Passion Translation Overview

SIMPLE SECTION IN DEPTH SECTION BIBLICAL SECTION

Simple

From the research of digging into other peoples material and compiling of my own material on the Passion, there are at least 36+ main and major points of contention that occur to where the Passion does not represent the authentic word of God. There is enough deviation and it is substantial enough, to where it is not a trustworthy translation or even paraphrase of God’s word.

Below are organized what I think to be some of the biggest issues with the Passion “translation”. I try to group them in such a way, for what seem to me, to be the strongest arguments towards major error and substantial issues, to medium strength arguments, to weaker arguments and then general questions or concerns that can be raised because of those other points.

In later articles, I will go into each point to expound upon the underlying issues and really flesh out what I think makes them problematic. In the meantime, below is the list

Foundational Arguments

My Background/Viewpoints

In all of my articles, I try as best as possible to be open minded, taking people at their word, taking things at face value. I attempt to think the best of what they say and how sometimes we err in what we say. When in reality, we meant to say something else and didn’t convey it well, so try to give as much grace as possible. I like to assume that people are being honest and therefore I make an effort, to the best of my ability, to be not overly critical, but to look at things through multiple viewpoints in a critiquing manner (whether it is something I might agree with or not) to better ascertain if it is true or correct. I am a normal, average person who likes to look into topics. I am not a scholar, I don’t have special training, nor do I claim to be an expert in any area. Just a person who wants to serve God to the best of my ability and help serve others. I have devoted at least 2 years, on and off to looking into the Passion though. In light of that here are some of my thoughts/background into the Passion.

When I first started looking into the Passion after hearing it several times, something just seemed off about it, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. It just didn’t sit right with me each time I heard it and at first I couldn’t figure out why. It was as if it was familiar, yet twisted. Almost like an off brand food that takes out key ingredients, but has a nice flashy box to get your attention. It might have a similar aesthetic, yet tastes so much different. That was my early way of identifying the Passion.

So many people around me loved it, people who I am really close to and deeply love and care for. I really wanted to give it a try giving it the benefit of the doubt, because heck if they liked it maybe I was just missing something that they could see. Or if there was something that was off, I wanted to let them know and keep them from something that would be potentially hazardous. But each time I read it, though it was beautifully and skillfully written, something seemed off in my spirit (good old Christianize phrases). Therefore I wanted to really start looking into it as best as possible, researching it, comparing it, hearing some other outside perspectives from other lay people who enjoyed it and why, along with seeking out scholarly views as well to be as balanced as I could be in my assessment. That way I could actually come to an accurate conclusion. If I needed to change my perspective I was and am still willing to. I want to learn and serve God with everything in me and use the best tools available at my disposal to convey His message to the world. I am not looking for everything to be wrong, that isn’t my view. Or that anything outside my camp or circle or church is automatically false. But, I want to be discerning and test all things (as we are biblically commanded to (VERSE!!!). Scripture teaches that there is error, false doctrines, false teaching and wolves within the world and the church. I desire to serve and worship God in spirit and in truth and aid others in that as well (VERSE!!!).

What I write below is in no way intended to be a personal attack on the author or just being critical for critical sake. Instead it is to bring forth an explanation why I personally can no longer sit idly by or recommend people to use the Passion for personal devotion, as a tool of evangelism and especially for use in the pulpit or to advise people to use it at all. I desire to not create a strawman or misrepresent things that are stated, whether in the Passion or during sermons or interview from its author, positions taken, or any such thing. But to give as balanced of a view as I possibly can for where I see major issue and error. And not to just be nitpicky over small things that might not matter in the end.

Truth divides us from error and truth precludes error. The cumulative case for issues and error in the Passion builds up so significantly that it is not a translation or even a paraphrase, but something possibly more in line with a targum or something else entirely. The issues are so profound, that in light of all of what I have found, that I can unequivocally state that the Passion is not a good representation of the Word of God. But please don’t just take my word for it. Look into it yourself. Pray about it. Talk to God about it. Allow Him to speak to you. Feel free to use the resources I have compiled, notes I have taken and information I have gathered. I pray that what I summarize below at least prompts you to turn to God and have a richer love for truth and God’s word.

(Please note for the below: any italics or bolding are my own addition to further emphasis what is being said and to highly prevalent and pertinent information)

No training in Biblical Languages, Translating, Textual Criticism

He has NO TRAINING in original Bible Languages (Greek, Hebrew or Aramaic), Translating, Textual Criticism... none……

The author of the Passion is Brian Simmons. He has various about me sections on his website along with a multitude of videos and sermons where a person can learn more about him and his background. But, pertaining to this section, he has no training in Biblical languages (by his own admission and by the observation and uncovering of others). This is so important, yet so often overlooked.

How can one be a translator and then translate the Bible if they don’t know the original language or languages from which they need to translate from? Just stop for a moment and think about that…..

Probably one of the single most important pieces of information regarding all of the “translation”, if you have no basis or training in Biblical languages, translating or even textual criticism, how can you faithfully go through and create a translation from those things? Yes, one can go through and use things that have already been translated into English and then create something off of those. That is generally what some missionaries do to create translations into other languages to unreached people groups and that would be fine. (I will talk more about that later.) I am also aware that translators generally don’t use the physical manuscripts themselves, but what has been compiled in things like the compilation from Nestle and Aland or the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, etc (we will cover the sources that the Passion uses in a different section).

Yet, Simmons’ himself admits,

“I had minimal background in biblical languages, so yeah it was something, honestly, it was something the Lord has really helped me with.” (SOURCE)

He also states, “I would have no business translating the scriptures unless it was on God’s heart to do so…..” (SOURCE)

And “My credentials would take time to explain and detail, but I do not claim to be a “scholar” of the original languages. I glean from the wisdom of many accurate versions of the N.T. in both Greek and Aramaic....” (SOURCE).

Simmons tells people that he has no training in the biblical languages, is not a scholar (though he doesn’t exactly claim to be outright, yet some of his statements make you assume or think otherwise). Therefore Simmons really shouldn’t have any business translating the scriptures. He states multiple times that part of what one would need to translate beyond just an understanding of the languages is a heart for God, but that doesn’t and shouldn’t cut it. There are plenty of people who have a heart for God, but have not and should not undertake to write a new Bible translation. He also states that he is commissioned by God to do this. That is fine if he believes that God spoke to him in that regard. But why not take the time to learn the languages from trained scholars, get a degree, go through proper channels so you can do it in a correct manner? But he indeed has created what he terms as a “translation” despite not knowing the languages.

People have come to the conclusion as well that he doesn’t know the languages without ever hearing him speak or looking into his credentials. This comes from organizations he has worked with in the past or from actual scholars in the relevant fields. They state similar conclusions, just in different wording.

The impression I get is that he hasn't thought through the issues of what we call text criticism. - Dr. Tremper Longman (33:20)

It seems that Simmons does not have the most basic understanding of textual criticism. (Source)

“Unfortunately The Passion Translation (TPT) shows little understanding, either of the process of textual criticism, or of the textual sources themselves” (SOURCE)

I am not trying to belittle what Simmons is doing, but he makes such amateur like mistakes just in Galatians (the text I looked at), which comes across as unprofessional. If Simmons had hired someone like me to deal with basic level issues I would have a ton to work with to get it in a place where it would even be readable. I have taught seminary students and I have tried to train them to avoid some of the very common place things that he does in this. - Dr. Gupta (16:15)

“ (I was) investigating Brian Simmons’ claims to be translating from Aramaic in certain verses of the holy scriptures. I reluctantly came to the conclusion that he did not know the language and was in fact making use of existing English translations from the Aramaic Peshitta.....It dawned on me gradually, as I was working on the Aramaic text of various verses, and examining Brian’s translator footnotes, that he might not know Greek or Hebrew either. There are many mistakes which I do not think that somebody with even elementary competence in these biblical languages could make.”(SOURCE)

“I have reluctantly come to the provisional conclusion that Brian Simmons is not translating at all, in any meaningful way, but rather is working from English versions, while making some use of lexicons to find novel renderings for individual words. I stand to be corrected. I have written to the author and publisher presenting my evidence and have not received any alternative explanation for the gross blunders in the ‘translator’ footnotes.” (SOURCE)

Brian often falls back to his missionary time in Panama to the Paya Kuna people group to use as an example though of him being a translator. He often states that this helped to prepare him to do the translating for the Passion. His website says:

“His background in translating the Bible originated as a co-translator for the Kuna New Testament with New Tribes Mission, providing the unreached Paya-Kuna people group of Panama with a copy of God’s Word for the first time. Since then he has leveraged his linguistic and biblical languages background to translate the entire New Testament and four books of the Old Testament into modern English” (SOURCE)

This is incredibly strange language. The post either intentionally or unintentionally becomes deceptive if you actually look at what it is saying in light of him not being formally trained in the original languages. The quote is trying to lead the reader to draw a conclusion of him being trustworthy to create the Passion. It doesn’t clearly state he was not trained in biblical languages or that he wasn’t an actual Bible translator in Panama. Or how was a “checker” of an already produced translation from others to the people group. Or how a full copy of the New Testament wasn’t provided to the people until after he left. What the person is left with is peculiar wording trying to stir a sense of trust and confidence in Simmons. Draw from that whatever conclusions you may. (Plus what does leveraging linguistic and biblical languages background even mean?!?)

Even the organization that he used to work with and for, Ethnos 360, (formerly New Tribes) has come out stating they had never trained him in those areas nor was he authorized to translate the Bible and that they are distancing themselves from the translation.

“As you have surmised, Brian is not a linguist of any sort”, (Don Pederson Ethnos 360)

on another occasion, “Brian is not a linguist of any sort” (Don Pederson Ethnos 360)

“His training in linguistics was through New Tribes Mission (now Ethnos360) back in the 1970’s*. At that time, NTM’s linguistic training was a one-year course that focused on language and cultural acquisition, not translation. NTM does have training beyond this for linguists and Bible translators, but my understanding is that Simmons didn’t take that training”. (Don Pederson Ethnos 360)

"The reference to Brian's prior service with New Tribes Mission should not be taken as an endorsement of lone ranger translation methods or recognition of modern day apostles other than the use of `being sent with a message' in the same way `missionary' is used. New Tribes Mission has very stringent guidelines for Bible translation that includes teamwork and accountability." (Spirit of Error)

“…Brian was not what he claimed and that NTM/Ethnos 360 did not agree with his doctrinal positions nor did we follow his approach to translation” - Don Pederson Ethnos 360 (Mike Winger)

“….Just so you know, NTM (now Ethnos360) does not endorse his doctrine nor his translation procedures or philosophy”- Don Pederson Ethnos 360 (Don Pederson Ethnos 360)

One of his fellow missionary workers, who was there with Brian during his time in Panama working among the Paya Kuna people, states:

Mike Winger quoting Jerry McDaniels Ethnos 360 - The things that Brian did in relation to the Kuna translation was that he was a checker, of which there were many checkers. But what they did, they were not part of the official translating team, but what they did, they would take the Bible after someone already translated into the language, Paya Kuna, they would bring it to the people and read it to them and see how that translation lands. And then they would report back, did they understand it, how did they feel about it, did it make sense to them. That was it they were, a checker. This is a person living in the village who would, according to Jerry, sit with someone, read it, make sure it sounds natural.  (Mike Winger)

Jerry McDaniels Ethnos 360 - “He was a church planter… not a translator”, “Nobody in our mission would ever say that he’s a Bible translator or ever was approved as a Bible translator” “I would never call it (Passion) a translation… I would caution people away from it” - (Mike Winger)

I will go into other details in the other article where we break down each of these main points even more in depth. But the gist of the first point is, Brian Simmons never was, nor currently (to the best of my knowledge), trained in the Biblical languages, translating or textual criticism to where he could or should be making a translation. Though it appears he might be able to use sources that have already been translated, whether into English, Greek, Hebrew or Aramaic and then use things like Lexicons or other resources to gather information. How can one state they are making a translation if they are unable to translate?

Do I think that Simmons has learned bits, parts and pieces of Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic by now after doing this for over the past 8+ years? Yes. He might know certain words, the alphabets, phrases and even some word structures. But from how he talks about the languages and based upon his translation, he still seems to lack even the basics according to various scholars. All of those things severely impede the ability and quality of the “translation” then that is produced.

Claims of Supernatural Revelation/Secrets

Brian claims on many occasions, whether in his sermons, on Sid Roth’s Its Supernatural or even in interviews that He received a “commissioning/called” from God to translate the Bible. He states in one place that

“Out of the blue this thing rose up in me, I want to translate the Bible. You know I tried to sober up, I tried to like slap myself. How could this be? You don’t just wake up some day and say you are going to translate the Bible…. I said Lord, if you really are calling me to do this, I want you to speak to me and I want it to be so clear that I have no doubt it was you. (13:35)

In another place he states on Sid Roth,

“What a wonderful night that was. Again I was in my room and the presence of the Lord became tangible, heavy, thick so powerful, that I slipped out of bed and knelt there by my bed and the one i love came commissioning me. He said, “I am commissioning you to do this translation project” and he breathed on me. Just blew his breath upon me. I will never forget that experience. And he promised me that he would give me help, that he would stand with me. That he would give me secrets of the Hebrew language, secrets of the Bible, that would be for this last days awakening. And that was the beginning of the Passion Translation project.” (1:56-2:52) or (30:30)

“Jesus Christ came into my room. He breathed on me and he commissioned me. And he spoke to me and said, “I'm commissioning you to translate the Bible into the translation project that I'm giving you to do.” He promised that he would help me and he promised me he would give me secrets of the Hebrew language. I felt downloads coming instantly. I received downloads. It was like I got a chip put inside of me, I got a connection inside of me to hear him better, to understand the scriptures better and hopefully to translate better.” 

“He promised that he would give me new understanding and new fresh revelation from his word. And immediately he gave me a download. Immediately I began to receive a supernatural download of insight and revelation that is continued to this day.”

“God's given me a lens. All I can say is God has given me a lens. When I read the Bible I see it so differently than I ever had before. He's revealing himself in this hour like never before. The word of God is coming alive to us it's like we're getting a brand new Bible isn't it.” (16:10-17:30)

There are a lot of these styles of video clips where Brian explains the supernatural experience that he had, which lead him to start the process of creating the Passion. In some audiences he seems to play it down a bit, and in others he really builds it up (which we all do to some extend when we understand the audiences we are speaking to). But he really seems to give a lot more of the details and fine bits to more charismatic leaning audiences.

The main part of his “commissioning” from God, he says, was that he felt an urge to translate the Bible, wanted confirmation on it, then he had a spiritual and physical encounter (not a dream for this one), God breathed on him, gave him specific promises and because of those things now he is equipped to do the translation.

One scholar Dr. Darrell Bock had this to say when he heard about Simmons “qualifications” through his commissioning:

If those are the qualifications (speaking of supernatural insight and revelations), the answer is clearly, he falls short of what's necessary to be a translator or even a paraphraser. Because you've got to understand what's going on the original context and the original language to be able to make that kind of a move. And the danger of the claim is that anyone can make that kind of a claim as a way of protecting the moves that they make - (41:37)

I am a person who I believe that miracles still occur, signs, wonders, dreams, visions etc. (though I think the frequency of these things occurring is less than what most people might say they occur at, ie it doesn’t happen every day). So I don’t come at this with a cessationism leaning.

There are just certain parts of his story, as he tells it over and over again which really make me start to question the validity of these experiences and then the outcome from them. I know that others question whether these experiences legitimately come from God or from the devil. I personally won’t delve into that currently as I would prefer to address the specifics of the outcomes and results of the experiences.

He has other times of dreams, visions and these “supernatural” experiences such as

“Man of fire walked through the wall. A Six foot tall orb of fire that scared me and that flame walked right up to my face within 3 feet of me. And I am looking into the fire of God. Everything in me got turned inside out. I saw all my gunk, I saw the things that I wish I had never said, attitudes I never should have had. It was like my whole life got turned inside out and I began to cry and scream and shrieked like a 12 year old girl…..I shrieked until the windows rattled, buried face into bed and screamed to try and muffle it. But the light still pierced me. I don't know how long he stayed there, if he stayed there any longer I would die….. Second of all, ahhh. He sees me the way I am… I had the thought, my wife is going to come home and there will be ashes on the floor and not know it's me and she’s going to vacuum me right up…. Slowly he went right back through the hole in my wall and it went back to a boring house. Shaking my head and crying. I said, what was that, I just wanted to get right with you God, I just wanted to be close to you, but like that is really close. That is like, what are you going to do when he comes for you… then I remembered I had to go to the grocery store and pick up milk - (Min 1:57:50 - 2:01:30)

I have watched through at least 50+ hours worth of his teachings so I could better understand a general picture of who Simmons is, the theology/doctrine that he believes and teaches and most of all to make sure I am not mischaracterizing or misrepresenting him or creating a strawman. These types of stories/testimonies come up quite frequently. There is even one where he says that a building caught on fire because God had given him a word that God was sending a coal of fire to the church and then above his head was an actual fire (it's interesting, but he states that other people can back up his claim on that one). So when he states things like God has spoken to him and told him x, y or z, it appears that he truly believes these things are occurring and have occurred (again I am not going to address currently the validity of them or the origin/source from which they emanate).

Dr. Tremper Longman states the following with Mike Winger while addressing some of the claims that Simmons makes about various encounters or “revelations”

Dr. Longman - I think they are dangerous claims, no way anyone can dispute him. Except by saying the Hebrew doesn't say that, he can respond with God showed me this. You know, what is to prevent God to reveal things to people that are really bad or dangerous or conflict with scripture as we read it?

Mike - It's one thing for someone to come and say I feel like the Lord has shown me something, I want to tell you. Something else to say God showed me that these changes that I am making to the Bible are from him and now it's saying something different than before. Which is like ok stop. You cannot do that.

Dr. Longman - The Spirit is speaking to us through scripture by the human authors, but God is the ultimate author of scripture

Mike - it was already inspired, it doesn't need to be inspired again - (37:05)

But something that is quite interesting is Simmons view that with all of this secret knowledge, understanding and insights that it comes from what appears to be divine inspiration. He almost seems to claim, in a round about way, that things such as his footnotes are inspired by God. The definitions used by people within a similar circle to Simmons for things like revelation, inspiration, etc can mean slightly different things than what standard definitions are. Some take this as he is making an assertion that they should be or are on par with scripture itself because they are divinely inspired or are “revelation” in a sense which would be near or close to scripture (though again its implied subtly towards and not spoken directly). Yet other times he appears to downplay it and say they are not on par with scripture. So it becomes slightly confusing.

And he blew on me. He breathed on me and he said I'm commissioning you. I'm calling you to do a new translation. He promised that he would give me new understanding and new fresh revelation from his word and immediately he gave me a download. Immediately I began to receive a supernatural download of insight and revelation that is continued to this day. It's not a day goes by that I don't discover something fresh, new, powerful, that has changed my life. And I'm sitting there all by myself, sometimes my wife's in the house, sometimes not. But I'm I'm in my office and I'm getting these revelations. I'm going how can I express this how can I show the world these things? (God speaking to him) “Footnotes son. Footnotes”

One of the things the Lord imprinted on your heart is that he would give you some of the secrets to the language what do you think some of those are? Well I think homonyms. I think just to keep it real short and simple. When he unveiled to me the secret of homonyms, that every Hebrew, virtually every Hebrew word, has multiple meanings. And to understand that he's saying both not just one right and it's so powerful. As we put it in our footnotes (19:42)

Mike Winger discusses this with Dr. Blomberg and says:

Mike Winger - He does tell people that the footnotes were inspired. I know this sounds weird, but he actually says they were inspired. That got God showed him revelations and then told him to put those in the footnotes… the same groups that are being led to believe that those footnotes are inspired, in some sense. Maybe a lesser sense, I don't know what that means, but in some sense they're inspired.

Mike Winger goes on to state in an interview with Dr. Douglas Moo:

Dr. Moo, “A lot of the footnotes particularly are problematic here I don't know if people are using those footnotes or not how much they're reading them.”

Mike Winger - “In one place Brian Simmons talks about some of those revelations that God was giving him and and God showed him to put those in the footnotes”….“This is unique among translations where where He's claiming that the footnotes themselves are the result of divine inspiration on his part”…..

Dr. Moo, “It's just it's literally nonsense. And so questionable interpretations in the text and then in the footnotes - (32:38)

From how Simmons chooses to talk about these various revelations and secrets that he gets and how he puts them in the footnotes, it would almost seem as if they are divinely inspired from God. Again it can appear that way, at least how he talks about them and discusses them with certain people. So those things then get added to the footnotes (other times he just double and triple translates words and sections. Sometimes the footnotes take up half to three fourths of the page depending on where you are reading it (online or in book form). Footnotes are a great help in any translation, it just seems strange to make those sorts of comments from Simmons.

There are other dreams, visions, trances and experiences that he goes into in various places. But one of the most prominent ones, which we can cover briefly, is when he was on Sid Roth’s Its Supernatural. Brian detailed about one of his trips to heaven (he states that he has gone/goes there somewhat often, do with that information what you will). And while he was there he was taken to a library room in heaven, given the choice to take any 2 books. One he cannot say yet, not release to say yet, and the other was the book on the spirit of revelation. He says that he was infused with one of the seven spirits of God, spirit of revelation and discovery. That anointing came on his life in that experience. It allows him to be a better teacher, goes beyond the mind, as he gets dreams and revelation from the Lord which is clear and prophetic. He believes he was baptized in the spirit of revelation in the library of heaven. Yet his journey didn’t end there he states.

Brian Simmons said he came across another book, John 22 (there are only 21 chapters in the book of John).

Brian - “I found a third one. I tried to, for a moment, I know my sinfulness coming out, but for a moment I thought how can I steal this book. How can I get this book, I already found my 2, if I could only take this book it would change the world. Every nation would come to know Jesus. It would shake the world if I could get this book.”

Sid - “Oh I would like that book too! What was the title?”

Brian - “He said, “Brian” I can’t let you have that book, but I will another day. I will bring you back one day and I will give you the book”. And written on the cover of the book was John 22.”

Sid - But wait a second, there is only 21 chapters in the book of John, how could that be?

Brian - Exactly. The last verse of Chapter 21, it says, John writes that if everything Jesus did were to be written down I suppose that the earth itself could not contain the books that would be written. And that’s how John’s gospel ends. But I saw John 22 in the library room of heaven. I know that is not adding to the scriptures, I would never imply that. There is nothing more going to be added to what is written. But the works of Jesus, the John 14:12 generation of greater works. There is coming a day when a John 22 company will complete and finish and release to the earth the works of Jesus again. - (42:13)

I will leave that there for you to take and dissect and figure out with it what you believe is biblical in regards to all of this and what some of the implications might be. Here is another telling of it with Sid Roth -

(29) Heavenly Visitation and Book of John 22 Brian Simmons with Sid Roth - YouTube

On a minor side note though, if it would have gone through and created that much revival and changed the world, why not just leave one of the other books and take that one originally?!?

Do the claims of secrets and revelation fit? What do actual scholars say who work on Bible translation?

Dr. Nijay Gupta - But then Paul says test it. And so that's what we do and we test it against the historic transmission of scripture. Through scribes through translations through translators for hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years. I have a lot of academic training. I have spent a lot of time fine tuning my Greek. I spent a lot of time in Galatians. And just from the exercise you’ve helped me undertake to criticize this. I found his claim for having revelatory knowledge and interpretation, I would consider that false and i would caution people against this. (53:42)

Dr. Nijay Gupta -About every 6 months a student or friend will come to me and say i discovered such and such translation. Tell me what you think and i usually say ignore it. The interesting thing to me about the Passion is not what Brian Simmons has done, lots of people have claimed insight into revelation or unlocked eschatology. The thing that surprises me is people are buying into this as some ultra superior translation. I could see some kind of idiosyncratic churches doing that. But for denominations or networked bodies to do that is remarkable to me (stating this as a bad thing or in a bad way) - (19:40)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - As I've studied a lot of Mormon history and documents over the years and Joseph Smith certainly made that claim about the book of Mormon and about subsequent revelations he believed God gave him directly that have been published in the distinctively Mormon scriptures. But I'm guessing that Brian Simmons wouldn't accept all of those simply because the founder passionately and sincerely claimed that God had revealed it to him. You have to have some standard to test the claims against (22:50)

Dr Darrell Bock puts it a little more bluntly when responding to Simmons claims of these “secrets” that God has supposedly revealed to Simmons. He says

(responding to the claim that God gave Brian secrets of Hebrew and Greek) - That claim is so incredibly arrogant I can hardly believe it. (39:10)

Purpose of the Passion - Revival Bible

The overall purpose of the Passion Translation is that it is a Bible that is supposed to help spark “revival”. It is there to help elicit special spiritual experiences as you read it. The Passion is there to be jaw dropping, to have mysteries come into your heart which are revealed before your very eyes.

