 Sorry, good morning everyone. And welcome back to the class today. Up here at a good break and you're awake. So we're going to quickly respond to the questions in the chat. And then we will move forward. I have done the recording on for this lecture. Okay, so we say this question, we responded. Okay, the next question is from Kennedy. Are there things that Jesus did that are not written in the Bible? Yeah, Kennedy. So the answer is yes. And this is of course stated by John for us in John chapter 20 and also in John chapter 21. John 20 versus 1331 in John chapter 21 verse 25. John stated that there are things Jesus did, that there's so many miracles that he did. That's not possible to record all of those miracles. But remember, these are miracles that was in his earthly ministry, not things about his childhood, right? So when you have some people recording things about his childhood, that's just fiction because the Bible clearly states, he started his ministry after being baptized in the River Jordan. And when John says there are many other things Jesus did, he's referring to the healing's miracles during his actual time of ministry. That is after he began his ministry, not as a child. So we can't use John 20 and 21, the descriptors in John 20 and John 21 bring up so-called supposed miracles that Jesus did as a child and so on. So we can't use that, okay? Let's see the next question is, Kennedy can. Why are the Maccabees writing not recognized and yet the two books contain worthy values? Yeah, so Kennedy, like we were mentioning, in the intertestamental period, which is about 450 years, there were a lot of other writings. So like the book of the Maccabees and a lot of other things that were written, but these were not considered as part of the Hebrew Bible because the Hebrews recognized Malachi as the last prophet, Abdullatam, doesn't mean they were not expecting any others. But in fact, they were expecting the prophet, Moses spoke about to come. It was not that they were not open, they were open. But for them, first criteria is for something to be considered valid to be included as part of the scriptures, it had to come from a prophet of God. It had to be inspired. And so while a lot of writings did take place, which we refer to as the apocrypha, or some of them are in refer to as apocrypha, they are not from a prophet. They're not from somebody who's inspired by God. They are the works of man. So Maccabees and other books that form the apocrypha and other books have written the intertestament period. A lot of literary works happen. They're good, they're virtuous, they are stories of people, et cetera. But they're not from a inspired person. So that's what they're not included in the Hebrew Bible as scriptures. Okay, because that is an important criteria. Okay, next question, Samuel. Is there value in indulging in books such as these, say a book written by Apostle Thomas, may have seen India and that's never gotten to him. These books can choose or even derail the levers. You know, okay, so there are people who do read it or read whatever books are there outside of the scriptures. And just to try to understand what was happening historically, what was happening. So, you know, whether it's, there are a lot of other literature during that time, during the early church. And there are people who like to read it because they want to know the history, they want to know what else was happening going on. So from that perspective, if somebody has the time and the interest, yeah. But if you're looking for something to grow spiritually, to develop your faith, to nurture yourself, and I would say, you know, let's stay with the 66 books of the Bible. They are meant for our faith and nurturing our faith. But if somebody has the time and the interest to read outside, that's fine. It just has more of information. Some people do that. Some people do read in order to know, you know, what was going on during those times, both during the inter-testamental period and in the early church, the first 400 years thereafter. So, you know, if people have the time and interest, they're welcome to do it. But if it's about faith, about strengthening your faith, then I, you know, we stay with the 66 books. Is that okay? Any other questions? Pastor? Yes, go ahead. This question just came to my mind. What do you think was the busiest to allow songs or songs to enter the collection of the Old Testament? Hmm. Because I understand that, yes, it's like a figurative description of God's love to the church. But I just wondered in a way, all the other books, you know, they seem so serious. Then here you come to the songs and songs. It's more romantic, you know, and everything about, but what do you think must have been the busiest? Why the people, the early people, the community have chosen that to be part of the holy books. Right. That's interesting. So, again, we have to try to get into, you know, we are looking back in time, trying to get into the mind of the Jewish people at that time. And I can think of just two reasons. One is that it was given, I mean, it was Solomon, a man who they knew, inspired, I mean, given wisdom by God. Secondly, it spoke something about human