Even more regrettably, modern denominational divisions are often driven by crass motives of money, power, and pride. Often, new denominations are created simply as ways to exercise control and power by a person or faction, and then justified by some obscure doctrinal rationale. All this makes a mockery of the church’s witness. So the existence of more than 40,000 denominations in the world is not only a measure of flagrant disobedience with respect to God’s desire for the Church; the paths that have led the church to this reality are littered with sin. Our contemporary practice shamelessly violated biblical teachings in ways unimaginable to those who wrote the New Testament and to leaders of the early church.
From Times Square to Timbuktu by Welsey Granberg-Michaelson (p.15).
One of the reasons I enjoy working in Bible translation is that our work generally does not have a denominational basis, indeed it can serve to bring believers from different backgrounds together; I wrote this in a blog post 8 years ago, but it is as true today:
Bible translation is one area in which Christians from different confessions can unite in order to advance the Gospel. The Scriptures are above our theological differences; there is no premillenial Bible as opposed to a post or amillenial one. The faithful translator strenuously avoids placing their personal slant or theological spin on their work – and where inevitable mistakes occur there is a rigorous checking procedure to ensure faithfulness to the original. If we are truly Christians, of whatever background, our concern must be to make God’s revealed word available to the millions of people around the world who still can’t read the book in their own language. Placing the Bible and God’s desire to communicate through it, above our own theological and cultural convictions is a liberating experience. It allows Christians who might never meet or who might, in other circumstances, be hostile to one another to work together towards a cause that is bigger than them and their secondary convictions.
16 replies on “A Church Divided”
No premillenial Bible? What about the Scofield Bible? Translators may feel above this partisan spirit but in the world inhabited by english speaking people there are plenty of divisive Bibles.
It is true that there are some egregious translations of the Bible (this one for example https://www.kouya.net/?p=2183). But things like the Scofield reference system are the work of editors and publishers, not translators. You are completely right to point out that there are divisive editions of the Bible published in English (and plenty of other languages) but in the vast majority of cases, that is not the work of translators.
It is even better. At dedications, unity between churches is often cited as a benefit of the translation process. In Ghana, it united a language community split in two for decades. Doctoral research in Ghana found that translation in two neighboring languages enhanced peace between them. The bad news? It seems that unity is not a motivating outcome for Western believers, if one judges by the number of times it is fronted in the publicity of members of the global alliance and the blasé reaction I get from American Evangelicals when I tell stories of results of peace and unity.
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No, we do not need 40,000 different Christian denominations: http://t.co/e6w6i88vam
Apologies Eddie, I probably wasn’t very clear. I was trying to say that although these versions are down to the publishers the translators are partners in the process. Next you’ll be saying, “Guns don’t kill people. People kill people.” 🙂
I’m not sure that “translators are partners in the process”. Once a text is finished and publishers get their hands on it, translators generally have very little say in what happens next. Guns do kill people, but that isn’t the fault of the miners who extracted and smelted the ore used to make the weapon!
I have an old Scofield Reference Bible and it is straight KJV with notes, admittedly slanted. But the translators have been dead for centuries.
Okay, maybe partners is the wrong term. However, I do notice a trend to blame the ‘church’ (I’m deliberately using the term extremely broadly to include the forces that shape Christian publishers) for the divisions of 1 Corinthians 1 while translators, theological lecturers, parachurch missions _____ (insert your own preferred group) remain innocently detached.
Like all of these things, the picture is complex. Translators are never detached from the Church because they are part of it and aren’t allowed a ‘get out of jail free card’ when it comes to Church issues.
I also think there is a significant difference between English or other large languages and the minority languages that I was writing about. I’m not convinced that translators have helped the English speaking Church by participating in the proliferation of English language versions which helps to reinforce division. This contrasts with minority languages which generally only have one (inter confessional) translation available.
I’m meeting you half way, John!
Amen and amen. Eddie for Pope! Eddie for Pope!
Pope Eddie? I was wondering what he’ll be doing next!
Churches may be divided because of denominations, but the body of Christ can know true unity. He is the vine, we are the branches
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RT @kouya: A Church Divided: Some thoughts on mission inspired by a powerful condemnation of the lack of unity in the Church. http://t.co/…