Some of the common phrases that Simmons repeats when describing the Passion Bible are: mysteries, glory realms, shock daylights into you, stun you, key to the book of proverbs, secrets only from above, embedded, Spirit of the Lord came upon me, breathed on me, released, pastors picking it up weeping and started crying. These are just some of the phrases he uses when he speaks about it.

Here is the text of an actual commercial for the Passion from when it aired on Sid Roth 

Romantic, poetic, heart filled words of God will fill you with new passion and revival fire, you will get to know God on a deeper and more intimate level. The very words in this translation will go right past the defenses of your mind and right into your spirit. The word of God will become so alive in you and you will have a supernatural encounter with the glory and presence of God   - (18:30)

That can mean a lot of different things to different people, but unless you are in the more hyper charismatic circles, it is quite strange language. His purpose, which he has stated elsewhere during his interview with Sid Roth, is that he believes the Passion is supposed to be a revival Bible.

There is a breath upon this work that goes beyond a human translator. It's the word of God, God breathed and he is wanting this God breathed word to come alive. He wants to give us a revival bible and I believe the passion can be a part of that. - (18:55)

There are other people within the same movement as him, the more hyper charismatic, or what some people term as the NAR (New Apostolic Reformation), who state similar things.

“Pastor Brian Simmons is doing a tremendous job training a new generation of radical Christians to impact the nations. The course of history will be set as these men and women help usher in world-changing revival.” - Dutch Sheets

On his website he talks about how the sources that he is using, and undergirds the whole thing, the Aramaic, that his “translation” is able to bypass the mind and go straight to your sprit. That is because the Aramaic helps to speak the “love language” of God and he constantly says that “Greek speaks to the mind while Aramaic-Hebrew speaks powerfully to the heart” (CBN Interview). He essentially says that no other translation can do that because they don’t place the same emphasis on Aramaic that his does (more on this in a later section). There is a lot that goes on in this translation because of the Aramaic (which is not good), but it is one of the main foundations this is built upon. If one knows even a little bit about Bible history, textual criticism and how we got the Bible today it is very, very strange to say such things.

There is also this undertone when he speaks of other translations that his is significantly better because of these special revelations and secret things that God has revealed to him. It is almost as if he is saying, without actually saying, that those other Bibles won’t allow for revival to flow, but mine will. He also states in various videos something along the lines of angry translators create angry translations. Again without quite saying it directly, the indirect or subtle context is that his translation is not from an angry translator. Or that those who have made translations in the past haven’t been “in tune” (good old Christianize again) to the Holy Spirit like he has, which allows him to get these secret revelations. I personally haven’t heard him say these things, but that seems to be the air beneath a lot of those styles of statements he makes.

Dr. Tremper Longman, who has worked on multiple Bible translations and written several commentaries talks about how actual translators are not angry or religiously dead or just too “scholarly” or pharisaical.

Dr Longman - “Prayer is really important, when we are doing our translation in committee, we spend a lot time in prayer. Not like we are a bunch of egg head academics and we only care about what Hebrew roots mean, we care about that.”

Mike Winger - “You mean you are not a bunch of spiritually dead religious scholars?”

Dr. Longman - “Exactly. That is one of the things I found exciting, NIV, NLT or all of them, everyone involved, vitally interested in communicating God's message to the world, great responsibility to do our best, to render it as well as we can. Every translation things that can be improved on later. All the other translations out there with the exception of the Passion are really reliable and responsible translations” - (51:40)

Aramaic Primacy

Simmons claims that there is what is called Aramaic Primacy to the New Testament. This is a huge shift away from any major (and when I say major, I mean at least 99+% of scholarship in applicable fields) that would normally state that the New Testament documents were written in Greek, not Aramaic. He believes that there are many (always unnamed) scholars, who have shown that the whole New Testament (sometimes he adds a caveat that maybe not all but most of the New Testament with a few exceptions) was written in Aramaic, not Greek. He gives some reasons here and there, but the main reason is that is the language which Jesus spoke, was Aramaic (more on this later).

This shift to Aramaic Primacy is one of the key foundations of his whole translation. Any major changes, parts that aren’t italicized, whole sections added, some of the words that are double and triple translated, and more, all come from the fact of this Aramaic Primacy. Without this view, most of his “translation” would utterly fall apart and there would be literally no basis for the majority of it. Brian makes this claim quite often:

All of our Bible commentaries and our understanding of the NT is based on Greek primacy, that the original manuscripts, original autographs were originally written in Greek. Guess what's happened in the last 5 years, brand new scholarship. Just like how they discovered things archaeologically, they have discovered, I have read the scholarly reports, hundreds and hundred of examples where it's been proven that the Greek manuscripts are 2nd gen copies of the original Aramaic New Testament. Virtually all of the NT, there could be some exceptions, virtually all of the New Testament was written in Aramaic and then copied into Greek. This causes all the scholars to freak out and go back to the trash can and all the dusty corners and pull out all the Aramaic manuscripts and they had thrown away the originals.

Ok. I am going to pause for just a second to let that soak in…. Ok. Done.

There are so many issues with this statement it is hard to even begin. It really circles back to the fact that he has no training in textual criticism, translating, nor the original languages.

Also before I go any further, who, please tell me who, in their right mind not only has Aramaic manuscripts and has thrown them into a trash can!?!? (I know, I know its just embellishment). But for people who don’t know even the beginning aspects of textual criticism they think that this stuff is true!!! No one is throwing away manuscripts because they are in Aramaic, and no one, I REPEAT, no one has Aramaic manuscripts from the 2nd or 3rd century (if anyone is aware of recent scholarship where they have found these PLEASE make me aware!). To the uniformed this can be very persuasive as it almost sounds like the Aramaic is purposefully being neglected, yet this is not the case at all.

I have personally written to Brian Simmons and his ministry to find out where he is getting this information from, but have yet to get a response. What “scholars” have made this ground breaking new finds? Who are the “scholars” who have put these findings in front of their coworkers and into peer reviewed journals, who are making headway into informing and providing the documentation of this? What is the evidence behind the Aramaic Primacy? What are these hundreds of examples? Where are the manuscripts from the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, or even 4th century in Aramaic?

I am open to seeing reasons of why there is Aramaic Primacy, through things like but not limited to

1. Scholarly work

2. Manuscript evidence

3. Explanations and arguments for it

But here is the thing, there are actual scholars who have addressed this very thing that Simmons states. That somewhere out there, there are these mystery scholars who are never named or people aren’t able to vet themselves. This becomes quite worrisome.

Dr. Tremper Longman - In an number of occasions, he will cite authorities to support his ideas, but in ways that we cannot follow up on. He uses phrases like some scholars or some Hebrew scholars. But not telling us who, whether they exist, whether they are competent modern scholars…. I am suspicious of such references when you say some scholars or all scholars say, without mentioning even one scholar, ….. Perhaps he does have someone, but you just can't check it out. You cannot give that semblance of authority without backing it up - (33:50)

And Dr. Darrell Bock states

That's because it's tied to sources and claims about sources that are really hard to run down. It's not clear where where the moves are coming from. You know when you get translation in English of a Greek text, the people who do the translation can tell you the Greek text that that's coming from and you, if you have a knowledge of the language, you can go and look up what's there what the basis for the move is etc… This translation doesn't give you even that possibility for those who do have that skill. So there's no way to vet or check if the move that's been made is actually legitimate one. Other than the claim of the text and a claim is not the same as showing for the basis for doing something. (37:26)

I am more than willing to change my mind on this subject. I have tried diligently to look into this to see, am I actually missing something here? Is there good evidence for Aramaic Primacy from the text of scripture, internal clues, external sources such as physical manuscripts etc? I have a document, around about 100+ pages looking into the arguments for Aramaic Primacy and thus far I find most of the arguments lacking severely.

Because I have not received a response yet, I tried to go through and find some names of scholars or general people who do support the Aramaic Primacy view. As of now I have been able to find around maybe 7 individuals. Some that seem to proport this view are: George Lamsa (one of the earliest proponents of this view I could find from around 1950’s), Andrew Gabriel Roth, Maurice Casey, Paul Younan, Christopher Lancaster, James Trimm and Steven Caruso.

I do need to look into each persons view points a bit more to see to what extend do they hold to it individually and the evidence they provide. I am also interested in seeing the qualifications and backgrounds as well to see how that my play into their views. But I have simply provided the names so you can see that I have actually tried to figure out how and why this view is held and that I am not just making statements from ignorance. And I have only come to know of these people after hours of trying to look into this myself.

Again, I am not a scholar. I am just a regular person who likes to look into things the best I can as I want to honor God. But how all of this is positioned is severely misleading and can lead people down quite a dangerous road in reference to the word of God. I am not stating people aren’t allow or should not ask questions. Or that we can’t be skeptical of people who are actual scholars within a field or even disagree with their findings. What I am saying is that this sort of view, which files completely in the face of literally 99+% of scholarship on this topic, starts to erode the confidence within not only the Bible (which is most important, as how can we trust what we are reading is “THE” word of God), but also people who are legitimately trained and are experts in theses specific fields.

Now I will provide as briefly as I can here some examples of why I think Aramaic Primacy is incorrect. But there will be a later article dealing extensively with Aramaic Primacy and specific examples of where I see it fall short. Lets start with this quote from Brian Sandifer

“TPT privileges the Aramaic translation of the Bible as a primary source text, putting it on the same level as the original Hebrew and Greek when translating. As a philosophy of translation decision, this is irresponsible no matter how sincere. Frankly it’s just weird. Say a bilingual English-Spanish speaker heard your spoken English message, understood you with complete accuracy, and wrote it down in Spanish for Hispanics to understand. Then someone else came along several generations later and translated that Spanish text back into English. Would you be more confident that your spoken message was accurately conveyed in the Spanish text or the English text?” (Reading the Passion)

From the start, I want to make it clear, I do strongly believe that Jesus spoke in Galilean Aramaic and did teach sometimes in Aramaic. But, that is clearly evidenced and showing with the text of scripture when that does happen. I do also believe that there is good internal evidence within the Bible that in more closed or small group settings that Jesus did speak in Aramaic (there are several examples throughout the Gospels of that). Greek was the lingua franca of the Roman Empire and in the Israel area, they spoke both Greek and Aramaic (depending on the region, there were certain dialects of Aramaic). Knowing even a little bit of world history can help a person to see these things. I believe that Jesus knew Greek, spoke in Greek and ministered in Greek. It does appear in scripture and common sense that in larger more open settings, speaking to bigger crowds or when speaking to specific groups, that Jesus was speaking in Greek. This makes sense especially to larger crowds where not all of them were from Israel, but from all over the Roman Empire who were living in diaspora and would come to Jerusalem for the Jewish Holy Days. The Jews who came from far and wide might not and probably didn’t speak Aramaic, especially because they had their scriptures written in Hebrew and also Greek with the Septuagint. But they definitely spoke Greek. If Jesus wanted to minister to all of them, it would make a significant amount more sense that while in public, in such large groups, He would speak in the language that everyone knew, the lingua franca of the Roman Empire, Greek. Israel at the time, through various historical documents, shows that people were bilingual if not potential trilingual (whether Hebrew or Latin depending on the area or context). Just like how many people in the United States on the boarder of Mexico are bilingual and how in more private settings like at home they will speak their native language is (in this case Spanish) and in outside contexts they will speak whatever that national language is (in this case English). Or if you go anywhere in Europe, most people in any of those countries are at least bilingual if not trilingual as well and would do similar things. In the marketplace speak the national language and at home speak their native language.

There are various reasons to assume that Jesus was at least bilingual beyond just the text itself, it also makes a significant amount more sense based upon the events of His life. Jesus’ trip to Egypt, his trade, the region he grew up in, his frequent trips to Jerusalem and varying parts of Israel, his trial and conversations with Pilate and others. All of these things would point to Him being at least bilingual, if not trilingual when you look at how he was able to open the scroll in the synagogue and read from it (if he wasn’t reading from the Septuagint version), or His conversations with the Pharisees and Sadducees as well, quoting the scriptures to them, most likely in Hebrew. Again I am not going to get into all the details and sources for all of those now, just a general overview that it seems highly unlikely that Jesus only spoke Aramaic. Its really not a big problem for His follower to not only know and understand what Jesus was saying whether he spoke in Greek or Aramaic and to then have that put into Greek depending on if it was originally delivered in Aramaic.

Some might make the claim that there are early church Fathers who say that the gospel of Matthew was written in Hebrew or Aramaic. I will address this more in another post with the full quotations, but the basic rundown of it is that it is somewhat vague and beyond those brief quotes we have no physical evidence of it being true.

There are also plenty of places throughout scripture where there is an Aramaic word that is used and the explanation or translation is given. There would be no need for something like that if it was all written in Aramaic, but would be highly necessary if it was written in Greek. If it were written in Aramaic as the primary original and then translated to Greek, they would have just been all translated out, there would be no need for those to stay in. There are words or phrases that are Aramaic throughout scripture and also that were a part of early Christian oral worship that seem to be embedded and vital. But again all of those are provided with translations and explanations within Greek of those things.

Now here are a few other reasons of why there doesn’t appear to be Aramaic Primacy.

1. Greek was the Lingua Franca for the Roman empire and if they were to reach the whole world with the message of the gospel, why would it be written in a language which only a tiny tiny percentage of that world would understand, being Aramaic?

   1. The oral traditions of the earliest classic creeds, confessions of faith, doctrinal statements, the documents of early Church fathers, the liturgical information we have, all of the things throughout the beginning of the early church history talking about the inspiration, infallibility, inherency, authority and trustworthiness of God’s word, Greek is nearly always (if not every time) the language in which the New Testament was described in, referenced in and used

      1. THIS IS HUGE, hardly any, if none at all (that I have been able to find) of the earliest things that we have from those early church fathers was written in Aramaic

         1. Which if the New Testament was written in Aramaic, you would think many of them would be writing, quoting and passing on information in Aramaic to others, this is not the case in what we find

2. There are NO early manuscripts within Aramaic or even Syriac until around the 5th century (called the Peshitta)

   1. Galilean Aramaic is different than Syriac Aramaic which is what we have as our “earliest” (around 5th century) dialect of Aramaic version (which is different than what Jesus spoke)

3. The oldest manuscripts that we have of the New Testament are all in Greek, especially the possible 1st century fragment of Mark and Revelation

   1. Out of the roughly 17 second century manuscripts and 1-2 first century manuscripts, they contain about 40% of the New Testament. None of those are in Aramaic

4. The writers of the New Testament documents clearly knew Greek based upon jobs and descriptions of their lives that are provided in the New Testament and early sources (Matthew - Tax Collector, Mark - Scribe/Missionary, Luke - Doctor, John - Fisherman/trade, Paul - Scholar/Pharisee/Roman Citizen, etc)

5. The general locations of where the main New Testament documents were written and the audience to whom they were addressed

   1. Matthew - Judea - to Jewish people in the surrounding areas

   2. Mark - Rome - to Jews in Diaspora

   3. Luke - Antioch or Caesarea - to Gentiles (specifically Theophilus)

   4. John - Ephesus - Jews and Gentiles

   5. Paul - Corinth, Antioch, Ephesus, Rome, etc - Primarily Gentiles, occasionally diaspora Jews

      1. For all of these, it doesn’t make any sense to have them written in Aramaic as almost all of their audience (if not all) did not know Aramaic, but would know Greek

      2. The locations where and to whom they were written matter a significant amount, but are often overlooked as people don’t know general history about these things

         1. The only one which might make even the slightest amount of sense to be written in Aramaic would be Matthew, but even that is attested

6. The quotes from the Old Testament are normally from the Greek Septuagint

7. The Q document hypothesis is purely theoretical and there is again no physical evidence of this

8. The synoptic gospels all utilize each others Greek, but not all of it could or would have been written in Aramaic in the same way

   1. Though some parts do make it sound like Greek was not their first language

   2. This accounts for some of the idioms that might not transfer 100% exact (and happens frequently in bilingual cultures)

9. There are no copies of Matthew within Aramaic

   1. The quote from the early church fathers doesn’t mean was written in Hebrew or Aramaic as they are slightly vague

10. There are many other early documents that show people in Israel in the 1st century not only knew Greek, were able to write in Greek

11. Even things such as graves/tombs had writing in Greek (which seems to insinuate the prevalence of Greek within their every day culture)

12. Putting in the “translation” of the Aramaic into the Greek makes more sense that the Greek was the original writing, if not those things would have simply been translated out

13. The views that Aramaic is more holy of a language than Greek has no basis

14. If you wanted to get the message of the Gospel out to the most possible people in the world you would do it through the common language which everyone shared, Greek, not a language which only a few small places spoke

15. The literary quality of the New Testament points towards Greek writings being the original, not Aramaic (different genres would have been used)

16. Sacred names being used doesn’t necessarily point to Aramaic

    1. usage of terms like Kurios (Lord in Greek) would line up more with Septuagint version of the Old Testament

There are other things we could get into as well, but I will save that for another article.

Out of all 5 of the scholars that Mike Winger has interviewed, all 5 said the same thing. Why is there reference to the Aramaic in this translation and how it is incredibly strange to use it. Here are some general quotes from them. I will try to keep this as succinct as possible, but I literally have at least 16 pages of straight quotes from at least 8 Bible translation scholars who say the same thing. And each of these scholars are trained within original languages and have worked on several different Bible translations, with many years of translating history under their belts. they all say things like: DON’T USE ARAMAIC, there is no basis for it textually, historically or manuscript wise!

I highly recommend you click each link and watch them for yourselves.

We will start with Dr. Nijay Gupta.

Dr. Nijay Gupta - One issue I find most troubling is his assumption that there is some kind of Aramaic original that he is drawing off of. Even though the vast majority and majority doesn't even cover it. I mean we are talking about 99.9% of scholars and seminaries and pastors agree NT documents were written in Greek and not Aramaic….. I just finished today a hundred and twenty thousand word commentary on Galatians. I couldn't even fathom an argument that there was an Aramaic original text. I became acquainted with this in the last few weeks, so I thought what am I missing here. I have looked at a whole bunch of sources to figure out ok what is the latest conversation on what we call the textual history of the NT and I couldn't find even a scrap of information to legitimize what he says. (22:45)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - Well it's important that readers need to know he is using things other than the bible. Source material other than the bible. Translations in other languages like Latin or Armenian or Georgian or Syriac they sometimes don't line up with those Greek manuscripts we know and trust. And I think Simmons likes to find something different in order, I am just guessing here, in order to find something really interesting to put into the translation. I think he likes that. Just when you mention what the translation is all about, he talks about new, he talks about innovative things you have never heard before. That's a dangerous approach to bible translation. Our goal isn't to find new things. It's really to be faithful to the original things and so If i were a publisher i would be very very concerned with anyone passing off as the bible something using material that comes from a later time than our best and earliest Greek manuscripts - (30:15)

Dr. Gupta’s Paper - Simmons seems to not grasp some fundamentals of Bible translation and interpretation. For example, he is not very consistent in his translation of key theological words (again, see below). Perhaps most troubling, is his insistence on “using” Aramaic texts as the most accurate biblical texts. Now, virtually all scholars and academic Bible translators (including myself) believe that Paul wrote his letters in Greek. It is odd and misleading for Simmons to appeal to Aramaic originals. -(Dr. Gupta's Paper) -

Next we will see brief comments from Dr. Douglas Moo

Dr. Douglas Moo -  I don't know why you would privilege the Aramaic in that way more than that at the moment. More serious however on the place this is where the translation to text is actually based on the Aramaic this is a really serious matter and this fact alone is enough for me to say I can't recommend that this translation be used by Christians as an accurate access to the Word of God. All translators agree these days that you base your translation of the New testament text on the Greek but you don't base it on any other languages. And while Aramaic is is an interesting language because it was probably the language spoken very often by Jesus, the standard everyday language in the Israel of his day, so obviously it has historical importance in that way. Nevertheless our new testament is not based on the Aramaic, it's based on the Greek. So when you begin to appealing for other languages any other language as a basis for the translation English, we've really left the the the the field of of normal translation work -  (17:44)

(In response to Brian Simmons saying scholarship has recently changed to Aramaic Primacy) - Not true. There might be a fringe group of scholars who are doing that or arguing that. In terms of scholarship you can find almost any conceivable view as wild or as imaginative as you want to be with it. But you can find somebody who argues something, but in terms of mainstream scholarship whether evangelical or not, it's not peculiar to evangelicals here at all. While there is recognition that behind let's say the teaching of Jesus there might be Aramaic, that even one of the gospels might have been in Aramaic or had an Aramaic version at some point. But all of that cannot really be a detected well. We don't have the evidence for that. And again. It's widely recognized by scholars on all hands that when you're doing translation of the new testament, your job is to translate to Greek. Can the Aramaic sometimes help us understand the Greek? Yes, but we're not translating the Aramaic ever. We're always translating the Greek which is the inspired form of God's word that's been passed down to us so - (21:50)

Mike Winger’s Question - To use the phrase lost Aramaic texts, what the picture that let's put this way, if that puts a picture in my mind that there are some ancient, you know for century from the first century manuscripts or it initially at least, that shows the Bible was originally written in Aramaic and then I've I've sort of restored that I'm translating it from the original language, that would be a misleading thing right.

