Galen Smith Retired from Multnomah Bible College and Biblical Seminary

The official title of this translation is "The Bible: A New Translation," but it is often simply called The Moffatt Bible. James A. R. Moffatt was a British scholar who published his New Testament in 1922, the Old Testament in 1926, and then a revision of both in 1935.

Moffatt used the Masoretic text as the basis of his Old Testament, and the Greek New Testament of H. Van Soden as the primary basis of his New Testament translation.

The translation reads in a fairly colloquial style, which has kept it popular enough to maintain being in print for nearly a century.

Perhaps its greatest weakness is its propensity for rearranging the text in certain places simply on the basis of logical inference, with no manuscript basis at all. Such textual emendations should only be used when the manuscript support is uncertain, and the reading of the text as it stands makes little sense at all. When used, such emendations should be noted. Because of this practice, I would not recommend this as the only English translation a believer should use, though I own a copy and do consult it at times.

The issue concerning the ending of Mark's gospel is often disputed. The basic facts are that the earliest and most important manuscripts of Mark's gospel end with Mark 16:8. That ending is quite abrupt, and so many scholars believe the original ending to Mark's gospel was lost. There are two endings that were composed later to try to give a better ending to the gospel. These are commonly referred to as the long ending and the short ending. The longer ending is better known and has better manuscript support than the shorter ending, and is normally printed in translations of the gospel, but often with footnotes telling of its weak manuscript basis. Some consider the longer ending to contain some doctrinal irregularities. The shorter ending does not have the doctrinal issues of the longer ending, but it has even weaker manuscript support. Entire books have been written defending each view of the ending of Mark. I would guess that there may even be more complete answers to this matter somewhere on this website.

March 06 2015 • 0 responses • Vote Up • Share • Report