The New Translation Vote
St Mark's has 90 regular worshippers, average age 61. Its pew Bibles and service books use a translation published in 1897, with 'thee' and 'thou'. A new translation by a national scholarly committee is now available. It replaces 'thee/thou' with 'you', uses 'humanity' where the old text has 'men', and moves some verses that appeared in the old text into footnotes because the earliest manuscripts omit them. The minister, Rev Adeyemi, supports the change. Four of the seven elders oppose it, arguing that the old words are what their parents and grandparents prayed, that changing the words changes the doctrine, and that the new footnotes 'take away from Scripture'. A vote needs two-thirds of the congregation. There is only enough money to print one version for the next five years. A 17-year-old member, Grace, asks in the question time: 'Can't we just check the original manuscripts and settle it?'
1. Assess the elders' argument that 'the older translation is closer to the original, so it is more authoritative'.
Read the worked answer
Distinguish three things. (i) The age of the English translation (1897). (ii) The age of the Greek and Hebrew manuscripts it was translated from. (iii) The authority of the text itself.
The claim fails on (i) against (ii). A late nineteenth-century translation is not old in manuscript terms. Many older English versions were made from a small number of late medieval manuscripts; the new translation rests on a much wider manuscript base, including early papyri and codices. So the older English is often further from the earliest recoverable text, not closer. The age of a translation and its closeness to the original are different questions, and the elders have run them together.
The footnotes. Moving verses to footnotes reflects manuscript evidence: some verses are absent from the earliest witnesses. The elders read this as 'taking away from Scripture', but if a verse was not in the original, restoring it would be adding. In most cases the doctrinal content of those passages is paralleled elsewhere, so no doctrine is lost - and that can be checked passage by passage rather than asserted.
Concede what is true. 'Thee/thou' was originally the informal singular, not a mark of reverence, so the old text is not intrinsically more holy. But familiarity has genuine liturgical value: people pray in words they know, and a change can feel like a bereavement. The elders' underlying concern - that worship should not be disrupted - is legitimate even where their argument is weak.
Verdict. The argument from age does not establish greater authority. Authority belongs to Scripture as Word, mediated through translation and interpreted by the community; no translation is identical to the original.
2. Advise Rev Adeyemi on how to proceed, referring explicitly to sources of authority and to the two-thirds rule.
Read the worked answer
Identify the sources of authority in play. Scripture (the text itself), tradition (the 1897 words as inherited practice), reason (textual scholarship and manuscript evidence) and experience (what the congregation can actually pray). Different Christian traditions weight these differently. In a congregation with elders, governance is itself a source of authority, and a change carried by a bare majority will not be received.
Do the arithmetic first. Seven elders, four opposed. Even if two-thirds of the congregation vote yes, the minister will be leading worship in a building where most elders believe he is removing Scripture. The vote is necessary but not sufficient.
Process recommendations.
- Postpone the vote by a month; three weeks does not allow teaching.
- Run two open sessions: one on how translation works, using a single verse where old and new differ and showing the Greek; one on what the footnotes actually mean.
- Trial the new translation at one midweek service for four weeks, keeping Sunday as it is. Experience is a source of authority too, and people need to hear it before they judge.
- Ask the elders to put their objections in writing and answer each point specifically, rather than answering 'the elders' as a bloc.
- Make the ballot secret, count it under the two-thirds rule, and publish the result with the reasoning.
Conditional recommendation. If the four elders still oppose after the trial, propose a dual-use arrangement within the five-year budget - new translation at the main Sunday service, old at the early service, one printed book containing both - rather than spending everything on a single version half the congregation will resist. Grace's question should be answered publicly: manuscripts help, but they do not settle the argument, because the argument is about what people can pray on Sunday.