The Holy Bible
A Conservative Version

Foreword

The two main reasons I created this translation were: 1) to make a more accurate English translation of the Bible, and 2) to make it free. God gave his Holy Scriptures freely, and I have no doubt that he intended for them to always be free. Certainly publishers have the right to sell what they print, and translators have a right to be paid for their labor, but the words themselves represent (or are supposed to represent) the Word of God, and it is robbery to copyright them. Hence, my translation is now and for all time placed in the public domain.

The text is available in two formats: 1) the traditional KJV style of verse grouping, and 2) the modern style of paragraph grouping. Please note that there are four verses that are contained in some New Testament translations (including the KJV and the ASV) that I excluded because they are not found in the majority of the Greek manuscripts. They are, Luke 17:36, Acts 8:37, Acts 15:34, and Acts 24:7.

The Old Testament

Regarding the text of the Old Testament I began with the American Standard Version (no longer under copyright), then I mostly made minor word changes in order to make it more readable for our generation. In some cases I also utilized the texts of the KJV and Young's Literal translation. There were a few places where I was dissatisfied with all of those translations. In those cases I utilized the texts of the Masoretic Hebrew, the Septuagint Greek (LXX), and a translation of the Hebrew of the Dead Sea scrolls (DSS). The Masoretic text is the Bible some Jewish scholars compiled at sometime six to ten centuries after Christ. The Septuagint is a Greek translation of the Old Testament created by Jews about two centuries before Christ. (The Septuagint is what was generally used by the authors of the New Testament when they quoted the Old Testament.) The texts of the Dead Sea scrolls are dated variously from several centuries before Christ to about his time.

Virtually all English translations of the Old Testament (including the KJV and the ASV), primarily, if not exclusively, have come from the Masoretic Hebrew text. However, since those Masoretic Jews who compiled that edition from the manuscripts available to them were enemies of Christ, then I treat that text with some degree of suspicion, especially since I have read the words of at least one of the ancient Christian patriarchs that accused the Jews of falsifying a few passages of it. Nevertheless, except for some Old Testament passages that were quoted in the New Testament, plus one verse taken from the Dead Sea scrolls, I did not deviate from the general wording of the ASV (or the other translations I borrowed from).

There are several hundred verses from the Old Testament that are quoted in the New Testament. Since the authors of the New Testament quoted primarily from the Greek Septuagint translation, then for most of those Old Testament passages I had three sources of the text available: the Masoretic Hebrew, the Greek Septuagint, and the Greek New Testament. (For some passages the text was also available from the Dead Sea scrolls.) In most cases the three texts did not differ significantly. When they did, however, I gave the New Testament and the Septuagint priority over the Masoretic. On those few cases where they all differed, I gave priority to the New Testament, since who knows better what the original words were than the Holy Spirit that guided the hands of the men who wrote the New Testament. Yet I tried to be very conservative in making those few changes. When the words were mostly similar, and the sense was the same, I kept the words translated from the Masoretic text. The changes I did make ranged from a single word to several verses. Out of about 23,000 verses in the Old Testament, I substituted words from the Septuagint in 38 of them, and words from the New Testament in 21 of them. In every case I made known what I did by enclosing those words in curly brackets. Also I indicated the source using the symbols LXX,  NT, and DSS.

There are too many complex issues involved in finding the original words to describe here. My goal in making these few changes in the Old Testament translation was to improve the unity of the words of our Bibles. Dear reader, I am a believer, not a scoffer. The vast majority of undisputed words in the Bible are more than adequate to prove to anybody (who loves truth and light) of its divine nature. Upon that foundation of faith, I strive to make the words we have as accurate as I can. And revealing its original unity is one part of that.

Now regarding God's name. The ancient Hebrew language contains no vowels, only consonants. And the word for God's name that is used in the books of the Hebrew Old Testament consists of the four consonant letters, YHWH (transliterated), and knowledge of its correct pronunciation was lost many centuries ago. Nineteenth Century German theologians suggested using the word "Yahweh," which is presently fashionable in the theological world. The translators of the ASV chose the word "Jehovah." But since the God-spirited authors of the New Testament used the Septuagint when quoting from the Old Testament, they used the Greek word for "lord." Perhaps that is why the translators of the KJV used that word. However, the word "lord" is used as both an adjective and a proper noun in the Bible, and the KJV translators chose to use the adjective form, capitalizing all of its letters, and adding the article, thus producing, "the LORD." However, when faced with both the adjective and the noun together, they wrote "Lord GOD" instead of "lord the LORD," for obvious reasons. Now I chose to follow their example in using the capitalized word "lord," but I used it as a proper noun because it represents God's name. So when both the adjective and the noun are together, I wrote it, "lord LORD" or "the Lord, LORD" as the text may have it.

