Let there be mishegas - The Jewish Standard

You would think that Christian conservatives would regard the Bible as Holy Writ. So many conservatives are believers in “biblical inerrancy” – the idea that the Bible is never wrong.

But some are actually attempting to rewrite it – or, as the Conservapedia Website declares, rid it of “liberal bias” (see conservapedia.com/Conservative_Bible_Project).

As far as I can tell, this audacious effort is mainly directed to THEIR scriptures – although they’ve “translated” parts of Genesis and Exodus.

Among the group’s guidelines for a Conservative version (I’ve deleted the footnotes):

1. Framework against Liberal Bias: providing a strong framework that enables a thought-for-thought translation without corruption by liberal bias

2. Not Emasculated: avoiding unisex, “gender inclusive” language, and other feminist distortions; preserve many references to the unborn child (the NIV deletes these)

3. Not Dumbed Down: not dumbing down the reading level, or diluting the intellectual force and logic of Christianity; the NIV is written at only the 7th grade level

4. Utilize Powerful Conservative Terms: using powerful new conservative terms to capture better the original intent; Defective translations use the word “comrade” three times as often as “volunteer”; similarly, updating words that have a change in meaning, such as “word”, “peace”, and “miracle”.

5. Combat Harmful Addiction: combating addiction by using modern terms for it, such as “gamble” rather than “cast lots”; using modern political terms, such as “register” rather than “enroll” for the census

6. Accept the Logic of Hell: applying logic with its full force and effect, as in not denying or downplaying the very real existence of Hell or the Devil.

7. Express Free Market Parables; explaining the numerous economic parables with their full free-market meaning

8. Exclude Later-Inserted Inauthentic Passages: excluding the interpolated passages that liberals commonly put their own spin on, such as the adulteress story

9. Credit Open-Mindedness of Disciples: crediting open-mindedness, often found in youngsters like the eyewitnesses Mark and John, the authors of two of the Gospels

10. Prefer Conciseness over Liberal Wordiness: preferring conciseness to the liberal style of high word-to-substance ratio; avoid compound negatives and unnecessary ambiguities; prefer concise, consistent use of the word “Lord” rather than “Jehovah” or “Yahweh” or “Lord God.”

Among the famous “liberal” passages to get the scalpel (or get scalped) is “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone” and “Forgive them, Father, they know not what they do.”

These guys know exactly what they’re doing.

RKB

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