So I am learning Greek. Most people when I tell them that, all ask the same question: "Why?"
Well, there are many reasons - but some of the ones that I thought I would post here are:
1. It's yet another way that I can learn more about God. Greek is a very precise language and often times you see things in Greek that you can't see in English. You have heard the term "Lost in Translation" - I mean, nothing critical is lost, and most pastors will make you aware of these things in Church (assuming you are going to a good Church), but it is kinda neat to be able to see them myself!
2. It's fun and I like being able to read the New Testament in it's original language - there is something neat about knowing that the original author wrote the very same word I just read rather then a translation of what he wrote... makes everything seem even more "real" to me somehow.
3. How many times have you heard something along the lines of "The Bible has been translated over and over so many times that no one knows what it originally said!" - it's this one I would like to (briefly!) deal with.
First, it's a stupid argument, and I wish people would stop using it... I know they wont, but I still wish they would. It's not like the Bible went from Greek to Latin, from Latin to German, from German to Slovak, from Slovak to .....whatever. It didn't happen that way! Whenever someone wanted to translate the Bible into a language, they went back to the original language to translate from! They may have used some of the other translations as reference works, but they main tool was the original language. It's not like our English Bibles are many steps away from the original languages - they are ONE step away. The analogy of the old "telephone" game is brought up (usually about the original writings themselves, but also for the translations), they say one person tells someone something, then that person tells someone, then that person tells someone... and eventually the original message is all messed up.
But what we have with our translations is Person A told Person B something. Done. Person B now decides to write it down in HIS language.... but he constantly checks with Person A to make sure he is writing down the correct message. Again, not several steps - just one!
The other reason I think this is a stupid argument is this: imagine you saw a sign in Spanish - and you didn't read Spanish. Would you just give up and say "well, we can never know what that sign says, it's lost forever!" Stupid, right? You can simply ask someone who speaks Spanish to tell you what it says - they can even write it down for you (translate it)..... and if you wanted to, you could learn the language yourself and read the sign in it's original language! The same is true of the Bible - and pretty much everyone knows it. All kinds of people speak the Biblical languages, and they will be happy to tell you EXACTLY what the Bible says - we have many, many good translations.... and people are learning the Biblical languages all the time.
Like I said - it's a stupid argument. I think it will be amusing if one day when I am talking to someone about the Bible - if they bring up the translation issue, that maybe one day I will be able to tell them "Well, actually I am not reading a translation at all, I am reading the original language!" ....it wont really do much, the person will likely just switch to a different argument, but it will be amusing none the less!
Anyway, thanks for readin!
Rob
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