Lost in Translation(s)

Abstract

"In contemporary Christian circles it may sound ironic to pose the question, “How well do we know our Bibles?” At first this appears to be a question of biblical literacy; that is, how familiar are we with the biblical content. Despite one’s opinions on the incline or decline of biblical literacy, there is no doubt that the Christian marketplace has become saturated with print, computer and other media resources enabling Christians to personally in-teract with the Bible in innovative ways never before conceiv-able. However, there is another implicit nuance to the question; that is, how well do we know the nature and origin of the text of our Bibles. With the sea of secondary resources exegeting and expounding the Bible, one can easily be lulled into assuming that the shape of the biblical text itself is a universal given not subject to change or alteration. Yet the reality is that the vast majority of people, including pastors and, to a certain degree, scholars, are reliant on translated texts"