Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Steven Avery <stevenavery AT verizon.net>]

Hi,

Notice that Rolf in this iteration is trying to limit the discussion, 
to simply NT references to OT passages.  The objections are largely 
the same, this fails totally due to:

a) scribal habits - (including the diverse authorship and books of the NT)
b) textual transmission (the original distinction vanishing without a 
trace or mention)
c) zero manuscript evidences - (today it is only a fanciful and 
selective emendation theory)

However, really Rolf's idea is to defend the NWT translation 
tampering as a whole, as we saw in 2005.  It is a fudge to raise the 
very limited group of NT-->OT verses, but Rolf does not address the 
difficulties in the theory even in its very limited form.

This theory of Rolf's, theories of Hebrew writing embedded in Greek 
NT autographs that later vanished without a trace, is raised by Rolf 
and others on a variety of boards .. b-greek, and Ancient Near East 
as well as b-hebrew. And is discussed on evangelical-jw boards and 
textual criticism boards. This is a highly unusual theory that 
combines very unique ideas of scribal habits and translation, never 
seen anywhere, and is clearly, if to be discussed in a scholarly 
environment, a cross-discipline "theory". You can not omit questions 
of scribal habits and the transmission of the supposed Greek-Hebrew 
text from the discussion.

And has to be looked at as a whole, including the fact that the 
supposed implementation of the theory in the NWT NT actually 
translates Jehovah in many other places than quoting of the OT, one 
count says 144 places.  They carefully avoid implementing this idea 
in verses like 1 Corinthians 12:3, Philippians 2:11 and Luke 24:34 
and John 20:28, which if the NWT were consistent would read like this:

1 Corinthians 12:3
Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the 
Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that 
Jesus is Jehovah, but by the Holy Ghost.

Philippians 2:11
And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Jehovah, to 
the glory of God the Father.

Luke 24:34
Saying, Jehovah is risen indeed, and hath appeared to Simon.

John 20:28
And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Jehovah and my God.

When the discussion on b-hebrew was on NWT translation consistency in 
2005,  Rolf Furuli specifically defended the inconsistent methodology 
of the hundred odd places and the verse omissions where kurios was 
not placed as Jehovah.

[b-hebrew] NWT's approach of consistent translation
Rolf Furuli - Nov. 18, 2005
https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/b-hebrew/2005-November/027060.html

Ironically, Rolf was agreeing with my position, while accusing me 
of  "a claim that is outright false ... false witness" when Rolf was 
pointing out that the JWs use "context" to decide where to make this 
decision.  Clearly, to the JW NT translators, context meant:

a) translate the NT kurios as Jehovah if it is "safe"
b) do not translate the NT kurios as Jehovah if it gives the sense of 
Jesus==Jehovah

*** Without a speck of reasoning as to why this should be 
back-applied to the NT authors. *** If the apostolic authors were 
writing Jehovah and this later became our kurios, at least try to 
credit them as being consistent.

[b-hebrew] NWT's approach of consistent translation
Steven Avery - Nov. 18, 2005
https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/b-hebrew/2005-November/027070.html
If a group inserts "Jehovah" simply to match their Christology, and 
omits it when it does not match their Christology, given an 
essentially identical
Greek, it is a violation of sound translation, and it is inconsistent 
to the  underlying Greek.

Rolf
> The discussions on b-hebrew should be exercised in a cordial way, 
> and not by accusing participants of  "sneaking in selective 
> doctrinal theories."

Steven
And I believe you owe me an apology for your 2005 claim of writing "a 
claim that is outright false ... false witness".  You set the stage 
for non-cordiality, meanwhile you never dealt with the substance.

Rolf
> Please stick to the issue: When the NT writers quoted the Tanakh or 
> the LXX, what did the writers do when they found the name of God in 
> the text? Please stop bringing religion into the discussion as you 
> and two other list members have done.  Use linguistic and 
> philological arguments, not religious ones!

Steven
This is largely a question about scribal habits and textual 
transmission.   When writing an original document, a letter in a 
language, is it common or do we ever see mixed languages and their 
different letter styles. When? Rolf incorrectly equates the LXX 
Hebrew-->Greek text with an autographic Greek text.

And for that purpose, all evidence is that NT writers wrote Greek as 
in the texts we have transmitted. That was covered in my questions 
about the difficulties in the theory, that you did not address in 
2005 and do not address today.

===============================

NON-ADDRESSED PROBLEMS

The theory of one NT author interrupting his Greek for a Hebrew that later :

    a) multiple authors in
    b) multiple books transmitted their text early, in
    c) multiple languages of early translation

They are supposed to have inserted the Hebrew Tetragrammaton 
(or  some unknown equivalent) into an original work Greek text, 
something unseen and  unknown in all textual history, Jewish or 
Christian.  (This is not the same as Hebrew-->Greek translation 
decisions, we are talking here about original Greek language writing).

     This is supposed to have occurred without a trace of this 
being  found or mentioned historically.

     And then there is conjectured a massive redaction of each and 
every occurrence in each and every book to bring them back to Greek 
(and perhaps Latin and  Aramaic) as we have them today.

     And this was done without any reference in any writings by the 
early church writers, and in addition this was a massive textual 
redaction done over a wide range of books, authors and languages -- 
and yet this massive translation tampering in the first 
centuries  was somehow done 100% consistently, and without a trace.

   When you really consider what is being alleged, it truly takes on 
an Alice-in-Wonderland type of nature.

   It also means that the New Testament was corrupt for about 1800 
years, and that the only true New Testament even today has no textual 
witness whatsoever in the original language.

===============================

Rolf, in 2005 you did not give try to defend your theory at all, 
against the overwhelming difficulties.  In fact, those difficulties 
shoot down the theory even if you tried to limit it to Greek authors 
reading a Hebrew Bible and writing a Greek text.

When you address the group of problems above, that involve scribal 
habits and textual transmission, and dual-language writing, that will 
be an interesting day.

Shalom,
Steven Avery
Bayside, NY.