PURPOSE

The purpose of this two-part (1) sequence of documents is to dismount another technique that is often used to disfigure people's faith - whichever the faith of their choice may be.

We have touched on one facet of this danger in earlier documents (2) ; now we will identify the other, and far more dangerous, facet: the technique used by those who, quoting the Holy Scriptures: (a) justify just about any criminal act "in the Name of God"; and (b) "can show" that there are key contradictions in them thus "proving" the inherent "unreliability" of Scriptures.

Why is this so important? Unfortunately men have been erroneously taught to place their faith in either an institution or in a book instead of placing their faith and entire trust in God. (3) The institution and book are the instruments to develop, and help place and strengthen our faith in God; they are not to become the object of our faith. When the faith is not based on God, all the unbelievers have to do is to discredit the "institution" (4) and prove the "book" wrong (5). Once that is done, the little faith man has will simply vanish away.


INTRODUCTION

How are we going to accomplish this? Precisely using their same techniques, but in reverse. We will point out apparent errors in the Holy Scriptures and other religious texts and show that they are not really errors, even though they may appear as such to the average under Evangelized individual.

Do not, O Christians, make the mistake of thinking: "That would never happen to me!" Jesus Himself warned us that:


Should you doubt those words, then listen to what M. Gorbachev complains about. (6) As we have said many times, even the evil ones have to serve God!

This will not be an exhaustive study of the issue at hand. That would generate unnecessary volumes upon volumes of examples. Through Parts I and II of this document, we shall only utilize a few examples to illustrate the point, and to underscore the importance of continually seeking the Guidance of the Holy Spirit in the understanding, interpretation and application of the Holy Scriptures and other religious texts.


DETAILS

There are several reasons why the Holy Scriptures and lesser religious texts may appear contradictory or outright wrong.


Let us now take one category at a time...


(a) The adjustment of a communication from God to the intellectual and development level of the recipients of the communication at a particular point in time is difficult.



(b) The translation of the Judeo-Christian Holy Scriptures.


An interesting exercise to illustrate this point is to have a native Portuguese and a native Brazilian who are fluent in English (but not intimately familiar with, say, the US culture) translate a brief text in Portuguese to American English and to King's English. The four documents will convey different imagery and inaccuracies.

Do the same with a representative of all Spanish speaking countries in Latin America and Spain and you will have a menagerie of images conveying the message and many of them will deviate greatly from the concept contained in the original US English version of the text.

When, to this dimension, we add thousands upon thousands of years of cultural and linguistic evolution and the ever evolving archeological interpretation and re-interpretations of those past cultures, one must be very careful in not placing too much weight in the meaning of certain isolated words or statements.

In addition to all of that, there is yet another dimension to be concerned about: The spiritual dimension of the concept being transmitted.

It is totally possible to translate a spiritual text from, say, English to Portuguese and convey the exact same spiritual message, while the mechanical translation of said text, even taking into account the cultural coloring of both languages today, would appear totally wrong. The reverse is also true.

In many cases the errors are simply out of ignorance and the poor spiritual illumination of those who study to be theologians, but do not know God, or those who study to be shepherds and who do not know God either. The "knowledge of God" (that is, intimate communion with God) is the foundation of all knowledge. With the exception of Paul of Tarsus, most of those selected by Jesus were uneducated men (i.e., culturally and religiously ignorant), but it was through their intimate communion with Him that the foundation of Christian knowledge was laid.


An example of a translation problem

Let us review the various versions of Colossians 1: 24 and compare them with its true translation:


The overall impression is that Christ's suffering was incomplete. His passion, crucifixion and death just was not sufficient suffering - just "did not quite make it" - and Paul has now to "make up the difference." This concept/translation is somewhere between blasphemy and heresy. However, in the most accurate translation of the original texts that we have found found we read:


As the reader can easily see, the suffering that was lacking was not Christ's suffering but His suffering manifested in Paul's flesh for the benefit of Christ's Body, the Church. This is a tremendous difference from all other man centered versions.

No Biblical error. Paul did not make a mistake either - it was simply that it did not occur to the translators, except to Msgr. Straubinger, that all that is Christ and of Christ was, is and will ever be perfect and no man can even think of making up something that Christ lacked, except, of course, Mr. and Mrs. Moon (7) who seem to be the latest version of the Antichrist and claim to be making up Christ's incomplete mission. But that is another story altogether; a story well covered in False Dawn (8).

