Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Precisely. That's my point. Given the fact that the NIV is NOT intended to be a literal translation of the Hebrew/Greek, is an error of this type really going to upset people? As you rightly say, people who care about textual precision are probably not going to be reading the NIV!
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Actually, the NIV
is intended to be a translation, not a paraphrase. Obvioulsy, the translators placed emphasis on easy readability in modern English, and that does differentiate the NIV from more "literal" translations that place no emphasis on readability. Further, as you are obviously well aware, it is quite impossible to translate any language into another "word for word." Consequently, the differences between the "literal" translations and other translations such as the NIV entirely come down to word and phrasing choices of the individual translators. One version is not any better or more "literal" than another.
Anyway, as a translation versus a paraphrase, the NIV is billed as an authoritative reference point for anyone studying the Bible in English who lacks the ability to read Hebrew or Greek or Aramaic. As such, the publishers better get their details right.
Harry, you're flying off on a tangent and missing the entire point behind why people would get upset over this formatting issue. This is simply not the same as finding a punctuation error in
The Count of Monte Cristo. This is the
Bible, and even if it doesn't mean much to you, it is
vastly important to many others on a scale which you obviously aren't comprehending very well. Zondervan missing something like this in their epub shows a disregard for basic RESPECT: respect for their readers and a respect toward God whom they say they are trying to serve in the publication of this text. I'm sure you didn't understand the ire of the Muslim community in Finland over those cartoons, either, but the expectation and demand by deeply religious people toward God is real and not something to be taken lightly. Throwing this epub text out there without taking the time to proofread it and catch such basic errors is incredibly disrespectful toward both God and the readers of the text. Zondervan absolutely should remove this text from sale until these errors are fixed, and in fact should send an apology to the readers who bought this text to begin with. I've never been very impressed with Zondervan as a corporation, so I doubt they'll do that.