Today in my sociology class, we were discussing religion and the subject of the Conservative Bible came up. The Conservative Bible is an attempt by the far right to eliminate liberal translations of the Bible. Their hope is to create a translation of the Bible that fulfills the following 10 guidelines:
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 modern emasculation of Christianity
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[3]
4. Utilize Powerful Conservative Terms: using powerful new conservative terms to capture better the original intent;[4] 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";[5] 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."
This alarms me for a number of reasons. The idea of translating the Bible to "remove liberal bias" threatens to make the text impure and will also tend to breed hate and narrow-mindedness. A society can not function when it falls to either extreme, and if such an extreme group gains too much support, it threatens the ability of society to progress. Also, this type of ideal encourages ignorance, and it is frightening to think that our society might one day become more ignorant than it already is. We are in an age now where we need to be opening our minds and expanding our ideals, not attempting to limit ourselves. Such extremist groups threaten the credibility of all religious groups. If you want to know more about them, I highly recommend visiting their website: http://conservapedia.com/Conservative_Bible_Project
Conservative Bible
By lennon12 - Posted on October 19th, 2009



It's easier to take the Bible literally when it says what you want it to.
The fact that this is even going on right now should make people wonder if men maybe did actually write the words in the books of the Bible. But people won't actually consider that. God wrote it and now men are wanting to do some, no doubt, heavenly inspired editing.
"What a crazy random happenstance!"
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There is a long history of ideological sects re-writing the bible so that it better supports their pet positions. The catholics did it first, and called it "canonization." To quote one of my favorites...
TTFN,
Blackout
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Like lennon12 said, a society can't function when it falls to either extreme (in this case, conservative or liberal). The fall of most great nations can be attributed to an internal divide. When I see this kind of Idealism impressed on a book as influential as the Bible, I have to ask: Is this just another step down that road?