Last week the New International Version (NIV) of the Bible announced plans for its 2011 translation, and it’s gotten a good amount of attention for a book that’s been around for hundreds and hundreds of years. That’s because the new version features a slew of changes with regard to pronouns, seeking a more gender-neutral approach that many evangelical organizations are denouncing.
It’s not like God is becoming a “Mother” or a “Being” anytime soon—that would be far too revolutionary for the NIV to even consider—but in text that refers to all people, gender-neutral pronouns are used instead, which often means replacing “he” with “he or she” or “a person” and adding “sister” where “brother” also appears.
For example, whereas Mark 1:17 used to read, “And Jesus said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make become fishers of men,’” the new version reads, “‘Come follow me,’ Jesus said. ‘And I will send you out to fish for people.’”
OK, so maybe that revision in particular lacks the nice ring that it used to have. But overall, I think it’s a step in the right direction for the Bible and the traditionally patriarchal Christian religions. It’s also an interesting discussion for the broader population about yielding to the masculine whenever a gender is unknown. That’s been a debate for years—whether it’s deeply sexist or simply not a big deal—but the NIV 2011’s decision is another important public body passively advocating for greater inclusion in the language.
The Committee on Bible Translations, which made the changes, seems to have a pretty cool process, and what’s even better is that it’s all spelled out on their site, lending an important level of transparency. Once a year, the biblical scholars behind the NIV meet to discuss language approaches within the religion and how modern changes in the English language or vocabulary should be reflected in the Bible. They’ve been meeting since 1965 and make broad changes every few years, although the 2011 version features the most sweeping changes since 1984.
Their FAQ on the website explains further about their reasons for the revisions:
Our mandate under the NIV charter is to maintain the NIV as an articulation of God’s unchanging Word in contemporary English. To the extent that gender-inclusive language is an established part of contemporary English and that its use enhances comprehension for readers, it clearly was an important factor in the decisions we made.
70 percent of the 15 committee members present at the time of voting need to approve any textual changes to the Bible, and about 75 25 percent of the changes made for the 2011 version compared with the 1984 version are gender-related.
Other publishers of Bible editions have similar revision processes to account for shifts in connotation or definition. For example, this year “booty” was removed from the new translation of the New American Bible, which replaced the word with the phrasing “spoils” of war—I’m guessing it’s been a losing battle against congregations’ snickers ever since Beyoncé and Destiny’s Child staked their claim to that word back in 2001.
The NIV’s new translations in particular have upset some evangelical Christians, including the Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood, a group that feels women at home “intelligently are to submit to the leadership of their husbands.” The organization has written extensively on the subject before, and their thoughts on NIV 2011 don’t stray too far from those other writings: gender-neutral language distances Christians from the text, mars the meaning, and should be avoided.
So what should win out? The traditions inherent in the Bible’s age-old text? Or considerations about language trends we see in our modern world? And is anyone else surprised by how progressive these gender-related decisions are?
