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by John David Clark, Sr. How faithful to the original text is the translation
Anyone can easily see a difference between these two words: it he Likewise, we all can see a difference between these words: which who We can see a difference between those words simply because there is a difference; the letters used to spell each word differ. In this study, that is how simple the issue is. In the Greek language, the difference between it and he or between which and who is as easily recognized as it is in English, for those Greek words, too, are spelled differently. For example, consider the Greek words for it I began this study with a question: "Did the writers of the New Testament refer to God's Spirit as a person (he, him, who) or as a thing (it, which, that)?" To find the answer to the question, I had only to locate the verses in the New Testament in which the apostles referred to the holy Spirit and then read each verse in the Greek. It was a very simple process, one that a first-year student of the Greek language could easily perform. Once I had determined which Greek words the apostles used when they referred to the Spirit of God, then the focus of the study became, "How faithful to the apostles' words are Christian versions of the Bible?" To answer that question, I needed only to read the appropriate verses in various translations and see how the apostles' words were translated. Lastly, I organized the information into Tables so that the reader could see:
What I discovered in most of the versions of the Bible produced by trinitarians which I studied is irrefutable proof of intentional mistranslation of words which refer to the Spirit of God. This statement is not intended as an antagonistic denunciation of those translators. It is simply a statement of fact, and it is a fact that no scholar on earth can refute. In the versions of the holy scriptures which they produce, I learned that Christian trinitarians routinely and purposely mistranslate Greek pronouns, so as to promote the doctrine of the holy Trinity. The evidence for my conclusions is organized and presented in the Tables on pages 9 - 22. You may turn to those Tables now, if you want to go directly to the heart of the study. At some point, however, you will want to consider the other relevant information contained in the Main Introduction which immediately follows this Short Introduction.
Many languages refer to things, as well as to people and animals, as "him" or "her". For example, bread and house in biblical Greek are treated as masculine words, and so, the personal pronoun he is always used when such words are the antecedent1. Love, sword, and city, on the other hand, are treated as feminine and always referred to as she. And words considered neuter, such as name and water, are always referred to as it. Gender designation may change from language to language (the biblical Greek word for spirit is neuter, but the modern German word for spirit is masculine), but within a language itself gender designation is consistent (the biblical Greek word for spirit is always neuter in biblical Greek). How it developed, and which people first began designating nouns as masculine, feminine, or neuter is an interesting question, but is probably unknowable. Nevertheless, the designation of words as masculine, feminine, or neuter became an integral part of many ancient languages and remains so in many modern languages.
A determiner is a word that signals that a noun (such as spirit) is coming in the sentence. In English, articles such as the and other determiners do not change form, regardless of what they point out (the man, the woman, the tree). But in many languages, including biblical Greek, determiners do change form in order to match the gender of the noun they describe. An excellent example of this is found in Ephesians 4:5. In this verse, we find but six words: three determiners which modify three nouns. In English, it reads:
In English, the determiner one is spelled the same way, whether describing Lord, faith, or baptism. But in Greek, we find in this single verse three completely different words which mean one in English. The reason that Paul used three different determiners is because of the genders of the three nouns in this verse: Lord is masculine, faith is feminine, and baptism is neuter. The Greek word for one masculine thing is hais, one feminine thing is mia, and one neuter thing is hen. So, these are the (transliterated) words for one that are found in Ephesians 4:5:
1 An antecedent is a word to which a pronoun refers. For example, John is the antecedent of his in the following sentence: John took his hat to the game. His is a pronoun which refers to the antecedent, John. In this study we will focus on pronouns which have the holy Spirit as their antecedent. For example, in Matthew 10:20 Spirit is the antecedent of which: For it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your heavenly Father which speaks in you. Since which refers to Spirit, the word Spirit is called the antecedent of which.
As with the word one from Ephesians 4:5 just given, and with virtually all such examples found in the New Testament scriptures, the Greek words are clearly different from each other, though in English translation they are exactly the same! In 2Corinthians 3:17, we find this example with the article the:
In English translation, the is spelled the same way, whether describing Lord or Spirit. But in Greek, Lord is a masculine word and Spirit is a neuter word, and so Paul uses two different words for the. Here is the actual Greek verse from 2Corinthians 3:17:
 The masculine the is different from the neuter the, as you can see for yourself. A young child could be taught the difference between those two words, and every young child in ancient Greece was so taught. This simple concept of different Greek words meaning exactly the same thing in English lies at the heart of our study, especially concerning pronouns.
As with determiners, described above, Greek pronouns which have masculine antecedents do not resemble pronouns which have feminine antecedents. And neuter pronouns, of course, are different from both masculine and feminine pronouns. (With pronouns this is true even in English: his, hers, and its, for example, are clearly different.) The issue, then, is simple: When Spirit (Greek: pneuma) is the antecedent, is a masculine or a neuter pronoun used? In other words, did the New Testament writers refer to God's Spirit as "it" or as "he"? And then, how faithful to the New Testament writers' words are the translations which we have?
