Talk:Bible translations into English

"Official" Versions

It may be interesting for some people to know which translation is officially recognized in various Christian (and Jewish) denominations (this means those translations that are used in liturgy etc.) Does anybody know more about that? 62.46.196.160

There is no such thing as an "officially recognized" modern Jewish translation of the Bible, nor could there possibly be. In the template being created now for Christian translations there is a place to note which demonination produces the translation (is that "officially recognized"?).Dovi 16:25, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

There is one official version, and it's the untranslated version. Torah, Tanakh, anyone who makes a decent attempt to translate it is accepted, but the translation is not ever seen as superior, or even remotely equal, to the original (despite still being sacred and important). Every other language will always miss something or another, missing the original intent and meaning of the hebrew. Thus, no "official" Jewish translation exists. SF2K1

So what about Christian translations? As far as I know, the Anglican Church uses the King James Version as de facto official version. The American Catholics use the "New American Bible", but what's about British or Irish Catholics? Does anybody know more? ~~

I thought the Anglicans used the English Standard Version/English Revised Version? American Catholics have a large number of "approved" versions[1]. Rmhermen 19:41, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Anglicans have no "officially recognized" translation; ministers and preachers use whatever they are comfortable with; usually a modern scholarly translation. The current Anglican Book of Common Worship lectionary uses texts from the New Revised Standard Version, but there is no implication that this is the only version to be used - it simply reflects the Anglican tradition of using the most recent scholarly translation. The King James Version is rarely used these days, a) because although a triumph of scholarship in its time, it has now been superseded by far better ancient source material and b) because the language of the KJV is no longer widely understood. --APRCooper (talk) 15:41, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

The Catholic lectionary on this side of the Atlantic uses mainly the Jerusalem Bible. Peter jackson (talk) 10:35, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

On which side of the Atlantic is THAT "this", and isn't THAT "this" parochial? MaynardClark (talk) 19:36, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

Overview of sources

Would it be feasible to have a quick-and-dirty table (or other form of concise representation) that shows the dependency of all those translations? I came here to quickly check which early English translations (Tyndale? Wyclif?) were based on the Vulgate and which weren't. Which use a Hebrew original? Which use the Septuagint original? Do the folks behind the Geneva Bible have access to Luther's translation? Etc., etc. I may be naive, but it seems as if such information is pretty well defined and could be presented as a table. (In any case, I found these otherwise wonderful pages lacking in giving me precisely the information I was looking for.) Arbor 13:03, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

It is by no means that simple. Shortly, people use the best material they have and as many sources as possible. For instance the New Revised Standard Version is a revision of the Revised Standard Version which "revised" the King James Version which was largely based on Tyndale's Version which was translated from the Vulgate and Luther's version or maybe only refered to them while using Hebrew and Greek sources available at that time. Rmhermen 16:40, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Specifically to answer "Do the folks behind the Geneva Bible have access to Luther's translation?", is certainly yes, how much it inluenced them is another question. Our article notes that it was translated from "Greek New Testament and Hebrew scriptures that comprise the Christian Old Testament."; however, "The English rendering was substantially based on the earlier translations by William Tyndale and Myles Coverdale." Rmhermen 16:47, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. As you point out, all the information is there somewhere, including my other questions. Maybe what I really would want is a Source texts subsection of the current page that gives a brief overview, pretty much like what you started explaining in the above two paragraphs. My original idea of a tabular presentation is clearly silly. Arbor 17:11, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

There are lots of ways to categorize scriptures. The lack of database features in Wikipedia make it hard to organize things like the "source texts" that you mention. Please take a look at Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Bible#Help develop Scripture Database website for a proposed improvement. --J. J. 19:13, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Problem with claim made in "Old English translations" section

"These centuries added to the (unfounded) conviction of many that the Bible ought not to become too common, that it should not be read by everybody, that it required a certain amount of learning to make it safe reading."

