[lab]oratory picked up on this story coming out of my own backyard of Grand Rapids, MI that manages to combine issues of copyright, religion, sexuality and emotional abuse into one package. The story covers a man attempting to sue Zondervan for publishing the NIV. He's taking issue with the translation of 'arsenokoitai' to 'homosexuals' in 1 Corinthians 6:9. 
He wants an apology and $60 million.
I know I'm just feeding the hype machine by passing this along to you, which I'm sure is exactly what this person wants, but it's just such an interesting case.
Here's an excerpt from the WOODTV article, which managed to get a phone interview with Fowler:Fowler says Zondervan Bibles published in 1982 and 1987 use the word homosexuals among a list of those who are "wicked" or "unrighteous" and won't inherit the kingdom of heaven.There's more of the same over at NBC25:Fowler says his family's pastor used that Zondervan Bible, and because of it his family considered him a sinner and he suffered.
Now he is asking for an apology and $60 million.
"To compensate for the past 20 years of emotional duress and mental instability," Fowler told 24 Hour News 8 in a phone interview.
He claims the company is misinterpreting the Bible by specifically using the word homosexuals. Fowler admits that every Bible printed is a translation, interpreted in some way, but he says specifically using that word is not a translation but a change.
"These are opinions based on the publishers," he said. "And they are being embedded in the religious structure as a way of life."
Some other bibles like the New American Standard also use the word. Others don't. The regular American Standard Version uses the phrase 'abusers of themselves with men.' The King James says 'abusers of themselves with mankind.' Still others use the word 'sodomites.' Fowler says the idea that those phrases are another way of saying homosexuals is a misinterpretation as well.As [lab]oratory points out, you can't just sue the publisher. You also can't really sue IBS (the copyright owner) because the CBT did the translation.The following is a statement from Zondervan:
Zondervan has not been served with a lawsuit and therefore cannot comment on it. However, it is important to note that since Zondervan does not translate the Bible or own the copyright for any of the translations we publish, we should not comment on the merits of how a word should or should not be translated. We rely on the scholarly judgment of the highly respected and credible translation committees behind each translation and never alter the text of the translations we are licensed to publish. We only publish credible translations produced by credible Biblical scholars.
It seems to me that his case might be rather weak considering the long history of scholarship in Bible translation. If the case is successful, which I highly doubt it will be, I do wonder what this could mean for translation efforts.
Thoughts?
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Comments (6)
From what I've been able to research I think there are three reasons why this suit isn't going to fly. I'm not a lawyer, a theologian or a Greek scholar but most of this research doesn't take an expert to understand.
First, It's been the practice of the courts not to rule on religious doctrine and they might see this as doctrinal.
Second, I don't think the translation angle is going to hold too much water. Apparently there were two words Paul used for male on male sex. One was "malakos" to indicate the passive partner, for example a male prostitute, which the King James translates "effiminate." The other was "arsenokoites" for the active partner, defined as "one who lies with a man as with a woman." The King James translated this as "abusers of themselves with mankind" while some other translations use "sodomite." The King James could be more literal but if NIV was going for a thought-for-thought translation it seems sort of logical that if Paul was going to condemn one partner in a homosexual act that the intent of the other word, "arsenokoites" would be to condemn the other as well.
Since "homosexual" is the English equivalent for this sort of activity the translators used the word for both "malakos" and "arsenokoites". I read several commentaries which emphasized that the action rather than the inclination was what was being discussed and named as sin, which might be why two words, distinguishing both partners in the act, would have been used.
Third, there has been little success in lawsuits in which an author or publisher is sued over attitudes or even actions which may have been precipitated by the content of a book, movie or song. Freedom of speech has won out in suits accusing song lyrics precipitated murder or alleging that criminals got ideas for the crimes they committed from novels. I think proving intent to do harm is pretty hard to prove.
All that said, somebody with a chip on his shoulder and something to prove might get somewhere depending on which judges he draws. That's what so much fun about our courts.
What power do we have, and how do we use it? Do we use our knowledge of God's Word to heal or to wound? This man would probably say that Christians, as a group, have used God's Word to wound him. I'm not suggesting for a minute that we don't teach truth, but I am suggesting that Christians can do more harm than good when we simply spout scripture without understanding, both of the words and of the person we are talking to.
One day,
Dude will stand before God,
Apologize to Him,
And owe Him a LOT more that a mere 60 million bucks.
So I can understand where Fowler is coming from, although 60 million dollars? That seems a little excessive and aggrandizing. However, I think the even more offensive translation out there right now is New Living Translation that actually translates it as "those who practice homosexuality." The whole concept of "practicing homsexuals" is entirely a modern concept that cannot be equated to what Paul was talking about.
It really saddens me to see that translation as there have been so many people damaged by that slight change in translation.
Also, a few years ago, I interviewed the chairman of the CBT. Although I did not talk to him for as long as I would have liked and I did not talk about translation as it relates to sexuality, the interview left me with the impression that his goal and the goal of other translators is to convey meaning. They want to give people the tools to guide their own thoughts and their own actions, not tell people directly what to think and what to do.
Perhaps this guy's family did give him a hard time. He needs to get an apology from them, not try to sue Zondervan. His family's reading of the text is not everyone's reading of the text. If two different types of behavior -- for instance, his familiy's behavior and mine -- seem to come from the same source, then obviously the source isn't to blame.