The Temptation. There have been many attempts by Christians to use certain Scriptural references to the Spirit as support for Christianity's doctrine of the Trinity. This doctrine holds that the Spirit of God is itself a person, and as such, should always be referred to as "he" (or "He"). The evidence in this study will show that the Greek words used in reference to the holy Spirit offer no support for that doctrine at all. Trinitarian translators are especially tempted to translate neuter pronouns which refer to pneuma as if they were masculine pronouns. They would prefer whom instead of which, and he instead of it. However, the writers of the original texts left nothing to the translator's discretion in this matter, for they chose the Greek equivalent of which and it every time they referred to the Spirit of God (or anyone else's spirit, for that matter). The Tables in this survey (pages 8-21) show that some translators fell to the temptation to ignore the Greek text in order to make it appear to the English reader that the apostles believed in Christianity's strange doctrine of a holy Trinity of persons. intentional mistranslation of the Greek text by some translators, for the obvious purpose of promoting the doctrine of the Trinity!
On the first page of Tables (page 9), in left to right order, you will find:
1 In biblical Greek, a few masculine and neuter forms are identical. In those cases, and purely for accuracy's sake, the "E" designation is used in the Tables. There are never any purely masculine or feminine pronouns used in reference to the Spirit. The translations used are simply labelled, 1, 2, 3, etc., so that the reader cannot be prejudiced by any names or titles. A list of the translations used in this study is included in the Appendix. Other Related Words. The and holy, the two principal modifiers of pneuma in the New Testament, are employed with pneuma often (147 and 91 times, respectively), and they are always in neuter form. Other modifiers of spirit are rare. Of these, "same Spirit" is used 6 times (1Cor. 12:4,8, 9,11; 2Cor. 4:13; 12:18), and in each case the neuter form of same is used. "One Spirit" is also used 6 times (1Cor. 12:9,11,13(2); 2Cor. 6:17; Eph. 4:4), and again, the neuter form of one is used in every case. Eternal, also in neuter form, is used once as an adjective for the Spirit (Heb. 9:14). My (3 times) and his (4 times) are the only other modifiers for the Spirit to be found in the New Testament writings, except for prepositional phrases such as "the Spirit of your Father", "the Spirit of God", or "the Spirit of grace", etc. I must stress the fact that there is not a single Greek word in either a masculine or feminine form used in reference to the holy Spirit in the New Testament. Every adjective, article, pronoun, or verb directly related to pneuma in the Bible is purely neuter in form (except in those cases wherein the neuter and masculine forms are identical, as explained in the footnote below). Pneuma is Neuter, Regardless of Whose Pneuma It Is. The rules of grammar which apply to words referring to the holy Spirit also apply to words which refer to other spirits, because pneuma (spirit) is a neuter word in the Greek language regardless of whose pneuma it may be. In the Tables, I have omitted references to any spirit other than the Spirit of God. The focus is solely on the issue of whether or not, from a grammatical perspective, the New Testament scriptures in any way support Christianity's doctrine of the Trinity. References, then, are to the holy Spirit of God only, not to unclean spirits or to the spirits of men.
When the information is carefully weighed, the conclusion which forces itself upon us is that the men who wrote the New Testament books were not intentionally making any theological point in their choice of words used in connection with the Spirit; they were merely following the rules of Greek grammar (though the theological point they inadvertently made is powerful, as you will see). If there is any theological point concerning the Spirit which can be made from the Greek grammar of the Bible, it can be made only from these facts: (1) pneuma is a neuter noun, and (2) if the apostles believed that the Spirit is a person, they were freed, by the rules of Greek grammar, to refer to the holy Spirit with a masculine pronoun, but they never once chose to do so. This is a revealing fact, one that will be treated more fully later. These two indisputable facts of Greek grammar argue, if anything, against the Spirit being a person, and by course lead us to a biblically sound conclusion: that the Spirit of God is not a person and, therefore, no such thing as a trinity of divine persons exists. However, some translations purposely leave the reader with a contrary impression--mistranslating certain Greek words in order to lend credence to the doctrine of the Trinity. Every reference to the Spirit as he, him, or whom found in the translations used in this study is unscriptural, as you will see for yourself; and the transparent inspiration for those mistranslations was not to make the Greek more understandable, but to make the doctrine of the Trinity more believable. The evidence presented here will prove that some translators wrote things as being part of the Holy Bible which the authors of the scriptures did not write, substituting the original words with their own for the sole purpose of indoctrination--and then publishing their work as a faithful translation of the original words and meaning. What is especially disturbing, though, is that none of the translators who altered the text admitting doing so. In their Introductions, not one of them mentioned the subtle changes they had made. This omission is inexcusable in itself; but not only did these trinitarian translators corrupt the text but they also purposely left the impression that they had not done so! Consider the following remarks of some of the translators themselves, taken directly from the Introductions to their various translations: From Translation #1: "The ever-present danger of stripping divine truth of its dignity and original intent was prominently before the minds of the producers at all times." (pg. v. of introduction) Comment: Despite sensing the importance of fidelity to the "original intent" of the New Testament writers, these translators intentionally mistranslated the simple words found in the original text on 26 occasions, substituting words they deemed to be more in keeping with the Christian doctrine of the Trinity. From Translation #14 (on the question of "whether the translator should `inject his opinion' into his translation"): This translator "cautiously answers" with a "yes", "on the ground that it inevitably happens anyway." But this does not mean that the translator "should exploit his role, illegitimately swaying his readers toward a partisan position." (xxii-xxiii of intro.)