Dr. Moo’s response - Yes. There is no evidence (39:34)

Dr. Moo’s Paper - Ever since the Reformation, Protestants have insisted that the inspired Word of God is to be found in Hebrew and Aramaic manuscripts (for the OT) and Greek manuscripts (for the NT). Yet The Passion Translation frequently bases NT translations on Aramaic manuscripts (as is pointed out in footnotes on the verses). In explanation of this practice, the website notes scholarly interest in Aramaic, as the language Jesus probably spoke most of the time. It is possible also, as the website notes, that some of the Greek manuscripts of our gospels might derive from Aramaic originals. However, it is quite another thing to use Aramaic manuscripts as the basis of a translation into English. In effect, what is happening here is that a text that no significant part of the church has ever viewed as inspired is being used to communicate the Word of God in English. This alone, in my view, renders this translation unusable by those who want to access God’s Word. (Dr. Moo's Paper)

The next is Dr. Darrell Bock

Dr. Darrel Bock - Second thing to tell you, if anyone who argues that they are dealing with lost manuscripts means that you're dealing with text you can't see and and if they can see them, they better tell you where they are and where you can find them so you can evaluate them. It becomes an unvetted category. You can't do that, you can't see, so that's a problem. Even though there are certain contexts in which Aramaic may have been the dominant spoken language as I've already said, the New testament was written in Greek it's original manuscripts are in Greek. And so to claim that Aramaic sits behind the New testament is a mistake in terms of the way the text themselves were originally written so - (5:15)

(Dr. Bock responding to Simmons claims of scholarship turning to Aramaic Primacy) - Not true. There might be a fringe group of scholars who are doing that or arguing that. In terms of scholarship you can find almost any conceivable view as wild or as imaginative as you want to be with it. But you can find somebody who argues something, but in terms of mainstream scholarship whether evangelical or not, it's not peculiar to evangelicals here at all. While there is recognition that behind let's say the teaching of Jesus there might be Aramaic, that even one of the gospels might have been in Aramaic or had an Aramaic version at some point. But all of that cannot really be a detected well. We don't have the evidence for that. And again. It's widely recognized by scholars on all hands that when you're doing translation of the new testament, your job is to translate to Greek. Can the Aramaic sometimes help us understand the Greek? Yes, but we're not translating the Aramaic ever. We're always translating the Greek which is the inspired form of God's word that's been passed down to us……Referring to the New testament primarily there in those places, the Aramaic is the original language we are working with. But for the NT, no the Aramaic is not an original language in which we find the text and should not be a basis for our translations - (21:50)

The next is Dr. Craig Blomberg

Dr. Craig Blomberg - There are no Aramaic originals for anybody to consult anywhere from the ancient centuries. What apparently has happened, this is my best guess, is that there are Syriac manuscripts as early as the 6th century. That's not all that early, that are written in a dialect language that is quite similar to ancient Aramaic. Though 500 years after the time of Jesus. And over the centuries from time to time people have as a kind of thought experiment, who have the ability with the languages, to say what would happen if we translated the Syriac literally into Aramaic. And would the meaning of those Aramaic words shed any possible light on on biblical texts. As best as I can tell that seems to be what has been done, but it's never explained that that's what has been done. It just sounds if you read to both the text as well as the footnotes as if there must be some ancient Aramaic text. Wondering about some place that somebody is translated- (10:07)

(Dr. Blomberg responding to Simmons claims of scholarship turning to Aramaic Primacy) - It's an astonishing statement and would love to know why he thinks this is true, where he got this from. I don't know if somebody else that he trusted said these kinds of things and he simply believed them. But I attend annually except for this year…the Society Biblical Literature, the Society of New Testament Studies and Evangelical Theological Society. The top several thousand biblical scholars in the world attend of of all different theological persuasions or none in a few instances. They would rise up as one person and say this simply is not true, this is made up, no one has discovered ancient Aramaic New testaments. And yes from time to time there are theories that individual scholars have come up with that a particular gospel reads like it could be a Greek translation of a Hebrew or Aramaic original but we've never found them. Yes it's true that in one case with the Gospel of Matthew we have several early Christian church fathers, as we call them, who said there was either a Hebrew or Aramaic Matthew before the Greek Matthew. That we have that may well be true, we've never found it. Any attempt to to present such a document would be a modern translators reconstruction translating backwards from the Greek. That we have once more, as what's more, is after you get beyond the Gospels, there would be no reason for there to be Aramaic originals of anything because the Epistles are all written to the diaspora, to the rest of the first century Roman empire. To Christians in many instances that were predominantly gentile who would have no ability to read Aramaic or Hebrew. The reason the entire New testament is in Greek and was in Greek originally is because that was the most common language that the most number of people, even if it wasn't their native language, could read. And then on top of that you have to realize that all of the classic creeds and confessions of faith and and doctrinal statements throughout history, talking about the inspiration, infallibility, the inherency, the authority and trustworthiness of God's word, have always referred the case of the New testament to the Greek. So even if somebody were to find one of these supposed manuscripts that would not make it authoritative it certainly would not make it more authoritative than the Greek that God chose to preserve his word in for at least 2,000 years - (12:38)

Dr. Blomberg’s Paper -  But one glaring, recurring error simply has to be mentioned. Consistently throughout the entire “translation” of the New Testament, Simmons refers to what the Aramaic says and how it would be translated, despite the fact that there are no ancient Aramaic versions of the New Testament. Every book of the New Testament was written originally in Greek and in no other language. Within a couple of centuries, the New Testament books were being translated into many other languages, including Latin, Coptic, Ethiopian, Syriac, old Slavonic, Georgian, Armenian, and so on…. No Aramaic copy of even the smallest fragment of any New Testament book from the earliest centuries of its existence has ever been found. What on earth is Simmons talking about? But the majority of scholars have never been convinced and, even if they were, it is still irresponsible to speak about what a nonexistent Aramaic version says. If that is what Simmons is doing, he should at least be honest enough to say, “The Syriac here says. . .” But of course, that wouldn’t carry the same mystique that attaches to suggesting that something was written in the very language that Jesus himself spoke. For this reason alone, if anyone is going to use the study notes in TPT, they must recognize and overlook this error, which appears on almost every page, and not give any credence to the more distinctive wordings of these portions of Simmons’ text that he credits to “the Aramaic.”” (Dr. Blomberg's Paper)

The next is Dr. Lionel Windsor

Dr. Lionel Windsor on his review of Romans- The first question that strikes me is: Why is so much weight given to Aramaic texts in a translation of Romans? Of course, using Greek texts make perfect sense. The Apostle Paul wrote his letter to the Romans in Greek, from a Greek-speaking city (probably Corinth), to Greek-speaking Jews and Gentiles in a city (Rome) where Greek was widely known and spoken. Anyone who wants to translate Romans needs to establish what Paul originally wrote in Greek….. These manuscripts display small differences from one another, but by comparing and contrasting these texts we can normally work out how the differences arose, and so work out with a very high level of certainty what Paul originally wrote. So of course we would want to use Greek texts to establish what Paul wrote in Greek, and it makes sense for Simmons to look at the Greek. Aramaic, on the other hand, is much more limited in its usefulness for translating Romans. Aramaic was a language spoken in the Eastern Mediterranean. It was common in Syria, Judea, etc. Jesus probably spoke it, and Paul probably knew it too. But nobody thinks that Paul actually wrote Romans in Aramaic. Why would he? Very few people in Rome would have understood him if he did that.

In Romans: Grace and Glory, Simmons gives no indications about which “Aramaic text” he is referring to. Here, the two texts Simmons cites as the basis for his Aramaic translations are (in the FAQ section of his website): The Syriac Peshitta, which is “a revision of the earlier ‘Old Syriac’ version, generally thought to have been produced around the turn of the fifth century” (King, The Syriac Peshitta, XIII). “the Roth text,” which seems to mean the Aramaic text that can be found in Andrew Gabriel Roth’s Aramaic English New Testament. This is based on the Peshitta anyway, so it’s not really a different text. (Dr. Lionel Windsor)

The next is Dr. Michael Heiser

Dr. Michael Heiser - "but when I read (on its FAQ) that they’re following “Aramaic manuscripts” of the New Testament in places, the radar in my head goes off. The idea is to bias readers to think they’ve discovered something new or not used to this point in producing an English translation. There are NO (as in zero) Aramaic manuscripts of the New Testament that predate the Greek material. Nor would it make sense to have the New Testament written in Aramaic in the first place, save for perhaps one of the gospels. Why? Half of it was written to Gentiles for starters, not Jews whose native language was Aramaic. But I digress — there are no Aramaic manuscripts of the New Testament that compete for primacy. The page must therefore be referring to Aramaic TRANSLATIONS of the New Testament (Syriac, for example, an Aramaic dialect), all of which are much later than the Greek New Testament material. - (Dr. Michael Heiser)

I will stop there for now. I think the point is basically driven across.

But here are a few other brief last quotes which I think summarizes it up perfectly

Dr. Nijay Gupta - The original text as far as we know were written in Greek. Not Aramaic. Especially Galatians. I think you'd have to make an academic case first. Don't refer to whatever someone else is saying. Write your own book. Publish it in a peer reviewed space and then you can try to create a translation based upon that - (48:10)

Dr. Douglass Moo - I think I think both in its appeal to Aramaic, if it's the additions that are added here and there, which we did not talk much about. But there are a lot of words added that might reflect good theology, but don't really reflect what's going on in the Greek text at all. Because of those things I don't think the Passion translation is a reliable guide to the Word of God - (43:27)

Dr. Douglass Moo - Again partly because of the inconsistent translation philosophy, partly because of the basing of translation here on the Aramaic, that no person should view this as their basic Bible. I question whether it gives us accurate access into the words of God - (41:20)

Dr. Tremper Longman - I do not believe that the passion translation should be used as a primary or secondary translation because it's not a translation of the Hebrew and Greek text - (56:05)

Dr. Darrel Bock - Just don't do it (in reference to using the Aramaic). It's a waste of time and energy, misleads the person reading it. Just don't do it. Don't be so devoted to the Aramaic that you end up not being devoted to the text - (27:00)

Dr. Darrel Bock - I don't care what the reason is. I've already said when it comes to Aramaic readings of these texts, please just don't do it. It hurts me - (30:25)

The reason that I have made this “summary” about the Aramaic so long, is that this is THE main underlying factor the majority of the time, which I believe leads Simmons to mistranslate based upon etymological fallacies, double and triple translate because of supposed homonyms, not italicize certain things, increase the length of verses, rendering of verses vastly different from other translations, inserts preaching points because of how a word or phrase might be rendered, and so much more. The bulk of that from what I see comes from renderings of the “Aramaic”. This is not always noted or within the footnotes, but in my experience it usually can be traced back to the “Aramaic".

This is the underlying current which I believe has one of the greatest affects on the whole translation and people aren’t aware of it without watching dozens of hours of Simmons teaching.

Sources Simmons is Using

Appeals to Nameless Authorities

There are so many times when Brian Simmons in speaking and within the Passion makes appeals to authority with absolutely no way to vet them. There is no way to go back to various “sources” that he claims he is receiving these things from, especially claims about the Aramaic and strange understandings or “revelations”. It starts to create a logical fallacy over and over again through these appeals to authority about supposed “scholars,” whos names are never mentioned. It is there to invoke a certain level of trust that really is not and should not be there. I have now reached out to both Broadway Publishing and Brian Simmons own website asking to have more information on the sources for things like the supposed “shift in scholarship over Aramaic” but after months have still not heard back.

During one of his interviews, Mike Winger talks with Dr. Gupta about Simmons claims of changing scholarship and his whole foundation for the translation being Aramaic, which the creates variations and drastic differences in the text. Dr. Gupta responds to Mike explaining how these supposedly “new” and “innovative” things can be dangerous to Bible translation

Mike Winger - This is such a big deal. Pretty much nobody agrees with Simmons on this. His claims about scholarship and changes in scholarship and new views of things don't seem to align with reality and his statements about going to Aramaic originals, when you say the Peshitta is late, there are no Aramaic originals. And like not only do we not have no reason to think it was written in Aramaic, we have good reason to think it wasn't . and there are no aramid originals he's really looking at the Syriac Peshitta which is a different thing that confuses the uninformed. But this is foundational. His Aramaic is foundational for his whole translation. He is constantly in the NT constantly translating from the Aramaic. The Aramaic says, the Aramaic says. The more I started to realize the reason why Simmons has all these passages with no italics is because a) he goes to the Aramaic and b) now that he is in the Aramaic he finds homonyms in Aramaic and translates words multiple times into a text making the verses much longer. Am i out of line saying his translation methodology is just bunk?

Dr. Nijay Gupta - Well it's important that readers need to know he is using things other than the Bible. Source material other than the Bible. Translations in other languages like Latin or Armenian or Georgian or Syriac they sometimes don't line up with those Greek manuscripts we know and trust. And I think Simmons likes to find something different in order, I am just guessing here, in order to find something really interesting to put into the translation. I think he likes that. Just when you mention what the translation is all about, he talks about new, he talks about innovative things you have never heard before. That's a dangerous approach to bible translation. Our goal isn't to find new things. It's really to be faithful to the original things and so If I were a publisher I would be very very concerned with anyone passing off as the bible something using material that comes from a later time than our best and earliest Greek manuscripts -  (29:05)

Dr. Tremper Longman also sees this occur and writes within his paper:

On a number of occasions, he will cite authorities to support his ideas, but in ways that we cannot follow up on. He uses phrases like “some scholars” or “some Hebrew scholars.” By not telling us who, we can’t evaluate whether they exist, or if they do, whether they are competent modern scholars (2:17; 5:11; 6:4) (Dr. Tremper)

Within his video interview with Mike Winger, Dr. Longman goes on to say about Simmons wild claims about the sources he is using,

Dr. Longman - I am suspicious of such references when you say some scholars or all scholars say, without mentioning even one scholar. I have written a rather comprehensive commentary on song of songs in an academic series where I have read a lot of scholars. I don't know anyone who would make the point about Bether being a realm of holiness. Perhaps he does have someone, but you just can't check it out. You cannot give that semblance of authority without backing it up - (34:45)

Dr. Longman - I think they are dangerous claims, no way anyone can dispute him. Except by saying the Hebrew doesn't say that, he can respond with God showed me this. You know what is to prevent God to reveal things to people that are really bad or dangerous or conflict with scripture as we read it. (37:05)

Dr. Longman - Seems to just pick and choose what will create novel renderings when he sees fit, rather than having a set strategy like is used by committees

Mike Winger - in other words if i can put it this way, his textual choices is what about what readings to use and what sources to use don't seem to be influenced by good wisdom but by what he likes ***

Dr. Longman - Yes. He has done nothing to disabuse me of that idea by saying this is why we went with the Septuagint rather than the Hebrew text. It seems very subjective - (33:20)

When Dr. Longman was asked where he thinks Simmons is getting these things he responded with:

I think it's coming from his imagination, from, if it weren’t for the fact that he’s doing a translation, he’s showing a lot of creativity. But this is not the place to do that type of creativity. And then pass it off as if it's a translation of the text  - (47:00)

Overall these sorts of wild claims that Simmons makes over and over again in his work, whether speaking or writing, give the reader and hearer a misguided idea that there are legitimate authorities to back up these claims. Having listened to countless hours of Simmons speaking, I have never once heard him provide those sources for the outlandish claims being made, nor is it clearly displayed within his writing.

Actual verifiable sources

To gain even a little bit of insight into the text he has created and the main sources he specifically says that he uses, there are only a few general place I have been able to find certain resources used in Passion. One is on the FAQ portion of the site www.thepassiontranslation.com and another is within various responses to articles, comment sections or reviews. There are certain sources made more prominent by Simmons. These are ones that a person would expect to see if they have looked into the front of many of their Bibles, familiar works are found over and over. Yet there are others that are a bit more hidden away that he gives away when giving responses to people, whether in response to a Facebook comment or where he is addressing criticism. This is extremely strange in translation work. There are and should never be, sources that he is using that he doesn’t openly admit to. This should raise huge red flags as a translation.

We will start with the official website first. There Simmons lists some of the sources that he is using (as of 2021):

The Passion Translation is not a revision or paraphrase of another existing version of the Bible. It is an entirely new, fresh translation using the original Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic documents. For the Old Testament, Dr. Simmons consulted the Masoretic Text of the Hebrew Bible and Aramaic texts, in conjunction with the Septuagint. A number of Hebrew texts were used, especially the edition known as Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (1977). For the New Testament, he used Novum Testamentum Graece, edited by Nestle and Aland (currently the 28th edition) as his Greek base text from which to work, while incorporating insights from the Syriac (Aramaic) Peshitta.

The interesting thing is, that several years ago, before the updates, he also included a final potion to the end of that including the text

while incorporating insights from the Syriac (Aramaic) Peshitta, as well as the Roth text.

That has since been omitted. That is very important, but we will come back to that in a bit.

The main sources quoted on the website are very standard for translation use. The Masoretic Text, Septuagint, Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, Novum Testamentum Graece, edited by Nestle and Aland (currently the 28th edition), those are used in most standard translations. Those are not normally a source of issue or contention (unless one is a KJV only individual) for most normal translations done by committees of trained scholars in Biblical languages and actual linguists etc.

As I have stated previously, I am not a Biblical scholar, nor do I have formal training. Just using a bit of time and ones mental faculties can help to compare what is the odd man out in all of these things between translations. That and a quick search of the internet, finding various videos of trained Biblical languages translators and scholars. There are plenty of videos out there from people whos sole job it is and has been for decades to translate the Bible, they will say these are the standards they use as they most accurately represent the original text.

But there are at least 3 times where Simmons mentions things that are very troubling: the Aramaic Texts (in Masoretic text), Syriac (Aramaic Peshitta) and in the now omitted Roth Text. I would like to focus in on these because these three cause the most deviation from what is actually there in those other sources and becomes part of the main basis for where Simmons gets so off (beyond strange revelations he receives).

Aramaic sources

The way in which Simmons presents the Aramaic texts from the Masoretic text seems to allude to the idea that there is a substantial undergirding of Aramaic in them. From everything I have seen in literature on the Old Testament as presented in the Masoretic text, Aramaic is found only in a few select places. The areas of Scripture that were written in Aramaic include Ezra 4:8–6:18 and 7:12-26 (which comes to 67 verses), Daniel 2:4b–7:28 (around 200 verses), Jeremiah 10:11, along with various names, phrases and single words in the Old. As of the writing of this article, Brian Simmons has not yet translated Ezra, or Daniel, or Jeremiah. So there technically should be no reason to use Aramaic within the Old Testament of the books he has done so far. I have not found manuscript evidence for the other books suggesting parts or whole books were and should be translated from Aramaic besides those places. If that sort of information is out there I will gladly take a look at it. But because he has yet to translate those specific books, he really has no basis to be using Aramaic for the Old Testament thus far unless he is using other texts that he is not making people aware of, or for other various reasons he has not made known to others.

The next was for the New Testament, the Syriac or Peshitta. There are a few key things to understand about this. It first and foremost is not the same dialect as any Aramaic that Jesus could or probably did speak. Jesus would have spoken Galilean Aramaic and Syriac Aramaic is different from that. This dialect of Aramaic would not have been spoken in the time nor the same place as where Jesus and His disciples resided. This is so vastly important to comprehend. There are people out there who say that the Peshitta represents the original writings of all of the New Testament, saying it is written in this form of Aramaic (again different than Galilean Aramaic which Jesus and the disciples spoke). But this dialect of Syriac Aramaic wasn’t around in the same time and physical location where they were. So how could it be the writing of the original still preserved, unchanged? That doesn’t make any sense.

“When we look at the New Testament in light of the time period, we find places where the Peshitta doesn’t quite match. It is written in a language that is 200-300 years too young and whose ancestor was difficult for Jews in the 1st century to comprehend. When we look at the New Testament in light of Jesus’ own dialect (early Galilean Aramaic, a dialect quite different from Syriac), we can find places where such phenomena as wordplay, puns, and potential mistranslations exist that are not present in the Peshitta. As a result, where Peshitta Primacy is very alluring, there are some serious errors that disqualify the Peshitta as the original autograph of the New Testament as we know it. - (Steve Caruso, Problems with Peshitta Primacy)

Think about it this way. We have a wealth of English Bible translations. If someone picked up a King James version of the Bible from 1611 from England, font styles of that day, spellings, etc it would be extremely hard for someone to read now in 2021 in the United States. There are bits and pieces that would be able to read, but word meaning/definitions have changed, puns since that time have changed. So if someone took a Bible written in 2021 and said that it was the original English translation of the Bible, more original than the King James 1611 (I am not talking about the internal content or Bible translation, just based upon the language being used), you would look at that person like they were crazy. The words being used, the meanings of the words, the wordplay, the puns, the sentence structure, etc. would all bring someone to the conclusion that the 2021 Bible was older than the 1611, and therefore not the original. It is the same way with the Peshitta.

The Peshitta has many issues relating to it being the “primary” version of the Bible. The term of this view is sometimes called Peshitta Primacy. Literally a whole in depth article can be written just on this alone so I will try to summarize as briefly as I can. There just is not a good historical basis for this view, manuscript basis, textual basis or even linguistic basis in which the Peshitta was the original version of the Bible, being written in a dialect of Aramaic that was not spoken by Jesus and was over a few hundred years later from a different region. Along with that the Peshitta excludes 2nd Peter, 2nd and 3rd John, Jude and Revelation and the Eastern Nestorian Church does not count these as scriptural (River of Life) .

Some people who hold to this view are the Nestorian Church and there are some Seventh Day Adventists as well, along with a growing group of those from a Charismatic or Pentecostal background.

“I have reluctantly come to the conclusion that Brian Simmons is probably not translating from the Aramaic when he says he is, for three reasons:”

1- Most of the translations seem to be incorrect, as I have endeavored to show in my ten posts on Galatians (starting here), as well as my post on Ephesians….. I find it hard to see how he could have deviated so far from usual translations and the lexical meanings of words if he was working from the Syriac text.

2 - He fails to tell us what edition of the Peshitta he is translating from.

3 - When I enquired about particular verses he made reference only to English translations from the Aramaic and not to the original (Peshitta)....  (River of Life)

One of the other things that occurs, is that Simmons does not inform us which version of the Peshitta that he is translating from (it appears to be an English translation of it, not an actual Aramaic version, and then uses an English Lexicon to do the translation). There are several specific sources which are quite odd that Simmons makes mention to in various Facebook posts or comment sections in response to peoples posts about his “translation.” Some include that of George Lamsa, Dave Bauscher, Andrew Roth and Victor Alexanders works. There are several major issues with some of these gentlemen, but that will be covered elsewhere.

When I enquired about particular verses he made reference only to English translations from the Aramaic and not to the original. This remained the case even after I had posted the Syriac text, and made reference to the Peshitta Tool, and thus indicated that I was willing to discuss the original text. (River of Life)

“Simmons, when he claims to be translating from the Aramaic, is actually taking text from English translations of the Aramaic, and even from footnotes to such translations;” (River of Life)

Even the renderings of the Aramaic words used in the Passion are quite different from other works which have recreated the whole New Testament from the Peshitta, making a person wonder where these novel usage of words are coming from. There are several different English translations of the Peshitta that are currently available for people to read. Here is a resource to see what three versions of the Peshitta actually look like - Peshitta New Testament (dukhrana.com) that someone can compare the words used in those three and then finding the same verse in the Passion to see where they differ. It would be quite intriguing to see how different they are in all the places that the Passion mentions Aramaic. But that would be for another time.

Specific Aramaic Versions Simmons uses

During an interview Simmons said the following of Lamsa, Roth, Alexander and Bauscher:

[George] Lamsa was the ground-breaker, he was the pioneer, but scholars know that his work still he tried his best to stay close to the King James, so in doing that it somewhat diminishes what he did but we’re all thankful for him. I’ve got, Roth has an Aramaic English New Testament. I think his website may be ‘aent’ – something like that – ‘Aramaic English New Testament’ and he has a wonderful translation that I refer to.

And then there’s all kinds of new ones coming out. That’s actually an Aramaic speaker who put out – his name’s Victor Alexander – very hard to get and expensive – but I have a copy of that in my library that I refer to. And then another book by [Bauscher]. (27:52) - (Welton)

There are several people who have come to the conclusion that Simmons is indeed using some of these same individual’s works, but creating renderings of the text that do not correlate with the actual text (whether Greek or even at times Aramaic though its being claimed that’s where it comes from).

“Simmons is apparently referencing that material (no doubt mediated through Lamsa and other tools — like the ones my company creates) — and then convincing the ignorant that he’s working with primary texts…They make claims about primary texts, inserting their own ideas into those texts. It’s either incompetence or dishonesty. Neither has a place in the Body of Christ.. “ (Dr. Michael Heiser)

It seems apparent that Simmons has been relying on English translations of the Peshitta, rather than directly consulting Aramaic sources.  This seems irrefutable when one looks at the anomalies in the translation made by Victor Alexander, and sees the same, or very similar, anomalies in Simmons’ work.  (Passion Problems)

As I have previously pointed out, ‘the Roth text’ must I think be referring not to Aramaic textual source material at all, but rather to Andrew Roth’s English translation of the Peshitta. (I have searched for an edition of the Syriac text by an editor called Roth, but not found one.) It seems strange to include an English translation among the ‘textual source materials’, when it is clear from earlier in the paragraph that by this he means ‘the original Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic documents’. (River of Life)

From what I have found so far in looking into some of those different sources that Simmons himself references, it led me to some great rebuttal sources such as River of Life and a few others. River of Life is probably one of the best with a technical knowledge of the language who has done some of the most in depth evaluation of the Passion, looking at specific Greek and Aramaic words in specific verses, chapters and books and showing how in error the Passion truly is. If you know some of those languages I would highly recommend checking his page out. Even for those of us who don’t know them, I would still advise to click the link and go through some of his various posts.

This article shows some of the connections of what seems to be where Simmons got his rendering of Living Expression in John 1 from. Here is the basic conclusion:

He (Alexander) translated Milta as ‘manifestation’…..despite the fact that no such meaning is given in any Syriac lexicon. What made Alexander believe that is what the word meant? Did he study its usage in ancient Syriac literature, as lexicographers do? Or did he just make something up, the meaning which he thought it should have? For those who, like myself, are deeply concerned about Brian Simmons’ so-called ‘Passion Translation’, and for those, even more so, who are reading his books, sincerely believing them to be the word of God, the question matters, because it is Alexander’s ‘manifestation’ that inspired Simmons’ ‘Living Expression’ in John 1.1

(footnote in the Passion states) 1:1 As translated from the Aramaic, which can also mean “Manifestation.” The Greek is Logos, or “Word” or “Message” or “Blueprint.” Jesus Christ is the eternal Word, the creative Word, and the Word made visible. he is the Living Expression of all that God is, contains and reveals. Just as we express ourselves in words, God has perfectly expressed Himself in Christ.

