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Global Christianity and the Rise of the Cellphone
Hugh Pickens writes "Alan Jacobs writes in the Atlantic about Every Tribe Every Nation, an organization whose mission is to produce and disseminate Bibles in readable mobile-ready texts for hundreds of languages including Norsk, Potawatomie, Bahasa Indonesia, and Hawai'i Pidgin as the old missionary impulse is being turned towards some extremely difficult technical challenges. The Bible is a large, complicated text containing three quarters of a million words and the typesetting is quite complex because of the wide range of literature types found in scripture and the need for several types of note. 'For all the issues that are still to be solved, ETEN is trying to do things that the world's biggest tech companies haven't cracked yet, such as rendering minority languages correctly on mobile devices,' says Mark Howe. 'There's a unity among Bible translators and publishers that stands in stark contrast to the fractured, fratricidal smartphone industry.' But once these technical challenges are met, it won't be only Bibles only that people can get on their mobile devices, but whole new textual worlds."
You would thing that people would be able do away with these historic and completely ridiculous ideas by now. Instead they are still stuck in the dark ages, but now with shiny new technology. Really sad.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
More fanfic.
Porn and religion, both a drain on society, but leaders in advancing technology to bring content to the masses.
I wonder how short a religious text could theoretically be, while still sustainably self-replicating between hosts. (i.e. religious believers). Much of the bible is akin to junk DNA.
Bible translation is usually the one taking the big step of documenting a new language and defining a character set for it. So really, this isn't new.
Crowd: OMG 4000 dudes 7 loaves 2 fish
Jesus: Lotsa food now LOL
Crowd: WTFBBQ!
Once the language barrier has been overcome, let's hope 'On the Origin of Species' is translated. After all, if you're going to use science and technology, you might as well go all the way.
"There's a unity among Bible translators and publishers that stands in stark contrast to the fractured, fratricidal smartphone industry."
Which is really and odd statement considering how many different versions their are, sure one might be able to say what 60-80% are version X, but still major fractions happen over the translations.
You have 5 Moderator Points!
Which Helpless Linux zealot/MS basher do you want to mod down today?
We all know LaTeX allows you to focus on the content and magically comes up with beautiful layouts. I mean the single best page layouts are always in the looks-the-same LaTeX format! And it's so intuitive to use!
Karen Armstrong in one of her TED talks put forth an idea that all religions should concentrate on the Golden Rule - the rule that Confucius created 3,000 years ago. Compassion. Orthopraxy as opposed to orthodoxy.
We should all act like a compassionate person instead of worrying about how others believe and if they believe "correctly" - which is lost on pretty much every practitioner of the religions of Abraham: Judaism, Christianity, Islam.
I really want to read a million-word document on my cell phone screen! Maybe reading the Bible while I'm driving will sort of cancel out, karma wise, sort of...
Sorry, but gray text on gray background is making my eyes bleed.
You're supposed to worship it. For most of its existence, only a selected few could read it anyway. At least Christians can now RTFM, and think a bit about what's in there now. Instead of having someone else tell them what to think about what's in there.
Although, it's inherent in religions of all stripes to tend to stray on the dogmatic side. Although all these indigenous folks can now read the Bible, who knows if they can understand what's in there. I don't think the authors of the Bible even knew themselves.
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
When the summary is written in English it's stupid to then slap a non-English word in it. "Norsk" translates to "Norwegian."
How will we ever conquer those mindless savages from across the galaxy?
#naabhaprzrag, #sverubfr-000, #agi-fcbafberq, negvpyr[pynff*=' negvpyr-ary-'] { qvfcynl: abar !vzcbegnag; }
Just take your time.
There's a unity among Bible translators and publishers that stands in stark contrast to the fractured, fratricidal smartphone industry.
Also, alas, in stark contrast to the fractured and occasionally literally fratricidal world of their theological paymasters.
Gutenburg missed out on selling trinkets to Catholics, invented the "mobile type" printing press, printed a bible because it was safe, and ended up helping to destroy the Christian induced sociopathic environment Europe had fallen into by making knowledge easily distributable. Now a Christian organization wants to use the new and improved method of distributing knowledge to translate a bible in languages with currently unsupported types in an attempt to endoctrinate them.
Having to work for a living is the root of all evil.