Comment: There is no doubt that this translator was sincere in his desire not to "exploit" his position as translator/interpreter. Yet, his translation contained 21 corruptions of the Greek in the narrow perimeters of this study, thus "illegitimately swaying his readers toward" the trinitarian faith. From Translation #9 (concerning what his response would be, if someone should say that his work is an interpretation rather than a translation): "If the word interpretation is used in a bad sense, that is, if it means . . . that there has been a manipulation of the words of the New Testament Scripture to fit some private point of view . . . I would . . . strongly repudiate the charge!" (viii) Comment: Nevertheless, this translator is guilty of doing just that. His version interpreted as masculine (as opposed to translated) 13 Greek neuter words which referred to the Spirit, thus "manipulating the words of the New Testament Scripture to fit" this translator's "private point of view" concerning the Trinity. He cannot repudiate that charge. From Translation #15, concerning one common mistake in judgment made by various other translators: This translator seeks to avoid the error of "adding words, phrases, and sentences to aid in clarifying the meaning of the text." Comment: His clearly stated intention to avoid the error of "adding words" to the text notwithstanding, this translator rejected the words of the original writers, in 14 places adding to the text words of his own preference which would "clarify the meaning" of the text from a trinitarian point of view. From Translation #4: The most astonishing contradiction of one's own stated principle was found in the practice of these translators. Sharply criticizing modern translations for frequently altering the original text, Translation #4 claimed to be guided by the "principle of complete equivalence", saying, "In faithfulness to God and to our readers, it was deemed appropriate that all participating scholars sign a statement affirming their belief in the verbal and plenary [absolute] inspiration of the Scripture, and in the inerrancy of the original autographs." (iii) Comment: This sounds very impressive. But one must wonder, if these translators sincerely believed that the original Greek text was absolutely inspired of God and without any error at all, how then could they have dared to alter every Greek word related to the Spirit which they found in the New Testament (thirty times in this survey)! Of the twenty translations surveyed, this translation was (1) most adamant that the original Greek text was verbally inspired by God and without any error whatever, and (2) most guilty of trinitarian corruptions of the Greek in translation! Without a single exception, when these translators were confronted with a neuter pronoun which referred to the Spirit, they replaced it in translation with the masculine "He", "Him", or "Whom". What justification could there be for their refusal to translate faithfully the words found in the original text, when they themselves signed a confession of faith that those words were verbally inspired by God? It seems to me that translators who truly believe that God Himself verbally inspired the words written in the Bible would certainly believe that those words were perfect and entirely beyond being improved upon; and, therefore, they could not consider it appropriate to replace God's words with "clarifying" words of their own. Indeed, they would necessarily consider such a practice as ungodly, if not downright blasphemous. Thus, with their own affirmation of faith "in the verbal and plenary inspiration" of the original Greek words, these translators have condemned themselves and their own work.
The aspiration of the translators whose works appear in this study was, no doubt, to render translations without error and without corruption. That is a noble principle by which to work. However, trinitarian translators failed miserably, in the main, to be guided by that principle when confronted with biblical Greek which contradicted their trinitarian faith. This is a gross violation of the readers' trust. If a translator feels so strongly about his faith that he rejects the original biblical text in order to promote it, he should at least have the integrity to alert the reader to the changes he made, so that the reader is not left with a wrong impression concerning the original words. This should be done out of respect for both the readers and the godly authors of the original text. Even if a translator sees himself as serving God and the best interests of the body of Christ in altering the text, and even if he is in fact doing so, that alteration must always be admitted to. Now, I invite you to consider the evidence which the following pages contain, and to decide for yourself which translations accurately reflect the original text.
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and for he 
. Even a small child in ancient Greece recognized the difference between those simple Greek words. 