This claim of an "(unfounded) conviction" can be refuted with the fact that protestant church groups are over 30,000 in number at this time of writing. [Cpt|Kirk 12:44, 23 March 2006 (UTC)]

---

i'm wondering whether 'although john wycleff....into old english' is really the right wording - given that to all intents & purposes, old english is about as different a language from modern english as modern german is from modern english; just because the word 'english' is in both names, they're not really the same language in any useful, plain english (!) sense. would it be worth rewording this opening paragraph to take that into account ? Star-one 12:44, 2 May 2007 (UTC)

This is only a small part of the history of the English bible

The link from "History of the English Bible" is confusing.Silver Surfer 10:45, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Educated Minorities and The People

"While the illiterate majority of the people had little desire for access to the Bible, the educated minority would have been averse to so great and revolutionary a change." I'm certainly not comfortable with this proclamation about "the people" having had "little desire for access to the Bible." I can understand their maybe having little need but, as I understand Western history, perhaps the primary reason for the spread of literacy itself was the desire for access to the Bible. Maybe a bit of acadmeic bias implied in this statement?--Economy1 —Preceding signed but undated comment was added at 23:43, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Article citations..

The article doesn't clearly cite the sources. I read the 1911 encyclopedia entry near the bottom of the page, and there are statements made in this article that do not appear to be in the original material. Also, the book cited at the bottom of the article, in the references section, is not linked to any specific material within the article, so I can not be sure what specific text the reference is referring to. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Godfollower4ever (talk • contribs) 04:28, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Bible translation popularity

The "2008" data actually was a link to current data. While a link to current data is good, it can't be used as a reference to back up any statement in the article, since it might change (and the article wouldn't). So I made links to both. DJ Clayworth (talk) 19:13, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

There's an interesting article which excludes Bibles at List of best-selling books. It would be interesting to see a list of Bible translations by annual or total circulation, rather than by sales.

--AuthorityTam (talk) 19:48, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

A list of versions sold rather than versions given away is much more useful for determining the public's interest in specific translations, suggesting that these copies will actually be used. Several organizations (such as the Gideons) give away Scripture versions that are not under copyright. Using distribution statistics would give a much higher number for KJV than the sales figures would. Pete unseth (talk) 21:35, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

Couldn't we just have both lists? If 100 million KJV's are distributed every year, I'm interested in that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by AuthorityTam (talk • contribs) 21:51, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

If anyone has a reliable source for such a figure feel free to add it. My guess is that Gideons International is going to dominate the bible giveaway numbers, and they seem to favour the NKJV. DJ Clayworth (talk) 13:31, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

I'm less interested in the ranking by distributor than in the raw figures by translation. I've heard estimates that a billion KJVs have been distributed and I'd like to see that from some reliable source. That would be a useful addition to this article.

--AuthorityTam (talk) 16:50, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Gideons International distributes more than 75 million bibles a year, but don't say anything about the translations they use. There are sources (not reliable enough for Wikipedia) that indicate they mostly give NKJV. DJ Clayworth (talk) 15:50, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Just who are the Christian Booksellers Association? All the translations listed that I know anything about seem to be hard-line evangelical or outright fundamentalist. Is this because these ones are actually the most popular? Or could it be that that is simply the affiliation of the CBA, in which case these figures would be meaningless? Peter jackson (talk) 10:38, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

The Christian Bookseller's Association is an annual meeting of Christian Booksellers from all backgrounds. Last time I went I met (Jewish) Jews, Evangelicals, Messianics, Catholics, Eastern Orthodox (nuns!), etc. It's just a bunch of people with a bunch of books trying to connect product to distributor. It's not an official organization. Spring Arbor used to make Bible sales numbers available, but decided it wasn't useful since some translations (like the NRSV) distributed directly to churches through denominational channels and their numbers would be artificially low in Spring Arbor's count. There's always Amazon rankings! But that changes by the day.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 11:22, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

And who might Spring Arbor be? Is there some reason why CBA figures should be more reliabl ethan theirs? Peter jackson (talk) 15:26, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Spring Arbor are the largest distributor of translations. They distribute our translation too -- but they no longer give out stats. The CBA... not sure how they calculate their stats, but their numbers look right.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 16:54, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

The point I was making is this. You mentioned a reason why SA statistics aren't reliable. Do you have any reason to suppose exactly the same reason doesn't apply to CBA too?