love, which is not something, you know, that God's people are averse to. Now, it's part of who we are, it's part of what God has given to us and made us. And in the Jewish community, there is a respect for women. There is a respect for, there's an honoring of human love and there's a respect for women. So I can think of these two reasons. One, because of who was behind it. So Solomon, a man, endowed with wisdom from God. Second, because of the respect for both human love and for this human relationship, this dynamic, which is held sacred. And so, you know, it's not something to be disdained or held, you know, be averse to. No, this is honorable knowing that God designed all of this. So it was still considered as part of the Hebrew Bible. Thank you, Pastor. Welcome. Anybody else, any other question? Okay, so let's move on. I'm actually a little behind of what I wanted to do. I was hoping to finish everything in the first hour. I think I was a little too ambitious. Anyway, let's try to answer the second question here. The next question is about English versions of the English Bible, et cetera, okay? Now, some of this we dealt with in our course on Permanutics in our previous semester. Yeah, in our second semester. So you may recognize some of the things that I'm saying here that why are there so many, so the question what we are trying to answer is why, what is the different? Why are there many English versions of the Bible? So somebody, and we'll be able to look at it from an apologetics point of view. Somebody may say, hey, you know, you've got, you know, you've got so many different versions of your Bible, which one is correct? And some of it may be even seemingly, contradict three, look at, you know, they can put two or three script versions aside and the same versus telling something quite different. So, you know, they can laugh at us and say, what's going on here? You know, which one is the authentic one? You know, so therefore they can work backwards and say therefore your original text is corrupt, but that's not the case. What we do know, like we already said last class and I'm not going to go over the details again, is that we have a substantial amount of manuscripts for us to be very confident about the original text. And also in the translation process are people, these scholars, the people are doing the translation, people who know the Hebrew and the Greek and the, the aramik that's needed and who are going to work with this, they, they refer to, you know, certain, they have categorized these manuscripts. One is referred to as the majority text, and then there is the division of text based on the date and also the region of the world that they come from. So because the texts were found in various parts of the world, right? And so then they choose to, which family of texts do they want to use? And so they will work with that and then they will do their translations. And so, you know, some may do a comparison all of this and then they draw. So whichever Bible you buy, the Bible in the beginning of the Bible, they will tell you, hey, we have used these texts to translate or we have used a combination of these texts. And then we have indicated in the, in the, you know, in the footnote or in the margin or in the middle column, what, you know, what is found or what is not found in the texts that be used, et cetera. So, you know, usually every Bible will tell you what set of texts they're translating from. But the reason, the philosophy or the reason behind us having so many translations and versions of the English Bible is this, it's very basic. So, and this is something we did see last semester. I'm just quickly reviewing. So there are translations that are word for word. And that means if that word is found in the original text that they're using, they will put that, you know, equivalent word or sometimes it may require a few words in English to translate that. So that's called form equivalence, the word for word, in King James, New American standard, so on. Then there is a part for part. That means we will communicate the original thought into English thought, you know, in the same thought in English language. It's called functional equivalence. Now, when they're doing thought for thought, obviously they are doing a little bit of, not just translation, but they're also doing a little bit of interpretation for us, right? So they're saying, this is what we think the writer was thinking. And so this is how we should be thinking about it in the English language. So it's not just translation, but there's a little bit of interpretation also coming in, little bit. It's a thought for thought, right? Of course, the translator's not trying to fool anybody or translators are German people. They are trying to do their best, okay? Then there is a combination of word for word and thought for thought. That is referred to as an optimal equivalence, okay? So somebody say, let's try to find a balance between word for word and thought for thought. And so you have some versions like that. And then there is the essential equivalence, which is meaning for meaning. So we're going away from word for word, thought for thought, and now we're saying meaning