Hebrew meaning

Unlike most modern Western languages, Hebrew associate meaning to letters, words, names, idioms and so on. This is not obvious to many western people who understand text in its literal context. However, since the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, you would often find a deeper meaning associated with the text which are usually lost in phrase-by-phrase English translations.

Punctuation marks

Both the original Hebrew and Greek manuscripts lack the English punctuation marks. All punctuation marks are added based on the translator's interpretation of the scripture.

• This affects which subject is currently in context. For example when 2 persons are mentioned, a simple comma could determine if the first or the latter person is being described in the following scriptures.
• This affects where people's own words end and where the author's commentary continues, for example most translations confuse Jesus' words with John's commentary which creates the impression that Jesus was in Heaven while he was speaking to Nicodemus.
• It could potentially cause misunderstanding, for example Jesus' words to the thief on the cross which creates the impression that Jesus is going directly to Heaven on the same day he was crucified.

Testament division

Because of a misunderstanding of Hebrews 8:7-13, the Bible got divided between the "deprecated" Old Testament and the New Testament.

Chapter and verse divisions

For the sake of convenience, chapters and verses were added to turn the Bible into a lookup textbook.

• This makes it easy to quote scriptures out of context.
• Distort the meaning of the original message, because the verse dictate which words belong together. It might be part of a longer message, or it might be a combination of multiple messages.
• Chapter divisions create the impression that the previous subject is concluded and that the next chapter addresses another subject. Often this is not the case and context is lost this way.

Titles

The original manuscripts did not include titles. These were added by the bible translators in tradition of modern textbooks and for the convenience to find a specific scripture on a matter. However, these titles often dictate what the purpose of a passage is, like modern English articles. Sadly, translators often choose misleading titles for bible passages which distorts the originally intended message.

Capitalization

Neither the original Hebrew nor the Greek manuscripts distinguish between capital letters and lower letters like the English language. It is each translator's own interpretation that determines which words should be capitalized. Some bible translators uses capital letters to indicate which words refers to God. Because some translators view Jesus as God, they would translate words like Him or He to capital letters which gives the impression to the reader that the original author's intention was to glorify Jesus as a god.

Name changes

Each Hebrew name has a meaning associated with it. However, when one changes the name, the meaning is often lost.

Names ending on a vocal in the Greek are considered feminine. Therefore, the bible translators added an "s" to all Hebrew names ending with a vocal, for example Jesus, Judas, Lucas, etc.

Role changes

Meaning changes

Textual variants

Many textual variants exist, especially in the New Testament. Many of those have no significant change in the meaning of the text and can be ignored. However, there are a few variants that has a significant impact on the meaning. Therefore, some denominations wrote their own bible translations based on the textual variants they favour.