Just think about this. The USA, which is most of the English-speaking market, & likely to be fairly typical of it, is 1/4 Catholic. Assuming Catholics are about as likely to buy Bibles as Protestants, & that ecumenical Bibles are proportionally popular among both, one would expect the total sales of all Protestant Bibles to be only about 3 times that for Catholic ones. As most of the latter figure would be for a single translation, the NAB (the British market being much smaller, while Protestants have a variety of versions, it's odd that neither the NAB nor the (N)RSV is listed. Nor, for that matter, is the GNB, a more moderate Protestant version that I thought was quite popular. This evidence vaguely suggests CBA figures may be just as unreliable as SA, perhaps for the same reasons.

In fact, the reason you mention, denominational distribution, might be expected to have the sort of results suggested here. The only major denomination in the USA that would be likely to be distributing the versions listed is the SBC. The other major groups would be distributing moderate Protestant, ecumenical or catholic Bibles. The hard-line Protestant versions listed would tend to be popular among large numbers of small denominations, which might not have such good distribution systems. Peter jackson (talk) 10:39, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

That's a reasonable analysis, but has it's own problems. Your third sentence - Catholics are about as likely to buy Bibles as Protestants - is probably incorrect. Protestantism places a much greater emphasis on biblical study than Catholicism. Also many of the Catholics I know have the NIV or KJV. You're making a lot of other assumptions. "I thought the GNB was popular" - yes, but its demographic has been largely taken over by The Message in recent years. While there are still a lot of GNBs out there, new Bibles are more likely to be The Message than GNB.

Denominations may prefer a specific version, but a lot of their members, when they want to buy a Bible, go to a Christian bookshop and buy whatever they see lots of there. Or they go to Amazon, where the story is the same. Where else are they going to buy them? Most churches don't actually sell Bibles.

The short version of this story is that the CBA figures may not be perfect, but they are the best we have and having them in the article is helpful. If we can find better figures, let's use them. DJ Clayworth (talk) 15:20, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I think both sides of this are right. The CBA numbers are not perfect, for the reasons cited. I just did an Amazon search for Bible translations, sorted in order of bestselling -- and the top ten were NAB, NRSV, NIV, KJV, Message, NASB, NLT, RSV, Amplified, Orthodox Study Bible. Is that RIGHT? No. It's just a list taken from Amazon as a snapshot of this point in time. It does not reflect usage or long term numbers, and does not reflect sanction by certain denominations or direct sales from the primary distributor to churches and schools. We cannot do original research, and even if we did it would be flawed (as Spring Arbor noted when I communicated with them in the 90's). What we CAN do is to list the CBA numbers and give a caveat for exceptions.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 16:17, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

So why give CBA figures but not Amazon ones? Note that Amazon's top 2 aren't in the CBA list at all. DJ, there are plenty of Bibles on sale in ordinary, not specifically religious bookshops. There are a lot more general bookshops than religious ones. Yes, many Catholics have Protestant Bibles. I wonder how many of them are aware of the difference. The NIV, like most editions of the KJV, is incomplete from a Catholic point of view. Under the old canon law (I don't know whether it's still in force) they were forbidden to use such Bibles. But this is just a point of interest, not relevant to the topic of discussion. Peter jackson (talk) 10:43, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

There are two problems with Amazon: 1) the numbers shift constantly (I've seen the sell ranks on my own book shift radically from day to day, irrespective of sales), and 2) it's not self reported -- the Amazon ranks have to be derived on the fly, which borders on original research. I don't have a great solution here, but I agree that the CBA numbers are flawed.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 11:59, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

The current version misleads the reader. The heading "Popularity of English translations" is an implicit statement that those mentioned are the most popular, which isn't supported by the evidence. Perhaps some caveat should be included, like "However, this does not include sales by general bookshops, churches, Amazon etc. which might give different results." Peter jackson (talk) 09:28, 22 August 2009 (UTC)

I've been thinking more about this issues, and the Amazon rankings might be the best way to go. It can be verified and updated by any editor at any time. It has the further advantage of reflecting real world sales.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 03:11, 23 August 2009 (UTC)

Problem with that is they list each edition separately. I just looked at Amazonuk & found 2 different GNBs in the top 4 (along with ESV & AKJV (as that edition (Oxford World's Classics) calls it)). Provisionally it looks like GNB is the most popular on this side of the Atlantic. Peter jackson (talk) 10:13, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

