Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.

(James 1: 22 NIV)

When God wanted to share his message he did so in writing. The commandments were written on stone tablets. But when Moses came down off the mountain, the Israelites didn’t read the message but had it read to them. (Actually, the first copy of the commandments was smashed by Moses and then he had to go back up the mountain and do a re-write.)

Even today in our highly literate culture, most people hear the word rather than read it. They stream the audio from Bible Gateway. They subscribe to the podbible podcast. They purchase audio dramatizations. But the primary place where people hear the word is at church, sitting in a pew on Sunday morning with a preacher reading from the Scriptures.

Absorbing God’s message through our ears rather than our eyes makes an enormous difference in our comprehension. When we read, we are ingesting a linear progression of black squiggles and interpreting them inside our head. When we listen, sound washes over us in different levels of intensity. The speaker’s voice shapes the message through tone, volume and pauses.

Read the following passage silently and then read it out loud:

Remember, O LORD, against the Edomites
     the day of Jerusalem,
how they said, “Rase it, rase it!
     Down to its foundations!”

(Psalm 137:7, RSV)

Although the syntax is pretty mixed up, it seems to make sense when you read it in your head. But when you read it out loud, it means the opposite of what the psalmist intended. Instead of “Rase it, rase it!” what you hear is, “Raise it! Raise it!”

NIV adequately translates this verse:

Remember, O Lord, what the Edomites did
     on the day Jerusalem fell.
“Tear it down,” they cried,
     “tear it down to its foundations!”

(The only difference in TNIV is that they have edited out the vocative “O”.)

ESV pretty much follows the RSV:

Remember, O LORD, against the Edomites
    the day of Jerusalem,
how they said, “Lay it bare, lay it bare,
   down to its foundations!”

CEV and NLT attempt to remove the awkwardness of the repeated phrase, by saying the same thing in slightly different ways:

CEV:

     Our Lord, punish the Edomites!
Because the day Jerusalem fell,
     they shouted,
“Completely destroy the city!
      Tear down every building!”

NLT:

O Lord, remember what the Edomites did
on the day the armies of Babylon captured Jerusalem.
“Destroy it!” they yelled.
“Level it to the ground!”

I’d like you to consider the effect of your Bible version choice on those who primarily listen to God’s Word. This includes people in your church or small group. And your children. Spend a little time reading your preferred Bible version out loud. Many of us who are teachers or preachers are able to understand a translation even when it is written in awkward English. In fact, we often feel that the more formal translations are more faithful because they are closer to the form of the original. But our hearers don’t have that option. They don’t know the Biblical languages. They aren’t seeing what we are reading, only hearing it. Awkward syntax and strange vocabulary act as barriers to comprehension.

Earlier this year I wrote about the importance of choosing a translation with a lower reading level for the sake of “hearers of the Word.” You can find that post here: Bible Version Cage-Match Round 3.

For some more perspectives on this topic, check out these posts by other writers:

• Ben Witherington: SACRED TEXTS IN AN ORAL CULTURE—How Did They Function?
• Eddie Arthur: Sacred Texts in an Oral Culture
• Tim Challies: Bringing Life to the Living