I will leave this section with the following conclusion:

“In no case can it be said that Simmons’ text has been ‘translated from the Aramaic’ as claimed. In six out of ten of these verses (see article for examples), there is a strong indication that Victor Alexander is the source of the change...Brian Simmons is using Alexander as his source in many verses, rather than the original Syriac text, then this has very serious implications. First, it seems to mean that he is not being honest. Second, as I have outlined previously (later sections of post) Alexander’s renderings are completely unreliable, as they do not appear to be based on a physical manuscript in the normal way.” (River of Life)

It seems apparent that Simmons has been relying on English translations of the Peshitta, rather than directly consulting Aramaic sources.  This seems irrefutable when one looks at the anomalies in the translation made by Victor Alexander, and sees the same, or very similar, anomalies in Simmons’ work.  Here are a few: (see article for examples) (Passion Problems)

Single Person Translation

The TPT (the passion translation), is the work of one man, Brian Simmons. To produce a translation, one would hope that the person doing it would have major training in things such as the original languages, textual criticism, Bible history, etc. A person should have confidence that the person presenting or making a translation would be equipped to do it. So just to remind people, Simmons himself has stated in multiple ways and occasions the following:

I had minimal background in biblical languages, so yeah it was something, honestly, it was something the Lord has really helped me with.”  - (Min 30:05)

He also states that he has a commission from God to make this “translation” and that according to the Passion’s website, “Passion translation is an excellent translation you can use as your primary text to seriously study God’s word.” Dr. Gupta, who is a part of a translation committee and translation process responds to these sorts of claims:

It is very irresponsible, as a reader, but even more irresponsible as a producer of that to say that. Any one person is going to make mistakes. If I were Brian Simmons and I would feel the calling to do something like that, I would put it before my peers and have it evaluated in a very formal way by a major publisher, by a team of confessionally like minded people. They would look at things like consistency, accuracy, consistency of method. A lot of things. It's very amateurish. I have written translations for commentaries on Colossians, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians. And I have to do tons of work on consistency, making sure I am using the same words in the same places. 

What you are doing when you write an official translation, you are trying to be as transparent as you can for the reader to see the biblical text behind what you are writing. You want that consistency as often as the biblical authors are being consistent. I would never want to see it in a pew as a pew bible. Even to make those claims I feel like is really irresponsible.

Something very irresponsible to taking something that a single authored “translation” that hasn't been put before peers, hey this needs to be respectful of the process that we use if you are going to be giving it to “the” people of God - (14:05)

Simmons normally has several different things that he says in response to things like that. He says in kind of a caviler sort of way things like, “"How dare I do it?!? Well God called/commissioned me to,” “You should tell that to Wycliff and Tyndale, almost 70% of KJV is plagiarism from Tyndale. 50 people took his work and said it should be the main part of the KJV,” and “What about the people like him who were missionaries to unknown peoples, can't wait for committees” (20:35, 21:45, Min 22:05)

The Passion website states:

Single-author translations have deep, historical roots. In the early church Jerome composed the Latin Vulgate; during the Reformation Martin Luther translated the original biblical languages into German; William Tyndale’s English translation later impacted the King James Version. There have been many single-person translations in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, including the translation of J. B. Phillips, J. N. Darby’s Darby Bible, The Complete Jewish Bible by Dr. David H. Stern, Robert Young’s Literal Translation, Kenneth Wuest’s The New Testament: An Expanded Translation, The Kingdom New Testament by British New Testament scholar N. T. Wright, a translation of the New Testament by American philosophical theologian David Bentley Hart, and more.

Some of that might be true, but it is a skewed version of reality and history. Many of the oldest translations and translators mentioned in the quote were people who were reformers who risked their lives to produce something to bring the Bible into languages that didn’t exist for the common person to read. Yet that is not the case for those who speak English in the modern world. Some of them had to do a single person translation because of persecution, being on the run and couldn’t work with with a committee or a group. Also the translators, to the best of my knowledge, weren’t putting in their doctrine or theology into the text like what happens with the Passion.

Translators since Martin Luther have worked together in groups, not only to pool their expertise, but to restrain the idiosyncrasies, impulsive decisions and lack of wisdom from which the best of us suffer.  (Themelios)

From an article on Thinktheology.co.uk, Simmons actually responded to some of the concerns that the author had posed to him. This was one of the responses he had made to the fact that it was “translated by one man”:

…..I mention that throughout church history there have been groundbreaking translations, all done by one man, such as John Wycliffe (a forerunner of the Protestant Reformation), William Tyndale (whose work comprises approx 80% of uniformity to the KJV - apparently the 50+ scholars copied from the work of one man), John Purvey, William Carey—not to mention the early church fathers who each did translations of portions of the Scripture. Additionally, in nearly every technical commentary written over the last 100 years, scholars have all chosen to present their own translation (i.e. Yale Anchor Bible Series, NIGTC, etc). And we owe a debt of thanks to modern translators such as Moffat, Weymouth, JB Phillips, and N.T. Wright for their contribution.

Also, I ask you about all the modern day translators that are working in the far off mission fields to translate the Scriptures into the indigenous languages. I was a co-translator with a Wycliffe friend who worked with me to translate the Paya-Kuna New Testament. Are we to tell the tribes and tongues that have to wait until we get a “committee” to do their translations? We did have field consultants who worked with us in doing the New Testament, just as I have consultants and theologians who are assisting me. Often there is only one or two speakers of the language that have sufficient linguistic skills to spearhead that translation project. Are you to deprive them of the precious word of God, or should we do the best we can to hand it to them in their native tongue.

At face value, one might wonder, yeah what would be the issue with this then? Well again, for the sake of brevity, here are a few points to make and then I will go into greater detail in the article for this section.

I can honestly see where he would be coming from in some of these points. There have been some great works created by single individual translations such as what he mentions above, but he doesn’t fully capture the scope of these individuals.

Part of Simmons reason for doing a single person translation is that he is using his skills from being a missionary to the Panama people, the Paya-Kuna people. One of the main points I will go back to as stated in the previous part, he has no specific or extensive background in Greek, Hebrew or Aramaic, whereas most, if not all of the people mentioned, had actual formal training in the languages.

His credential is being a “linguist”, church planter, and Bible translator for the Paya-Kuna people of Panama (Simmons worked with New Tribes Bible Institute). Being someone who translates the Bible into a modern language (especially a language that doesn’t have a Bible translation) does not guarantee the translator knows Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic. I know that because I know people who have translated the Bible into such languages (tribal) who don’t know any of the biblical languages. They use an English translation (or whatever their own first language is) and, perhaps, tools keyed to Strong’s numbers. The results are quite serviceable, so I’m not being critical of the method. I’m being critical of the deceptive marketing. The marketing for the Passion Translation suggests it’s a translation from the originals that is chock-full of insights heretofore neglected or missed. - (Dr. Michael Heiser)

These men that he has mentioned were skilled linguists who were actually trained with Greek and Hebrew, among other languages. Although I will admit I personally haven’t looked into each of these men with great veracity to see their exact credentials, the basic gist of what I have been able to find is that they were indeed trained within the Biblical languages. Also going along with that, in today’s world, there literally has never been an easier time in all of history to learn and have access to skilled and in depth teaching of these languages. The opportunity to sit under amazing scholars, professors, outstanding teachers has never been as accessible as it is today. It simply takes time to set aside and learn. If one believes that God has not only called them to do something, but is commissioning you to do it, why wouldn’t you get as much teaching and training in that area as possible?

Both Tyndale and Wycliffe produced some of the earliest English translations of the Bible. Both men undertook their translation work under conditions of intense persecution by the religious authorities, and Tyndale was even burned at the stake. Given their historical context and the atmosphere of persecution, it makes sense why they would have to work as lone translators. (It should be pointed out, however, that it is now believed that Wycliffe did not work alone, but that the work attributed to him was done by multiple translators.) Also, it should be noted that, unlike Simmons, both men were scholars of the languages they worked from. Wycliffe translated from the Latin Vulgate, and Tyndale translated from Hebrew and Greek manuscripts. (Dr. Michael Heiser)

Along with that, some of the men which he mentioned were pioneers in the fact that there never before existed a Bible within the language that they translated it into. Yet again, they were actually trained to do so. They weren’t just relying on other texts only within their language, though some might have used parts or pieces of text. Instead because of severe religious persecution, with threat to their very lives, they undertook the translating of the Holy Scriptures into their own language so the common individual could read it in their native tongue to hear and believe God’s words. For some of them, they were on the run because of that persecution and therefore couldn’t use other works even if they were already created. But Simmons is under no persecution, has ample opportunity for further learning from highly skilled individuals who can teach not only the fundamentals of Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic, but also the complex nuances of these languages to better ascertain and understand how to properly translate.

In contrast to the work of Wycliffe and Tyndale, Simmons' translation has been produced in a much different historical context--when English-speaking Bible scholars abound and in an atmosphere free from persecution by a state church. Thus, there is no need for Simmons to work alone. (Dr. Michael Heiser)

Instead though, from everything I have seen him talk about, there seems to be no desire to use those sorts of tools at his disposal and that are all around him, (though I don’t know him personally so I cannot say with 100% certainty he hasn’t sought out in depth teaching). From the overwhelming majority of sermons and preaching I have heard him do, he seems more interested in “new secrets, downloads” and using sources that are already in English that seem to be highly questionable. I am all for trusting God, leaning on Him for wisdom and insight. But He is also the God of the natural along with the supernatural. Sometimes God calls us to use the natural which then He puts His super on it to bring Himself glory. I just currently don’t see that from Simmons and that causes great concern.

Also to his point of the various people groups who have yet to receive a translation of the Bible in their language is a completely different subject all together and not a correlation to the current issue. We, English speakers, have an astronomically high amount of translations in English. We are not wanting regarding that. We are not starving for the words of God because we have nothing. We are not without one single version of the text so that we can hear God’s word for the first time in our language. Generally what he is stating is a red herring, diverting from the actual situation. No one is saying we shouldn’t have missionaries go into unreached people groups and provide a translation. People are saying we should not create a new version all together of God’s word, seeking to “improve” it by adding emotive language where it doesn’t belong and putting in our own commentary, ideas, biases all the while trying to pass it off as authoritative and better than all previous works because those are missing something crucial this one has. Along with all of that, most of the time once there is one translation in that language and the language itself is better understood by more people, there are others who come after in committees that try to do the standard way of translation with those checks and balances.

Scholars and Translators views of single person translations vs committee translations

People who are actually trained in this kind of work have a process like Dr. Tremper Longman explains:

An example from NLT - I was in charge of Psalms and Wisdom literature, song of songs. The translation philosophy that we as a committee had bought into, worked very closely with Hebrew text. Looking at all other texts like Septuagint. I did a translation and then sent it off to 3 other experts whom I trusted and respected and had written commentaries on the book. They responded to my translation. And I had to, if two of them disagreed with my translation, I had no, I couldn't say I don't care what you say, I had to adopt your translation. This is good checks and balances on each other. Goes off to a stylist, they take our translation and they work with it and then I work with the stylist, and make sure the stylist who isn't an expert in Hebrew didn't change the meaning and then I send it back to the 3 other consultants, and work it out. And we usually had a list of things we were still working on. And then it went to the central committee who was made up of the 6 senior translators. And the stylist and 4 people from the press who were part of the publisher. It's a long process. Individual translation might be more lively because you don't have those checks and balances. And the liveliness goes to far.  - (48:15)

When asked by Mike Winger about single person translations, Dr. Najay Gupta, who has worked on several Bible translations responded:

It is very irresponsible, as a reader, but even more irresponsible as a producer of that to say that. Any one person is going to make mistakes. If i were Brian Simmons and I would feel the calling to do something like that, I would put it before my peers and have it evaluated in a very formal way by a major publisher, by a team of confessionally like minded people. They would look at things like consistency, accuracy, consistency of method. A lot of things. It's very amateurish. I have written translations for commentaries on Colossians, 1st and 2nd Thessalonians. And i have to do tons of work on consistency, making sure I am using the same words in the same places.  (10:50)

What you are doing when you write an official translation, you are trying to be as transparent as you can for the reader to see the biblical text behind what you are writing. You want that consistency as often as the biblical authors are being consistent. I would never want to see it in a pew as a pew bible. Even to make those claims I feel like is really irresponsible.

Normally translations have committees, they discuss very vigorously each of the kind of elements of each verse thoroughly. Even though he says there is are people vetting it, he seems to be a man taking credit for the translation himself. That is really dangerous, I would recommend people stray away from any kind of single author oriented translation

Something very irresponsible to taking something that a single authored “translation” that hasn't been put before peers, hey this needs to be respectful of the process that we use if you are going to be giving it to “the” people of God - (14:05)

Dr. Gupta explains as well in his academic paper on the Passion and his view on single person translations

No—for a number of reasons: First, we rely on diverse and balanced academic translation committees to hold each other to a high standard of scholarship, and Simmons seems to have been working on his own authority. 

Second, he regularly makes unusual translation decisions of varying levels of significance (which we will detail below regarding Galatians).

Third, Simmons seems to not grasp some fundamentals of Bible translation and interpretation. For example, he is not very consistent in his translation of key theological words (again, see below). Perhaps most troubling, is his insistence on “using” Aramaic texts as the most accurate biblical texts. Now, virtually all scholars and academic Bible translators (including myself) believe that Paul wrote his letters in Greek. It is odd and misleading for Simmons to appeal to Aramaic originals. 

….Again, if we are talking about “official use” translations, then yes, it (single person translating) is a bad idea. Most official Bible translations are carefully planned out with checks and balances to avoid theological bias and to reinforce a sense of “consensus” in terms of the translation reflecting the best biblical scholarship available today.

Yes, there are a number of single-author translators out there, but most of them would never want their work to be used as the Bible (e.g., N.T. Wright, Kingdom New Testament). The reason why some of these single-author translations can be helpful is that they might provide a unifying theological coherence to Scripture. But with that “coherence,” you often have bias and blind spots. That is not necessarily a bad thing, but it becomes a major liability if that is your main “Bible.”  (Dr. Gupta)

During his interview with Mike Winger, Dr. Darrell Bock had this to say, quite blunt and to the point:

Dr. Bock - That claim (God gave Simmons secrets of Hebrew and Greek) is so incredibly arrogant I can hardly believe it. The reason most translations have team of translators is because it takes more than one person to produce a good translation, much less a good paraphrase. So I think that way of framing the discussion, the fact that it is reliant on primarily one person already shows a little bit of problem, with the whole approach to the way in which these texts have been rendered.

Mike Winger - So, in your opinion, does it look like this guy's qualified to do the kind of thing he's doing here? 

Dr. Bock - If those are the qualifications, the answer is clearly, he falls short of what's necessary to be a translator or even a paraphraser. Because you've got to understand what's going on the original context and the original language to be able to make that kind of a move. And the danger of the claim is that anyone can make that kind of a claim as a way of protecting the moves that they make  (39:10)

Dr Douglass Moo had this to say and Mike Winger had a follow up comment as well

Dr. Moo - I am suspicious of translations that are produced by one person. I think he talks about consulting others. But I'm not sure who they were or what degree of that consultation might have been. Each of us has our biases. Each of us as our ways of looking at things and most major translations of the Bible are produced by teams of scholars. The idea we have, 15 members, male and female, drawn from different parts of the world, different denominations, theological perspectives, all within the evangelical camp. Nevertheless deliberately from different theological perspectives so no single person or viewpoint can sort of be smuggled into the text. And the problem again when you have one person essentially doing the work, is that inevitably, there might be biases smuggled into that. I certainly wouldn't want to translate the Bible on my own. I would be afraid of what of what the result would be and how many of my theological biases might show up

Mike Winger - I love that and I just would want the audience to recognize the appropriate humility of an actually accomplished trained scholar. He's got experience in this field, as opposed to what we see from Brian Simmons. Where he has some pretty wild claims about being inspired by God being given secrets of Greek and Hebrew and then bringing a translation - (15:50) 

Within his academic peer reviewed paper, Dr. Douglas Moo stated the following:

As we noted above, The Passion Translation is basically the product of one person

It is not clear who the consultants mentioned on the website are; nor is it clear what role they had in the work. But the worry is that we are too often hearing in this translation one particular voice. 

Yet no single person is up to the work of translating the Bible. No person can be an expert in all three languages and in all 66 books. This is why the best translations are produced by teams of scholars. The NIV, for instance, on which I work, is the product of the Committee on Bible Translation, a team of fifteen scholars from different parts of the world and from different evangelical theological traditions.  (Dr. Douglas Moo)

States there is a “Committee”

Though the website has now updated the terminology used and added in some general notations to make it appear as if there is some sort of committee, nothing of substance has yet to be produced for people to be made aware of. In most standard Bible translations, there is a group of people from various backgrounds and viewpoints who come together to help give a balanced perspective of the text so that no one set of theology or doctrinal viewpoints is overtly emphasized. It is a system of checks and balances usually to help safeguard the word of God so that it is not easily twisted to fit only one persons point of view. Though it is not always 100% perfect to have a translation done as a committee, it can make sure that the finished product more accurately represents the word of God from the cumulative compilation than from a skewed one sided bias.

Without those checks and balances in place, it makes it to where there can be an over emphasis or an imbalance within certain theological or doctrinal points that just simply aren’t in the text, but placed within certain areas where the author so deems. Things can be added, other things taken away, certain parts can be over stated, other parts understated, definitions and meanings rewritten and shifting can occur more easily. There are so many issues that can more easily occur from a single author of a translation compared to using a committee. And this is exactly what we see time and time again throughout the text (further examples provided in this article).

I will say though, that recently there has been an update to the Passion’s website where it lists a few people who “theologically” check the work done one the Passion. It mentions the following names:

His work has been theologically reviewed by professionals such as Rick Wadholm Jr. (PhD), Gary S. Greig (PhD), Jacqueline Grey (BTh, PhD) Jeremy Bouma (ThM), and others.

I have tried extensively to find out more information about these people. I have spent hours trying to look into them. I have used social media, search engines, universities, just about anything I can think of to find out about them and their history, background within correlating fields etc. There is hardly anything of substance I have been able to find on most of them. But again, it is slightly deceptive or not clear (if I am giving the benefit of the doubt) within how it is written. It doesn’t detail only who they are, how their specific field/fields might relate, but most importantly, it doesn’t detail what they have actually done on this project. What does theological reviewing encompass as that is such a broad statement? Do they go through and retranslate what Simmons has written as well? How is their input utilized and filtered? Is their input disregarded if it disagrees with a “mystery” or “download” Brian has received? There is just so much that is left out of that section, that many other translations will include or make readily available on who the individuals are, the credentials they have to do the work they do, the specific work that they contributed to it, ways in which to contact them, and so much more. There is none of that which can be quite alarming and concerning. I am willing to have my mind changed and am open to hearing how they actually play a part to better understand if that can be presented.

One of the only things that I have been able to find is a quote from Dr. Gary Greig stating the following about the Passion:

“After reviewing the Greek and seeing how Brian Simmons translates words, phrases, sentences and how he references the Aramaic version (Syriac Peshitta 2nd-5th century AD) of the New Testament, it is evident that Brian is clearly a seasoned, well-trained translator. I’m glad Brian is doing this fresh translation for readers today. My concern is that in the sea of new English translations, new believers without a strong connection to Christ may lose a sense of the objective truth of God’s Word and may be tempted to buy into the relativism of the world and make passages say whatever their itching ears want them to say, which 2 Timothy 4:3 shows will be a problem in these End Times. But that is why The Passion Translation carefully reflecting the original languages-that is, carefully respecting the objective truth in the text of Scripture-makes this a really good translation. It provides fresh, new phrasal and lexical equivalents in English for all readers today that produce a deeper understanding of what God ((Think Theology)

This one comment flies completely in the face of everything that I have seen and read from other scholars, and is one of the only main quotations that is affirming of the Passion as a whole from anyone who has worked on Bible Translation. Again, I am more than willing to change my mind, but would need to have much of the evidence I am presenting here disproven and the adverse shown to be true.

Scholars View of the Passions “Editing/Review” that the website states

When Brian Simmons was speaking before Bethel church in Redding California, he had specifically stated to them that

It (the translation for the New Testament) will be in a theological review period, we have theologians going through it and we have editors going through it (2:48)

Along with his comments that he makes like this and the ones on the website about there being a committee, there were several actual translators who were asked whether it appeared that the Passion went through the normal scholarly reviews before publishing.

In his discussion with Dr. Douglas Moo, Mike Winger asks a bit of a longer question regarding the review process

Mike Winger - Right another thing that you mentioned, oh I guess we've already spoken about the problem of the one-man band, I will say this I like to ask one question related to that the idea of a one-man translator is that Brian Simmons does actually work hard to give the impression that the passenger translation has been done with the same checks and balances as mainstream translation so this would include like the NIV ESV all those but you've expressed concerned about that I did reach out to the publisher broad Street who they've said they hired a number of scholars a variety of scholars I reached out for their names and if I haven't got that info yet so I'm not saying those people don't exist but let's sidestep the issue of whether they exist or not and I just want to ask this as you look at the the book of Romans does it look as though this has been fact checked and you know gone through for accuracy by the type of committee that should do it

Dr. Moo - Again, I can't imagine that serious scholars of Romans would have let some of this stuff through. So I find it, I would like to know who those people are as well because they're just are so many places in the translation of Romans where they're just kind of outright errors. In terms of rendering the text and again appeal to Aramaic is another example we've talked about already. Of course as someone who has served, when you sit down in a room with 14 other scholars all of them are very very knowledgeable about the word, ancient languages, ancient contexts. All of them very seriously concerned to render the Bible in English, representing how significant process that is. We are choosing words that people are going to read as their Bible, and believe me, that's a sobering thought that drives what we do. You might have a particular view of something but you know what if it doesn't pass muster with those 14 other scholars it's not going to go anywhere

Mike Winger - So the types of checks and balances mean one person can't force their view. They're not making the final decisions, there has to be a committee.

Dr. Moo - Yeah I'd like to know if there were rules about majority, I doubt it in the Passion translation (35:33​) 

In Mike Winger’s interview with Dr. Gupta, when asked this question, Dr. Gupta responded

Mike Winger - Does it look like this has gone through the process of refinement for accuracy has happened?

Dr. Gupta - Absolutely not. I have done consulting for major translations. There is such a thorough vetting and balancing process, readership, readability process. This doesn't seem, I am not trying to belittle what Simmons is doing, but he makes such amateur like mistakes just in Galatians (the text I looked at). Which comes across as unprofessional. If Simmons had hired someone like me to deal with basic level issues I would have a ton to work with to get it in a place where it would even be readable. I have taught seminary students and I have tried to train them to avoid some of the very common place things that he does in this. If there is a committee, it feels very superficial that they did anything like accuracy, readability, anything like that - (15:20)

Now these conclusions are based upon the work of scholars who did a peer reviewed paper and the a subsequent interview explaining their findings. These are men who were hired to do a review by an outside party and Mike Winger did not dictate what they could or could not write nor what their conclusions would be. Their findings were quite conclusive, that it appears that the Passion is the work of one man, Brian Simmons and IF there was any sort of review or committee it was very superficial and they allow too many things to pass through their “ review process” which makes it appear very “amateurish.” Whether it was the theological review, or even some of the linguistic review, there were many issues that are still apparent in the text. Based upon this, if there was a committee, they did not do a good job, as other scholars have concluded who have done actual translation work.

With all of that evidence, it does appear to have been the work of one man, Brian Simmons. If there was a committee it doesn’t appear to have had significant impact on the “translation” to make it cohesive and taking out the plethora of issues from a translators perspective. This then really has given Simmons a high amount of creative license, which he seems to take quite often, and allows him to put seemingly whatever “download,” “insight,” or “revelation” that he wants into the text and still calls it scripture. That is not what trained scholars do and is not then appropriate to call it an accurate Bible translation that is able to be used as a primary Bible for personal use and behind the pulpit.

Scholars Brief Comments

Main synopsis

I have searched as best as I can to find what actual scholars then think about this translation. There have been in depth interviews that Mike Winger has done, peer reviewed academic papers that have been written and there are various blog posts that other scholars have written as well. For now I would like to focus in on the interviews and papers that have come from Mike Winger personally hiring trained scholars to review specific books of the Passion “translation.”

He originally reached out to various scholars who specialize in the field of Bible translation, who are currently working on or have worked or are doing consulting work for various Bible translations. He asked them to write an academic review paper on a book of the Bible that each person knows best and has done translating for, for translations like the ESV, NET, CSB, NLT etc. The overall premise behind it was that they could give their unbiased, unfiltered review and Mike would not change anything or adjust it. Whatever they said and the conclusions they came to would be what he presented and would make available to everyone for free. Mike Winger then went through and did a video interview with them to discuss their papers and ask specific questions then of each of these different scholars to get their thoughts and perspectives in that moment and respond to certain things.

