Was the Bible "Lost in Translation"?

Critics often claim that the Bible has been translated and re-translated over and again numerous times throughout history. They claim that our Bibles today are nothing but “translations of translations of translations” and are therefore inaccurate. However, this statement is false.

Each version of the Christian Bible (NIV, NASB, NKJ, the Message, etc.) has been translated one time and one time only, each from the original Greek and Hebrew manuscripts. The only exception is the Old King James Version, portions of which were translated from the Latin Vulgate Bible. The Latin Vulgate itself was translated from the original Greek and Hebrew manuscripts by Christian scholar Jerome in the fifth century AD.

Word for word, the most accurate translation of the Bible is the New American Standard version. When I took Greek in college, I compared my translations of New Testament passages with the NASB, and for the most part they were identical.


Note: The Joseph Smith Translation of the Bible, also called the Inspired Version of the Bible, is not considered valid. Smith supposedly created this “translation” through divine inspiration, since he was not intellectually qualified to perform any sort of actual linguistic translation. The work is merely the Old King James Version with some significant additions, clarifications, and revisions to support Mormon doctrines.