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From: yiri@ucf-cs.UUCP (Yirmiyahu BenDavid)
Newsgroups: net.religion,net.religion.christian
Subject: Re: The best little bible in the world...
Message-ID: <1772@ucf-cs.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 29-Nov-84 08:31:12 EST
Article-I.D.: ucf-cs.1772
Posted: Thu Nov 29 08:31:12 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 30-Nov-84 19:21:30 EST
References: <1368@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Organization: UCF, Orlando, FL
Lines: 35

The only thing which will genuinely do what you ask is to split the
quest into two sub-quests:
1.) Regarding the Jewish Bible, use the Masoretic Hebrew, the
Septuagint Greek and the Dead Sea Scrolls to establish the best
reading of the Hebrew (yes, the Greek sometimes helps to support
the Hebrew reading when used along with the Dead Sea Scrolls...
read the book on the DSS by Yadin and also by Allegro - both
books). If you are not able to do this, don't fool yourself 
that you are. If you can't penetrate beyond the English then
your best bet is to use the Jewish Publication Society version
(The Torah, The Prophets, and The Writings, three volumes) AND,
MOST IMPORTANTLY, RECOGNIZE THAT THIS IS NOT(!!) AUTHORITIVE AND
DOES NOT(!!) DO WHAT YOU REALLY WANT... IT ONLY APPROXIMATES IT
SOMEWHAT.
2.) If you are including the 'New Testament' in your definition,
then the best you can do is go to the Novum Testamentum Graeca
published by the American Bible Society, replace Vaticanus
readings with Sinaiticus readings and consider Peshitta readings
and the earlier papyrii readings and translate it yourself
with the help of something like the Vine's Expository Dictionary
of the New Testament. Be sure to find the best English word for
each Greek word, translate it that way literally and then try to
understand THAT translation rather than substitue other English
words like most translaters have done. That interjects too much
bias of Christian translaters into the text - ALWAYS. There is
NO substitue for this method and NO English version which will
do what you asked. Other aids are available to help most anyone
translate for themselves if they have enough concern to learn
the Greek alphabet and put in some time... it doesn't go fast
if you are a beginner. Nevertheless, you can take the Englishman's
Greek Concordance and a Parsing Guide to the Greek New Testament,
along with Vine's, and with some determination you can do it.
I'm telling you that if you do not do this for yourself, you
WILL be deceived!