Mystic-als said:
Can I ask how the LDS bible was translated. Because it is almost entirely different from the normal KJV. Not outright different but the meanings and insinuations are.
First of all, if you were to ask an LDS person to let you look at their Bible, you would find that the text is identical to any other KJV Bible. The differences come in the footnotes, which not only cross-refference the Bible with the other accepted scriptures of the LDS faith, but give clarification of what certain words mean and refferences to something called the JST (Joseph Smith Translation). I believe it is to this that you are referring. I found a decent article that may explain it to you. Unfortunately, I am never able to link to this site correctly, so I have posted the name of the article, as well as one section that might be especially helpful. You can search
www.lds.org for the rest of the article. I'm sorry, but it's the best I can do.
David Rolph Seely, The Joseph Smith Translation: Plain and Precious Things Restored,
Ensign, Aug. 1997, 9
The Translation Process
In June 1830 the Prophet received by revelation the first part of the book of Moses. By February 1831 he had received the rest of the book. It appears in the JST manuscripts as chapters 1 through 6 of Genesis.
The Prophet did not translate the Bible in the traditional sense of the wordthat is, go back to the earliest Hebrew and Greek manuscripts to make a new rendering into English. Rather, he went through the biblical text of the King James Version and made inspired corrections, revisions, and additions to the biblical text. Both the Lord and Joseph Smith consistently refer to the process of these inspired revisions and additions as translation (
D&C 76:15;
D&C 124:89). The Prophet acknowledged the revelatory nature of this translation work. He introduced the first chapter of the book of Moses in his journal as an example of the Lord granting line upon line of knowledgehere a little and there a little [see
Isa. 28:13], of which the following was a precious morsel.
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But the Prophet never recorded exactly how he did this work called translation. One clue is the 1828 copy of the King James Bible that the Prophet and Oliver Cowdery purchased from E. B. Grandin in Palmyra on 8 October 1829. It was marked by Joseph Smith in ink and pencil; words were crossed out and verses marked with various symbols. In addition, there are five handwritten manuscripts containing long Joseph Smith Translation passages of the Bible. These are in the handwriting of various scribes, including Oliver Cowdery, John Whitmer, Sidney Rigdon, and others. Some of the manuscripts have entire biblical passages written out and others have only the specific verses or passages that were changed in some way by the Prophet.
From this evidence it appears that the Prophet and a scribe would sit at a table, with the Prophet having the King James Version of the Bible open before him. Probably he would read from the King James Version and dictate the revisions, while the scribe recorded what he said.
5 Some of the corrections and revisions were small, including sometimes only vital punctuation changes. Other revisions were much more lengthy, restoring large passages of text.
LDS scholar Robert J. Matthews from Brigham Young University concluded that there appear to be at least four different kinds of changes the Prophet Joseph Smith made to the Bible:
(1) Portions may amount to restorations of content material once written by the biblical authors but since deleted from the Bible.
(2) Portions may consist of a record of actual historical events that were not recorded, or were recorded but never included in the biblical collection.
(3) Portions may consist of inspired commentary by the Prophet Joseph Smith, enlarged, elaborated, and even adapted to a latter-day situation.
(4) Some items may be a harmonization of doctrinal concepts that were revealed to the Prophet Joseph Smith independently of his translation of the Bible, but by means of which he was able to discover that a biblical passage was inaccurate.
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While it is not always possible to determine the exact nature of each of the Prophets revisions, we accept them as being inspired. From his studies Brother Matthews concludes: The translation was not a simple, mechanical recording of divine dictum, but rather a study-and-thought process accompanied and prompted by revelation from the Lord. That it was a revelatory process is evident from statements by the Prophet and others who were personally acquainted with the work.
7 In fact, many sections of the Doctrine and Covenants were revealed during the period in which Joseph worked on his inspired translation; in several instances, the revelation of important doctrines was directly connected with the translation process. For example, at one point the Prophet wrote: From sundry revelations which had been received, it was apparent that many important points touching the salvation of man, had been taken from the Bible, or lost before it was compiled. It appeared self-evident from what truths were left, that if God rewarded every one according to the deeds done in the body the term Heaven, as intended for the Saints eternal home must include more kingdoms than one.
8 He then recorded that while translating the gospel of John, he and Sidney Rigdon had seen in vision what is now section 76 of the Doctrine and Covenants, the revelation on the three degrees of glory. The vision was given after they had read
John 5:29.
Other examples include section 77, received in connection with the translation of the book of Revelation, and section 91, received when Joseph Smith came to the books of the Apocrypha that were part of the Bible he was using.
During the years 1830 to 1833, the Prophet, assisted by scribes, worked his way completely through the Bible. On 2 July 1833, Sidney Rigdon, corresponding with the Brethren in Zion whose letters to the Prophet had just arrived, reported, We this day finished the translating of the Scriptures, for which we returned gratitude to our Heavenly Father, and, two paragraphs later, refers to having finished the translation of the Bible, a few hours since.
9 But throughout his life the Prophet continued to work on the manuscripts, editing and making further changes, preparing them for publication virtually until the time of his death. Small portions of the translation were published during his lifetime in these Church publications:
The Evening and the Morning Star, Times and Seasons, and the
Millennial Star. On many occasions the Prophet expressed his desire and hope that the new translation would eventually be made available to the Church in its entirety. The martyrdom of the Prophet prevented this in his lifetime.
The manuscripts of the Joseph Smith Translation were preserved by Emma Smith, the Prophets wife, and eventually became property of the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which published various editions of the translation. The first edition appeared in 1867; in 1944 a corrected edition was published, containing at least 352 verses amended to correct copyist proofreading and typographical errors in the earlier edition. In 1970 a parallel-column edition was published, with the King James Version in one column and the Joseph Smith Translation in the other.
Many Latter-day Saints were cautious about those publications because of the different versions that had been printed and because the manuscript evidence showing what textual changes the Prophet had made was not available for study. In 1968 Robert J. Matthews was given permission by the Reorganized Church to examine the original manuscripts. His book examining the significance of the Joseph Smith Translation was published in 1975.
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