Who Runs May Reid

Stuart Reid has much fun with Conservapedia's ridiculous attempt to "translate" the Bible without all that lefty rubbish about compassion for the poor. But all translation is to some extent exegetical, and that of the Bible has always been especially so. People who insist that in order to read their sacred texts you first have to learn Hebrew, or Arabic, or Sanskrit, or whatever, may very well have point.

Moreover, Bible translations in recent decades have often been very highly politicised, in relation variously to academic theology, to the internal affairs of various Christian communities, and to the wider world. Insisting as the Conservapedia authors do, that a reading of which they happen to approve must be older, and that that in turn makes it more authentic or reliable, is a standard liberal trick. As ever, neoconservatism stands exposed as nothing to do with any conservative tradition.

Incidentally, since it might come up in the comments, the Catholic Church on the eve of the Reformation certainly did not prohibit vernacular translations of the Bible. Nothing could be further from the truth. The absolute ban on vernacular Bibles was peculiar to England, and was a response to the political threat posed by Lollardy, not anything to do with theology as such. And all those making theological decisions could in any case read the Bible, with which their daily liturgical life was shot through.