At least not if you can avoid it. Why? Simple. Apple’s pricing will cost you. For example, Mellel currently costs $41.99 AUD on the App Store. The non-App Store price is $39.00 USD. Now that the Australian dollar is worth more than the US, buying it direct works out to something like $37.00.
Unfortunately, while iOS App Store suffers the same disparity, it is more difficult to get around the Apple version of the exchange rate.
Image via Wikipedia
OK, that’s just a catchy title for this post, but let me explain the issue I want to highlight. There are great debates about which translation methodology is best all over the web (including on this very blog, see here and here). Is a literal “formal equivalent” translation better, or is a “dynamic equivalent” translation better? Or perhaps even a foreignising translation! What is generally lacking, however, is an examination of whether a particular translation methodology is endorsed in Scripture itself.
The Christian Bible, uniquely among religious books, does actually tell us something about translation. The reason is that the NT was written in Greek while the OT was written in Hebrew and Aramaic, and the NT quotes the OT in translation. This means that it is possible to analyse the type of translation methodology which finds approval in the NT. This, in turn, may allow us to draw some inferences about modern translation methodologies and how appropriate they are!
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The Australian media has started picking up the story of the lead codices which purportedly relate to early Christianity. Since the media coverage is typically inadequate (Adam Spencer on ABC local radio in Sydney this morning certainly didn’t offer a particularly probing interview of David Elkington), I’m just offering a link to a more detailed discussion which itself contains more links for anyone interested in the “discovery.”
In short, there are good grounds to be sceptical of the authenticity, and even if authentic, there are grounds for doubting their relevance for our understanding of early Christianity. The find has to be subject to far more rigorous scrutiny than it has thus far.
Anyway, for more, read here.
Let me begin with a warning. What I’m about to suggest is probably to be perceived as sacrilegious to many and tantamount to heresy.
I have lost count of the number of times I’ve heard/read/been told that children are only and always a blessing in the Bible. The assertion is frequently made, but rarely demonstrated. The statement gives the impression that the Bible is full of affirmations of the blessings associated with children.
When pushed, however, the number of references provided is very small. In fact, people usually turn to Psalm 127 and are hard pressed to offer further substantiation for the claim (so the “only and always a blessing” starts to sound somewhat hyperbolic). But does Psalm 127 really say quite as much as is often claimed for it? I think not!
Let’s take a look at the Psalm:
|
שיר המעלות לשלמה
אם יהוה לא יבנה הנה נחלת יהוה בנים |
A song of ascents. This is Solomon’s.
1If Yhwh does not build a house, |
(b) The term שכר can mean “wages” but points to a reward in a tangible, material sense. The sons born will bring material well-being.
(c) The expression בני הנעורים, translated “sons of [one's] youth” implies that the particular blessing of sons is associated with those born while the parent (father) is relatively young. The implication is that when the father is old, his sons are old enough to help him. The focus is on what they can do for the parent in a tangible way, not in some intangible, feel-good manner.
(d) It is interesting to ponder a minor emendation in verse 5b:
לא יבוש כי ידברו את אויבים בשער
i.e. change יבשו to יבוש and read “he [the father] will not be ashamed when they [the sons] argue with their [the family's] enemies at the gate.” There’s no support for such a change in the DSS nor in the LXX, and the unaltered reading does make sense as well, indicating that the sons will prevail in legal disputes (presumably by weight of numbers). OTOH, the emended reading implies that the father’s honour stands unchallenged through the actions of his sons. This perhaps fits better with the thrust of the preceding verses.
What is clear about this Psalm, however, is that its view of children as a blessing is heavily culturally conditioned. For one, the focus appears squarely to sit on “sons” not children (see the note in the NET Bible on this point).
Second, that they are a blessing is founded on a couple of caveats — their value is greater if the father is young. This is likely to be a cultural consideration because once the father is older his sons will themselves be of sufficient age to support him rather than need to be supported by him. This is reinforced by verse 5 where the value of these sons of one’s youth is tied to their ability to contend for the family in disputes at the city gate (in the modern world you’d probably be better off hiring a good lawyer).
Ultimately, if you want to argue that children are always a blessing, this is not the text for you. The strongest argument for seeing all children as a blessing is to be found in Gen 1:28 where God’s blessing is linked to filling the land.
What is more, the claim that children are only and always a blessing is further undermined when we look at what is said about children in the book of Proverbs. For example:
Prov 17:25
A foolish son is grief to his father,
and bitterness to her who bore him!