This is the overall synopsis of each of those papers or interviews:

Dr. Tremper Longman - The Passion Translation is a deeply flawed presentation of the Song of Songs. Its imposition of an allegorical interpretation represses the primary meaning. One can’t hear God’s intended message in this translation. The addendum provides examples of the many problems with this interpretation. (Dr. Longman's Paper)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - Overall, I found TPT’s translation of Galatians occasionally thoughtful, but largely haphazard and “amateur” in its translation techniques. It lacks a consistent translation method, and does not take into account major trends and agreement in Galatians biblical scholarship. Many of the additional flourishes and interpretive glosses that TPT includes are misleading and/or overly speculative. Overall, I take TPT’s Galatians as the personal opinion of a missionary—which may have some value in its own right—rather than a consistently accurate “translation” of the Greek text of Galatians for serious use. (Dr. Gupta’s Interview 56:56) or (Dr. Gupta’s Paper)

Dr. Darrell Bock - I would say I love your passion for the word of God but your passion shouldn't be for the Passion Translation. It should be for the Word of God as it is and there are better translations that accomplish that. (Dr. Bock's Interview 43:13)

Dr. Douglas Moo - However, for the reasons I have enumerated, I would counsel believers not to use The Passion Translation as their Word of God. Much better options in the “meaning based” translation space are available (e.g., The Message, the NLT) (Dr. Moo’s Paper)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - It (the Passion translation) can inspire more passion for Jesus and God’s word, so long as people recognize that the most passionate parts are Simmons’ additions rather than actual translations. But for someone who isn’t already familiar enough with Scripture to sort the original from the overlay, this version will prove too misleading for it to be recommended.

If a literal translation of TPT were provided to an unreached people group who had not previously had a Bible in their language, it would certainly be adequate to teach them everything necessary for salvation and much that is appropriate for sanctification. 

But with the plethora of English-language translations and paraphrases already available, it is hard to see why TPT was even necessary. Despite some of the wonderful passion and turns of phrase, there are also enough problems with it that it probably should have had a surgeon general’s warning on it about its potential hazards. (Dr. Blomberg’s Paper)

I don’t know if you read through that last part of the quote from Dr. Blomberg, but I think it is worthy enough to put it again below all by itself.

Major Scholarly Quotes from Interviews and Papers

Each of the interview that were done with the scholars have plenty of amazing quotes from these various scholars. Here are some other major quotes from them about the Passion explaining its issues, the contentions they have, its shortcomings, errors, flaws and outright problems. I will not detail all the in’s and out’s of each of them, but just allow you to see the cumulative affect of their views. They are in no particular order or specific grouping.

Dr. Tremper Longman - Passion translation is a deeply flawed presentation of the Song of Songs. It's imposition of an allegorical interpretation represses the primary meaning of the book. One cannot hear Gods intended message in this translation - (58:30)

Dr. Tremper Longman - The Passion translation cannot be justified by the Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic. And for that reason i would say it's not a translation. It's more like a highly, highly, highly interpretive paraphrase - (4:40)

Mike Winger - can i say then that the very theme of his song it ultimately comes out of nowhere there is nothing that justifies that, it might sound nice might preach well, just not true to the word of God,

Dr. Tremper Longman - right that is a fair interpretation - (44:00)

Dr. Tremper Longman - So there's significant changes, I can't put a percentage on it, but it's pervasive throughout the whole of the song.

Mike Winger - Yeah, you said in your review his version of the song misses the important teaching of the song and you also said it obscures the important message of the song and you said he does great disservice by repressing what might be considered what we might consider to be the primary message of the book. And so here I just want the audience to recognize and please correct me if I am at all misrepresenting your thoughts here that this is not a nitpicky thing with little differences and little changes here. This is dramatic and significant. Alterations that means that you will not get what God gave. - (19:10)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - Biggest concern is that it's being called a translation. In terms of a kind of a homiletical spiritual information thing i don't agree with it. But there is lots of stuff out there i don't agree with. I think it should be recognized that it is a sermonic interpretation of the new testament and it can be used by whomever finds it helpful. I would recommend people to ignore it, but that's my opinion (51:21)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - A lot of what this translation does is not going to reach the level of pricking anyone’s conscience immediately. It has a cumulative effect I think on kind of creating all these potholes and problems that can do a lot of damage. Some of the things are a little more obvious but it's a lot of the subtle things that can kind of let certain historic heresies creep into the text that would never make it into major translations ever. They would be stopped at like door one you know. So those are very troubling (44:29)

Mike Winger- All right let's try to give a big picture answer here. Your thoughts on this. Are you getting the same thing that Paul wrote when you read the passion translation as if it was your only Bible?

Dr. Darrell Bock - Well certainly in spots the answer that questions no. And so that and then you have no way without another translation of even knowing that that's going on. So that's the problem. So if you're going to use this translation the only context in which it would be at all useful or usable, it seems to me, is with a couple of really good translations next to it so you can see these deviations, hopefully more clearly. And you can tell when it's off. Then normally when this gets done and in something that's called a translation, these additions would have been noted stylistically or in font by italics or something like that. Or by a side note in the margin that would be an explanatory note or something like that. But that's not going on here. So you're you know you're at the translator's mercy in this context

Dr. Darrell Bock - Just don't do it (use the Aramaic to justify alterations). It's a waste of time and energy, misleads the person reading it. Just don't do it. Don't be so devoted to the Aramaic that you end up not being devoted to the text (27:00)

Dr. Darrell Bock - I don't care what the reason is. I've already said when it comes to Aramaic readings of these texts, please just don't do it. It hurts me! - (30:25)

Dr. Darrell Bock - Well it's a hard question. I mean obviously I've got problems with it and I think it's too charismatic for its own good. But the problem is the danger of being too charismatic is that you will add to the Word of God or you will misrepresent the Word of God. People need the Word of God as it is they don't need it added to and they don't need it misrepresented and the further away we get from what the Word of God. That is, the more we introduce things into people's understanding that may in the end not be helpful to them, and actually sorting out what it is that the Bible says. And we're interested in the Bible as God's revelation for what it says not what we think it might say (30:40)

Dr. Darrell Bock - I will treat this as a paraphrase and not a translation, because it is NOT a translation. This rendering is only a paraphrase, at best. The appeal to Aramaic manuscripts for a Greek text makes no sense to me (often pointed out in my notes as to why this is neither relevant nor called for). Claims that there are fresh readings there that are legitimate are an exaggeration of the work’s quality and misrepresent the original Greek text. (Dr. Bock’s Paper)

Dr. Douglas Moo - I applaud the obvious deep concern expressed in this translation and its explanatory documents to bring the Word of God alive to a new generation. However, I find it has several problems that, together, mean it is an unreliable guide to the meaning of Scripture. (Dr. Moo’s Paper)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - My concern is simply that it's calling itself a translation which is very misleading and it's not but if it called itself a paraphrase. Yes I would still have some criticisms but not nearly the number of things that I think we're going to be talking about (6:41)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - But it's through a half a dozen extra words that aren't untrue to the text but they're not in the text. It's just, that's the way to do a paraphrase well but it's not a translation  - (1:18:11)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - But in general, whenever a rendering of Scripture adds entire phrases and clauses to the text that are not necessary just to complete the meaning of any sentence, and especially when they do so on a regular basis, it is properly referred to as a paraphrase. To be sure, adding material that does not correspond to anything in the original Greek of the New Testament, for example, can make the Scriptures come alive. If it is true to the context and meaning of what was originally written, it can be very helpful for modern readers, especially believers who are young in their faith or new to the process of Bible reading.  But those who produce the work should not confuse readers by claiming it to be an actual translation of the Bible (Dr. Blomberg’s Paper)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - To be sure, Simmons does claim that, whenever he inserts something that doesn’t correspond to the ancient Greek (or Hebrew), he puts the English in italics. Unfortunately, he doesn’t follow through on this pledge with any consistency. On numerous occasions, such insertions are not italicized at all. It is one thing, as with the LBP or The Message, to acknowledge producing a paraphrase all in the same font, so that readers know they have to consult a real translation to find out what the original said. It is much more misleading, however, to claim to be distinguishing translation from paraphrase but then to do so very inconsistently.  (Dr. Blomberg’s Paper)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - It is true that one influential complementarian interpretation has seen contextual support for the interpretation put in italics, but there are so many other well-supported explanations of this verse that it is irresponsible for a “translator” to foreclose all the other options by picking just one and calling it a translation. Even the “embarrasses herself” goes well beyond what Paul writes. He does not explain who thinks it is a disgrace for women to speak in church. Most likely it is someone other than the female speaker, who may feel no embarrassment at all. To top off the confusion, in 11:3, Simmons uses an egalitarian translation of “head” to say that Christ is “the source of every human alive, and Adam was the source of Eve, and God is the source of the Messiah.” So is he a complementarian or an egalitarian?  Arguably, a translation should not tip the scales of the interpretation of any passage in either direction.  (Dr. Blomberg’s Paper)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - The most common way he tries to accomplish this (adding passion into the text) is by adding single-word adjectives and adverbs to the text (almost never in italics) to turn fairly common and even ordinary words into exciting concepts. (Dr. Blomberg’s Paper)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - I have taught seminary students and i have tried to train them to avoid some of the very common place things that he does in this. If there is a committee, it feels very superficial that they did anything like accuracy, readability, anything like that - (16:15)

Dr. Tremper Longman - On a number of occasions, he will cite authorities to support his ideas, but in ways that we cannot follow up on. He uses phrases like “some scholars” or “some Hebrew scholars.” By not telling us who, we can’t evaluate whether they exist, or if they do, whether they are competent modern scholars - (Dr. Longman's Paper) 

Dr. Tremper Longman - But there are other problems. He achieves his translation by utilizing a number of ill-advised or simply wrong interpretive strategies. I will briefly comment on these now. I will also cite selective examples from my comments on specific verses and their notes below. Note that the vast majority of my examples below are specific illustrations of how he imposes his inappropriate allegorical interpretation on the text. - (Dr. Longman's Paper)

There are so many other quotes that stand out from the interviews and paper, but for brevity’s sake I will limit it to those for now for the major stand out quotes.

Interview Questions

During each of the interviews that Mike Winger did, he asked each of the translators their thoughts on specific aspects of the Passion and its usage. Some of the questions he was able to inquire the understanding and view from each scholar and other questions only a few were asked (as it appears that Winger had thought of more after the first interview or two). It is interesting to see the questions that Mike had come up with and the the responses of each individual.

The first was: Do you have anything nice to say about the TPT or what positive choices were made in the TPT?

Dr. Tremper Longman - I don't have anything nice to say about it as a translation. No, I think it's a misleading translation - (55:35)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - Over and over again he deconstructs Christianize language and tries to find other language to find other ways of using biblical language, anointed one or messiah. I think he alternates. I think it's reasonable. I think it's helpful often from getting away from thinking Christ is his last name. Refers to gentiles as non Jews. That kind of stuff, those are choices that I find helpful. He puts a little more emotion in places that I feel like are appropriate. I didn't love what he did with the fruit of the Holy Spirit. He did put a little more than what our traditional translation do which are ok  - (38:10) 

One of the other questions that was brought up was following up from a quote on the Passion website that basically states that the Passion Translation is an accurate translation

Dr. Nijay Gupta - I would be ok with that if you would take out the word translation… If you take out the word translation it is an opinion. And he is welcome to his opinion. My opinion is he’s thrown himself off by depending on the Aramaic, later Peshitta Syriac. He’s already kind of thrown himself off mainstream historic Christianity. So if he’s going for that niche go for it. But he is going to miss out on the majority of Christians that follow the creeds and so forth (47:08​)

Another question that Mike asked was about whether the Passion is interpreted from the original language, carrying original meaning of God’s original message:

Dr. Nijay Gupta - The original text as far as we know were written in Greek. Not Aramaic. Especially Galatians. I think you'd have to make an academic case first. Don't refer to whatever someone else is saying. Write your own book. Publish it in a peer reviewed space and then you can try to create a translation based upon that - (48:10)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - Then there would have been no mention of a non-existent original Aramaic if that were true. And there would have been no need for even the words and clauses that Simmons acknowledges have been inserted, to bring out the meaning, which he puts in italics. The very fact that he does that about half of the time that he should have, even that much acknowledges that it is much more than a straightforward translation - (1:24:19)

There was a question that Winger brought up from the Passion’s website and in a few of the books as well which generally states that it doesn’t distract or distort from the original meaning:

Dr. Tremper Longman - Passion translation, distorts from the meaning of the original language, it certainly is very vibrant and potent language, it just doesn't relate well to the original languages  - (57:10) 

Dr. Darrell Bock - Last part of that phrase is problematic because I do think there are distortions. I do think the first two thirds of it is what a paraphrase generally speaking attempts to do. And so and again, obviously the people who have published this believe in what it is that's been done. I'm not quite as confident in the consistency of what you have here. It certainly doesn't rise to the level at which some of these quotes have suggested. So again I would say do you want to set it alongside something else, perhaps, but this is not going to be your primary way to access the Word of God (36:29​)

Dr. Douglas Moo - Again, I think every translation of the Bible aims for that. To carry over what the original Greek, in this case is in Romans, to carry over what that original Greek means and colloquial understandable modern English. That's the goal all of us have. I just have to judge about whether that's actually happened or not when you assess each translation attempt 

Mike’s Response to Dr. Moo - and for those who can't judge what what's your judgment as far as does it distract from or distort the meaning of the scripture

Dr. Douglas Moo’s Response to Mike - I think I think both in its appeal to Aramaic, if it's the additions that are added here and there, which we did not talk much about. But there are a lot of words added that might reflect good theology, but don't really reflect what's going on in the Greek text at all. Because of those things I don't think the passion translation is a reliable guide to the Word of God (43:27​)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - If that's if that sentence had stopped after the first two clauses about its potency and its relevance I could have agreed but it distracts and it distorts sadly repeatedly (1:23:33​)

Another one that was asked to them was whether the Passion is a good translation as a primary text:

Dr. Tremper Longman - I do not believe that the passion translation should be used as a primary or secondary translation because it's not a translation of the Hebrew and Greek text - (56:05)
Dr. Darrell Bock - Well two problematic words there, the word excellent and primary. Okay it's adequate in most places, it should never be your primary text  - (32:30)

Dr. Douglas Moo - Again partly because of the inconsistent translation philosophy, partly because of the basing of translation here on the Aramaic, that no person should view this as their basic Bible. I question whether it gives us accurate access into the Words of God   (41:20)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - No. Is that short enough? It can't be used as your primary translation or for serious study. It could help if you know what the original says as a secondary tool in many, but not all instances. (1:21:21)

For a different style of question Mike Winger asked about whether this should be used in Churches, book stores, or even Bible Apps/programs:

Dr. Tremper Longman - No I don't (think it should be along side other Bibles in books stores or apps). I think it should be marketed for what it is. Allegorical, interpretation, rereading of the text. It goes way to far in my opinion as a translation (53:50)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - I believe in a free market kind of economy of education so I tell people read whatever you want as we are not in the business of book burning. But I will say hopefully you have good pastors, mentors who you can trust who can help to sort out the most beneficial things from the less beneficial. If someone walked in my office and asked what I thought about the passion translation, I would say ignore it (50:38​)

Dr. Douglas Moo - I would prefer that it'd be described and it's distribution is what it is, which is a paraphrase and a reflective paraphrase and even in places it has speculation. That's because it's tied to sources and claims about sources that are really hard to run down. It's not clear where where the moves are coming from. You know when you get translation in English of a Greek text, the people who do the translation can tell you the Greek text that that's coming from and you, if you have a knowledge of the language, you can go and look up what's there what the basis for the move is etc. A note that claims that this is a homonym or a note that says this is an Aramaic text, I grant it for an English reader, to tell someone with the where the text is and even render that and transliteration. It's going to do most readers no service. But to have some idea of what it is specifically we're talking about so that someone who does not have knowledge can go and check it out. This translation doesn't give you even that possibility for those who do have that skill. So there's no way to vet or check if the move that's been made is actually legitimate one. Other than the claim of the text and a claim is not the same as showing for the basis for doing something. (37:26)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - It should be in Bible Gateway because I checked in Bible gateway also has the original living Bible paraphrased and it has the Message. So then it has dozens and dozens of other translations some that most people have never heard of and that's just in English. So it clearly is aiming for certain comprehensive scope that makes including TPT legitimate. A Bible app well what's its purpose again, if it's an app that is intended to allow you to compare a whole slew of translations then I would have no objection to it being there, and if a bookstore owner were trying to imitate Amazon and having as broad a selection as possible of everything under the Sun that would be no reason to censor it. But as I find when I talk to bookstore owners were they still exist most of them are trying to be selective in the Bibles that they include knowing that they can't just put 24 different translations in front of people in baffle them. If you're trying to just select a good cross-section of the best, at different levels of English reading, then I would discourage including this (1:25:23)

One of the next questions that Mike would ask then is about a quote from Bill Johnson that is on the website of the Passion Translation, how it is one of the “best things to happen with Bible translation in my lifetime.”

Dr. Tremper Longman - Very misleading statement because it's not a translation and because a lot of wonderful things have happened in Bible translation particularly in the 80s and beyond - (56:35)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - What's happening in seminaries over the last 20 years is fewer and fewer seminaries are requiring the biblical languages. There are a variety of reasons for that: economic, education in grade school. I am discouraged to think about how many pastors out there don't know the biblical languages. I went to Gordon Conwell. We spent many, many hours on biblical languages and it's one of the most important things I have ever done in my entire life is learn Greek and Hebrew and Aramaic. I am guessing that some of these pastors endorsing this they don't know much about the textual history of the bible. But it's a precious thing we guard as academics and as people who work in seminaries. That we guard that textual history regard what the scribes has passed along over the years. It's really discouraging to hear that people are considering this kind of a new innovative and reliable translation when we have really wonderful things already through the translations we have.  (49:10​)

Dr. Darrell Bock - Probably has too much passion for the Passion. It's way too way too high a level of praise for what this is an adequate paraphrase. It's one of several that are out there and I could probably name on two hands translations or paraphrases that would be better (32:46)​ 

Dr. Douglas Moo - I just would disagree. I think that the passion translation as far as I have been able to assess, it is just kind of taking a wrong turn on a number of points. We are blessed in English with many many translations of the Bible, with different translation philosophies. If you want more meaning-based rendering we have things like the NLT which is a very fine work for instance and I don't think the passion translation is a useful addition to our, as it were, a series of English translations already available in our lifetime

Mike Winger’s Response to Dr. Moo - So it's not one of the best things to happen to translation within our lifetime

Dr. Douglas Moo - Not within my lifetime at least

Dr. Craig Blomberg - I'm assuming he's been alive for more than a few years, and that he is aware of the dozen or more excellent translations that have been produced in his lifetime. So that is just an astonishing if not appalling claim that flies in the face of reality (1:22:13)

There was another question that Mike Winger asked about if we should be using the TPT as a supplementary or secondary Bible. Here’s the response of Dr. Gupta:

Dr. Nijay Gupta - My initial reaction to that is, why not just look at the message. The message is much more consistent. In Galatians I feel like Simmons makes some, what I feel like are very strategic theological points that are clearly opinions. My question would be are the readers going to know when that happens are they going to know it's an opinion, that there are a whole group of people that would argue against that that are scholars, translators, translations. It leaves a lot up to chance, up to trusting him as an interpreter of scripture. Basically to use this as translation even supplement you really have to trust that he understands new testament theology, what the bibles all about that sort of thing. And to be honest I don't. I don't feel like he has a good interpretation of Galatians here - (32:05) 

Mike had asked Dr. Darrell Bock on whether it seemed as if Simmons was qualified to produce a translation:

Dr. Darrell Bock - If those are the qualifications (degree from the Wagner institute on prayer, divine secret revelations, spiritual experiences etc) the answer is clearly, he falls short of what's necessary to be a translator or even a paraphraser. Because you've got to understand what's going on the original context and the original language to be able to make that kind of a move. And the danger of the claim is that anyone can make that kind of a claim as a way of protecting the moves that they make  (41:37)

One of the questions that Mike Winger had also asked Dr. Darrell Bock and Dr. Craig Blomberg as well was if it seemed like God had given Simmons secrets of Hebrew and Greek or not:

Dr. Darrell Bock - That claim is so incredibly arrogant I can hardly believe it. The reason most translations have team of translators is because it takes more than one person to produce a good translation, much less a good paraphrase. So I think that way of framing the discussion, the fact that it is reliant on primarily one person already shows a little bit of problem, with the whole approach to the way in which these texts have been rendered. - (39:10)

Dr. Craig Blomberg - There are at least some places where they can't be correct. I can't say they never are correct claims, but they're certainly are some places where they can't be correct (1:27:21​)

Following up then with Dr. Douglas Moo on a similar question, Winger asked him if it appeared that God had possibly grown Brian Simmons brain by touching it, allowing him to translate better and also seemed to have help from an angel to translate the book of Romans because of verses like Romans 3:24 took him around 8 hours because it was so hard. Here first are some of the quotes from Simmons to understand more of the context:

Brian Simmons - I spent about 8 hours working on Romans 3:24 just to make sure that I have captured it properly and put it into the text….. Romans is a hard book. I don't know. I translated it, I memorized it as a kid, but it was hard. I didn't even get through the first chapter I'm saying God you got to help me this is like this is serious stuff. I mean Paul's a genius. This is like, what is better the Romans? 2:00 in the morning I'm literally shaking awake by an angel just like you coming in my room. He wakes me up, just like that I'm thinking who's waking me up, and it was this angel that filled the the floor to ceiling. He says I've come for the presence of God to help you. You might want to read Romans. I had such help. It had least amount of editing, my wife can verify, it caught our publishers flat-footed. They had no clue I was going to get it done that quick. I mean I love Romans….. God really helped me with this translation with Romans in particular I'll just I'll leave it at that I'm mega understating it God really helped me do this translation and I've had lease I've had less revisions and I've had to go back and correct less things than any other work that I've done (45:43​)

Brian Simmons - It wasn't long after that that He (God) came again. It was in a dream and he touched my forehead. This is again something I don't share, He came and touched my forehead right here, right here and said “I'm increasing your capacity to know me.” Touched me right there and then I woke up. It just so happened that we were going to Australia and we ended up, you know it was a serendipitous supernatural connection, we ended up with the top brain mapping person in the world. She's from the UK and she happened to be there with her husband and we had coffee together. And I asked her what if God touched you right here at a hairline, right there? What would that do to your brain? And she said you're understand, it would enlarge the capacity.

So within the interview with Dr. Bock, Mike Winger asked the following:

Mike Winger - When you, as a someone who knows this stuff, when you look at the work, is it like a mathematician looking at Einstein's work going, wow that was brilliant work? I mean does it look like the mental capacity of the man have been supernaturally expanded when he translated Romans?

Dr. Darrell Bock - I certainly don't see any evidence of that. It's interesting you mentioned Romans 3:24. He translates their at the end of that verse liberated us from the guilt punishment and power of sin. Now he put some of that in italics which he uses to sort of indicate his additions. Nevertheless there's no basis in the Greek at all for those three different liberation words, guilt, punishment, and power. It's simply the Greek says, the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. So redemption has the idea of liberation or freedom perhaps but freedom from these three things, while maybe accurate theologically, is not in that verse. So again I just don't see that kind of evidence of the claim about expanded brain capacity. We realize people can make all kinds of claims but they have to be tested otherwise we're we're really at their mercy aren't we (47:32)

One of the final questions that Mike Winger had asked to each of the translators was, what would you say to a Christian who loves the Passion Translation?

Dr. Tremper Longman - They should spend some time comparing the passion to other translations to see just how divergent it is from those translations - (57:45)

Dr. Nijay Gupta - It is idiosyncratic and it uses innovative but not historically credible approach to bible translation. It's not a translation at all, that's more of a misnomer it's more of an amplification from the opinion of the translator. I would say if you are going to use it, make sure you’re using a lot of other resources to compare it to. If you can learn Greek and Hebrew all the better to really compare it in a healthy way to what scripture says (52:51​)

Dr. Darrell Bock - I would say I love your passion for the word of God but your passion shouldn't be for the passion translation. It should be for the Word of God as it is and there are better translations that accomplish that (43:13​)

Dr. Douglas Moo - I would be very cautious about using the passion translation as my Bible. And if they wanted to ask I'll be willing to follow up with explanation yeah  (44:51​ )

Dr. Craig Blomberg - You are free to read anything you want. I think it's still a free country, sort of. But realize what it is you're reading and the parts that give you greater passion may be very helpful to that end. but there are places where it's just flat out wrong. So don't give up a standard translation ((1:33:29​)

As you can see, there is so much that actual scholars who have been trained and have been putting their skills to use, who know the original languages and have helped to complete some of the foundational English translations have to say about the Passion. They have so many issues with the Passion that there is over 5-1/2 hours worth or response to the translation. Within the videos they detail the specific issues and instances of error from the translation itself, the application of emotion where there is none, change themes or the subject of the text, adding significant amounts of words through double and triple translating, the problems from the translator and his translating philosophy and the overall end result. What is even more crazy is they were able to identify some of Simmons theology based upon how and what he was writing.