How much of the King James Bible was lost in translation to English. It's odd that certain languages don't have words for certain concepts and so in translation, something is lost.
The Bible we read today is the result of the Council of Nicea, and several other alignment efforts over time.
But I strongly suggest we all read the ENTIRETY of the texts within the Bible. Because only then do the outright inconsistencies and lies become evident.
(coming across Gibraltor of course).
This is well known among the educated academic community to have been one of the main reasons that the Catholic Church went on the Crusades. Justifies it? No. Makes your Christians seem less crazy? Yeah.
the system architecture is largely the same, only difference being in the words chosen in presentation of the stories. Minor UI differences.
the effort to bring better and more convenient communications to people everywhere, particularly in obscure languages that might otherwise die off - although we are losing languages on a regular basis.
I am saddened to hear that all this effort is being directed merely to bring a monotheistic religion like Christianity - likely the cause of more human misery than any other individual concept in history - to an ever widening audience. Its like building a tool to spread ignorance...
"The first time I got drunk, I got married. The second time I bought a chimpanzee, after that I stayed sober" Arian Seid
The King James? The Eastern Orthodox? The Coptic? Hebrew? Syriac? Which apocrypha will be in or out? Will they charge extra for those? Get back to me on that, willya?
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
If only organized or 'enforced' religion would be stamped out once and for all, as quickly as free thinking individuality and is being stamped out, we could then get on with disposing of greed and paranoia next too, as long as people are 'taught' dogma, and taught to obey, things will remain as screwed up as they patently are.
Organized religion has no place in a no-BS, progressive society, it only serves to ingratiate those involved, keep the political status quo, .. because it seems rather obvious, (to me) that its not working.lets stop perpetuating the myth eh ?
it holds and draws some people backwards, willingly, and confines thinking and keeps people passing the buck,. This god-shaped mindset, so apparent in many humans, should likely be filled perhaps *not* from an external source. like, er.. *someone else's ideas*
Disseminating these 'texts' does seem rather, to be blindly contributing to the whole damn mess in the first place. ..
but i guess i shouldn't expect any better from them
...A nice piece of fiction, but I wouldn't want to live my life by it.
Bible translators have also given us XeTeX, which is now an important part of the TeX ecosystem. And a bunch of useful (and good looking!) fonts: http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&id=FontDownloads
I don't understand the problem.
The bible at its core is just words. It does not matter what font you use, it does not matter what size or format you use.
It is like all other books, or even most websites.
They talk about notes, but that is a single special case that seem like you could solve in an afternoon.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
So basically the plague, virus, the neurological parasite has just mutated and found a new path to spread through... I really hope there are enough people with immunity (Intelligence), to ensure that at least a few of us remain and the world will not be engulfed by this... putrid disease that is religion.
When all is done, they'll have made one book accessible to the tiny number of people who are literate only in these minority languages.
If instead they taught people to read a major language they'd be opened to a whole world of ideas.
Yea, The idea of a God who loves you enough to die for you in spite of your destructiveness is so ridiculous.
Norsk? I'm glad people are finally trying to teach those Norwegians about Christianity. /sarcasm
I've read Slashdot for a few years now, and every once in a while I see articles posted that directly or indirectly refer to Christianity. And every single time, it ends up being a sounding board for the Slashdot "community" to boast about how proudly atheistic they are and criticize the few Christians Slashdotters that give their point of view. I'm a devout Christian, and I can't quite fully express how saddened I am to see some of these comments. For someone to mock my faith, a faith that I've seen work miracles in people's lives and help them go from a place of pain and destruction to a place of life and peace, is something that literally makes me shake with sadness. Were the Crusades not very Christian-like at times? You betcha. Modern Christians don't condone many of the acts that were committed "in the name of" Christianity hundreds of years ago. If you see anyone killing someone else in the name of Christ, they're not true Christ-followers. So do NOT lump us all together. It's like blaming the existence of nuclear weapons on every physicist that ever lived. It's not a fair accusation. (I know somebody's going to comment on that statement and bash it somehow - so go right ahead, prove to yourself that you're not reading this comment for your own benefit, but rather just to find ways to knock down a Christian). Secondly, some of you have made comments about how the Bible doesn't apply to modern day or that it's too cryptic for us (or even its original authors) to understand. Is this difficult to understand? "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." (Matthew 6:34) Does this next verse have no applicability to the present day? "Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need." (Ephesians 4:28) Or just read the book of Proverbs (which is