Many, many other apparent errors could be brought to light but we are only trying to show one or two examples of each category.


(c) The Holy Scriptures show only "window shots" of events that were continually evolving.

There are Biblical passages where we may find outright (apparent) contradictions and those are used in many cases to prove that the Holy Scriptures cannot be trusted. What is being forgotten is that the events that we are reading about are on-going. One individual may say "yes" in one of the Gospels and then say "no" in another of the Gospels. Was the time exactly the same? No. You may agree with us now and ten minutes later you may not - that does not show incoherence, that show that the circumstances were different ten minutes apart.


An example of such - "window shot" - problem


Incoherence? No. Both thieves could have been indeed mocking Him as we read in Matthew 27:38-44 until one of them was awe struck by Jesus' demeanor, even in such condition, and had a conversion upon which he then did say what we read in Luke 23: 39-42.

One "instant" before miguel de Portugal's flash conversion, he was supernaturally seeking ways to force a decadent life upon himself, and was unaware of what was about to happen. In the instant after the flash conversion, what he had been seeking was no longer important or of interest. It was immediately discarded since his priorities had been instantaneously changed. If one would report the "instant before" and the "instant after" there would appear to be total incoherence, unless one knew what happened in between.

As the Biblical example shown above - there are many more situations which only reflect a report at two different "windows of time" and do not reflect errors in the Holy Scriptures.


(d) The interpretation of the Holy Scriptures hinges on the social and religious customs of the area and the time in question.

To translate ancient texts one must understand the social and religious customs of the time in question lest the translation of the Word of God becomes a vehicle of perdition.

An example of the consequences of ignoring customs at the time in question


This passage has obviously given headaches to many non spiritual translators and shepherds. We could see this passage being grossly misinterpreted since a question would come (or brought) up - without a doubt - regarding the two men in a bed: Obviously one was in the "wrong position" and was left but the other was in the "right position" and was taken. The reader may use his/her imagination to see how much disinformation could be squeezed out of this monumental error.

Dr. Straubinger was the only one that we found (in five languages) that had the correct translation:


"Elementary, my dear Watson" - as Sherlock Homes would say. In spite of Da Vinci's Last Supper, dining tables as we know them now did not exist then. There were more like very low platforms and men reclined by them while eating the food placed on those low platforms.

Someone mistranslated "reclining" to "lying", ignored the fact that it was a food related scene [women would be grinding grain (logically in the kitchen) and men working (cultivating) in the field] and added the "bed" because there is in a bed where one normally lies these days - and Presto! a major translation error which most Bibles have and about which we have the sinking feeling that has been (and continues to be) used for the justification of improper behavior/acts.

Once again, errors of this type abound from the many non spiritual and culturally impoverished translators.


(e) Many other religious texts which become "Holy Reference Points" for the faithful because:


We will just cite a few of these without categorizing them. The reader should be able to do so on his/her own.

Example No. 1


Example No. 2


Example No. 3


Example No. 4


Example No. 5


Example No. 6


Example No. 7


Example No. 8


Amongst the many less than fortunate statements made by men and women honored by the Roman Catholic Church, there are also many true gems. This is just another example of the absolute need to make the Holy Spirit of God an integral part of our daily lives since amongst the fine wheat there is is much chaff - both sowed by the same sower. With the Light of the Holy Spirit of God we can easily separate the wheat from the chaff without falling in grave sin just because St. So and So said it!

It is Jesus and Mary Whom to Whom we must look for examples to emulate and not the Saints. The Saints are to be examples and reminders that "For man all is possible with God", but they are never, ever, to replace Divine Wisdom and much less take the place of image of God that we must strive to emulate!

(iv) The original Greek texts upon which the New Testament are based were lost long ago. This will be covered in Part II of this document - but "dark" as it may appear, it has a "happy and faith building conclusion".


IN CONCLUSION

Biblical literalism or symbolism? It is both; it just depends on the circumstances. With an intimate relationship with God we will be able to sail through the End of These Times with a minimum of errors and difficulties, remembering the admonishment from Our Lord Jesus Christ:













En Español:  Interpretación Bíblica Literal o Simbólica - Parte I

Published on June 24, 2005 - Feast of the Birth of John the Baptist • Reviewed and Confirmed on July 14, 2009