The New Testament

By far most of the three years I spent translating was with the New Testament, because although I began revising the New Testament text of the ASV, I ended up translating almost all of it directly from the Greek itself. And I did not use the same Greek edition that was used by the translators of the ASV, because I consider that edition to be based upon inferior manuscripts. Since there are currently over 5000 surviving manuscripts of the New Testament books, and they do not all agree completely, scholars of Bible Greek must necessarily pick and choose in order to create a usable Greek New Testament. The edition I chose was compiled by Maurice A. Robinson and William G. Pierpont (of the Textus Receptus tradition). To see the reasons for my choice of that text read the essay Searching for the Word of God. 

In addition to using many books, I relied very heavily upon the computer program BibleWorks. I also relied very much on Maurice Robinson's material that contains the Greek text plus grammar aids. I found that material so helpful that I decided to combine the words of my own English translation with that information to create a Greek-English Study New Testament with integrated study aids for those of you who want to examine the Greek text without having to become skilled with that language. You can find out more about that by reading the foreword to the Greek-English New Testament. You can also compare the wording of my translation with the Greek text in that study Bible. For that reason I did not bracket or italicize words that were only inferred by the Greek text. Not every translation does so, and most of those that do are not consistent about it, including the KJV and the ASV. Nevertheless, all English translations must occasionally add such inferred words. For example, there are many sentences in the Greek New Testament that have no verb. In such cases the word "is" is most commonly added. I did my best to keep the number of such additions minimal. Nevertheless, if there is any question in your mind, the Greek-English Study New Testament will make clear when such things were or were not done.

I also employed the old pronouns (thee, thy, etc) because they provide more information than the often ambiguous word "you." The words "thee," "thou," "thy," and "thine" are all singular pronouns. The words "you," "ye," and "your" are plural. A good rule of thumb to use while learning these words is that if the word begins with the letter "t" it is singular. Here is some other information they contain that the modern "you" does not. "Thee" is in the objective case, while "thou" is nominative. "Thy" and "thine" are possessive. "Thine" is used in place of "thy" before a word that begins with a vowel, or an unaspirated "h". For example, "for thine is the kingdom," or, "thine heir." "Ye" is nominative and plural, while "you" is in the objective case, equivalent to "thee," but always plural in the old English. "Your" is also possessive, but always plural in the old English.

I have wondered why our language has been weakened by forsaking these more informative words. Is it because the enemies of Christ want to discard and discredit everything that reminds us of our Christian heritage, like the wording of the KJV Bible? Language is often manipulated in order to manipulate thinking, either for good or for evil. It is naïve to deny Satan's continuous active hostility. When speaking of dates, modern scholars have substituted the expressions BCE (before the common era) and CE (common era) for BC and AD so as to remove any reference to Christ our Lord. Did you know that the ancient Egyptians were so successful in destroying any record of the Israelites ever being in Egypt, that the only way we know they were there is from the Bible?

Translating the Greek New Testament into English basically involves two things: 1) selecting equivalent words, and 2) arranging them in correct order. Perhaps the greatest strength of the English language is the size of its vocabulary. Nevertheless, there are many Greek words that do not have an exact English equivalent. I chose the best I could depending upon the context. But only by carefully studying the lexicons, and examining how each word is used by the New Testament authors, can you learn their meaning more fully. Every translation has this limitation.

I replaced a few English words commonly found in other translations with terms of greater accuracy. I also translated the actual meaning of many words normally transliterated. For example, the word "baptism" literally means, "immersion," and so that is how I translated it. Also I used the word "agent" instead of the transliterated "angel." There is so much that is false and misleading associated with the word "angel" that its use only promotes error. Having emphasized accuracy of translation over readability or tradition, some familiar expressions or passages may seem strange to you. If this happens, I beseech you to reconsider your previous understanding, and be like the brothers in Berea: "But these were more noble than those in Thessalonica, who received the word with all willingness, examining the Scriptures daily, if it has these things this way" (Acts 17:11).

Sinful men have always scoffed at what the Bible really says. Dear brother, do not be lured into using words their way lest your mind also become beclouded. They have distorted many good words in their war against righteousness.

"Now to the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, alone wise, to God is honor and glory into the ages of the ages. Truly" (1Timothy 1:17).

Walter L. Porter
www.stillvoices.org