I ignored the duplicates in my top ten -- but the Good News Bible shouldn't be in the top ten. No matter what we do there will be a caveat.SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 11:47, 27 August 2009 (UTC)

Out of interest I tried your method for UK. There's a slight complication, as you see:

• GNB
• ESV
• AKJV
• NIV/Message parallel text
• Message
• NJB
• NIV
• NRSV
• NCV
• NLT
• NKJV
• Amplified

In the course of this I came across several more GNBs. It seems quite clear it's the most popular over here. As we're a sizable minority of the market, I don't see why it shouldn't end up in the top 10. Of course all of this probably counts as original research anyway. Peter jackson (talk) 10:59, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Exactly -- although looking something up on Amazon is just looking something up, the WAY something is looked up influences the result. I'd be happier if my own translation were in the top ten, but that's a different matter... ;-)SkyWriter (Tim) (talk) 14:40, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

I noticed that the discussion of popularity of various versions assumes that sales are greatly affected by what bookstores carry. But I think this is misleading. If other versions are more in demand, bookstores will carry them, applying the law of supply and demand. I'm pondering how to reword this to acknowledge that many stores carry a limited variety of versions, but that this is in response to the popularity of versions. Pete unseth (talk) 17:26, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

A quick thought from someone who only scanned this discussion. Aren't we talking about prevalence here, not popularity? I'd be careful about conflating the two, even if they are correlated. Jtrevor99 (talk) 20:56, 26 June 2018 (UTC)

Critical translations

The Anchor Bible Series, the only example previously cited in this section, is not a translation but a series of commentary and reference books. That leaves us without a single example of "critical" translations. Does anyone know of such a translation? DJ Clayworth (talk) 15:24, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

I am not quite sure what you looking for. Do you mean something different from a study bible? There is an edition of the New International Version called the Archaeological Study Bible (ISBN 031092605X), whose notes are largely historical and cultural rather than theological in nature. There is also an edition of the English Standard Version, the Literary Study Bible (ISBN 1581348088) with added material about the Bible as literature. Are these along the lines of what you are seeking? LovesMacs (talk) 15:39, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

The original section (which I didn't write) seemed to imply that there were translations out there that were deliberately instituted by secular scholars. However since the only example it gave was a set of study books, not a translation, it's more than possible that whoever wrote it made a mistake. We're not looking for study books, or for bibles annotated in a particular way - we're looking to see if there are secular-inspired translations out there. Frankly I've never heard of one, but I'd rather ask to see if anyone else has before removing the section. DJ Clayworth (talk) 15:47, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

The closest I can think of are various poets'/writers' own renditions of sections of the Bible. There's a professor named Robert Alter who has translated the Pentateuch, the Book of Psalms, and Samuel 1 and 2. I don't know if you could call his translations truly secular but they weren't made expressly for liturgical use. LovesMacs (talk) 16:04, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

I hadn't heard of him, but he might be worth a mention. Thanks. DJ Clayworth (talk) 16:13, 8 May 2009 (UTC)

Alter is certainly worth a mention. Staff in the theology department at my local university hold him in high regard. And just yesterday, flicking through the "further reading" of a new book about the Psalms by the Dean of Durham Cathedral, I noticed one of Alter's books. I'll see what I can do in the next few days to add something here. Feline Hymnic (talk) 09:40, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

Totally agreed on Alter fitting the definition of a secular translator (and he does a bang up job, too). I think that the section "Critical Translation" needs a rethink, though. The Anchor series does contain a translation, and it certainly qualifies as a translation -- although it is a lot more than that. Alter certaintly qualifies as a secular translator.

But even a card carrying member of a religion can create a "critical translation". I was just discussing one of those on another page recently -- the Comprehensive New Testament (ISBN 0977873714). It basically translates the Nestle-Aland 27th edition (a critical Greek text), and it translates 15,000 critical textual variant notes. If the Nestle-Aland qualifies as a critical Greek text (and it does), then a translation of its base text and 15,000 textual variants would quality as a critical translation. I think there's another one out there like that, too -- that translates the limited notes in the UBS4 into English. I'll try to find that title too. I think Metzger and Aland were both Christians, and their Greek texts are the epitome of what we would consider a critical text. Translations in similar formats would qualify, even if the editors were Christians.EGMichaels (talk) 16:49, 10 May 2009 (UTC)

