After that, ask them why, if the Bible is the “inerrant” word of God, do some translations of that second verse use “miscarriage” while others say something more general like “caused a premature birth” instead? Because the meaning of that verse changes drastically depending on which way it’s translated.

According to Google Translate, the original Hebrew for just that phrase directly translates to "and her children went out," but with the full context of the verse it becomes "and her children are born." Make of that what you will.

I could translate it to "and she gets a black eye," but that doesn't make the word itself any less reliable, only my wrong translation. I don't know about the people you hang out with, but I'm pretty sure it's important for Christians to understand that human translations are prone to error.

[–] billiam0202@lemmy.world 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

It's problematic to try to read that verse as just meaning "born" exactly because of the context. The whole passage is about restitution in two scenarios: a pregnant woman who is injured as a bystander from two men fighting and

suffers an unclear birth event with no additional damage
suffers an unclear birth event with additional damage.

Breaking it down that way, it seems apparent to me that the birth event must mean a miscarriage. If two men fight and that causes a woman to go into labor, but her child is safely delivered, what restitution would be owed? What harm has actually been caused? That actually eliminates scenario 1. The only way the whole passage makes any sense for the father to be owed payment is to see what property he has been deprived of- a potential child, or a potential child and his wife. And this just helps to reinforce the point: the punishment for causing the death of a person is not the same as for causing a miscarriage, which means that in the Old Testament unborn fetuses we're not equal to people

And no, American Evangelicals do not allow any room for error in translation of the Bible, because they see it as God's direct word to man and therefore it can't be wrong.

[–] Sotuanduso@lemm.ee 4 points 1 year ago

Guess I must be something other than an American Evangelical then. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

It sounds like you found a sensible way to translate it.

[–] Cabrio@lemmy.world 11 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Born, or birthed? A stillborn is still birthed. See, we can play this game for millenia, others already have.

[–] Sotuanduso@lemm.ee 5 points 1 year ago

I copied what Google Translate told me. I'm no expert on matters relating to birth. That's why I said "make of that what you will."

However, I do know that we have a lot more technical language than they did back then, so that's something to keep in mind.

[–] MeetInPotatoes@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

"¿Porque no los dos?" or... Why not borth?

[–] MeetInPotatoes@lemmy.ml 2 points 1 year ago

The people who downvoted this have no sense of humor. C'mon, "borth?"... objectively hilarious.