People I read a Serbian Orthodox Bible, not written in English we are not Italian or Latin based language and do not use Roman Numerals. Which is why I am doing this
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Our language is Cyrillic and comes from the Greek alphabet and our Bible came from the Greeks as well.
For many centuries we did not have a written language. We did come to Christ in the early days of the First Church through Word of Mouth teaching. For many centuries it was a tradition that men who were learned in the Bible would go from village to village where people were often illiterate and they would verbally teach the villagers about Jesus and the Bible. Some would read out the scriptures, some would give sermons and others would testify as to what God did for them or give the testimonies of other people known by the villagers.
It wasn't until after World War 2 (WW2) that my parents country ended up with education available throughout their nation. Many of my parent age only learned to basically read and write as adults after WW2. So many couldn't read their own Bible for themselves. Only in the past 60 years with the increase in literacy do we see updated versions of the Bible and a version provided by the Bible Society.
Of course the Old Tradition of men going from Village to Village teaching from the Bible ceased not because of literacy but communism that came with World War 2.
God has had to be faithful to my parent's countrymen all the time they were without literacy to ensure His message reached those who did not have the skill to read a Bible or did not have the money to buy one.
We take for granted that people have had a Bible who lived long before us and we also take for granted they were literate enough to read one.
That is why Bible version arguments really make me laugh. To start off with where was the King James Bible all those years but in the land of England and we know many in England couldn't read back then either, so the influence of the written Word of God and it's accuracy was really a problem for a very small number of people living in England. What about the rest of the World? I come from beyond the sphere of England who only reigned for a short while over many nations overseas. English is not my first language even though I was born in Australia.
So God was only in England giving an accurate version of His Word to some literate nobles. What was the rest of the world doing while God was only concerning Himself with this King James Bible? If you think about it in that way you would understand how ludicrous the argument for a "only the King James version is the perfect Word of God". God has not forsaken every other country that is non-English speaking and illiterate to the max to give one lot of people in this world an accurate Bible.
While the King James grew out of the Latin Vulgate and transformed itself from one form of English to another over the centuries, elsewhere God was ensuring people of the world heard His gospel message wether by Oration or through some written means.
I learned to read in Serbian(as a child) because my parents insisted we retained their language and culture. My skills to read a Serbian Bible in Old Slavonic (in my early days as a Christian) were not good enough. I took Russian at University as a general studies subject to increase my ability to read in the Slavic language as Russian was closer to the Slavonic(used in my parents Bible) than modern day Serbian. I did this so I could read the Serbian Bible to my grandparents and several aunties who were all illiterate or did not know enough English. I have used the Serbian Bible(found a couple of more modern versions over the years) until recently as these family members have all passed away now. It has been a very useful skill to have as I have witnessed to my family through God's Word and given them a gospel from a source they would believe. BTW these family members have given their hearts to Jesus and they have all repented with me and received Christ (only God knows the actual heart of each person but I know they did so willingly and sincerely).
I can't find my most recent version but the Serbian Bible I have at the moment on my desk (Septugint based translation) simply states it was published in 1974. I'm sure some one else in the family has the more modern version.
So yes back to my original point, Roman Numerals are part of English because you have a Latin based language. We don't use them and so we only use dates and version numbers as standard digits (you know 0,1,2, 3 etc). So to say you use a LXX means nothing to me as I do not have an English version of the Septuagint.
I am fortunate having a recent Southern European background that it gives me a perspective beyond just the English background which influenced the education of Australians here and other colonies of England. So I see things differently than those who only have English as their heritage and language. My view of the world & it's history comes from a couple of angles not just one.
So people you have to realise that not all of us are English only. Some of us come from beyond the sphere of an English Heritage and we do from time to time have a
"what are you talking" about moment. I still think in Serbian first. My hubby is from a mixed English background and I on occassion use either a Serbian phrase or sentence with him. When I see he is looking at me like
I realise I've done it again and repeat in English.
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Re: The Lying Paraphrased Bibles
Originally Posted by Hannah
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Amazing God's faithfulness was shown in providing his word through people, God sure can work beyond the written word, languages and countries...Acts is quite the testament to that i.e. the apostles speaking in other languages they had never previously studied.
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(Not that there would be anything wrong with that—it is a very good translation. My point, of course, is that it really does not matter. ALL good translations are exactly as has been said by many people above: good translations.
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