The Dead Sea Scrolls Bible (ISBN 0060600640) by Martin Abegg, Peter Flint and Eugene Ulrich probably qualifies as a critical translation. It is a translation of the books of the Hebrew Bible using the Dead Sea Scrolls as source text, with textual variants noted. LovesMacs (talk) 00:54, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Yes! I have a copy of the Dead Sea Scrolls Bible and it is a wonderful resource! So, Alter, Comprehensive NT, Dead Sea Scrolls Bible... I'd still like to include the Anchor series.EGMichaels (talk) 03:39, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

How many books have been translated in the Anchor Series? If it's only a few then I really don't think it deserves a mention, given the hundreds of possible translations vying for space in the article. I'm not even sure what its distiguishing features are - in what way is it a different kind of translation from the NIV or the RSV? By the way, the Comprehensive New Testament doesn't appear to be a single-source translation. It extensively notes for textual variants, but my understanding is it still makes a choice of words based on all the textual sources. Have I misunderstood that? DJ Clayworth (talk) 21:06, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Sorry -- missed this note of yours the first time. The Comprehensive New Testament follows the Nestle-Aland 27th edition text, and footnotes all the translatable variants (or as many as they could fit -- even 15,000 is probably not hitting all of them). Although the Nestle-Aland is itself an eclectic text, it's still the single source for that translation. EGMichaels (talk) 21:54, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Footnotes

"but do not state which textform is indicated in the footnotes or the base text". What does that mean? The NIV at least indicates which manuscript is the source of the main and variant translations. DJ Clayworth (talk) 21:12, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

Random NIV example: Colossians 3:4 "When Christ, who is your life" the footnote says "Some manuscripts our". "Some manuscripts" doesn't specify what kind of textform those manuscripts may fall in. The New King James Bible will say that this "our" is TR (Textus Receptus) and "you" is NU (Nestle-Aland/UBS). I think that because the NKJ was going back to the Textus Receptus they felt more pressure to say what reading was coming from where. That's just speculation, but the notes certainly do give more information than the NIV or NRS that just have "some manuscripts" or "other ancient authorities." Granted, it's a mixed bag, since even the NIV and NRS will make some notes of the DSS or LXX in the Old Testament.EGMichaels (talk) 21:39, 11 May 2009 (UTC)

The NIV does often say which source text is which, though it doesn't always. The phrase we use "limited footnotes" would seem to cover the case. DJ Clayworth (talk) 15:17, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Is this true?

From the article, in the section on Early Modern English translations, specifically talking about Tyndale's translation:

"Greek and Hebrew are slightly closer to English than Latin, and thus, Tyndale’s translation is one of the more accessible versions in its English phrasing."

I find that very difficult to believe. Latin has had a much bigger effect on modern English than Greek, and Hebrew very little direct effect. I would like to see a citation for this at the very least. I left it in, but I would very much like to see some evidence for this outlandish claim.

98.109.133.51 (talk) 01:33, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

Reasonable points. In fact looking at the cwhole paragraph, it seemed to be mostly original research with no reliable sources backing up the claims. I've simply removed it. Someone is welcome to restore such information if it can be reliably sourced Feline Hymnic (talk) 10:47, 19 September 2010 (UTC)

"Greek and Hebrew are closer to English than Latin" paraphrases something that Tyndale wrote: "For the Greek tongue agreeth more with the English than with the Latin. And the properties of the Hebrew tongue agreeth a thousand times more with the English than with the Latin." (Tyndale, Obedience of a Christian Man, fol. xv, as quoted in David Norton, The King James Bible, A Short History ..., p. 13). This is a polemic for Tyndale's life work of translation, but also reflects the state of the Latin and English languages of the time. In Tyndale's day, Latin had not yet influenced English sentence structure; Bible translation and the proliferation of nonfiction books were to change English in the next 75 years. The Greek of the Bible was probably more colloquial than scholarly, and if Tyndale's acquaintance with Greek was mainly in the Bible, I can see where he was coming from. Note that Biblical Hebrew, like English, had lost case endings on nouns and adjectives, making word order more important; Hebrew also favors short sentences. Tyndale simply translated the Hebrew phrases into simple English, giving rise to the many Hebraisms in modern idiom; Tyndale may have been the single most influential stylist in the English language [personal opinion, but Daniell and Norton probably have something to say]. In any case, this discussion belongs in the article on Tyndale's Bible. Eall Ân Ûle (talk) 04:57, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Conflicts with another wikipedia article

