or what is known as the Septuagint, translated by seventy learned Jews, assisted by "miraculous power," about two hundred years before Christ, could not have been, it is said, translated from the Hebrew text that we now have. The differences can only be accounted for by supposing that they had a different Hebrew text. The early Christian Churches adopted the Septuagint, and were satisfied for a time. But so many errors were found, and so many were scanning every word in search of something to sustain their peculiar views, that several new versions appeared, all different somewhat from the Hebrew manuscripts, from the Septuagint, and from each other. All these versions were in Greek. The first Latin Bible originated in Africa, but no one has ever found out which Latin manuscript was the original. Many were produced, and all differed from each other. These Latin versions were compared with each other and with the Hebrew, and a new Latin version was made in the fifth century, but the old Latin versions held their own for about four hundred years, and no one yet knows which were right. Besides these there were Egyptian, Ethiopic, Armenian, and several others, all differing from each other as well as from all others in the world.

It was not until the fourteenth century that the Bible was translated into German, and not until the fifteenth that Bibles were printed in the principal languages of Europe. Of these Bibles there were several kinds -- Luther's, the Dort, King James's, Genevan, French, besides the Danish and Swedish. Mort of these differed from each other, and gave rise to infinite disputes and crimes without number. The earliest fragment of the Bible in the "Saxon" language known to exist was written sometime in the seventh century. The first Bible was printed in England in 1538. In 1560 the first English Bible was printed that was divided into verses. Under Henry VIII. the Bible was revised; again under Queen Elizabeth, and once again under King James, This last was published in 1611, and is the one now in general use.