Eisegesis instead of Exegesis

Each of us as we read and study scripture practice what is called Hermeneutics, whether we practice it in a correct and good way is up for debate though. Each of our hermeneutics is developed over our life and unless trained in proper ways, it is normally shaped based upon life experiences, desires, emotions etc. Hermeneutics can be defined as

The study of the methodological principles of interpretation (as of the Bible), a method or principle of interpretation - Merriam-Webster

The science of interpretation, especially of the Scriptures. The branch of theology that deals with the principles of Biblical exegesis. - Dictionary.com

In all of the research, reading the Passion and listening to countless hours of Brian Simmons sermons, it becomes quite evident to see that he puts his thoughts, ideas and even preaching points into the text and has a specific way in which he puts his hermeneutic into practice. His basic views and then application of interpetations is normally based upon signs, wonders and miracles, emotions (specifically love) and other interesting things. As he reads the text during his speaking engagements, he also seems to pull them out of the context they are in and then put in his views, superseding what the text plainly says to bring about “profound revelations.” This is generally what is called eisegesis, putting ones own thoughts or ideas into the text which brings out a different result than what is or was intended, normally ignoring context from a historical perspective or even the complete context of the surrounding verses, chapters or whole book. The opposite of that would be then exegesis, which is what Christians should be trying to practice as they read the word.

Eisegesis and exegesis are fancy theological terms that not everyone might be aware of. Eisegesis is defined as:

The interpretation of a text (as of the Bible) by reading into it one's own ideas - Merriam-Webster

An interpretation, especially of Scripture, that expresses the interpreter's own ideas, bias, or the like, rather than the meaning of the text. - Dictionary.com

Greek eis- (into) + hègeisthai (to lead). - Definition: A process where one leads into study by reading a text on the basis of pre-conceived ideas of its meanings. It is rare for someone to be called an 'eisegete', because eisegesis has a well-earned negative reputation…. Eisegesis is what's being done when someone interprets the Bible according to notions that were born outside of the Bible. In eisegesis, we read stuff into Scripture. Spirit Home - Exegesis

Exegesis is defined as:

Greek exègeisthai (to interpret) - ex- (out) + h-ègeisthai (to lead). Related to English 'seek' Definition: To interpret a text by way of a thorough analysis of its content….In its most basic Bible-relevant meaning, exegesis means finding out what the Spirit originally was saying through its author in that Bible passage. Spirit Home - Exegesis

When looking between exegesis and eisegesis, there are a few basic things we want to keep in mind. Gotquestions.org has a great article that states the following:

The process of exegesis involves 1) observation: what does the passage say? 2) interpretation: what does the passage mean? 3) correlation: how does the passage relate to the rest of the Bible? and 4) application: how should this passage affect my life?

Eisegesis, on the other hand, involves 1) imagination: what idea do I want to present? 2) exploration: what Scripture passage seems to fit with my idea? and 3) application: what does my idea mean? Notice that, in eisegesis, there is no examination of the words of the text or their relationship to each other, no cross-referencing with related passages, and no real desire to understand the actual meaning. Scripture serves only as a prop to the interpreter’s idea.

When looking at the Passion, one might think to themselves, what do those terms have to do with it? Well quite a lot actually.

The direct goal of Simmons is to create a work that encompasses his views of scripture and the background that he comes from. This is not just something that someone such as myself is making up, but that Simmons himself states. Though the website tries to take more of a balanced approach, even saying that everyone can use it, its good for a primary Bible or even from the pulpit or even how its not made for a specific denomination, when Brian speaks before audiences he feels more comfortable with he is more willing to explain some of the reasoning behind and undergirding his translation. Mike Winger shows a specific clip from one of Simmons speaking engagements where he explains his views and then Winger responds to it.

Brian Simmons - And to my knowledge there's never been has never been a translation of the Bible ever and this generation in English from people who believe in the five full ministry dreams visions chances angels coming the fire of God divine encounters people going to heaven back getting fresh revelation with passion on court unrestrained attached to the translation as a mouthful and that's what I'm trying to do with the passion translation

Mike Winger’s Response - Personally, my view that the Passion Translation has purposely been made to incorporate a particular view of the gifts of the spirit and it fits with what someone called the hyper charismatic movement. I think that Brian Simmons has admitted as much in some context while he denies it in other contexts.

This is made quite evident that Brian Simmons goes through and puts things into his text over and over again that do not come naturally from the surrounding context , specific term/buzzword additions, preaching points added, emotion input where there is none, significant verse lengthening, greater talk of the prophetic in places that it does not exist, lessening points of sin in certain spots, greater emphasis on love in others and much more (these are explained in other various sections).

It becomes quite apparent for people that are professionals in this field that they are able to spot it quite easily. They are able to notice how what Simmons is doing is not the work of exegesis, but instead it is eisegesis. For instance this quote from George Athas, who is the Director of Postgraduate Studies at Moore Theological College and lectures in Old Testament, Hebrew and Church History:

George Athas - This translation of the Song of Songs is truly awful. As a professor of biblical studies who works with the original languages, I can assure you that this translation does not reflect either the words or the meaning of Song of Songs, contrary to what it claims. It’s not that the translation is careless—rather, it’s eisegesis. It is imposing pre-conceived ideas onto the text and then claiming that the change is due to the translation strategy. It’s terrible!

I’m honestly stunned at how off the mark this translation is. It claims to be bringing out the real meaning of Song of Songs, but it’s really just thrusting someone’s own wishful ideas about it onto the readership. If you want to understand Song of Songs, then please, avoid this translation.

The differences here are quite stark! Not only do the lines hardly bear resemblance, it’s plain to see that the translator has decided to read notions of sacrifice and atonement into the verse. Again, don’t get me wrong: these are biblical notions. But they’re simply not here in this verse. You have to impose the ideas onto the text. That’s not interpreting or exegeting the Bible. That’s called eisegesis—reading your predetermined ideas into what a text is saying. George Athas

Then there is also someone named Andrew Wilson who is a teaching Pastor at King’s Church London who has theological degrees from Cambridge (MA), London School of Theology (MTh) and King’s College London (PhD).

Andrew Wilson - “The Passion “translation” inserts all kinds of concepts, words and ideas of which the original gives no hint whatsoever.”

“God’s love language is not hidden, or missing; it is in plain sight in the many excellent translations we have available. The Word of God, in any language, is a book of love and literature, heart and head, passion and perceptiveness, foundations and fire. It doesn’t need adding to.”

“I wouldn’t recommend people use TPT, and if they do, I would recommend they recognize that a) it is not actually a translation, and b) they use other versions as their primary texts for study.” Andrew Wilson

Lionel Windsor who wrote a review on the book of Romans sums up his response with the following (I would highly recommend to read the whole article as he makes some excellent points):

Lionel Windsor - So is this “Passion Translation” really a translation? In other words, is it “translated directly from the Greek and Aramaic texts”, as it claims on the title page and in the front matter? Well, in some places it’s a translation. But in other places, it’s highly questionable whether we should call it a “translation”. It reads more like a reflective paraphrase from Simmons, sometimes tightly based on the Greek text, at other significant places quite loosely based on the Greek text, occasionally using insights from the Syriac Peshiṭta, yet at other places having little discernible connection to the critical version of the Syriac Peshiṭta even in places claiming to be based on “the Aramaic”. It seems to add concepts to the biblical text that simply aren’t there in the original words–whether Greek or Syriac. Lionel Windsor

One of the best articles that I have read which gives such a great amount of information comes from Andrew Shead who is the head of Old Testament and Hebrew at Moore Theological College and is a member of the NIV Committee on Bible Translation. He states the following:

Andrew Shead - Not only does TPT seek to overwhelm its readers with emotions that have been imposed on Scripture, but the distortion of the word of God that results from these additions means that readers are deprived of the correct knowledge of God that is prerequisite for the proper shaping of their emotional responses.

Often the doubled clause or line makes space for ideas (underlined) not represented in the original: ‘So all I need to do is to call on [sic] to you / Singing to you, the praiseworthy God’ (v. 3); ‘My sobs came right into your heart / And you turned your face to rescue me’ (v. 6). These cases of exegetical expansion count as alterations, not just additions.

However, Simmons has strayed so far outside Nida’s programme that his work would not be recognised as legitimate by any Bible translation society in the world, past or present. Andrew Shead

There are even those who come from a similar vein of belief as Brian Simmons who still cannot get completely on board with the Passion because of several reasons. David Fish who has a website named Revival Culture had this to say:

David Fish - “So what is it? It’s a paraphrase. It’s the Biblical text reworded in the words of the author, based upon the author’s ideas, beliefs, and presuppositions. Plain and simple…...There is no actual attention being given to the literal syntax and grammar of the languages. It feels as if he is researching vocabulary and its meanings and choosing the ones which he feels put forth some kind of emotion. Again, he is paraphrasing with a particular agenda, a particular idea he would like to put into the text. This is not a scholarly method of translating the original texts.” David Fish

There are also some quotes from one of the academic papers for the individuals that Mike Winger hired to review the Passion. Dr. Temper Longman had this to say:

Dr. Temper Longman - But there are other problems. He achieves his translation by utilizing a number of ill-advised or simply wrong interpretive strategies. I will briefly comment on these now. I will also cite selective examples from my comments on specific verses and their notes below. Note that the vast majority of my examples below are specific illustrations of how he imposes his inappropriate allegorical interpretation on the text. 

The differences here are quite stark! Not only do the lines hardly bear resemblance, it’s plain to see that the translator has decided to read notions of sacrifice and atonement into the verse. Again, don’t get me wrong: these are biblical notions. But they’re simply not here in this verse. You have to impose the ideas onto the text. That’s not interpreting or exegeting the Bible. That’s called eisegesis—reading your predetermined ideas into what a text is saying. (Dr. Longman's Paper)

Dr. Douglas Moo during his interview with Mike Winger stated:

Dr. Douglas Moo - We should all recognize that to the translate the Bible requires interpretation. There's no such thing, there's no possibility of translating the Bible without interpreting. So it's not the matter of interpretation per se that I want to criticize. Rather it's the questionable interpretations I find in Romans where one particular view gets locked in. An example here I know this is a very debated one, so I don't want to again come down too hard here, but Romans 8:29 Paul begins a string of verbs talking about how God has worked on our behalf to bring us to ultimate glory. The first verb in that string is a Greek word proginoso ? which is difficult to translate. There are at least two options there and the passion Bible we have, “he knew all about us before we were born”. Now that is a legitimate option for the meaning of the verb. Although all about us is is not really included in the name of the verb at all. So that's that's a bit going beyond the data I think. But again one particular view has been chosen here excluding the other view which is that it's choose beforehand or set love on us beforehand or something of that sort  (30:44​)

In Dr. Moo’s academic paper, he put it pretty plainly

What it comes down to, is this then: good translations make good choices. I am not sure that good choices have been consistently made in The Passion Translation Often one particular interpretation of a text has been chosen and rendered into appropriate English – often obscuring other options for its meaning. Another verse illustrates this point: Rom. 8:29. This verse begins with a verb that might mean something like “know about ahead of time” or “choose ahead of time.” The Passion Translation renders “he knew all about us before we were born,” locking us into one of the alternatives (Dr. Moo's Paper)

There are so many places, beyond what even quotations can allow, where the Passion puts in additional info or ideas, even leaving out certain aspects that don’t quite line up with his theological views, which are not found within the context or the scope of the Bible. But instead they are simply interpretations or additions of the “translator” who is using eisegesis instead of exegesis based upon his own specialized hermeneutic.

Homological Expediency (Preaching Points in the text)

Preaching Points

One of the most interesting things that I find with the Passion is that you can actually find basic preaching points that are added to the text. This is absolutely absurd and crazy phenomena that cannot quite be found within nearly any other Bible. These can be just simple one liners that can be added to a sermon or a whole sermon can be centered around just one talking point. The general term for this is called Homological Expediency. It is basically where you are choosing an interpretation that is going to preach well, positioning it in such a way that rather than teaching the text as it actually is you choose your own interpretation. This can be in the form of simply statements that don’t exist within any other translations, to whole sentences or paragraphs, all of which preach very well, but are not consistent with the original text of the Bible.

Dr. Douglas Moo explained it best while doing his interview with Mike Winger:

Dr. Douglas Moo - This for instance is an example here from the first verse of Romans. Paul calls himself a doulas normally translated slave or servant. The footnote says that this word is one who has chosen to serve a master out of love. That is frankly nonsense. There were millions of slaves in the Greco-Roman world and there weren't very many of them who were stepping forward and saying oh I want to be a slave to this master out of love for him. It's just it's literally nonsense. And so questionable interpretations in the text and then in the footnotes

Mike Winger’s Response - Laugh out loud here but it preaches well I think is the point because yeah it preaches well and it's and and you you would know and I know there's times where as a pastor I want to teach and I'm thinking oh that's such a powerful point and then I go to double check and I go no it's really not substantiated and at that point you're integrity comes into play

Dr. Moo’s Response - I warned my my students all the time about what I call homological expediency. Choosing the interpretation that's going to preach the best, rather the interpretation of the text actually seems to be teaching. I suspect that we all fall prey to that that once in a while

Mike Winger’s Response - Yeah I'm sure it has happened to all of us. But you know, how many of us have made a translation that does that in the translation? (33:58)

One thing that I can easily commend Simmons on is he truly is an excellent writer. Almost a poet of sorts. He has a brilliant way of using adjectives, verbs, adverbs, prepositions, even interjections. Part of the reason that the Passion is so interesting to read is because of Simmons use of language. It really is more emotive than a standard translation. But that is also part of the issue then as well. When he does write his text in such a modern contemporary way, he creates these one liners that make it easy to become preaching points. Andrew Shead explains this in his article called Burning Scripture with Passion which reviews the Psalms from the TPT:

Andrew Shead - Simmons’s style is certainly striking and absolutely contemporary. The book is a treasure trove of one-liners.

Specific examples

‘You are my prize, my pleasure, and my portion’ (16:5); ‘My tears are liquid words, and you can read them all’ (38:9); ‘You call yourself a mighty man, a big shot?’ (52:1). ‘Here’s my story: I came so close to missing the way’ (73:2). ‘Like a river bursting its banks, I’m overflowing with words’ (45:1).

Of course, many of these are not part of the text, but there are many vigorous, fresh and accurate translation choices that do faithfully reflect major theological themes, such as ‘Yahweh now reigns as king!’ (Ps 93:1; 97:1). However, the stylistic hallmark of The Psalms is not its linguistic freshening-up, but its genre. Andrew Shead

This is an incredibly weird phenomenon that really isn’t found within any other translation. One could make the argument that it is found with the Message, but that is a paraphrase and not a standard translation, which is what the Passion tries to pass itself off for. Therefore, one of the reasons I would not say it is a translation and instead something more along the lines of a paraphrase or a targum (covered in a different article) or even a Bible commentary is because of its use of those preaching points or stylized phrases put right into the text. It is a deviation from the original wording and even meaning, adding a more stylized flair to the text, which would make it no longer true to the authentic, original meanings. Thereby changing the possible context of not only the words but the verses as well. And the accumulation of those changes, adjustments, additions or subtractions can add up quite significantly over the many books that have been “translated” thus far.

Overall it just is strange. It sounds nice as you are reading, but still. Strange

Portrayal of an accurate translation, neither accurate nor a translation

Passion Translations Website Claims

The Passion website makes the claim that it is supposed to be a highly accurate translation. They have several sections within their FAQ to help explain their general stance.

- The Word of God was never meant to be studied in personal isolation, but proclaimed and preached in community….The Passion Translation has been crafted with modern English readers and listeners in mind, which is why it is ideal for modern English churches. The cadence and word choices, sentence structure and emotive language all lend a hand in helping readers easily proclaim passages, pastors clearly communicate God’s Word, and listeners understand the specific message God wants them to hear.

- The Passion Translation is an excellent translation you can use as your primary text to seriously study God’s Word because it combines the best aspects of what is called formal and functional equivalence Bibles.

- It is a balanced translation that tries to hold both the Word’s literal meaning and original message in proper tension, resulting in an entirely new, fresh, fiery translation of God’s Word.

- The goal of The Passion Translation is to bring God’s fiery heart of love and truth to this generation, merging the emotion and truth of God’s Word, resulting in a clear, accurate, readable translation for modern English readers

- The Passion Translation is an essential equivalence translation. TPT maintains the essential form and essential function of the original words. It is a meaning-for-meaning translation, translating the essence of God’s original message and heart into modern English.

They even go through to make sure that people know that it is not supposed to be a paraphrase but an actual translation. It is not supposed to be taken as a paraphrase so they explain it as:

- A paraphrase version of the Bible utilizes an existing English-language translation as its base text. It paraphrases one version into more contemporary language. 

- A translation, however, uses the original Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek manuscripts as the base text for a new version of the Bible. It translates these original languages into a modern language.

Another thing that they state specifically in their FAQ is that it is a great translation for serious study because of it being accurate, faithful, clear and readable

This version taps into the love language of God, letting the words of Scripture go through the human soul, past the defenses of our mind, and into our spirit. Countless people have told us how The Passion Translation has helped them freshly discover intimacy with Christ in their journey through Scripture, and that it has rapidly become their favorite translation of choice for Bible study. We are thrilled to offer this accurate, faithful, clear, and readable translation for your serious study of God’s Word, and look forward to hearing how it helps you encounter the heart of God anew.

Responses to claims on their website

Ideal for churches

Balanced

clear, accurate, readable

Essential equivalence

Not a paraphrase

This is why he says it's a translation (except he doesn't know any of the languages so has to rely on commentaries, reference tools or the text translated into English)

Also he states in the title that it's a translation, based upon this I couldn't claim it is trying to present itself as a paraphrase or commentary

Serious study

Soooo it is applicable for study because it taps into the “love language of God” (which he says other places is the song of Solomon, the language of the heart),

people like it

Others who said they created something better

This is something that Brian frequently states, that all the other translations are “missing” aspects (such as emotion of God, has been translated incorrect, secrets missing, intellect added/exemplified, etc) therefore his is the most accurate

We really need to understand something very basic. What is scripture, what constitutes as the Word of God and how different can it be and still constitute as the Bible ? I think it is put excellently by

Passion “Translation” Is Not Accurate

There are many people from different walks of life, from everyday individuals such as myself to Bible translators to heads of departments within universities, each who have good reason to state that the Passion is not accurate as a Bible.

Lionel Windsor wrote within his review of the book of Romans in the Passion:

Lionel Windsor - “In other words–the Passion Translation is not actually a translation. It is not seeking to convey the original meaning, but it is deliberately seeking to add the concept of divine “passion”, even where it is not present in the original. And this is precisely what has happened here. There is no justification for adding “passionately” in Romans 1:9 (not from the Greek, nor even from the Aramaic) apart from the desire of the translator to find the idea of “passion”.”

In other words, is it “translated directly from the Greek and Aramaic texts”, as it claims on the title page and in the front matter? Well, in some places it’s a translation. But in other places, it’s highly questionable whether we should call it a “translation”. It reads more like a reflective paraphrase from Simmons, sometimes tightly based on the Greek text, at other significant places quite loosely based on the Greek text, occasionally using insights from the Syriac Peshitta, yet at other places having little discernible connection to the critical version of the Syriac Peshitta even in places claiming to be based on “the Aramaic”. It seems to add concepts to the biblical text that simply aren’t there in the original words–whether Greek or Syriac. (Lionel Windsor)

Dr. Temper Longman states the following:

The Passion translation cannot be justified by the Hebrew, Greek, and Aramaic. And for that reason I would say it's not a translation. It's more like a highly, highly, highly interpretive paraphrase - (4:40)

Andrew Shead wrote it so clearly as well in his article Burning Scripture With Passion:

Andrew Shead - “Simmons has produced a text so far removed from the original that it no longer counts as the Bible”

“And this is even before we remember TPT’s lack of interest in textual and linguistic accuracy. So frequently does TPT misrepresent or ignore the original text that one is forced to conclude that its author had little interest in representing the meaning of the original as preserved in the manuscript tradition.”

In Nida’s words, this is not a linguistic translation; it is a cultural translation, and hence it is not a legitimate Bible.

“….it does not count as a faithful witness to the original text. There is no possible way in which a reader of this translation could ever know whether a given unit of meaning in TPT has an equivalent in the original. And this severing of meaningful connection to the words of the inspired original firmly excludes Simmons’s translation from the category of Scripture.” (Andrew Shead)

I am not sure how much more plainly it can be stated than that first sentence. I am going to put it again:

Shead also goes onto further explain how and why this should not be considered a translation giving very specific details:

Andrew Shead - Unfortunately The Passion Translation (TPT) shows little understanding, either of the process of textual criticism, or of the textual sources themselves

The Syriac Peshitta is a generally conservative translation of a Hebrew text almost identical to ours, made a few centuries after Christ. Only rarely is it a witness to an earlier or more original text. The Aramaic Targums are based on the same Hebrew text, but often insert interpretations into the text, so that Jews did not consider them to be Scripture.2 Our oldest copy of the Aramaic Psalms is from after 800 AD. The Greek Septuagint is by far the oldest and most important non-Hebrew witness to the original. It has a complex history and varied character, and must be used with care.

None of these considerations seem to weigh with Simmons, because his aim does not appear to be the reconstruction of the original text. In many places where the Syriac is actually an important witness to the original Hebrew text, Simmons makes no reference to it at all (e.g., Ps 2:9; 24:6; 42:4; 49:11; 73:7; 145:13).

He seems instead to be looking around in ancient sources for changes and additions that he can use as he himself changes and adds to the text.3 As a general rule, when ancient versions disagree over the original Hebrew, Simmons either ignores the problem or uses all of them

The famous line in Psalm 22:16, ‘they pierced my hands and feet’ (Dead Sea scrolls, Syriac, Septuagint), reads ‘like a lion my hands and feet’ in the MT; Simmons uses both ‘lion’ and ‘pierce’, the latter twice over for good measure.

To give one more example, in Ps 74:3a the Syriac has ‘servants’ (’bd’) instead of the Hebrew ‘steps’ (פעם), possibly because the Syriac translator read the word פעל in his Hebrew source-text (p‘l means ‘to labour’ in Syriac). The Septuagint, ignored by Simmons, has yet another reading (‘hands’), which suggests an ancient interpretive struggle here, possibly due to a textual uncertainty.

Simmons’s response is to mistranslate the ‘Aramaic’ (Syriac) in a footnote, and use it as an apparent license to provide a double translation that bears no resemblance to the Syriac or any other ancient version! (Andrew Shead)

It is just simply not a translation. From everything that I have ever heard and read from others and even read of the Passion myself, there are many issues that make it not a translation.

Not a Translation, but a Paraphrase or a Targum
The Passion website again defines a paraphrase as the following:

- A paraphrase version of the Bible utilizes an existing English-language translation as its base text. It paraphrases one version into more contemporary language. 

- A translation, however, uses the original Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek manuscripts as the base text for a new version of the Bible. It translates these original languages into a modern language.

Merriam-Webster defines a paraphrase as a

a restatement of a text, passage or work giving the meaning in another form; to say (something that someone else has said or written) using different words

Larry Overton, who has an article reviewing the Passion translation looks at this and factors in both the Passions FAQ and the standard definition for paraphrase and has come to this conclusion:

The etymology of the word (Paraphrase) in English comes from the compound Greek word paraphrazein [παραφράζειν], to tell in other words.[5] That definition tracks very well with Simmons’ “essential equivalence” philosophy delineated in his TPT FAQs.

The word paraphrase does not intrinsically mean “not having consulted the original languages.” It is entirely possible to consult the grammar and vocabulary of the Greek New Testament and still paraphrase its contents. And that is just what Simmons has done. - (Larry Overton)

Another explanation of a paraphrase is given by an article from Revival Culture again:

“So what is it? It’s a paraphrase. It’s the Biblical text reworded in the words of the author, based upon the author’s ideas, beliefs, and presuppositions. Plain and simple…...There is no actual attention being given to the literal syntax and grammar of the languages. It feels as if he is researching vocabulary and its meanings and choosing the ones which he feels put forth some kind of emotion. Again, he is paraphrasing with a particular agenda, a particular idea he would like to put into the text. This is not a scholarly method of translating the original texts.” (Revival Culture)

This is exactly what I personally am seeing and have seen over and over with the text. There is an agenda with the certain text resources chosen, the “translating” process and then the end result. It is not and never is a scholarly way of going through and translating a text, whether it is a general document from a hundred years ago or something as important as Bible manuscripts from almost 2,000 years ago.

When Mike Winger had hired the various scholars to do a review of the Passion, almost every single one started their review process and concluded that this was either a paraphrase or a targum. They were confused on how or why this would be called a translation. Several of them had to contact Mike Winger for an explanation of why this was being called a translation.