for meaning. What we think he meant, we're going to tell you in the English language. So meaning for meaning. And this usually happens when you do interpretors, when you speak through interpreters. The interpreter's not doing a word for word, when you're speaking, let's say I'm speaking Hindi and I'm preaching to a crowd that understands Hindi and I'm preaching in Hindi and somebody's interpreting for me from English to Hindi. That person is not going to do a word for word. He's not going to do a thought for thought. Most likely he's going to be working meaning for meaning. He's going to take the meaning of what I said and put that into Hindi language and communicate it to the audience. Now I've had situations where, you know, this happened while I was preaching. The interpreter started telling his own story. He has created his own story because he felt he can communicate the meaning of what I'm saying by a story. So the story was nowhere in anything that I was saying, right? But he developed a own story and he was using that story to communicate the meaning of what I was saying. So it's like, it's not exactly what I'm saying, but the goal, his goal was, let me communicate the meaning. And so he's developing own story and he's telling the people. And I didn't understand until a long after I said, he's speaking a lot more than I'm speaking. Then I realized, oh, this is what he's doing. He's made up his own story and through his story, he's getting the meaning across. Anyway, his intent was good, he was sincere. So, you know, that's a big part. So there's a meaning for meaning translation, right? So they're trying to, again, so they're doing an interpretation of it, okay? So this is called an essential equivalent. So the passion translation, which is getting popular these days is that, right? And then there's a paraphrase. So paraphrase is, it's way beyond thought for thought or meaning for meaning. It's more like, okay, let's start to tell it to you as a story. Let's put it out to you in a way that you will enjoy reading it. We can't necessarily call it a translation, but it has, you know, in story form, in essence, what was communicated in text, but some people may at least start reading the paraphrase. So if you want to look at it, you know, in a chart like this, and again, I just got this off the internet, it's nothing big here. So if this is on the left-hand side, you're saying, okay, this is closest to the text. And then you have, you know, as they're moving forward, you're going from word for word, thought for thought, meaning for meaning, and then paraphrase. So you'll find the closest, of course, is the interlinear. That means it's a Bible that has the Hebrew words or the Greek words. And top of the each word is the English word. So that's an interlinear Bible. It's, of course, very difficult to read because it doesn't come out in proper English sentence. It's just exact word for word. But then you'll find, okay, see in a New American Standard Bible, the Amplified Bible, the English Standard Version, the Revised Standard Version. Then you have the King James and New King James, which are word for word. They kind of come in this category, and they are pretty close to the original, right? So if you're a Bible study, if you're a person who's studying the Bible, you definitely want to work with one of these versions of the Bible because their word for word, they're pretty close. And then you begin to transition into what is thought for thought, right? So you have the HCSB, the Holmen, the New Revised, the New American Jerusalem Bible, the NIV somewhere here. A lot of people use the NIV, but you're somewhere kind of quite away. They've done some interpretation for you already. And then you have the New Living Translation is kind of here, on the edge of thought for thought, getting ready to move into paraphrase. Then of course, when you go into the paraphrase, you have the Good News Translation of Good News Bible, Contemporary English Version, The Big Bible, Message Bible. So the Message Bible is like really on the other end of the spectrum, but it's close to the audience, meaning make it easy for people. So if somebody asks the question, hey, why do you have so many different versions of the Bible, you explain it like this, right? Look, if I'm speaking to you, and let's say you know Russian, I know English, I'm gonna use an interpreter to help me communicate to you. The interpreter can communicate what I'm saying to you in many different ways. The goal is for you to understand what I'm saying. So the interpreter can do a word for word, every word, he can write it and translate it and tell it to you, or he can communicate the part of what I'm saying, or he can do a meaning of what I'm saying, or he can paraphrase, summarize, give you a gist of what I'm saying. So the interpreter can do it. The goal is to help you understand and get you to help you get the most important things that are being said. And so that is why we have many of these different versions and translations of the Bible and they all serve a purpose. Ultimately, we have different kinds of readers. Not all the readers will be able to, of course, handle a King James or