even in the Old Testament) and you'll find a slew of practical advice for living a better, more fulfilling life. Sure, a lot of the Bible is a historical record of the Jewish and Christian people living in the Middle East for a period of a few thousand years, and not every law in Leviticus applies to us today. But the Bible isn't a story, it's a living history, and real churches are not museums for the saints, but hospitals for the sick. Before you make comments on the Bible, make sure you've read it; you don't lend youself much credibility by scoffing at it without having actually explored it. I wasn't always a Christian, and I explored other religious texts before settling on the Bible. The conclusion I came to was that it offers something that no other 'religion' offered. Rather than having to 'change' before we can become 'right' with God, we become right with God (through simply asking for it) and letting God's love change us. Have you ever felt that life is more than just about technology, physics, inventions, etc? Don't you ever get tired of reading news articles every day about the current size of transistors, Apple's patent wars, or funding for space programs? I sure do. If that's all that life is about, then that's pretty scary. I have to believe that life is about helping people in a real and tangible way, TODAY; building up others in our community who aren't as fortunate as us, and not just speculating about how we can make cooler stuff out of silicon. Seriously - many of us live in cities where people are outside, homeless, starving, and dying every day, and yet you feel comfortable sitting back with your $4.50 Lattes and criticizing Christianity, the single largest organization today that is trying to help the real problems of real people at this very minute. If that's the kind of community that Slashdot is, then I'm done. I'd rather go make a difference in this world than read about occasionally interesting tech news.
From what I've seen I'd say the unity among Bible translators is probably similar to that among scientists. There aren't a lot of people who are qualified to do a first-rate job of it, and they're very intelligent, and thus they tend to realize that they don't always have all the answers.
Now, unity among denominations and churches is an entirely different matter. It takes a far different skillset to get people to pay to listen to you go on for an hour about whatever you're feeling concerned about. The people in power here tend to be much more political and ideological, and they tend not to be so humble about the limits of their knowledge (if they were humble they wouldn't sound so convincing behind a pulplit and people wouldn't pay to listen to them).
Of course, some of this depends on what you call a Bible translation. Anybody can grab their denomination's favorite existing English translation and modernize the words or do a literal translation into another language they happen to know, and thus the general sense of academic liberalism doesn't apply. By translation I am referring more to creating a rendition of the text of the Bible that conveys in the best way possible the intended meaning of the original authors. That requires strong knowledge of the original languages, good historical context, good language skills in the target language, and strong skills in textual criticism (trying to figure out what the original authors wrote in the first place, translations aside).
There's no one perfect way to translate the Bible. Compromises always have to be made in making translation choices, and different translations make different decisions based on the intended audience etc. of the translation. Take a look at Dao de jing translations and you'll see that there are plenty again, each with different aims for translation and thus slightly different results.
-- The Grand Teddy Bear has Spoken: "Windows 8 Source Code Available NOW! more disgusting than your pr..."
Wouldn't it be easier just to figure out how to give them smallpox over the phone? It's just about as useful.
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
"Don't do unto others as you would not have them do unto you."
"Help people find their way" vs. "Just leave people alone to find their own way" is a gigantic tar-baby of a philosophical discussion all by itself.
Thank God I live in a country where I can follow the dictates of my own conscience. If believers are so unenlightened there are places you can go. Starting with North Korea.
Stay negative.
Nowadays in the Middle East we have the bizarre situation that many countries have governments imposed, ultimately, by the victors of WW1 (and still being defended by them), being opposed by relatively democratic Muslim insurgents with the support of the EU and limited support by the US. All of the warring forces claim to believe the teachings of the same book, but with a range of more or less optional add ons (Mishnah, NT,the Fathers, the Qu'ran, Book of Mormon). At the end of the day, and I write this as someone who very nearly ended up ordained, there isn't anything to choose between any of them in terms of good or evil.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Yes, for its time the Kingdom of Granada was a success. Arts and sciences were encouraged, the status of women was relatively high (a Jewish prayer book with feminine pronouns was discovered there some years ago), and the Muslim rulers tolerated (rather than encouraged) other religions. But I suggest it was a relatively small beacon of light in a dark world, more like Switzerland than part of an empire.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
101 Bible Contradictions http://www.pcworld.com/appguide/app.html?id=530862&expand=false
in about ten years there will be more protestants then Christians...its nearly neck n neck now. ....