An actual Bible translator, who is one of the lead translators for the NLT, Dr. Craig Blomberg states the difference between a translation and a paraphrase

Dr. Craig Blomberg - The difference between a translation and a paraphrase, of course, is not a hard and fast one, but a matter of gradation. But in general, whenever a rendering of Scripture adds entire phrases and clauses to the text that are not necessary just to complete the meaning of any sentence, and especially when they do so on a regular basis, it is properly referred to as a paraphrase.

To be sure, adding material that does not correspond to anything in the original Greek of the New Testament, for example, can make the Scriptures come alive. If it is true to the context and meaning of what was originally written, it can be very helpful for modern readers, especially believers who are young in their faith or new to the process of Bible reading.  But those who produce the work should not confuse readers by claiming it to be an actual translation of the Bible - (Dr. Blomberg's Paper)

Blomberg also states the following within his paper:

Dr. Craig Blomberg - To be sure, Simmons does claim that, whenever he inserts something that doesn’t correspond to the ancient Greek (or Hebrew), he puts the English in italics. Unfortunately, he doesn’t follow through on this pledge with any consistency

On numerous occasions, such insertions are not italicized at all. It is one thing, as with the LBP or The Message, to acknowledge producing a paraphrase all in the same font, so that readers know they have to consult a real translation to find out what the original said. It is much more misleading, however, to claim to be distinguishing translation from paraphrase but then to do so very inconsistently.  (Dr. Blomberg's Paper)

Within the interview that Mike Winger did with Dr. Tremper Longman, he explained that the Passion is simply an interpretive paraphrase:

Dr. Tremper Longman - It's more like a highly, highly, highly interpretive paraphrase

Mike Winger - Why do you qualify even the term paraphrase with those extra words?

Dr. Tremper Longman - You can have a paraphrase that sticks close to the original languages, a paraphrase technically is taking something in 1 language and putting it in different words in another language. I call it a paraphrase because the translator Brian Simmons, he has concluded that the Song of Songs is an allegory and he translates in a way that brings an allegorical meaning that isn't explicit in the text. Even if the song of songs is an allegory, which almost everyone today says it's not, by everyone i mean scholars who study the song of songs. The allegorical meaning is not explicit  in the text itself in the Hebrew. (4:40)

Dr. Tremper Longman also specifically wrote about this within his paper as well:

Dr. Tremper Longman - The Passion Translation of the Song of Songs is not a translation, but at best, an interpretive paraphrase. A translation takes the original Hebrew and works to represent the message in a way that will communicate the original message of the author to an audience who reads a different language (in this case, English)

….translators must work hard to avoid importing ideas that are foreign to the text, so as to not obscure or distort the meaning of the original text. (Dr. Tremper Longman)

During one of his interviews, Mike Winger brought up how this is not a paraphrase with Dr. Nijay Gupta, who gave a very poignant response:

Mike Winger - Lets start with the nature of the Passion Translation. People think it's a paraphrase, I have actually see people review it as a paraphrase. But not according to its title, it says its a translation and the website says it's a translation….

Dr. Nijay Gupta - It's a product, as a product they are trying to put their best foot forward. There is no FDA regulating translations. No FCC out there policing translations. Anyone can publish a translation and it would be sold on Amazon until kingdom come. It's almost like calling something natural, there is no regulation. So to call something a translation from the original languages, anyone can do that. The question that Christians have to ask is, is it faithful, respectful, accurate to the original text. The proof is in the eating, does this taste like scripture. Most people reading the bible don't know Hebrew, Greek or Aramaic, they trust the academy and educated people in church, to give some communal awareness to if these things are faithful to scripture - (5:50)

Dr. Darrell Bock clearly stated that it is not a translation, instead it is only a paraphrase:

Dr. Darrell Bock - Oh this is a paraphrase it's not a translation. That's pretty clear and the notes make that clear. The notes make that very clear in spots where they refer to Aramaic text for the New testament which of course is not the case. The New testament was originally written in Greek at least the books that we have that comprised in the New Testament. It's true that the background language in the culture was Aramaic, but the text that we actually have for the New testament are all Greek texts  (2:50)

Well in most spots it's actually adequate as a paraphrase. There are a few places where they're reading the text differently and they're a few cases where I think they've mistranslated or misled the reader on what's going on. But the bulk of it as a paraphrase is an act with paraphrase 

Paraphrase basically is a way of summarizing the meaning of texts in different words than the actual translation itself. All translations engage in some level of interpretation of paraphrase. When it usually resorts to a paraphrase to try and bring out fully some of the nuances of what a translation often will leave more obscure unless you know the idiom or something involved. So the choice of a paraphrase in a rendering is not a bad thing if you tell people that's what you're doing. So as a paraphrase it's adequate and most spots but there are a few places where it's got problems  (4:09)

…And so the challenge of a translation is it's usually has to be compact, but to give the full force of what's happening in one language and translate to the other something gets lost in the transmission, That's inevitable. That's why scholars learn the language so that they can actually get a sense of what is really going on. Having said that, what happens with a paraphrase is you're trying to play with that dimension and bring it a little more. What may be implicit, make it more explicit, which involves a lot more judgment. And the more judgments you make the more likely that some judgments will be good and other judgments will be not. And so the problem with this paraphrase is it looks like it has a lot of judgments that are on the ehh side of the good side (34:13)

One of the strongest responses to the Passion that I have ever read that puts it plainly and bluntly it would be Andrew Shead’s conclusion:

“(Simmons) achieves this (reintroducing passion and fire into the Bible by) abandoning all interest in textual accuracy, playing fast and loose with the original languages, and inserts so much new material into the text that it is at least 50% longer than the original. The result is a strongly sectarian translation that no longer counts as Scripture; by masquerading as a Bible it threatens to bind entire churches in thrall to a false god.”. (Andrew Shead)

Targum

There was a method of writing around the time of the second half the first millennium where Jewish scribes would write a version of the Tanak (the Old Testament to Christians), but in it they would write commentaries or would paraphrase or sermonize within the text. Part of its main point was to go through and put in theology or contemporary views into the scriptures to make them more applicable for the modern audience. There is a very rich history of Targums for the Jewish faith. I had first only heard of these because of one Dr. Nijay Gupta and Dr. Tremper Longman. Dr. Gupta explains it quite well within his interview:

Dr. Nijay Gupta - Targum kind of a paraphrase that leads into explanation, sermonizing. Breaking down for modern contemporary explanation. Breaks boundaries of translation moves into unpacking theology, contemporary relevance. Translation paraphrase, mixed with poetry or sermonizing. The passion fits that as some of the choices made burst out into a little sermon. If it matches up with theology that might be helpful for you. But again I find it so inconsistent and historically inaccurate on a number of levels that I would not recommend it for that use -

Mike Winger - I think that this is a big thing that you don't notice if you are not from charismatic circles as I have had some experience there. And I still believe in the gifts of the spirit and the work of God there so it isn't skepticism or cynicism there on my part. But as I read through the Passion, the targum like elements are very frequently preaching points for charismatic or hyper charismatic preaching communities. Which I think is why it's been endorsed by Bill Johnson and Hillsong leadership, Bobbi Huston. Official endorsement as this great bible translation. And I think it's because it's added those preaching points. It's less about the translation and more about the preaching points which to me is the worst part because it's adding things to the text that aren't necessarily there. And in some cases incorrectly changing it. 

Dr. Tremper Longman stated that the Passion is most reminiscent of a Targum:

Dr. Tremper Longman - The closet analogy to The Passion Translation’s treatment of the Song of Songs is the Jewish Targum written in Aramaic sometime in the second half of the first millennium AD. (Dr. Tremper Longman)

Official Use Vs Supplementary Bibles

One of the main claims that Simmons and the Passion website FAQ present is that this should be used as a primary Bible for both personal and pulpit use. This would try to set it along side of other standard translations that have been around for many years that are tried and true like the ESV, NASB, KJV, etc. Dr. Nijay Gupta had this to say about that sort of claim:

Dr. Nijay Gupta - “Official use” translations are those that are treated as works to be used as the Bible, for public worship and personal Bible study, to study as Scripture and memorize as Scripture (such as the KJV, NIV, NRSV, and ESV).

 Then, there are all kinds of “supplementary” translations; these are aids or tools for better understanding the Bible, such as Eugene Peterson’s The Message. Peterson didn’t see this as replacing traditional translations, but more so as an aid, to help readers understand their Bibles better

Yes, TPT is a misleading, inaccurate, and overall “bad” translation if it was intended as an “official use” Bible. (Dr. Gupta's Paper)

Within his interview he states:

Dr. Nijay Gupta - In Galatians I feel like Simmons makes some, what I feel like are very strategic theological points that are clearly opinions. My question would be are the readers going to know when that happens are they going to know it's an opinion, that there are a whole group of people that would argue against that that are scholars, translators, translations. It leaves a lot up to chance, up to trusting him as an interpreter of scripture. Basically to use this as translation even supplement you really have to trust that he understands new testament theology, what the bibles all about that sort of thing. And to be honest I don't. I don't feel like he has a good interpretation of Galatians here - (32:35)

For all of this, I would summarize it with the following. If the Passion was positioned as a Message style paraphrase with a signs, wonders, and miracle twist I don’t think I would have as much of an issue with it. I would still disagree significantly because of all the factors I have already written about and the ones still yet to come, but I could at least better understand. But that clearly is not how it is marketed, portrayed, or promoted and talked about by Simmons and others. If it was, people would know more so just like the Message that it is not an actual translation and not to take everything in it as 100% scripture, just to be used for general interpretation with commentary aspects, basic understanding of concepts and even a nice literary piece with how it is written. But based upon everything above, it clearly is not a translation and should not be seen as a translation. The number of issues presented by trained professionals, scholars, people who know the original languages inside and out, people who do actual Bible translation as their job on a daily basis, people who have helped to produce some of the most standard Bibles we all use today, people who are on various committees and boards to make sure that we are preserving the scriptures so we know what God’s word actually says. These people all say, this is not a translation. It is very hard to argue with that conclusion based upon the evidence and who it comes from .

An Overemphasis on Emotion

Why emotion?

Whenever Simmons does speaking engagements one thing is quite clear, he is an effective communicator. He is skilled in conveying some of his thoughts through speaking and writing. There is no denying that. His use of especially adjectives, adverbs and verbs, his nonverbal communication with the manner in which he speaks, makes him quite convincing in specific regards. But just because someone is skilled within communication does not mean they are right. One of the most underlying premises of who Simmons is and wants to convey is and always was an aspect of emotion. He is incredibly emotive within his speaking and writing.

The Passion FAQ gives the reason for the use of emotional language in it

The Passion Translation is an attempt to bring God’s fiery heart of love and truth to this generation, merging the emotion and truth of God’s Word. The result is a clear, accurate, readable translation for modern English readers, permeated by the heart of God and the emotion of his Word.

A goal of The Passion Translation is to recapture the emotion of God’s Word, for emotion is vital to God’s message. As Gregory Clapper rhetorically asked: “Is the great range of scriptural language about the ‘heart’ dispensable ornamentation which only clouds the real message of the Gospel, or does this emotion-language itself convey and constitute, in large measure, the real message?” Brian Simmons believes Scripture’s emotion-language is at the heart of God’s Word, because it fully manifests the heart of God.

The heart and mind are not opponents in God’s Word, but allies and supporters of each other. If we want to grasp the fullness of God’s character and his passion for our lives, we must recapture this lost language. The genuine message and fullness of God’s good news in Christ is laid bare in and through the Bible’s emotion-language.

At surface level that sounds great, who would want to object with wanting to have God’s heart or to deny aspects of scripture? I mean, God did make us with emotions and the Bible does talk about the emotions that God experiences as well. Who wouldn’t want to have greater passion and ascertain the Bibles emotion language?

This also stems from the fact that Brian’s views on love and how he thinks too many translations create a fear driven theology. He can be seen saying this and explaining it in several places, but in this video at the 34:15, 36:30 and 40:15 minute mark

The Passion Translation, Interview with Brian Simmons on Sozo Talk Radio

Mike Winger states in one of his interviews:

Mike Winger - It's almost like the passion translation is what Brian Simmons thinks the Bible should be, should say - (45:03)

Andrew Shead provides some great insight into this, why Simmons seems to think that the Bible needs more “Passion”:

Andrew Shead - Now this may seem an obvious question, but what does ‘passion’ mean? For Simmons it means a type of emotion. The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English defines passion as: ‘a very strong feeling of sexual love’, ‘a very strong belief or feeling about something’, or ‘a very strong liking for something’.

But more than this, Simmons wants his translation to ‘trigger an overwhelming response to the truth of the Bible’ (p. 8). This valuing of being overwhelmed by something is what seems to drive his whole project. And here’s the thing – this is a uniquely modern, even novel, cultural phenomenon. The idea that things are more real, more true, more valuable, when we feel them strongly is a product of 19th century Western Romanticism. Not that Simmons believes that our emotions make God himself more real. Rather, they make him more real to us; the stronger the emotion, the more fully we realize our ‘quest to experience God’s presence’ (p. 4). (Andrew Shead)

We as humans have emotions, that is quite obvious. Now, there is no denying the fact that there is emotional language within the Bible. It is seen all over. But the fact that in the Passion, there is emotion in places that there never was in either the original languages nor in any other standard translation. Shead further explains it brilliantly within his article:

Andrew Shead - The Bible is both deeply affirming of human emotions, and acutely aware of the danger of being controlled by them.

To be human is to have emotions, and the Bible is full of them. There’s no denying the depths of Jacob’s love for Rachel (Gen 29:20); of the exiles’ grief at the loss of Jerusalem (Lam 1:2); of the Magi’s joy at seeing Jesus (Matt 2:10). Jesus, too, shared the emotions common to humanity, both negative and positive. He felt extreme grief at the prospect of his death (Matt 26:38); he was consumed by jealousy on the Lord’s behalf (John 2:16–17); he exulted when the Spirit showed him what the Father is like (Luke 10:21).

Not all emotions are desirable, of course, and the Bible uses language of being ‘overwhelmed’ for unwelcome emotions, emotions that come from outside and ‘prevail against’ us, such as terror, guilt, or grief (e.g., Pss 55:5; 65:3; 88:7–8). Not that there is anything wrong with feeling them – it’s part of living in a fallen world.

However, ‘passions’ are another story. The word ‘passion’ is used to translate a wide range of Greek and Hebrew words whose meaning spans craving, strong desire, lust, jealousy, rage, or anguish. What these very different internal states have in common is that they tend to overwhelm us and control our behavior. They pull at us so that we will give in to them. They long to direct our lives in place of the Holy Spirit.12

In short, emotions are a mixed bag. There is good fear and bad fear, good grief and bad grief, even good joy and bad joy (Jer 50:11–13). One key principle holds this mixed picture together: Right emotion flows from right knowledge of God

We learn to love what God loves and hate what he hates by encountering him in Scripture (Deut 6:5–6; Prov 2:6–10). To be in Christ means being shaped by the Word of God, which includes our emotions (Col 3:16). 

Joy, for example, is a fruit of the Spirit because it is evoked by coming to understand what God has done for us in Christ (Ps 105:43; Luke 2:10; Rom 15:13). The emotions of a believer do not grow stronger; instead, by the grace of God they become redirected. And this process of redirection also entails learning to govern emotions and not be ruled by them (Tit 2:11–12; Jas 4:1). Again, the word of God is key. (Andrew Shead)

When we do not have the correct emotions in the correct places in the correct manners in a correct biblical manner, it can create major issues. I think this is really what starts to occur with the Passion. There is emotion in places that was never in the earliest manuscripts we have in Greek or Hebrew. And yet to make things more emotive and “passionate” the TPT has put it in simply where it does not belong. As a result we can then have a skewed view of a certain emotion or it can completely change the context of a specific verse or whole chapter through those either additions or omissions. That becomes very dangerous. Shead closes out with one of the best explanations of the issues that result from this type of change:

Fatally for Simmons’s ‘passion’ program, the emotions TPT seeks to evoke do not arise naturally from the word of God, but are artificially introduced. TPT generates emotions from the translator’s personal response to the text, and uses them to shape our reception of the text. It evidently does not trust in the power of Scripture to move the hearts of its readers without a good deal of outside assistance. After all, if Scripture were sufficient for the task, TPT would not have dialed the emotional volume up to eleven.

 And the problem is not simply that actual references to emotional states in the Hebrew Psalms are multiplied until they completely and wrongly dominate the whole book. It’s the nature of these insertions as well…. 

Not only does TPT seek to overwhelm its readers with emotions that have been imposed on Scripture, but the distortion of the word of God that results from these additions means that readers are deprived of the correct knowledge of God that is prerequisite for the proper shaping of their emotional responses.

In his listing of major genres in the Psalms (‘themes’, pp. 5–6) he completely omits the Psalter’s most common genre, namely, lament. And while the translation does include the lament psalms, it does not give them the expansive treatment that praise receives.

Tragically, this illegitimate layering of selective passions over the top of Scripture – mostly those of physical intimacy and breathless elevation – prevents TPT from showing us the actual dimensions, the ‘width and length and height and depth,’ of the love of Christ as it shines from every page of Scripture.

The emotive, emotional language makes the Passion very interesting to most people. It does sound different than almost every way, verses seem to fly off the page and captivate with how they are worded. But that is because it is so different than every other translation. Dr. Craig Blomberg explains a little bit more of why some people find it interesting with his interview with Mike Winger:

Mike Winger - so in your review you talked about why people may be attracted to the passion translation what are your thoughts on that 

Dr. Craig Blomberg - It's passionate and regularly we find adverbs and adjectives in particular that are added, almost never in italics, to make simple words more exciting. And I flipped back to the first page of 1st Corinthians and my eyes lit almost randomly on verse 5. In him you have been made extravagantly rich in every way. The Greek has nothing corresponding to extravagantly but the very concept of riches for some people connotes extravagance. So there's nothing horribly wrong with that and it creates a sense of excitement and and power. I'm not just rich I'm extravagantly rich and I don't know if I can keep playing Bible roulette and to remind us more often but  (43:26​)

Dr. Blomberg also states how Simmons adds emotion and passion to the text where there really is no need for it whatsoever:

Mike Winger - You mentioned chapter 1 verse 3 Paul has a standard greeting in all of his writings or many of them he says grace and peace to you but this is different in  

Dr. Craig Blomberg -Joyous grace and endless peace be yours continually from our father, feels good. I like that, yeah. Is grace something we should be joyous about? Of course. Is it true if I live forever that I will always have peace? Of course. And therefore is it theologically correct to pray that this joyous grace and endless peace be ours continually? Sure it is. It just doesn't say any of that in the text. It makes me excited about it (45:03​)

He goes onto explain Dr. Blomberg gives very specific examples within his paper detailing how the Passion attempts to introduce more emotional passionate language:

Dr. Craig Blomberg - What, then, is the attraction of TPT? Indeed, why is the word Passion in its title? Clearly, Simmons is a passionate man, with a passionate love for God and his word, and he wants others to fall in love passionately with God through this version. 

The most common way he tries to accomplish this is by adding single-word adjectives and adverbs to the text (almost never in italics) to turn fairly common and even ordinary words into exciting concepts.

Paul’s standard greeting of “grace and peace be to you” in 1:3 becomes “May joyous grace and endless peace be yours continually.” Clearly, that is more passionate, but it’s not what Paul said. Even “continually” (or synonyms), which Simmons regularly inserts for present tense verbs (whether or not the context warrants them), is completely gratuitous here, because the Greek lacks the verb altogether. It is appropriate to supply “be,” but nothing more

Still, if one is thinking theologically, many of the insertions are delightful and hardly unorthodox. Had the version admitted to being a paraphrase, everything would have been fine.

Thus, to quote an array of terms with added modifiers, we discover that we have been made “extravagantly rich” (1:5), that God is “forever faithful” (1:9), that the rulers of this world crucified “the Lord of shining glory” (2:8), that God has revealed to us “his inmost heart” and “deepest mysteries” (2:10), that Judgment Day will be revealed by “blazing fire” (3:13), that Paul’s spirit is present with Christ’s “infinite power” (5:4), that believers should continue to live “the wonderful lives” to which they have been called (7:17), and that Paul “joyfully makes himself a servant” of Jesus. But why only in this last case is the modifier put in italics?

Some of Simmons’ turns of phrase are striking and downright delightful, even if they are pure paraphrase

The end of 1:10 becomes, “Form a consistent choreography among yourselves, having a common perspective with shared values.” 

The end of 1:17 tacks on, “For I trust in the all-sufficient cross of Christ alone.” 

The incestuous man in 5:1 is living in “gross sexual immorality. . .that’s so revolting it’s not even tolerated by the social norms of unbelievers.” 

In 5:8, “we can celebrate our continual feast, not with the old ‘leaven,’ the yeast of wickedness or bitterness, but we will feast on the freshly baked bread of innocence and holiness.” 

In 9:22, Paul has “adapted to the culture of every place” he has gone. 

The examples of the Israelites’ idolatry in the wilderness should teach us “not to fail in the same way by callously craving worthless things” (10:6). Why not? 

“For we live in a time when the purpose of all the ages past is now completing its goal within us” (10:11b) (Dr. Craig Blomberg)

Dr. Blomberg was not done yet there, instead he gives a extensive amount of examples still after this of

The Passion then extenuates and selects certain emotions to increase and input and downplays others the author doesn't find suitable (seen especially in the psalms for things like remorse, lament etc). Andrew Shead explains how Simmons tries to “aid” scripture where he thinks that the author thinks that it is lacking in emotion, which then creates major additions or omissions:

Andrew Shead - The Bible’s emotions are modified. Feelings of awe are directed towards total ecstasy; feelings of ardour and intimacy are directed towards total surrender. In short, Simmons makes a false claim when he states that TPT will ‘re-introduce the passion and fire of the Bible to the English reader.’ It’s the other way round – Simmons is trying to introduce the ‘passion and fire’ beloved of his own culture into the Bible.

He is trying to make the Bible value something that we value – the feeling of being overwhelmed by a strong emotion – in spite of the strong stance the Bible consistently takes against this exact thing. As Ps 117 TPT says (but the Bible does not), ‘Let it all out! … go ahead, let it all out! … O Yah!’ (Andrew Shead)

Dr. Tremper Longman also comes to the same conclusion that there is an over emphasis and overusage of emotional language used when he wrote his paper on the review of the Song of Songs:

Dr. Tremper Longman - Often, he will distort the Hebrew by overplaying the emotional register of a translation. 3:1 is a good example. There are examples of factual errors (1:14; 2:1, 6; 8:6) (Dr. Longman's Paper)

Andrew Shead provides clarity in how the Passion actually goes through and deprives correct and right emotions through these changes (whether additions or omissions). If we go through and change what the Bible states, even slightly it causes cursory adjustments that have an effect in the long run. Compound those changes over not only several verses, but chapters, books and even the whole New Testament and eventually the old and that makes it categorically different. It truly becomes no longer the Bible, despite Simmons best intentions to add emotion into places the original text does not put it.

Andrew Shead - Not only does TPT seek to overwhelm its readers with emotions that have been imposed on Scripture, but the distortion of the word of God that results from these additions means that readers are deprived of the correct knowledge of God that is prerequisite for the proper shaping of their emotional responses. (Andrew Shead)

Possibly Named translation after an Angel

Comments seem to imply its named after an angel

There are plenty of things that Simmons says that are quite peculiar, but one of the most strange things are his comments during two different interviews with Sid Roth. Some people love Sid Roth with his willingness to welcome people on his show with some wild views and experiences that are “supernatural”, other people absolutely dislike him and warn others to not to partake in his ministry. Sid Roth is no stranger to controversy, especially with the people he has on his show. Brian Simmons has appeared on the show several times but in one of his interviews with Sid they are discussing the “translation” that Simmons is making. While talking about it, Roth is explaining his profound love for this new version of the Bible and asks Brian a bit more about the background of it, specifically where the name for it came from:

Sid Roth - “Did he tell you the name of the Bible?”

Brian Simmons - ”no, He didn't.”

Sid Roth - “So where did you come up with the word passion translation”

Brian Simmons - “Well, years ago I saw an angel named passion in our church meeting. And the Lord spoke to me not audibly, but internally and said that angel is with your ministry, it's the angel of passion” (31:15) or (2:52)

As I have listened to the overall context of the clip, there really isn’t much more to it than what is quoted above. There is no greater explanation given, nothing else really leading into it that would make the outcome of the quote seem different. At its very surface level, it really does appear to be that the reason the Bible that Simmons makes is called the Passion Translation, is because of an angel that is a part of his ministry, an angel of Passion. Now whether that means he was intentionally name it after the angel or that he was naming it Passion because his ministry is all about passion and there is an angel that aids him within that, there are a variety of explanations one could come to. But it is just incredibly strange as to why he would bring up the aspect of an angel when explaining the naming of the translation.

