How the bible is translated

Translating from one language to another can get complicated. It is not a simple matter of a word for word translation, because there are shades of meaning of words, and at times it can be hard to find the right word in another language.

The bible was originally written in Greek and Hebrew. We have very ancient texts from which to translate. There are not many real problems in translation, but there is a sentence here and there that is hard to translate.

There are a few different theories of translation, or perhaps I should say methods. One is to attempt a word for word translation. This can be hard to read, and from Greek you can get close but it is very hard. In Greek word order is not important at all. Or .. In Greek word order no difference makes.  If you did an actual word for word translation in the same order, most sentences would make no sense. But still it is possible to get pretty close to a word for word type translation. The NASB does this, and some other translations do
as well.

Another theory is that the meaning is what matters more than the literal words. In this case translators try to translate thought for thought, instead of word for word. This may not be as technically accurate, but it does make the meaning more clear at times. It is often easier to read as well. The NIV is a good example of this type of translation.

A third way is the paraphrase, which is not really a translation at all. A paraphrase just puts it in other words. There is little thought given to technical accuracy and the attempt is to just put the meaning into words the reader can understand. The Living Bible and the Message are good examples of this type of work.

Even in saying this, there is a little bit of all three in any translation.  Now technical accuracy is important, but keep in mind, that the important thing is that the reader understand what is written.. If you are technically accurate, but no one can understand it, it is not worth much.

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Does the Bible say how old the Earth is?

Just how old is the earth? Did it evolve over billions of years, or was it created in seven days about 6,000 years ago?

There are Christians, and others, who hold to a “young Earth” theory, believing that it could be as “young” as 6,000 years. Most Christians do not believe this. Another idea out there is that the Earth is eternal, without beginning or end as a huge chunk of matter floating in space.
There are scientific estimates of the age of the earth, but when you are talking billions of years, or even millions, it’s hard to have any level of certainty. And is it not also possible that there could have been previous civilizations that we do not even know about?
I will admit that I do not know how old the Earth is. I have no idea, and don’t care all that much really.
But I have studied the Bible for years, and I can say with a fair amount of certainty, that the Bible does not say how old the Earth is, or even how long it took to create.
The Bible is a holy book (actually a collection of many books) to a lot of people, and it contains many answers to many questions. But there are questions it does not answer. There are times when it just doesn’t say. The problem arises when people try to make it say something that it does not really say.
We also need to realize that there are different types of literature in the Bible. The Psalms, for instance, are poetry, and should be read as poetry. Also especially in Hebrew writing, which nearly all of the Old Testament was written in, there were certain styles of writing and ways of saying things. Often they would tell a story in a general way, and then repeat it in a more specific way.
This is the case with the creation story. The general creation story is told in Genesis, and then the story is told about the first people.
There is also an issue of translation. When Genesis lays out six days of creation, we see that in English and think it was a week. That could be, but it is also just as possible that the “days” are a literary device used to frame the story. The Hebrew word translated “day” in most English bibles could just as easily be translated time, or period of time.
So we can say we do not know how long creation took, and therefore we do not know the age of the Earth. There is nothing wrong in saying we do not know, and in saying the Bible does not say.
At some point in history, someone wanted to know how old the Earth was, and they went to the bible and found a way to interpret it to a certain number of years. We do know that Abraham lived around 2100-2400 b.c., and some scholars say less than that. We know that Jesus lived about 2000 years ago. Beyond that, we really do not know.
The Bible does give genealogies, so and so begat so and so and those lists are long. There are a few of them here and there, but a careful examination shows that they obviously left out some generations. In Hebrew your ancestors are your ancestors. Whether that be your father, or your ancestor of 200 years ago, he would be called your father. Even in the New Testament period, they still referred to Abraham as Father Abraham. The point is, the genealogies were used to show a relationship, not to detail every generation from one generation to the other.
Even so, the genealogies were used to figure out a young date for the Earth, but a plain reading of the text, and understanding the language and culture, shows that it really doesn’t say.
I don’t think it helps the idea of credibility of the scriptures to make it say something it does not say. The point of the Bible is not to tell us history. The point of the Bible is to show us who God is. There is some history here and there, but only as it relates to telling us about God. Whether that history is exactly accurate is not even relevant to me.
There is a little information about science, geography and other areas, but those details are not the point.
As you read the scriptures do not miss the message, or the forest for the trees.