GEE mister pope what ya doing to gt them doing it to make more christians....OH RIGHT they got a nazi pope
that will do it...
Going back to Kung fu-tse would be a step backwards, one that the neocons like - which is why they claim to support "compassionate Conservatism" and oppose what they call "socialism", which involves the New Testament demand to love your neighbour.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
Bear in mind that the theists are just as strong in their beliefs as the atheists, but neither can prove their belief either way and must rely on faith.
But atheists are not trying to prove that gods do not exist. They simply lack belief in the existence of gods. If we lay out the interesting options in doxastic logic they are:
1. p:G - a person has belief in the existence of gods
2. p:~G - a person has belief in the non-existence of gods
3. ~p:G - a person lacks belief in the existence of gods
Of these, the first probably does not exist since the majority of believers either believe only in a single or a particular panoply of gods. They are making an ontological commitment and they have a burden of proof to demonstrate the existence of the particular god or gods they believe in.
The second sentence is probably fairly rare. Again they are making an ontological commitment and must demonstrate that no god exists. Since it is impossible to prove an open-ended negative like this they are in a difficult position (what about the god that the sentient gas bags of an unnamed planet in IOK-1 worship).
The third is the majority atheist position. It doesn't make an ontological commitment, it is merely sceptical of the evidence that believers supposedly have for the existence of the particular deities they worship.
Old School : Jesus wept.
Today: OMG!!! SAN2RUM SI SURGNG OVER MARICA!!1!1!! OMG J3SUS FOR DA WIN!
!111!1!11!1!1111! WTF LOL
There have been all kinds of morons in history. And many have later been utilized to push one ideology or the other.
Side note: Your sentence does not even make sense at all, because gods are immortal, hence cannot die. But I see your effective intelligence has rotted away a long time ago.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Eh, this sounds loosely based on the anime "Eden of the East"... and the company within that anime that makes the "Eden" system. It's really cool, though. :)
.... the smell of a religious debate (or is that debauchery) in the morning.... it smells like, a clusterfuck.
Whatever merits, whenever, and where ever.... i simply had to comment on something i found particularly amusing in the leading: "There's a unity among Bible translators and publishers that stands in stark contrast to the fractured, fratricidal smartphone industry."
Seriously?
New International Version, New Living Translation, English Standard Version, New American Standard Version, King James Bible, International Standard Version, Aramaic Bible in Plain English, GOD'S WORD Translation, King James 2000 Bible, American King James Version, American Standard Version, Douay-Rheims Bible, Darby Bible Translation, English Revised Version, Webster's Bible Translation, Weymouth New Testament, World English Bible, Young's Literal Translation.......and on.... and on..... and on.....
Seriously?
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
If God would have wanted that speakers of Potawotomie, Norwegian, Indonesian or Hawaiian Pidgin, He would have used their languages. The message of the Bible is reserved to speakers of Ancient Hebrew, Aramaic and some parts are for Koine Greek speakers.
The rest of you are not invited. Party crashers!
__
Men with no respect for life must never be allowed to control the ultimate instruments of death.
GW Bu
But it matters now.
Singularity: a belief in the "God" idea with the "demiurge" relation inverted.
Have gnu, will travel.
I've read Slashdot for a few years now, and every once in a while I see articles posted that directly or indirectly refer to Christianity. And every single time, it ends up being a sounding board for the Slashdot "community" to boast about how proudly atheistic they are and criticize the few Christians Slashdotters that give their point of view.
I'm a devout Christian, and I can't quite fully express how saddened I am to see some of these comments. For someone to mock my faith, a faith that I've seen work miracles in people's lives and help them go from a place of pain and destruction to a place of life and peace, is something that literally makes me shake with sadness.
Were the Crusades not very Christian-like at times? You betcha. Modern Christians don't condone many of the acts that were committed "in the name of" Christianity hundreds of years ago. If you see anyone killing someone else in the name of Christ, they're not true Christ-followers. So do NOT lump us all together. It's like blaming the existence of nuclear weapons on every physicist that ever lived. It's not a fair accusation. (I know somebody's going to comment on that statement and bash it somehow - so go right ahead, prove to yourself that you're not reading this comment for your own benefit, but rather just to find ways to knock down a Christian).