This article's description of only two types of translation seems to conflict with http://en.wiki.x.io/wiki/Bible_translations#Modern_translation_efforts which clearly distinguishes "dynamic equivalence" as different from "paraphrase." This article here equates those two, implying that only two methods of translation exist: 1) literal, word for word, and 2) paraphrase. This is disingenuous at the very least. The discussion on the linked Bible translations page is much more in-depth and better written.

DocOctopus (talk) 20:15, 4 December 2011 (UTC)

The page actually says: "considered to be somewhere on a scale between the two extremes". Of course the article on the general subject of Bible translation will dwell more on the details, as it should. This is only discussing English language translations, a separate subject, not an attempt to duplicate that page. Rmhermen (talk) 00:32, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

Early Modern English paragraph.

I was caught up short reading this paragraph. Two sentences begin with the work "It", which has no obvious antecedent. At first I thought "It" referred to the books that Tyndale printed, but this obviously does not fit the context. This should be an easy fix.

Much worse is the disinformation in the last sentence, "In this version the 14 books of the Apochrypha [sic] are returned to the Bible in the order written rather than kept separate in an appendix." (my emphasis} Nobody knows enough about the dates of the books of the Bible to line them up in the order written. There is not even a standard order; Medieval manuscripts differ, and each of the major religious traditions has its own "logic" for arranging the books in the modern printed copies (and its own choice of books). How about "in their usual places according to the Latin Vulgate, rather than being in an appendix, as in all Protestant Bibles". (Actually, I'm not sure about the last five words -- is this true of Protestant Bibles in other European languages?) Eall Ân Ûle (talk) 05:24, 16 January 2012 (UTC)

Intentional mistranslations, biased translations, politically/religiously motivated translations, etc.

This is undoubtedly a sticky subject and one that, in practice, is likely more difficult to handle than in theory. The recent attempts in the main article to neutralize discussion of the Jehovah's Witnesses translation of the Bible (which renders Elohim, Yahweh, etc. as Jehovah, and also translates the New Testament to deny the divinity of Christ), as well as the advent of intentional mistranslations such as the Queen James, make me wonder what place such translations have in this article, or in related articles on the Bible. Adding to the complexity is the fact that opinion on whether a version is intentionally mistranslated, biased versus the original text, etc. usually is not unanimous and is subject to perspective. But we may be able to make a distinction on the basis of the group(s) involved in developing the translation...for example, I would argue that translations produced with critical scholarship, or groups with no strong political/social leanings, or groups represented by several mainstream denominations, should not be classified in this group. Jtrevor99 (talk) 20:59, 28 August 2014 (UTC)

You are opening a can of worms. However, it may be possible to identify translations whose introductions identify specific topical goals in their translation. Other than that, I think you are on shaky ground.Pete unseth (talk) 12:03, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

Oh, I absolutely agree that it's a can of worms, and there is no clear, universal, delineation. But it is one that needs to be addressed, nevertheless. Identifying the topical goals, along with the group(s) responsible for the translation, might be helpful. It might also be helpful to identify passage(s) that might have been subjected to deliberate mistranslation. My only concern is that I do not think attempts at accurate translations - whether they succeeded or not in a given person's opinion - ought to have equal footing with translations that deliberately change the text. Jtrevor99 (talk) 15:32, 29 August 2014 (UTC)

"Fringe and anti-Catholic"

Doug Weller, I saw your removal of a link for being "fringe and anti-Catholic". I'm not challenging it but am looking for more information. What about the link is "fringe and anti-Catholic"? (To wit: a link can exclusively cover Protestant denominations without being anti-Catholic, though such probably should be stated in the article.) Jtrevor99 (talk) 18:08, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

@Jtrevor99: The website argues that Catholicism is pagan. Pretty fringe I'd say? Did you look at the website?[2] It comes nowhere near our criteria at WP:RS.

I did but only briefly - I missed that part. :) Jtrevor99 (talk) 20:41, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

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