a new King James, or some readers may prefer a paraphrase. Some readers, depending on where they want to start, they may prefer something. And so the reason we have many different versions is to make the Bible more accessible to people. Now, of course, in the process, there's going to be a lot of difference, just like how an interpreter trying to explain something to somebody in Russian, if he's giving you a gist of what I'm saying, that what you read or what you hear in the gist of what I've said will be very different from an interpreter who is trying to communicate meaning for meaning or thought for thought or word for word. Now, so you might question the gist, but that was just a gist, just a paraphrase, just a summary of what was being said. They will not have all the details, they will not have all the specifics, but it's the essence of what was communicated. So yes, things may look very different. And also, when it's communicated in modern English, it may be very different from how it was communicated in, you know, let's say a King James version or old English format and so on. So we explain it that way to help people understand, okay? And there's just a list of versions and so on. Okay, let me just wrap this up, then we'll take questions and then if everybody's happy, we will move to the next lesson. Hopefully we'll get it started. So just to sum up, you know, what we've talked about the Bible was amazing is the unity of the scriptures. The unity of the scriptures is not something that is forced but by man, but something that is inspired by God. So although we understand that, you know, there was this, a community process in the assimilation of the Old Testament or the New Testament books, you can't force unity, you know? You can't force that coherence. It has to be inspired. The fact is, if it was just a natural human process, the likelihood is it's going to be very divergent. You know, people are going to come up with their own ideas. There's going to be a lot of contradictions, a lot of distortions, a lot of their own parts. But because there has been one source of divine inspiration, it is consistent, it's coherent, and it's not forced by man. Man only played the role of collecting it and putting it all together and preserving it over time, but the unity was inspired by God. Second, we also find it's historical and archaeological accuracy that means you don't find things in the Bible that can be disproven by archaeology or history, secular history. No, it's there, it's valid. Then, of course, the scriptures have fulfilled prophecy, hundreds of prophecies have been fulfilled, which is very amazing because that again, cannot be forced. Nobody's going back and writing something, you know, 3,000 years, 2,000 years ahead, nobody's doing that. They've just been collecting it and then over time, you're seeing the prophecies being fulfilled. So that is another amazing part of the scripture. And some of the things we have mentioned is it's indestructibility. Many have attempted to destroy it, but it has survived through time. And interestingly, even the Old Testament is pointing to a Messiah. It's pointing to the coming of Jesus Christ. And we also see that the teachings are powerful and it may not always be what is popular, but yet it's timeless. And it has life-transforming, power lives of millions of people have been changed through the reading of the scripture. So the scriptures themselves are not just good philosophy or good content that you read and you like it, but it's something that changes lives, transforms lives. So it's powerful. All right, and so here's just a quote here. I think it's from, this is from the Gideon's Bible that you'll find that's really very, very well written here in the last paragraph. Okay, so I'm going to pause here. Let's take some questions and then we will move to the next. Okay, let's see now. Okay, there's a question from Christopher. Is thought for thought quite similar to meaning for meaning? The translation indicating the thought of the author which incense translates to meaning. Is there a different process in how these approaches are used? Yeah, so the thought for thought, so let me just put it like this. So in meaning, I am actually doing a little bit more interpretation than in just communicating the thoughts. I'm doing it for, of course, the benefit of the reader, right? So a thought is, okay, this is what is captured. Meaning also puts in or brings into bear, bear the context and the relevance to the author for the modern day reader. So what is stated must be understood in the context, but it also must be interpreted or made relevant for the modern day reader. So meaning has a lot more interpretive process around the translation as opposed to a thought for thought translation. So a lot more interpretation is being done for the benefit of the modern reader. Okay, go ahead, please. Samuel. Thank you, master. I don't know if we are going to cover this in this, but the whole process of how the 66 books were put together, so just a little bit on that, like meaning was it done by, we'd say like the church and some people did like, but like, did it happen over the course of time? Like, you