Trying Out the Holman Christian Standard Bible

When I first began reading the Bible in earnest, I used the NIV (New International Version).  The NIV is a very good translation.  It took a lot of criticism in the beginning, largely I believe, because it was such a break from the then tradition of biblical translation.  However, it’s been a number of decades and a lot of the KJV (King James Version) Only crowd have died off.  Many many more translations have been produced and the NIV has more or less fallen out of the popular spotlight though it is still quite popular.  Anyway, that’s the one I read at the time.  Using that Bible, I read through the New Testament a handful of times and the minor prophets and a few other Old Testament books here and there.

Then I heard about the ESV (English Standard Version).  It gained some sexiness in the mid 20-oughts.  Add to that, the Crossway covers (very sexy) and that was the first Bible I bought.  They had a free Kindle version too, which was nice.  Mark Driscoll also endorsed it along with a number of the Calvinist crowd.  But reading through the Bible, I started noticing some liberties being taken, especially in numerology.  People do complain about versions and the conversion of the word “man” to “people” but that’s not really what I’m after.  What I started noticing was that certain phrases or words were translated in ways other than the original text warranted.  It was things like in Exodus 20:6 where it says “showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me.”  In the foot notes it says “or to the thousandth generation.”  A simple interpretation of a thought, yes, but when you mess with numbers in the Bible, you are missing with contextual meanings.  Can’t do that.  “Thousand” is used a number of times in the

Bible and specific meaning can be drawn from its usage. 

Compare the NIV:  “but showing love to a thousand [generations] of those who love me.”

Compare the HCSB:  “but showing faithful love to a thousand [generations] of those who love Me.”

These make interpretations too, but they keep the terminology and they demonstrate what they’re doing while they’re doing it.  No footnotes.  Well, the NIV left out steadfast/faithful.

Another problem I have with many modern translations of the Bible is the traditional lack of translation of God’s personal name in the text.  Of course anybody reading the text knows that LORD means YHVH, the Hebrew transliteration of God’s name, so God’s name has not been “left out,” just left untranslated for tradition sake.  Virtually all scholars agree that the correct pronunciation of the tetragrammaton (four letter name) of God is Yahweh or Yah’weh.  But few translations of the Bible do.

So I started reading LORD as Yahweh in my own personal reading.  The thing is, the name is used A LOT, over 6000 times in the Old Testament.  But I was still reading the ESV, a version I knew had problems I didn’t like.

I had been told about the Holman Christian Standard Bible a while back by a Jehovah’s Witness or two.  They use the name Jehovah (a bastardized and Anglicized version of God’s name) profusely and stick it in everywhere in the OT and everywhere they feel it necessary to excise Jesus’ divinity in the New Testament.  Naturally, I distrusted anything coming from a JW.  They are after all perhaps the most well-known dangerous mind control cult.  But I came upon the HCSB on my own one day when researching the name Yahweh. 

The HCSB uses Yahweh when the name of God is stated in the Hebrew.  For instance, if the author says something like “our God, whose name is the LORD” it doesn’t really make much sense in English.  It’s like “they call me the Doctor!”  “Doctor who?”  “Exactly.”  Well, fun, but not useful.  It would seem to me a better translation would be “our God, whose name is Yahweh.”  Now you know what we’re talking about.

The HCSB still uses LORD pretty regularly.  They only use Yahweh a few more than one in ten times.  But remember, the name is in there over 6000 times.  That’s like eight times per page.

So after reading virtually all the Bible in NIV, and again in ESV, now I’m reading the HCSB.  Of course I still have access to every version available on various Bible apps, and my personal copies of the ESB, NIV, NASB, and even the Greek NT.  I can’t wait to get back to the New Testament to see how the HCSB translates those.

Jesus Turns the Tables

Someone I know of made a comment recently about when Jesus turned over the tables of the money changers in the temple. There seems to be some misunderstandings running around about what was really happening there. So here's the impression that I get.

In Jesus time, the temple was not the kind of place that it was envisioned to be when it was built. When it was built, it was the holy place of Jewish worship. Jews from all over the world were required to come to the temple once a year and offer a sacrifice. For some, the sacrifice was a bull or a ram. Obviously, more expensive sacrifices were required from those who could afford them. Those who could not afford a sheep were required to sacrifice a dove or pigeon. Another requirement was that the animal be perfect, that is to say, it could have no blemishes, birth defects or diseases.

From the beginning of the temple, there were those who did not have their own animals to bring to the temple to sacrifice. A carpenter for instance didn't raise sheep or doves and therefore likely would have to buy an animal for the sacrifice. Day laborers (otherwise known as the poor) also often didn't have any livestock of their own and were required to buy an animal. Also, people from far away likely lived in a kingdom or area with a different kind of currency than was accepted at the temple, so money changers were employed in the same way they are now in international airports.

What began to happen as time wore on in the temple was what happens in many situations when you leave a ruling establishment in charge for a long period. They started taking advantage of the situation. Money changers started to charge exorbitant fees to transfer into the local currency. Some even say that those in charge of inspecting the animals began to say that the animals were not free of blemishes, requiring the person to buy an animal from the temple staff for the sacrifice. In some cases, they even say that the person's old unclean animal was even resold in the same market as a clean animal.

The net result of all this as in most cases of corruption was the disenfranchisement of the poor. The poor are the most likely to be affected by any corruption since they cannot afford to buy what they may be forced to buy. Later in the same discourse, Jesus addresses this by mentioning the widow's two copper coins and that she had given all she had. The highlight is when we understand that those coins were equal to 1/128th of a denarius which was a days wage. As you can see, it was a minuscule amount of money, yet it was all she had.

So it was not simply the selling of items in the temple that Jesus detested for such sales were a necessity to provide the people with sacrifices. Neither was it the changing of money because that was also a necessary part of temple business. Instead, it was the dishonesty, the usury and the taking advantage of the people who came to worship. The Jewish system of religion required a blood sacrifice for the atonement of sins and it was the "paid religious professionals" of the "church" who were blocking the people from attaining the forgiveness they sought. This is why Jesus called them "thieves" or "robbers" depending on your translation.