What can be done to guide conversation to a favorable conclusion? The use of words in speech and in writing to denote or connote certain ideas, concepts or perspective are meant to influence the hearer/reader in a desired direction. Words often lead to emotional reactions, positive or negative. Too often the choice of words leads to heated conflict.
A good place to start might be an article posted on the internet April 22, 2023 by Bruce Rottman. Mr. Rottman has taught economics in secondary schools for over 40 years, and is currently Director of Brookfield Academy’s Free Enterprise Institute, in Brookfield, Wisconsin. As a teacher, he appears to support values of a conservative nature, and as such he directs readers to more traditional considerations.
Mr. Rottman’s article is important in that it provides a starting point, a provocation to consider words carefully and thoughtfully in order to build on ideas. It is valuable in that sense.
The choice of words found in the Holy Bible is of profound importance. Reiterating the second sentence in my opening paragraph, consider its purpose. “The use of words in speech and in writing to denote or connote certain ideas, concepts or perspective are meant to influence the hearer/reader in a desired direction.” Now consider the “why” of differing versions of the Holy Bible and the “why” that publishers want to sell them. Is it possible that publishers are more interested in dollars than readers’ experience and devotion to God?
Please read Mr. Rottman’s primer on words that trigger emotions and ruin good conversations. Then click here to get your free copy of my booklet, A Layman’s Thoughts on Bible Versions. It’s designed to be a quick read and condenses the thoughts and findings of present-day Biblical scholars who have spent years and thousands of dollars for the purpose of searching out and studying primary copies of early Bible versions that are still in existence. Their search for truth presents facts far beyond the desire for money and are meant to edify Bible scholars as well as laity in the manner espoused by early Bereans. Acts 17: 10,11,12 10 And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea: who coming thither went into the synagogue of the Jews. These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so. Therefore many of them believed; also of honourable women which were Greeks, and of men, not a few.
God’s word, the Holy Bible, is written for common man to believe. God honors questions and encourages them to give scholars and deep thinkers insight into his thoughts and to what is pleasing to him in our study and worship. Abel understood this; Cain did not. For the simple, reading and believing is enough.