know, was it like a 10 year project or a five year project or was it at like one shot? Like they said, and they put the 66 books together. So just a little bit on that, I've heard a couple of preachers saying that, you know, the 66 books were already being used by the churches, churches in that early period is just nobody had taken the time to put them together, but it's not that somebody sat and filtered and said like, okay, these books fit, but it was like the letters of Paul, most churches were already using it and it's just, it came together and it was like the Bible itself imposing itself on the church. So that there's that part of the argument, which to me changes my perspective a little bit, saying like, it was not people deciding the Bible, what Bible should be, but the Bible itself imposing. So that's a team of thought. And also if, you know, a little bit more specifics on who put it together and how long did it take if we know something around that? Yeah, so like what we have said, right? It was, I think part of what you've spoken basically is the answer, which is over time, you know, the 39 books were already recognized as scripture. The early church continued with that, you know, as we explained. And then by the time John wrote 8090, he wrote the book of Revelation. We had the New Testament scriptures at the writings of the apostles and so on, we had it. And so when we cross over into the second century, the church already recognized and used the Old Testament scriptures, 39 books that we have, and the 27 New Testament scriptures. So they were using it right from the beginning of the second century, as we explained, just that they never called it the Holy Bible or they didn't put it together the way we have it, right? So they continued using it. But it was only, like we mentioned, around 376, 80, around that time, 370, when a lot of the different councils of Christian leaders began to officially refer to the New Testament. And of course, the Old Testament was already there, but to officially recognize it and formally say, this is our scriptures. And then Jerome translated the Bible, meaning the scriptures, the Hebrew, the Old and the New Testament. He translated it into Latin for us. So by that time, they had recognized, this is the scriptures by which we live by. And I think, so it's safe to say that by 370, 80, we had the Bible, as we know it. But it was not in one single council that they sat down and said, okay, here we announce, this is the Bible. No, but I think like what you already stated, it happened over time and these councils, towards the end of the third century or the fourth century, they formally recognized what was already accepted by the church by that time. They formally recognized it. So it was more of a formal recognition as opposed to making an official document by that time. And it happened, the interesting thing is, it happened more or less simultaneously by different councils around that part of the world, the Mediterranean, who said, okay, these are the scriptures. We're formally going forward with it, but it had already been followed for about 250 years prior to that in an quote unquote, informal way. So yeah, Charles, as a farmer of the different versions, to the basis for the loss of verses in some versions that are put as footnotes. So Charles, yeah, the answer to your question is, the use of the manuscripts and also how the translators would go about doing the translation. So the translators decide how, okay, we're using these manuscripts and we will translate from here. And if we find something, you know, missing, we will put it as a footnote here. The King James says, we will put everything together. That means whatever we find, we'll put it together. And some will say, okay, we are using these set of manuscripts. If there's something missing, we will indicate it in a footnote. So that's how they go about it. When did the worst thing start from the scroll and does it affect to change the Bible meaning or wording in the Bible? Interesting. So we clifted his translation around 1300 something, 13, what's the date there? I forget, I know somewhere in 1331 or something. Now I don't know, Kennedy, exactly when the worst thing started, but I'm assuming it must have been around that time or maybe even from the time of Jerome, which was around 370. Yeah, I don't know exactly when it started, Kennedy. The worst thing, we'll have to find out. And does it change the meaning or wording of the Bible? I don't think it would change the meaning. They were trying to be, also keep the flow of thought. So that's what you'll find in the way it's translated. An indication of a start of a paragraph and so on. So even in doing the work, just they tried to follow the flow of thought. Okay, I just realized that Mangi was supposed to do a little presentation for us today. Sorry, I forgot about it in the very beginning. I just suddenly came to my mind. Is Mangi here on the call today? Oh, Mangi's there. Mangi, are you ready to do your presentation for us, Mangi? Hello, Mangi. I think he must have given up. So this is Mangi. Are you there? Oh, Mangi, do you want to do your presentation? I completely forgot. And then suddenly