(August 24, 2021 at 8:08 am)Ahriman Wrote: Everyone is free to interpret scripture however they want.
Oh, wow. Now that's not a comment most Christians would agree with.
I see we're exercising our newly found right to ignore necroposting. Funny that.
But seriously, it is a great topic. Consider that the written word is a form of communication and nothing else. We still haven't perfected the mind meld so getting across an idea from one bag of mostly water to another is not a perfect activity. Every single human ape reads/listens/hears through their own filter that has been dirtied by their life experiences. So no interpretation is perfect, no matter what you are talking about.
Regarding Biblical translations, you must consider that none are done without bias and this is an interpretation. I would agree that any complete work should be interpreted "consistently" and by this I mean the entire work should be interpreted through the same lens or viewpoint so that the interpretation doesn't change throughout the work. However, I seriously doubt is it possible for humans to interpret a work, particularly and ancient one, with zero bias. Interpretation, especially from long dead languages, is not a perfect science. A word from Koine Greek does not have an exact lookalike word in modern English. It just doesn't work that way. In part, any such translation is an attempt by the translator to get into the mind of the author of the work. And mind you, I'm speaking about the specific work the translator is translating, which could very well be a translation of a translation of a copy of a copy of an oral story....multiply by 100. When speaking about the Bible, there are no translations that came directly from the original version.
Why is it so?
~Julius Sumner Miller
~Julius Sumner Miller