Prov 19:13a
A foolish son brings destruction to his father.
Furthermore, Proverbs implies that children are born without wisdom and hence need training to make them wise:
Prov 22:15
Folly is bound to a child’s mind,
A rod of discipline will remove it from him.
(See also Prov 13:24; 15:5; etc.)
Then it would also be helpful to explain how Absolom was a blessing to David (2Sam 15–16).
Finally, the transition from OT to NT presents another consideration: do Jesus’ words about families (e.g. Matt 12:46–50) suggest that the same consolation found in sons in Israel (and Ps 127 implies the blessing comes from adult sons, not toddlers or infants!) can now be found in our relationships within the people of God? Was a large family seen as a blessing because it meant the growth of God’s people? If so, the NT offers a different perspective where all can become children of Abraham. In the OT, becoming a “great and numerous people” was a sign of God’s blessing, and this was largely achieved through reproductive means. In the NT, the expansion of God’s people is through evangelism: not once in the NT is having children described as a blessing although many other things are so described. The categories do change.
Unless you’ve been hiding away you’re probably aware that the King James Version of the Bible is now 400 years old. People everywhere are making comment on this fact and offering observations and well-considered thoughts. In many respects it is remarkable how well the translation has stood the test of time, but it does nonetheless show its age. One manifestation of its age lies in portions within the text which, to the contemporary reader, don’t quite sound quite as they perhaps ought to have.
Here are a couple of examples:
Acts 5:1-6
1 But a certain man named Ananias, with Sapphira his wife, sold a possession, 2 And kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part, and laid it at the apostles’ feet. 3 But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost, and to keep back part of the price of the land? 4 Whiles it remained, was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart? thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God. 5 And Ananias hearing these words fell down, and gave up the ghost: and great fear came on all them that heard these things. 6 And the young men arose, wound him up, and carried him out, and buried him.
That’s right. Some theologians like to say that God gave us free will, he did not make us mindless automata, but here’s evidence to the contrary: Ananias was a wind-up man!
Ezek 43:11
And if they be ashamed of all that they have done, shew them the form of the house, and the fashion thereof, and the goings out thereof, and the comings in thereof, and all the forms thereof, and all the ordinances thereof, and all the forms thereof, and all the laws thereof: and write it in their sight, that they may keep the whole form thereof, and all the ordinances thereof, and do them.
As far as I can tell, that’s the verse with the greatest abundance of thereofs of any in the entire KJV.
Mellel is a word processor for Mac OS X which handles multi-lingual texts rather more effectively than most of the available alternatives. The latest version, 2.8, was released a few days ago. That update includes a powerful new “track changes” option. However, Mellel is in need of a cosmetic makeover, its brushed aluminium appearance and buttons are very much showing their age.
It is possible to go some way towards addressing this issue. My attempt has resulted in this:
To achieve this, download this file, unzip it, and copy the resultant directory’s contents into the Resources of the Mellel application (right-click on Mellel, choose Show Package Contents, then go into Contents, Resources). The images in the ZIPped folder should overwrite the Mellel versions and, next time you launch Mellel, you get the updated appearance!
As always, make a copy of the Mellel app before you mess with the Package Contents!
Many readers of Genesis 1 have noted that day and night exist before the record of the creation of the sun in Gen 1:14. This has been met with numerous imaginative attempts to account for this apparent discrepancy between the Genesis account and a modern scientific understanding of the universe.
The new year has arrived and the smoke from the fireworks has cleared (mostly). I am over fireworks, they just don’t get me excited any more.
On the positive front, however, there has been great anticipation over the arrival of Accordance for iOS and it has finally appeared. I have not, to this point, felt that there has been any app available which would make an iPad a particularly compelling purchase, but perhaps this will be it (of course now I’d be rather inclined to await iPad version 2).
If you’re an Accordance user with an iPhone, iPod, or iPad, you really ought to get this app. After only a brief play it makes sophisticated searches much easier than the other iPhone Bible software I’ve tried.
Yes, that time of year has once again arrived, and so it is time to remind all and sundry to investigate The Crimes of Santa Claus.
CBMW (an organisation which stridently opposed the TNIV) has posted a preliminary evaluation of the 2011 NIV. Unsurprisingly they conclude that “we still cannot commend the new NIV(2011) for most of the same reasons we could not commend the TNIV.” However, I think there are a number of problems with their analysis which I’d like to raise here in order to provide a little perspective.
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