it just came back to my mind. Well, at this moment, that you are supposed to do your presentation. If you're ready, we'd love to hear from you. Okay, awesome. So I'll give the presentation now. Okay, go ahead. Okay, so to start, I did some research and yeah, it is, there are a lot of evidence that supports that Koran cannot be the way of God. To start with, Koran was only written 150 years after Muhammad was alive, was lived. So that means any of the people who wrote Koran they never met Muhammad. And some of them were lived a thousand kilometers away from where Muhammad lived. And each one of those people wrote his own version of Koran. So there are around 20 or 30 versions of Koran that I recognize as Koran. And each set of Islam and countries, they choose which one that they'll adopt to use for the unfaith. So that's the first evidence. Secondly, my not. If you want to share this screen or something, please feel free to do it. I wrote it down on paper. That's okay. Okay, so that was the first one. If we compare it to the Bible or the New Testament, we say most New Testament texts were written by people who either knew Jesus personally, like Matthew or Peter or people walk with apostles like Mark and Luke. So Koran, first of all, was only written 150 years after Muhammad was dead. And all those people with Muhammad, most of them died in power struggles because they wanted to satsit Muhammad. So after a year or two years, they'll be killed so that someone else can take their position. And there's no evidence that supports Muhammad's claim that he was inspired when he wrote Koran. Because it's only a story that he speaks himself if you compare it to the Bible, where God didn't only give the revelation to one person, the revelation of the Bible given to the Bible over 40 people. For example, the Old Testament was given in a period of more than 1,500 years. And all those, even though it was given to different people, all their topics and all their writing points to the same message and the same author. Compared to the Koran, it's only one person who claimed that the word was revealed to him by God, but it doesn't have evidence to show that God gave him the word. And those who came out of time, most of them, they just added their own words to what they believed that Muhammad said because they never met him. And it was words of the mouth they worked with him. Thank you so much. I'll share the text in the stream, the evidence. Okay. Good job. Thank you, Maggie, for making the effort to research and share with us, we really appreciate it. Thank you. Okay. All right, one last question, then we'll go for a break. Now, why does Kennedy say Maggie, my son-in-law? I don't understand that. Anyway, Avni, his question is, is the Ministry of Apologetics a particular calling a matter of one's interest? Or is it for everyone in ministry to be ready with these answers? How do we understand this? Because we do not see many apologetics around the world. I think it's, especially for us, who are engaged. And this is just my opinion. Especially those of us who are living in urban centers, where people are asking questions, thinking through on many of these things. We need to be ready to answer, at least provide an answer, may not get into all the technicalities of things, but provide a reasonably acceptable answer on various questions. If we are out in the village, areas where people are not, they don't necessarily think and ask these kinds of questions. For them, they just, you pray, you see a miracle, you'll believe, it's okay in those contexts, maybe we don't need to be prepared with such answers on these kinds of questions because the audience may not be thinking along those lines. So for them, it's okay. But for those of us, and many of us, will be engaged in cities and in a post-modern world where people are thinking on these lines, they're having a lot of thoughts going on, a lot of information coming. They will definitely ask these questions and so we need to be prepared. And my answer is, I think all of us, as believers, whether we are in quote unquote, standing up in front and preaching, just as believers we should know for our own benefit and for being able to help other people. All right, again, we've run our time. Sorry about that, but let's close in prayer and then we will dismiss. All right, so let me request somebody to close in prayer. Anybody, please jump in, take a moment to say thanks to the Lord. Let's pray. Go ahead Charles. Father God, we are really thankful that you are continuing to teach us. We are called for this, that we are supposed to learn your word and we are able to understand it and having such teachings, they will help us to understand on how to rightly divide the word of truth. Thank you, Lord, for our pastor. Thank you for all of us that were in this call. Lord, we pray that we'll be able to internalize them, understand them and be able to apply them for a fruitful living. Thank you. For in Jesus name we pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you. Thank you everyone for patient listening. Take a quick break. I'll see you in the other class. God bless. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.