Secondly, some of you have made comments about how the Bible doesn't apply to modern day or that it's too cryptic for us (or even its original authors) to understand. Is this difficult to understand? "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." (Matthew 6:34) Does this next verse have no applicability to the present day?
Or, "Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need." (Ephesians 4:28)
Or just read the book of Proverbs (which is even in the Old Testament) and you'll find a slew of practical advice for living a better, more fulfilling life.
Sure, a lot of the Bible is a historical record of the Jewish and Christian people living in the Middle East for a period of a few thousand years, and not every law in Leviticus applies to us today. But the Bible isn't a story, it's a living history, and real churches are not museums for the saints, but hospitals for the sick. Before you make comments on the Bible, make sure you've read it; you don't lend yourself much credibility by scoffing at it without having actually explored it.
I wasn't always a Christian, and I explored other religious texts before settling on the Bible. The conclusion I came to was that it offers something that no other 'religion' offered. Rather than having to 'change' before we can become 'right' with God, we become right with God (through simply asking for it) and letting God's love change us.
Have you ever felt that life is more than just about technology, physics, inventions, etc? Don't you ever get tired of reading news articles every day about the current size of transistors, Apple's patent wars, or funding for space programs? I sure do. If that's all that life is about, then that's pretty scary. I have to believe that life is about helping people in a real and tangible way, TODAY; building up others in our community who aren't as fortunate as us, and not just speculating about how we can make cooler stuff out of silicon.
Seriously - many of us live in cities where people are outside, homeless, starving, and dying every day, and yet you feel comfortable sitting back with your $4.50 Lattes and criticizing Christianity, the single largest organization today that is trying to help the real problems of real people at this very minute. If that's the kind of community that Slashdot is, then I'm done. I'd rather go make a difference in this world than read about occasionally interesting tech news.
Check your premises.
First you use Pascal's Wager (belief has no down side and huge up side). All the time and energy of dedicating your life to a mistaken idea is somehow not seen as a down side. And then for the up side, don't you have to have chosen correctly among the many many religions to get the benefits?
Then you use the emptiest of arguments (look at nature, that must be god's doing). Through the scientific method, we have learned an awful lot about how things have evolved to the point we're at now. And if you want to resolve the pesky questions of origins of life and the universe by postulating a god, you're merely replacing those questions with the even bigger question of god's origin.
Here is an excellent website for anyone interested to know more about the difference between genuine christianity and counterfeit christianity.
Google: "notes from a retired preacher"
"I cannot understand why we idle discussing religion. If we are honest—and scientists have to be—we must admit that religion is a jumble of false assertions, with no basis in reality. The very idea of God is a product of the human imagination. It is quite understandable why primitive people, who were so much more exposed to the overpowering forces of nature than we are today, should have personified these forces in fear and trembling. But nowadays, when we understand so many natural processes, we have no need for such solutions. I can't for the life of me see how the postulate of an Almighty God helps us in any way. What I do see is that this assumption leads to such unproductive questions as why God allows so much misery and injustice, the exploitation of the poor by the rich and all the other horrors He might have prevented. If religion is still being taught, it is by no means because its ideas still convince us, but simply because some of us want to keep the lower classes quiet. Quiet people are much easier to govern than clamorous and dissatisfied ones. They are also much easier to exploit. Religion is a kind of opium that allows a nation to lull itself into wishful dreams and so forget the injustices that are being perpetrated against the people. Hence the close alliance between those two great political forces, the State and the Church. Both need the illusion that a kindly God rewards—in heaven if not on earth—all those who have not risen up against injustice, who have done their duty quietly and uncomplainingly. That is precisely why the honest assertion that God is a mere product of the human imagination is branded as the worst of all mortal sins." -- Paul Dirac
Paul said it best. Let's move on, please.
In an other whole new textual world...
This would be cool - except these Biblical scholars use OLD translations or New translations funded (ironically) by the NRA (such as the NIV) - and which are quite innacurate and the result of more politics than a desire for some higher truth. There are some excellent scholar translations out there (published outside of the USA where the politics makes truth unacceptable) and these would actually totally alter theological discussions were they used.
