Proverbs 14:32, How Translators Can Pervert Scripture!
September 2, Proverbs 14:32
Acts 7:54-60; 2 Cor. 1:9; 5:8 “Ye shall not add unto the word, neither shall ye diminish ought from it” (Dt. 4:2).
How Translators Can Pervert Scripture!
The faith that justified Abraham was the same faith that justified Paul. Likewise, the true saints under the Old Covenant, lived on the sincere milk of the Word, and were nourished thereby, whatever the measure of their grasp of the fullness of its truth was. In more recent times, many individuals boasted, and denominations claimed, that their creeds were based on the Bible alone. Sadly, their practice does not support many of those claims. What Satan began with, Yea, hath God said, is now, for many, Yea, God has not said!
3. The Plot Explained: The change from death was because the critics believed it to teach a too advanced view, for the O.T., of the doctrine of life-after-death! It is true that the fuller light about the after-life comes in the N.T., but one Testament does not teach something different or contrary to the other. Bridges comments in a footnote as follows, “Does not this text clearly prove that, while ‘life and immortality were brought to light by the gospel’ (2 Tm.1:10), the dawn of the day beamed on the Old Testament saints? What could this hope of the righteous be, but the consummating purpose of the Gospel?” He also quotes a learned German critic’s comment, in the same footnote, “A splendid testimony of the knowledge of the Old Testament believer in a future life. The wicked in this calamity is agitated with the greatest terror. He knows not where to turn. But the godly in this last evil has no fear. He knows to whom to flee, and where he is going.” So much for the assumed too advanced view of the after-life to justify the word change.
4. The Plot Exploded: Even Kidner warns not to discard the Hebrew text here because of its supposed too advanced view of the after-life. Do we not catch glimpses of the future-life in Job, for instance? “Man dies and where is he? If a man die shall he live again?” asks Job (13:10, 15). All seemed to fail him (19:14), but then there is a cry of triumph (25, 26) almost equal to that of Paul when he shouts I know that my redeemer liveth… and I shall see God! Perowne says, “The same vivid contrast meets us in a more expanded form in Psalm 73.” There the prosperity of the wicked contrasts with the suffering of the righteous. How can God be just and allow this state of things to continue (vs.1-16)? Suddenly the scene changes to the Sanctuary of God (17). It is there the true state of things appears. Then understood I their end,-the end of both wicked and godly! Thou hast set them in slippery places. How are they brought into desolation in a moment! They are utterly consumed with terrors (18,19). Yet the righteous hath hope in his death. Thou shalt guide me with thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory (24). In both Ps. 49:15 and 73:24 the same word in Hebrew expresses the hope of the Psalmist (receive, take). Then go way back to the Book of Genesis (5:24) and notice that this is the very same word used to describe the translation of Enoch!
Thought: “Some men’s principles follow their interests!”
Prayer: Help me to rightly handle the Word of Truth.