# What do you all think of the NLT?



## tellville (Aug 10, 2008)

With all the hype about the new NLT study bible, I was wondering what people here thought about it as a translation? I'm talking about the 2004 or 2006 update versions, not the 1996 version. 

On a side note, I think this NLT vs. ESV study bible war going on right now is pretty interesting. Very smart of Tyndale to one up the ESV by getting their Bible out first. Totally didn't see it coming.


----------



## Grace Alone (Aug 10, 2008)

I don't know of anyone in my church that uses the NLT, so I suspect their target customers aren't the same. My church is mostly ESV with a little NKJV, NASB, NIV, and KJV.


----------



## larryjf (Aug 10, 2008)

The revised NLT has made improvements, but there is a systemic problem that comes from the translation philosophy.


----------



## DMcFadden (Aug 10, 2008)

larryjf said:


> The revised NLT has made improvements, but there is a systemic problem that comes from the translation philosophy.



Exactly! They can tinker until _all_ of the cows come home, but at the end of the day it is still a dynamic equivalent translation.


----------



## JohnGill (Aug 10, 2008)

*Problems with the NLT*

Psalm 119:9 How can a young person stay *pure*? By obeying your word and following its rules.

Implies I'm pure to begin with which is contrary to the doctrine of Total Depravity.

Proverbs 8:22 The LORD *formed me* from the beginning, *before he created* anything else.

It looks as if they have either followed the Septuagint reading or the Targum here. They also state that the wisdom of God was created by God. It was this bad rendering in these two texts that Arius used to start his heresy. But even if one does not accept that the passage is referring to Christ (1 Cor 1:24) the denial of the Deity of God must be dealt with. If wisdom didn't exist prior to God creating it, then God didn't have wisdom but gained wisdom. This is contrary to Rom 16:26 and Mal 3:6. It also leads to logical contradiction concerning the nature of universal, abstract, invariants. If God created wisdom, and you cant create universal, abstract, invariants by their very nature, then God lied in Proverbs 8:22. Either wisdom does not exist or the 'god' mentioned in the 'bible' got wisdom from a more powerful being in whom reside all universal concepts principally. To simplify, if God created wisdom, then God does not exist.

Micah 5:2 But you, O Bethlehem Ephrathah, are only a small village in Judah. Yet a ruler of Israel will come from you, one *whose origins are from the distant past.*

Here they agree with the Jewish Rabbis in their mistranslation of the Hebrew. This is a prophecy concerning Christ. In Matthew 2:6 it is quoted as referring to Christ. Since Jesus origins are from eternity and not the distant past, either Matthew was wrong for quoting Micah 5:2 or the Jewish Rabbis who deny Christ and the NLT which apparently follows their teachings on the verse are wrong.

There are New Testament problems, but these three verses are enough to discredit the NLT, or any other version with these issues, from being acceptable to Christians for study.

A useful book in determining an English translation to use is Henry Ierson's Notes on the amended English Bible, with special reference to certain texts in the revised version of the Old and New Testaments bearing upon the principles of Unitarian Christianity (1887)

Ierson was a unitarian writing in praise of the Revision of 1881 and how it supported unitarianism. Whichever English translation you wish to use, take it through Ierson's book. If it has translations that Ierson would be proud of, then toss it.

Hope this helps.


----------



## Robbie Schmidtberger (Aug 10, 2008)

The New Living Translation has a place in our hands. That place is when our audience has a limited understanding of English. Many of the men behind the study notes are reformed in their doctrine of salvation and church. Am I going to buy it? No. My students are fluent in English. 

One of my professors from college recalled that when he first started preaching on the mission field, his congregation did not have more than a 850 English word vocabulary. So what translation did he have to use? It certainly was not the NASB or the NIV there.


----------



## Presbyterian Deacon (Aug 10, 2008)

Because I collect Bibles, I have it. But I have not referred to it very often. I find it to be, generally a poor translation.


----------



## Backwoods Presbyterian (Aug 10, 2008)

I find it confusing.


----------

