On Sunday, January 15, 2012 at 2:04:47 PM UTC-5, samsloan wrote:
> The Simple English Bible, The New Testament
>
> Introduction by Sam Sloan
>
> The Simple English Bible is a new translation of the Holy Bible. It is
> the result of an effort by several teams, not just one team, over a
> period of many years. The purpose was to reduce the Holy Bible to
> simple words not more than about six letters long. Any person with a
> Fifth Grade Reading level and any foreign person who knows some
> English but is not fluent should be able to read and understand this
> Bible.
>
> A basic vocabulary of three thousand words was created for this Bible
> and this Bible only uses those words.
>
> Not only is this a reduction of the text to simpler words but it is
> also a completely new and original translation. Most other new
> editions of the Bible are simply rewrites of the well known King James
> Version of the Bible. By contrast, The Simple English Bible is an
> entirely new and original translation.
>
> This can be demonstrated by comparing almost any verse of the Bible.
> Take for example John 3:16:
>
> John 3:16
> King James Version (KJV)
> For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that
> whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting
> life.
>
> As can be seen, several words in this famous passage are never used in
> everyday English. We do not speak of a “begotten Son” nor do we talk
> about anyone who “believeth”.
>
> If you check other Bible translations, you will see almost exactly
> these same words. For example:
>
> John 3:16
> New International Version (NIV)
> For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that
> whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.
>
> John 3:16
> Easy-to-Read Version (ERV)
> Yes, God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that
> everyone who believes in him would not be lost but have eternal life.
>
> John 3:16
> Common English Bible (CEB)
> God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who
> believes in him won’t perish but will have eternal life.
>
> There are at least 30 different editions or translations of the Holy
> Bible and all of them say almost exactly the same thing.
>
> Yet, anybody who has ever done translation work knows that no two
> translators, working independently of each other, will produce exactly
> the same result. The similarities of all of the above translations
> shows that they are all just re-writes, not original new translations.
>
> Now, compare them to The Simple English Bible. Here we have:
>
> God loved the people of the world so much that He gave up His one and
> only Son. Every person who commits himself to Jesus will not be
> destroyed. Instead, that person will have eternal life.
>
> As can be seen, this is something different. Instead of one sentence
> we have three. The three different concepts have each been given a
> sentence of their own.
>
> Which is correct – the 30 or the one that is different?
>
> Is it correct to say “God so loved the World” or rather is the correct
> translation “God loved the people of the world”.
>
> It should be obvious that “God loved the People of the world” is
> correct. Otherwise, it would be that God loved the rocks, the oceans,
> the volcanoes, the trees, the insects, the germs, the microbes and so
> on and expected them to believe in him. Surely, it does not mean that.
> So, it must mean that God loved the humans, alone. To answer a child's
> question, Sorry, your dog or your cat will not make it into Heaven.
>
> Almost every verse of the Bible follows this example. Long, complex
> sentences are broken down into short simple sentences.
>
> Let us take one of the most controversial verses of the Bible:
> Revelation 13:18
>
> King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
> Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of
> the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six
> hundred threescore and six.
>
> The Simple English Bible
>
> This is true wisdom. The person who has understanding should figure
> out the number of the wild animal.(It is the same way that men count.)
> Its number is 666.
>
> As can be seen, there are important differences between the two. The
> King James version says that it is the number of the man, such as a
> Social-Security-Number or a Drivers License number is a number
> assigned to one person which he will carry for the remainder of his
> life.
>
> The Simple English Bible instead says that it is a number in the
> counting system that men use, but not the number actually assigned to
> any specific man.
>
> Again, it seems obvious that the translation in The Simple English
> Bible is correct. Surely, there is no living, breathing man walking
> around numbered 666.
>
> My involvement with the Simple English Bible dates back to April and
> May 1981 when I spent about two weeks at the Summer Institute of
> Linguistics in Dallas Texas. This is an organization that tries to
> develop a writing system for every one of the six thousand known
> languages of the world, with the eventual goal of translating the Holy
> Bible into each of those languages.
>
> This goal is unrealizable because it takes about 20 years to do this
> for one language and there are not enough people willing to undertake
> such a task, but anyway they try.
>
> The two most memorable people I met there were Joyce Overholt and Max
> Cobbey. The most memorable event while I was there was the
> announcement while I was eating in the cafeteria that two SIL
> researchers had been killed and their dead bodies had been found in
> the jungles of Columbia. They had been there trying to reduce one of
> the Native American Indian Languages to writing. Unfortunately, a
> Marxist group had thought they were American CIA agents and not there
> to do God's Holy Work and for that reason had abducted and killed
> them. This illustrated the dangers in this kind of work.
>
> A man I met when I spent about two weeks in the offices of the Summer
> Institute of Linguistics in Dallas was working on the Simple English
> Bible. As I was driving to New York, he asked me for a ride and I gave
> him a ride in my rental car with my Chitrali wife, Honzagool. He spent
> the night in my family home in Lynchburg, Virginia. Although I lived
> in Manhattan, he was going to Hartford Connecticut where he was
> working on The Simple English Bible. This was a distance of 125 miles
> out of my way but as I was interested in the Simple English Bible I
> drove him there in my rental car and the man whom he had come to see
> he gave me a copy of the Simple English Bible as a reward, although
> with some reluctance as he said that only a few copies of this bible
> were in existence, as he had not been able to afford to print more.
>
> He asked me if I could reprint his Bible and I said I would.
> Unfortunately, he had in mind a big press run and there was no way
> that either I or Ishi Press had the money at the time to do this.
>
> Now with the new technologies available I can afford to do it and as I
> still have the Bible he gave me back in May 1981, I have decided to
> contact them about this but unfortunately both of the men involved are
> dead. Max Cobbey is dead too. He died in 2008. The only one that might
> still be alive is Joyce Overholt. However, that is a fairly common
> name. I found one person on the Internet by that name and I have
> written her but she has not responded. Yet another person who was
> associated with SIL at that time and with whom I have corresponded was
> Kendall D. Decker, so I decided to look him up and was shocked to
> discover that he died recently too at the age of only 50.
>
> I am not getting any younger either so I have decided that I had
> better get this Simple English Bible reprinted now or else the True
> Word of God will be forever lost.
>
> Sam Sloan
> Friday, January 13, 2012
>
>
>
> http://www.amazon.com/dp/4871872211
> http://search.barnesandnoble.com/books/product.aspx?ISBN=4871872211
>
> The Old Testament of the Bible in Chinese, Part I, from Genesis
> through Chronicles
>
> http://www.amazon.com/dp/4871872009
> http://search.barnesandnoble.com/books/product.aspx?ISBN=4871872009
>
> The Old Testament of the Bible in Chinese, Part 2, from Ezra to
> Malachi
>
> http://www.amazon.com/dp/4871872106
> http://search.barnesandnoble.com/books/product.aspx?ISBN=4871872106
>
> The New Testament of the Bible in Chinese
>
> http://www.amazon.com/dp/4871872203
> http://search.barnesandnoble.com/books/product.aspx?ISBN=4871872203