—Photo AP
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HOW MANY PEOPLE WOULD YOU LIKE TO READ THE BIBLE? HOW MANY PEOPLE WOULD YOU LIKE EXPOSED TO THE WORD? HOW MANY PEOPLE WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE IN CHURCH? HOW MANY PEOPLE WOULD YOU LIKE TO SEE FOLLOW THE WORD??? Since I am guessing quite a few – more than are doing these things right now, then this new NIV is a God-send to THOUSANDS of, INCLUDING ME!!! For what it is worth, there is at least one more person willing to read the Bible and participate in a Bible Study – due to this book that is newly… Read more »
For me the main issue of the gender neutral bible is the question Is it acceptable to translate only the general idea of a passage and sytematically omit male-orientated detals of meanings that are present in the original Hebrew or Greek text? The practical outworking of such translation practice is that the following are omitted, father, son, brother, man, he/him/his and substituted with other words/terms. Even, if they are there in the original language. Does this matter? you might ask. Below is an example of such a change. The 1984 NIV renders 1Cor. 14:28 ‘If ther is no interpreter, the… Read more »
Online Article…
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If I can add my 2 cents’ worth, apropos this discussion, to provide a lead-in to the main point, what do we make of the NT renditions of the following: # David Stern, Jewish New Testament, 1989. ISBN 9653590030. # Heinz W Cassirer, God’s New Covenant, 1989. ISBN 0-8028-3673-9. Both these renditions sought to present the NT in a manner that avoided, or at least sought to diminish the Pauline-Imperial Church’s Anti-Semitism and anti-Torah stance ever since the days of Marcion – especially in that doubtfully canonical book: Galatians. Had Paul not been prodded by the Jacobite Jerusalem-Central Church to… Read more »
As someone who’s worked in Christian publishing for many years, let me shed some light on Bible translations. First, Christian publishers know that if they produce a new version, people will buy it. Putting it bluntly, Bibles are profitable, and even though older versions continue to sell, there is always a rush for people to get the latest version. Second, the pretext for doing new versions is to make the Bible more accessible to contemporary readers. That is nonsense, although, to be fair, I think the various translators/revisers probably believe this. Obviously if you gather several Bible scholars in a… Read more »
The article said: “…about 75 percent of the changes made for the 2011 version compared with the 1984 version are gender-related…” But the article has its facts backwards. Only 25% of the changes are because of Gender Inclusive Language. The other 75% is because the translators thought that a verse could be worded better or because of improvements in our knowledge of the Biblical world and the Biblical languages–hence changes to verses like Malachi 2:16, 1 Corinthians 7:27, and Philemon 6 (changes not related to gender but instead due to advances in Biblical Studies). The NIV 2011 is about 85%… Read more »
Tyler, you’re right. The correct numbers are that 75 percent of changes were unrelated to gender, 25 percent were. My apologies for the inaccuracy.
This politically correct ploy is out of harmony with the spirit of authenticity and totally unneeded. Shame on the perpetrators.
This book that many people call The Bible has been translated and re-translated and added to and subtracted from for centuries. There has never been one original unchanged version, ever. As far as the New Testament goes, none of that was written within the lifetime of the figure who becomes known as Jesus. It was first standardized at all in the 300’s AD. And, the gender norms that people think of as ancient and traditional often change over time. Among the early Christian movements women had a pretty prominent role, minimized by later male Church leaders. (And, no, this isn’t… Read more »
I don’t really like this, because the Bible is almost a historical document practically dictating what people thought and how they lived back then. It’s also a piece of literature, and doing this is like the whole Huck Finn debacle. To use gender-neutral pronouns is to completely erase women were ever considered inferior back then.
Mostly I just find it odd that people want to make a fundamentalist reading…of a translated text…agreed upon by committee. The fact that the preferred text– the King James– is so politically charged that it actually has the guy who commissioned the propaganda piece’s NAME in it…that is just gravy. I like the KJV for the poetry of the translation, but translating a text explicitly requires judgment calls. Gender neutral terms is a reasonable call.
I find this rather silly. Here we have students in high schools and colleges struggling to understand Shakespeare, but no one would dare alter a letter of those texts no matter how outdated the language. However, because a handful of progressive liberals consider the Bible sexist, people alter the text to make God, Jesus, Jesus’ words and so on gender-neutral. This reminds me of how several years ago DC comics changed a line in Green Lantern’s oath from ‘blackest night’ to ‘darkest night’ because they thought some people might think the original line was racist. The Biblical text is many… Read more »
Accuracy in translation isn’t easy– it isn’t pat, there isn’t a “right” way to do it.
Good point about Shakespeare Jacobtk.
good point.
There are many Bibles out there that are written for men, women, teens..etc etc. If people think this version of the Bible will help them, then great. However, the original Bible, the age-old text, already is gender neutral . When God uses the word “man”, it’s not a commentary on sexism. When we start to mess around too much with old-age texts, like the Bible or other texts, it’s like that game of telephone where the message starts to change. We start to loose the context of things from a period that we won’t ever be able to revisit unless… Read more »