However Since they show no interest in the truth - this is no different to the other content owners trying to hang on to an old business model.
You can't prove it either way.
That's not true at all. You can never prove a negative. You can't prove the non-existence of something without examining everything in existence, which isn't feasible. There is no known method to arrive at a proof God doesn't exist. Mathematically there's a number of subtleties here, which make sure that such tricks as asking which rule applies to "not not God exists" don't change the nature of the question.
Proving something doesn't exist in a limited, qualified set is of course possible, and is an entirely different problem. But we don't know a mathematically rigorous definition of the "set" of possibilities that we actually live in. We don't even have an intuitive definition that's useful imho.
Proving God exists, however, is simple : just make him show his face. Point a telescope at his living room ... you get the point.
Incidentally, I also believe that it wouldn't matter to atheists at all if God proved his existence. They are not unbelievers because they really care about the intricacies of what can be logically proved or not, or they would have the same problem with nearly every science (anything that can't be expresses in a proven-to-be-consistent logic system. If you really care about mathematically correct proof, you'd be a climate-change-denier for example. Hell, you'd be denying that physics itself works at all, since it most definitely can't stand up to a mathematical standard of proof). Atheists, and agnosts mostly are unbelievers because they hate the social customs involved (eg. because it is somewhat at odds with their dating life, real or imagined dating life I mean), or because it's popular in their neighbourhood.
Proof that God exists would make hardly any atheists change their mind. It doesn't solve the "real" problem they have with religion : that it provides a set of rules they (think, in most cases) they can short-cut without consequences.
scientific developments and technology to disseminate ignorance and world view of the bronze age herdsmen who knew all the secrets of the universe because a burning bush revealed it to them. Seems like a worthy project.
As the island of our knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.
I absolutely agree that there are a lot of translations (English in particular has a wealth of them). In general though there are good reasons. A translation project is no small undertaking, and not generally done without reason. From my research over the last few years (I'm writing bible software, and reviewing translations for a church to use in their pews), the major reasons for separate translations are as follows:
.
* Philosophy of Communication: translations exist on a sliding scale between "formal equivalence" (word-for-word) and "dynamic equivalence" (thought-for-thought). This is the reason that the ESV and KJV (more formal-equivalence) use the technical theological word "propitiation" in Romans 3:25, whereas the NIV (more dynamic-equivalence) uses the phrase "sacrifice of atonement". Both have their place, and are preferred in different contexts.
* Evolution of Language Usage: as great as the KJV was for its time (1611), it may confuse many people if modern English translations rendered James 2:3 as "And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing". The ESV instead says "and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing".
* Disagreement over Manuscript Significance: Some people regard what has been called the "majority text" as the true critical text of the original new testament. Therefore, they prefer English translations based on this text (generally the KJV, but also including the WEB and EMT) rather than translations based on other critical greek texts (e.g. Wescott-Hort, Nestle-Aland). The reasons for this dispute are fairly involved. A good book, summarising academia on the topic for the lay person, is D.A. Carson's The King James Version Debate
* Ideological Preference: Some people do seem to stand by the KJV through thick and thin, as though it were a matter of faithfulness to God, without much in the way of actual rational arguments why it is a better translation. This may also include a sentimental desire to remain connected to the history of christendom.
These are generally not bad reasons to create a new translation. Now, some of the arguments do become petty (particularly under the Ideological Preference heading). But generally, translators have good reasons for thinking that more people will understand the content of the Bible much better, because another translation is made available that attempts to communicate the same ideas to a slightly different demographic.
Censorship is the opposite of education. If neo-darwinism were defensible, people would not need to try and censor ID.
The biggest problem Christianity has is market fragmentation. The existence of different sects only proves that it can't survive in a modern world against the iCult.
I appreciate it's not easy to get the translations for some languages onto devices that don't properly support UTF character sets, but if they support UTF properly with the full symbol set, then as far as I'm aware it covers 98% or more of the languages used on the planet.
Whining about the "difficulties" of typesetting different styles used by the Bibles is disingenuous and pathetic. It is no harder to specify the format of a fragment of a Psalm song than it is to format a paragraph of plain text if you're using any kind of half-assed layout description language and a decent text processor. That's what such products do -- automate layout management.
I agree there may be some languages which aren't well served by such tools, in particular anything which uses a pictographic form such as original Chinese vs. Simplified, but even the Chinese themselves don't use the Original Chinese forms much any more.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
Is to teach them Hebrew and Aramaic so they can finally read the book for themselves and stop digesting the propaganda translations they're being given.
OK, from KDE user to KDE user: let's ditch all the sects and religions and historical/political mumbo jumbo. Religion is more about politics and government than science. Let's apply the scientific method to this statement: "15 000 000 000 years ago, the universe started expanding and cooling down. Hydrogen formed, and lumps of hydrogen condensed to form stars. In the stars, all the elements up to iron were formed. This first generation of stars died, and some of them went nova, thus filling the universe with all the elements we see today. We are made of the stuff of dead stars, 10 000 000 000 years in the making."
Then to this one: "And the mountain of Sinai was smoking, all of it, because The-Ever-Living came down on it in fire. And its smoke went up like the smoke of a furnace; and the mountain quaked exceedingly. And it happened while the sound of the ram's horn was sounding, and becoming very strong, Moses spoke. And God answered him by a voice."
Take Occam's razor:
For one, 20th century mainstream science [aka. sanctioned to be taught in public schools; sanctioned by whom? by the political/religious?/ leaders of the day] pulls billions of years to match the CMB radiation and similarly measured [more or less distant] observations. The former statement is a THEORY and, like any theory, it is debatable [last time i checked there were about 14 or 12 billion years, nothing directly measured].
For two: The Exodus happens in 1447 BC [debatable historic date, nonetheless, +/- a decade or two, give or take]. Thousands of real people, on a sunny day, in the middle of a desert, witness a Stargate-like landing on Mount Sinai [artificial thunders, lightnings, strange sounds, jets of fire, etc.]. This wasn't a unique event, as the ancient history of Israel is quite rich in what we'd call "close encounters of the third-kind."
From the two statements above, which is more likely to stand as real? The proposed 15bn theory or the historical encounter? The idea or the registered and witnessed event?
According to wikipedia, the complete bible was available in "Norsk" (that's Norwegian for "Norwegian") in 1930, and it has been available in Danish (readable by any literate Norwegian at the time) since 1550. We're even lutheranian protestand christian by constitution, god damn it..
Pardon while I laugh.
There probably are, but if you're wanting to write notes in them, it'd be kind of rude to use the church copies when you have one of your own you can freely write in.
Because you have painted yourself into a corner where even if you were to see the effects of an actual God you could not accept them.
There is no conclusive evidence of life after death. But there is no evidence of any sort against it. Soon enough you will know. So why fret about it?
-Robert A. Heinlein
(oddly, my A.C.-posting CAPTCHA was " outgrown"... coincidence? I wonder...."
Since we're discussing science and religion. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=-xpVueJyjwc
BTW except for the part about God creating the heavens and the earth, your scientific timeline of creation tracks Genesis 1:2-32 although with 3000 years of filling in the details.
They are corrupt, They have done abominable works, There is none who does good. The Lord looks down from heaven upon the children of men, To see if there are any who understand, who seek God. They have all turned aside, They have together become corrupt; There is none who does good, No, not one. Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, Who eat up my people as they eat bread, And do not call on the Lord? There they are in great fear, For God is with the generation of the righteous. You shame the counsel of the poor, But the Lord is his refuge. (Psalm 14:1-6)
That would be the Norwegian word for "Norwegian," Mr. Jacobs.
the koran
I applaud their efforts, translations of the Bible lead to reading , and reading leads to enlightenment which leads to right action, and the decline of fanatics.
I was just thinking this morning that the ereader may well be one of the most influential inventions ever.
Banned books as physical copies are very easy to control--as electronic copies the can be disseminated at the speed of light,,,or physically transported on a single 1cm^2 chip from which an unlimited number of copies can disperse.
Secrecy supports tyranny--by single individuals and by whole populations.
Knowledge destroys tyrants, free dissemination, liberates people's minds so that slaves will learn of their slavery and take back their natural liberty--as only they can, as slaves must free themselves. But liberation cannot happen to a people who already see themselves as free--blinded to the chains which bind them..
Before you can break your bonds, you must first acknowledge their existence
The very best slaves are those who are ignorant of their lot. Reading kills ignorance, knowledge destroys superstition and religion.