I do not think (as some others have posited) that the angel of passion he describes is the one that he mentions elsewhere that helped him in the translating of the book of Romans, or that this angel even helps him to translate at all. But he has said that God has sent an angel to at least aid him for the book of Romans. Do I personally believe that God sent an angel to help him translate Romans to be the case, no I don’t. But to certain audiences that Brian is comfortable in (like all of us), he is a little more willing to share those sorts of spiritual experiences.

A simple and plain reading of his response seems to point towards it being named after an angel that is a part of his ministry.

Now I am more than willing to change my mind on this as he doesn’t get into great detail about it. He could have said just what was above, but meant something slightly different given a longer explanation. Or he could maybe provide more of an overall context to his statements to give greater insight.

I have yet to find any other clips of him talking about the reasoning behind the naming of his Bible beyond an interview with CBN:

CBN - Before you settled on the name, The Passion Translation, were there any other names that you thought about for it? Would you like to share any of the other names that were thought about?

Brian Simmons - Really, The Passion Translation was from the beginning, was our intent, and it stuck inside of me and I really felt the Lord was leading us to do that.

So based upon at least those two specific instances where he discusses the reason for the name the Passion “Translation”, and how since the beginning there really wasn’t another name for his work beyond the Passion, it just is incredibly strange. If others have been able to find more information regarding this I am more than happy to review it and make changes to this post or even to my overall view. But any times that I have tried to reach out to Simmons even for basic questions I have not received a response yet (probably because they get thousands of emails and it would be difficult to go through them all).

Heavy reliance upon aramaic and Peshitta in strange areas

Why Aramaic and Peshitta there?

On the Passion website and in many of Brian Simmons speaking engagements, he always states that he is using the earliest and best manuscripts to help create his work. And yet his references to Aramaic and the Peshitta really display quite the opposite. We have covered in a different area how it is quite strange for him to use especially Aramaic in certain places in the Bible (pretty much any of the New Testament books and any of the Old Testament books beyond a few very select passages in Daniel, Ezra and a passage with Jeremiah, which he has yet to translate).

And yet over and over the Passion puts within its footnotes how such and such was translated from the Aramaic or the Aramaic says x, y, z. And his usage of the Peshitta as a specific source that he references is strange as it is a text that is around 400+ years too late from when the New Testament was written. Plus the Peshitta excludes certain books from the New Testament, resulting in a 22 book Bible rather than a 27, including one of Simmons’ favorites of Revelation.

Within the footnotes Aramaic is reference roughly the following quantities from what I have been able to find thus far (and could change as other editions come out). This can be a general reference to a similar Aramaic word or it could be him saying that he translated a specific section of verses or words from Aramaic (this again is quite problematic for a variety of reasons, more can be seen about this in other sections).

Taking all of those different numbers and adding them together, Aramaic is mentioned around 1622 times. That is 1622 more times than what is and should ever be necessary (with maybe, just maybe a few exceptions of key Aramaic words such as Abba, Golgotha, etc.) As Aramaic plays such a pivotal role within all of Simmons translation. There are various scholars who have mentioned that it really has no place whatsoever to be in a translation, especially in the novel sort of ways it is strewn in this one.

Taking all of that over the 515 chapters that Simmons has translated so far (4 books of the Old Testament and 27 of the New Testament), that would equal out to roughly 3 times that it is mentioned per chapter. Of course some books this happens significantly more than others. Some of the books where it happens significantly more than others would be books like Acts at 262 times (averaging about 9.36 times per chapter), then John at 168 times (averaging about 8 times per chapter), Matthew at 151 times (averaging about 5.4 times per chapter), Hebrews at 122 times (averaging about 9.39 times per chapter), Luke at 118 times (averaging about 4.92 times per chapter), Mark at 113 times (averaging about 7.06 times per chapter) and the list goes on and on.

Based upon the above data, there are 3 different books where Aramaic is referenced in the footnotes on average less than 1 time per chapter, there are 12 books that are between 1 and 4 references of Aramaic within the footnotes per chapter, 9 books where Aramaic is mentioned in the footnotes on average between 5 to 7 times, 4 books where Aramaic is in the footnotes 8 times on average per chapter, and there are 2 books where Aramaic is referenced in the footnotes on average of 9 times per chapter. The highest frequency happens in Hebrews at 9.39 times per chapter, then Acts at 9.36, then 1st and 2nd Peter at 8.6, John at 8 along with Jude as well.

This of course is just a general average taking all of the occurrences spread out over the whole book and so specific chapters might have a significant amount more within a certain book compared to other chapters. But that might have to be for a different time for us to look into that.

Scholars response to Aramaic in strange places

Again this is all just extremely strange that Aramaic is referenced over that 1622 times in the 515 chapters that Simmons has written. Because of these footnotes that mention the Aramaic, whether in passing or that a specific word or words are “translated” from it, is one of the main reasons Dr. Douglas Moo has stated that the Passion cannot be trusted:

Mike Winger - the next issue that you brought up was textual basis and And this is one that I think is a huge huge major issue I think it's at the very center of the issues with the passion translation and all the reviewers have brought up this issue as well but I think it's the kind of thing like the average person really needs help understanding cuz soon as you say Aramaic they're like I don't know what we're talking about anymore so in the book of Romans the passion translation to 20/20 edition it references the Aramaic 53 times can you talk about that for a minute

Dr. Douglas Moo - Oh sure and we we should note that in the footnotes there are two levels of what is going on. There when they talk about Aramaic on one hand, sometimes he will simply say oh it might be interesting for you to know if the Aramaic has this. It doesn't really affect the translation. The text is probably all right, though I don't know why you would privilege the Aramaic in that way more than that at the moment. More serious however on the place this is where the translation to text is actually based on the Aramaic this is a really serious matter and this fact alone is enough for me to say I can't recommend that this translation be used by Christians as an accurate access to the Word of God. All translators agree these days that you base your translation of the New testament text on the Greek but you don't base it on any other languages. And while Aramaic is is an interesting language because it was probably the language spoken very often by Jesus, the standard everyday language in the Israel of his day, so obviously it has historical importance in that way. Nevertheless our New Testament is not based on the Aramaic, it's based on the Greek. So when you begin to appealing for other languages any other language as a basis for the translation English, we've really left the the the the field of of normal translation work  (17:44)

In his paper Dr. Moo states the following:

Dr. Douglas Moo - Ever since the Reformation, Protestants have insisted that the inspired Word of God is to be found in Hebrew and Aramaic manuscripts (for the OT) and Greek manuscripts (for the NT). Yet The Passion Translation frequently bases NT translations on Aramaic manuscripts (as is pointed out in footnotes on the verses).

In explanation of this practice, the website notes scholarly interest in Aramaic, as the language Jesus probably spoke most of the time. It is possible also, as the website notes, that some of the Greek manuscripts of our gospels might derive from Aramaic originals. However, it is quite another thing to use Aramaic manuscripts as the basis of a translation into English. In effect, what is happening here is that a text that no significant part of the church has ever viewed as inspired is being used to communicate the Word of God in English. This alone, in my view, renders this translation unusable by those who want to access God’s Word. (Dr. Moo's Paper)

These footnotes are pivotal for Simmons as I previously mentioned in another section, at its in the footnotes that Simmons was told by God to put in these profound revelations, downloads and insight into. During his interview with Dr. Craig Blomberg, Mike Winger brings this specific issue up:

Mike Winger -All right so you did a you didn't excuse me you did not to a full review of the footnotes of Simmons work but you did mention it you did want to talk about it because you said that there is a glaring recurring error that simply has to be mentioned now in your review what was so glaringly erroneous that you just had to bring it up and often about

Dr. Craig Blomberg --On almost every page and often about two or three times on every page of footnotes there is a note to something in the text. And it talks about the Aramaic original. Now it is true that in the Old testament in the books of Ezra and Daniel, there are sections that were not written in Hebrew as the rest of the Old testament was, but were written in Aramaic. 

Mike Winger -But the passion translation hasn't tackled those yet they have just done the New testament and then Psalms and song of songs and a few selected parts of the Old testament 

Dr. Craig Blomberg -There are no Aramaic originals for anybody to consult anywhere from the ancient centuries. What apparently has happened, this is my best guess, is that there are Syriac manuscripts as early as the 6th century. That's not all that early, that are written in a dialect language that is quite similar to ancient Aramaic. Though 500 years after the time of Jesus. And over the centuries from time to time people have as a kind of thought experiment, who have the ability with the languages, to say what would happen if we translated the Syriac literally into Aramaic. And would the meaning of those Aramaic words shed any possible light on on biblical texts. As best as I can tell that seems to be what has been done, but it's never explained that that's what has been done. It just sounds if you read to both the text as well as the footnotes as if there must be some ancient Aramaic text. Wondering about some place that somebody is translated (10:07)

In another section of the interview they continued the conversation:

Mike Winger - Well I do have a concern about that, because Brian Simmons does actually tell people that the footnotes were inspired. I know this sounds weird, but he actually says they were inspired. That God showed him revelations and then told him to put those in the footnotes. 

Brian Simmons Quote - He (God) gave me a download, immediately I began to receive a supernatural download of insight and revelation that is continued to this day. It's not a day goes by I don't discover something fresh, new, powerful, that has changed my life. And I'm sitting there all by myself, sometimes my wife's in the house, sometimes not. But I'm in my office and I'm getting these revelations, I'm going how can I express this how can I show the world these things? (God says to him) footnotes son, footnotes.

Mike Winger - He (Simmons) says this in public crowds, so that the particular groups that are promoting this book are being told by their pastors to get the passion translation are also the same groups that are being led to believe that those footnotes are inspired in some sense. Maybe a lesser sense, I don't know what that means, but in some sense they're inspired. And in his translation just for instance, just for 1st Corinthians I actually went through the 2020 edition just to double check everybody's work to make sure that your criticisms in the previous version still apply to the current version. Well there's 73 footnotes that reference the Aramaic and just for 1 Corinthians and 23 verses in 1st Corinthians that are as translated from the Aramaic. And so those are a lot of, to me it seems like those would be 73 times that this translations is misleading you in its footnotes. And that he claims are inspired. Am I going too far by saying that?

Dr. Craig Blomberg - Occasionally there's not a huge difference in meaning between the two. So I don't want to swear by every one of the 73. But in general, yes that's misleading. 1 John 4 which I think he actually translates, paraphrases well enough to get the gist, tells us to test all the spirits. Right at the very beginning of that chapter and so just because a person however sincere or well-intentioned they might be makes a claim for God to have revealed something directly to him. As I've studied a lot of Mormon history and documents over the years and Joseph Smith certainly made that claim about the book of Mormon and about subsequent revelations he believed God gave him directly that have been published in the distinctively Mormon scriptures. But I'm guessing that Brian Simmons wouldn't accept all of those simply because the founder passionately and sincerely claimed that God had revealed it to him. You have to have some standard to test the claims against  (19:42)

Even with all of the information above, the use of the Peshitta in general is fairly strange. Steve Caruso is the writer of a website called Armaicnt.org. He has several articles that he created explaining aspects of Galilean Aramaic vs Syriac Aramaic (which is what the Peshitta is written in). He has this to say:

The Peshitta manuscripts are roughly 5-8th century manuscripts that are a manuscript translation from the Greek into Syriac Aramaic  “In other words the Peshitta, at the earliest, represents fourth century Syriac. It cannot be from the first or second centuries AD as some proponents claim.” Written Old Syriac proved difficult to understand among first century Jews.

The earliest actual Peshitta manuscript we have is from the late 5th century or early 6th (Codex Phillipps) which has a very large number of Old Syriac Gospel readings in it…. There are vocabulary and grammatical differences that firmly date the standard Peshitta’s text to no earlier than the 4th-5th century – and that is despite zero examples of the standardized Peshitta text until a few hundred years later. Aramaicnt.org

He even has several articles as well displaying issues with the idea of the Peshitta being the primary text of the New Testament, or something called Peshitta Primacy. He expounds more on that in his article labeled Problems with Peshitta Primacy, giving the issues with it showing from the actual language itself as he knows Aramaic.

One of the biggest reasons that he provides is that Galilean Aramaic is most likely what Jesus would have spoken. This dialect was distinct and different than other Aramaic. It was so prominent that people could tell as one spoke, which is seen when Peter is talking after Jesus is arrested, the knew him by his speech. The Peshitta though was written in Syriac Aramaic, which again is quite different and distinct from Galilean Aramaic and several hundred years later and in a different area of the Middle East as well. Therefore, in a very short explanation, the Peshitta and Aramaic would not have been the text of the New Testament and should not be used as if it is part of the primary text or general sources in which to use as Simmons does. Along with that all of our earliest manuscripts are within Greek, so there is no Aramaic original. Again for a more in depth argument, see the other section where I have written on this more extensively.

Hypothetical arguments

Lets just say hypothetically that there was a basis even for a single book of the New Testament being written in Aramaic, that being Matthew (which I don’t believe, but just for sake of argument based upon the quote from the early church Father about Matthew possibly being in the Hebrew tongue and how his gospel was supposed to have been written in Judea to a Jewish audience). If Aramaic was used in areas where Jesus spoke, if he was using that while addressing the crowds rather than Greek, that would be roughly 1/3rd to 1/2 of the one gospel where Jesus was speaking (and that is an incredibly liberal estimation). Even with that, the rest of the text is clearly written in Greek. But again, for arguments sake, lets say all the words of Jesus were in Aramaic and the other part was written in Greek, then assuming that the rest of the gospels are agreeing with what the Aramaic states for the words of Jesus that they write about within the synoptic gospels, but they just have it in Greek. Out of all the 4 gospels then, roughly (again just general estimations) 1/4th of the 4 gospels would have some sort of Aramaic basis (and again I don’t believe this).

There would then be no need to consult the Aramaic then besides the specific places that Jesus was actually speaking and even so we would be comparing the Aramaic with the Greek. Especially for the other sections, the other authors who were writing to individuals in the diaspora who spoke Greek, how the main audience of almost every single New Testament book were Hellenized individuals, who even if they were Jewish would have most likely been reading the Greek Septuagint if they were outside of the Judea area. Also how Paul was writing to churches that he formed that would not have known Aramaic, who were filled with Greeks, Romans, people from Asia Minor. Outside of Judea almost no one would have known Aramaic, so how or why would Paul ever have written his letters to Greek speaking people in a language they would not know? Why then would we have any bit of Aramaic in any of Paul’s letters, ever?!? Even if Paul would have used Aramaic, which there is absolutely no basis for at all, why would he use a dialect of Aramaic that would have been so vastly different in that of Aramaic spoken in Judea. So really there is no reason that any of the Gospels, apart from the words of Jesus (and this is a bigggg maybe/hypothetical which I don’t know is realistic at all), the other gospels, the Pauline Epistles, the General Epistles, nor even Revelation would have a basis in Aramaic.

Dr. Lionel Windsor states the following about this:

Dr. Lionel Windsor - The Apostle Paul wrote his letter to the Romans in Greek, from a Greek-speaking city (probably Corinth), to Greek-speaking Jews and Gentiles in a city (Rome) where Greek was widely known and spoken. Anyone who wants to translate Romans needs to establish what Paul originally wrote in Greek

Aramaic was a language spoken in the Eastern Mediterranean. It was common in Syria, Judea, etc. Jesus probably spoke it, and Paul probably knew it too. But nobody thinks that Paul actually wrote Romans in Aramaic. Why would he? Very few people in Rome would have understood him if he did that. (Dr. Lionel Windsor)

With all of that something to keep in mind as well is that some of the books such as 2nd and 3rd John, 2nd Peter, Jude and Revelation are not included in the Peshitta. Therefore one could contend that if there is any kind of reliance upon the Peshitta in the Passion, then maybe Simmons should not have included those, let alone not put in any aspects of Aramaic into them.

Final examples of Aramaic and Peshitta usage

Dr. Lionel Windsor has one of the best breakdowns that I have seen looking and comparing what Simmons seems to be doing when he is looking at the Greek, the Peshitta, and the Aramaic (or English versions of these sources as Simmons states he does not know the original languages and others have surmised as much). Windsor does this in his review of the book of Romans an provides the following chart information and chart:

Dr. Lionel Windsor - As far as I can tell by reading his book and its footnotes, Simmons is trying to give the impression that normally his translation is based on the Greek texts. However, there are 23 places where Simmons marks a phrase “As translated from the Aramaic”. When he does this, he normally gives a Greek alternative in a the footnote, implying that he thinks that his Aramaic translation gives us better access to the original than the Greek manuscripts.

However, in many of these 23 places, it is highly questionable whether the Syriac Peshitta should be used to replace the Greek in helping us to understand what Paul originally wrote (in Greek!). In the table below I have listed all 23 instances. In each case, I have given Simmons’ Greek translation, King’s translation of the the Syriac Peshitta, and then Simmons’ Passion Translation “from the Aramaic” which he believes should replace the Greek:

Windsor goes on to say the following in explaining the chart that he has created:

Notice how in several places, the Syriac does not provide much warrant for replacing or modifying the Greek text as it stands.

For example, in Romans 1:9, the Greek has the word “gospel”, but Simmons believes that this word “gospel” should be replaced by the Aramaic word “revelation”. However, as King’s translation shows, the word “gospel” is clearly there in the Syriac Peshiṭta (this can be confirmed by using these Peshitta tools at dukhrana.com). Hence there is no discernible reason from the Syriac (“Aramaic”) text why Simmons should make a point of replacing the word “gospel” with “revelation”.

Furthermore, the whole rendering of the verse is a little strange and over-the-top. Here’s a slightly fuller comparison of Romans 1:9:

The Greek text from the NA28 critical edition: μάρτυς γάρ μού ἐστιν ὁ θεός, ᾧ λατρεύω ἐν τῷ πνεύματί μου ἐν τῷ εὐαγγελίῳ τοῦ υἱοῦ αὐτοῦ, ὡς ἀδιαλείπτως μνείαν ὑμῶν ποιοῦμαι. The ESV translation from the Greek: “For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I mention you” King’s translation of the Syriac (Aramaic) Peshiṭta: “God, whom I serve spiritually in the work of the gospel, is witness to how I remember you in my prayers constantly”. The Passion translation from the Greek and the “Aramaic”: “And God knows that I pray for you continually and at all times. For I passionately serve and worship him with my spirit through the revelation of his Son.”

Notice here in particular the word “I serve”:

The Greek term (λατρεύω) refers to “the carrying out of religious duties, esp. of a cultic nature, by human beings” (BDAG). Hence the ESV is right to render it “I serve”. Furthermore, as King’s translation shows, the Syriac is clearly based on this Greek word – i.e. the Syriac gives no indication that there was any other original Greek word other than “I serve”. This can be confirmed by using these Peshitta tools at dukhrana.com and looking at the meaning of the Syriac term, which basically means “to serve” or “to perform ones function”.

However, the passion translation has rendered the word “I serve” as “I passionately serve and worship”

Why has Simmons taken a word that means “serve” and turned it into “passionately serve and worship”? It is not because of the meaning of the Greek term. Nor is it because of the meaning of the Syriac (Aramaic) term that has been used to translate the Greek term. The only justification I can find comes from the translator’s introduction,

The goal of the Passion Translation is to reintroduce the passion and fire of the original, life-changing message of God’s Word for modern readers—not merely to convey the original, literal meaning of words, but also to express God’s passion for people and his world.

In other words–the Passion Translation is not actually a translation. It is not seeking to convey the original meaning, but it is deliberately seeking to add the concept of divine “passion”, even where it is not present in the original. And this is precisely what has happened here. There is no justification for adding “passionately” in Romans 1:9 (not from the Greek, nor even from the Aramaic) apart from the desire of the translator to find the idea of “passion”. (Lionel Windsor)

This is all coming from someone who knows the actual languages and is able to see the errors themselves from the text. To go back to not only Greek, but also Aramaic as well and he can see where the differences come in and then potentially where Simmons is getting these things from. People like Windsor provide that kind of insight for us who do not know the languages, but might have had the general understanding that something was off. They just provide the evidence for the conclusion that was already there and give that justification to where we should not be using the Passion, nor promoting it as the word of God, a Bible translation, or even a paraphrase.

Translation techniques and style

Translation philosophy continually changes

The Passion “Translation,” being the work of just one man, Brian Simmons, runs into a lot of issues because of that. There are certain things the occur here that most other translations don’t normally need to worry about. One of the things that happens here is the fact that the overall Translation Philosophy that Simmons states on his website that they use, is not consistent throughout the translation, but is actually constantly changing. This happens from sometimes verse to verse, chapter to chapter or even book to book.

Here is what the website states is their overall goal:

The Passion Translation‘s philosophy is that the meaning of God’s original message to the world has priority over its exact form, which is why our goal is to communicate the meaning of Scripture as clearly and naturally as possible in modern English. Brian and other reviewers have sought to remain faithful to the original biblical languages by preserving their literal meaning, yet flexible enough to convey God’s original message in a way modern English speakers can understand. It is a balanced translation that tries to hold both the Word’s literal meaning and original message in proper tension, resulting in an entirely new, fresh, fiery translation of God’s Word. (The Passion Translation FAQ)

The website FAQ basically states that it is their desire to have a balanced translation, not quite word for word and not quite thought for thought. There are other translations that actually do this sort of thing. They are more of a middle ground on the “Bible Translation Spectrum” as seen within an example on the below photo.

This I think gives a good overview of most standard translations, roughly where they are (which some you could shift one way or another, so I am not too set on them being exactly where they are shown), the rough grade level for reading and some other aspects that go along with them. In this version of the image, it shows the TPT just on the very right between the LB and the TM. I think this is a good and appropriate spot for it based upon a lot of my research and the feedback from various scholars. Though there are many charts like this, I think this one does encapsulate the overall gist of basic locations for various translations.

There is an accumulative effect of these changes, shifting from one style of translation to another, that can be seen and is by individuals who do this work on a daily basis. During his interview with Dr. Douglas Moo, Mike Winger brings this up during their discussion:

Mike Winger - Let's talk about these seven areas the seven topics of concerns that you had. The first one was confusing translation philosophy what did you have to say about that

Dr. Douglas Moo - The passion translation has a lot of publicity talked about a meaning-based translation philosophy. That is putting the Bible into language that people can understand that will not necessarily follow the formal structures of the group to Hebrew they are make underlying the text I don't really have a quarrel with that. As such I think there's a place for those kinds of translations and and on the whole I think sometimes are translation philosophy is too biased toward a kind of word for word approach. As if that's the best way to translate. And anyone who's worked seriously from one language to another knows what word for word doesn't work. You cannot translate that way. You cannot be understood if you try to do let's say word for word from Spanish to English or from English to German or whatever. So I don't really have a quarrel with the claim for a meaning based approach, but I do find that it is applied very inconsistently. So there are some texts and places where it's very paraphrastic if I might use that word. Where the structures of the Greek are really left behind in order to get the meaning in English and again fine if that's accurate I don't have a quarrel with that. But then there are other places where that kind of philosophy is not put into place. 

So for instance in Romans 8:4 through 11 Paul uses the Greek word Sarx a number of times it's a notoriously difficult word to translate into English. We sometimes simply render flesh, but the word flesh per say in English often conveys, you know, the skin on my body. That's flesh. The Greek word Sarx very hard to translate into English so not necessarily falling folks and struggle with how to do that but again place like Romans 8:4 to 11 you have sharks use a number of times. And the passion translation simply uses flesh which which really doesn't get at the meaning of that word in English at all. Just kind of replaces a single Greek word with an English gloss. So there is an inconsistent application of the philosophy in my view. It's done well in some spots but in other places sort of a default to a more word for word approach

Mike Winger - So that was like that's like a woodenly literal moment in the midst of what a philosophy that's claiming it's doing something other than that (6:34)

Mike goes on to state the following:

Mike Winger - Actually say in your paper that there are and I'll quote you here many places where ideas with no basis in the original text are brought into the translation and there's problematic additions that you speak of Romans 8:14 is one of those examples

Dr. Douglas Moo -Yeah that's another issue here. Anytime you've got a meaning-based transformation and you're going to try to capture the meaning of the original in English words that don't exactly match the original, decisions have to be made you kind of have to figure, out okay how am I going to do that. What is the way to do that? And it's really easy in order to capture a sort of good accurate, even elegant English, to add ideas that aren't really represented in the text at all. And I'm afraid the passion translation does that quite often where there are words in English that's simply aren't represented in the original. Again I could cite a number of examples of this I think you mentioned Romans 8:14 is one example here. The passion translation renders mature children and there's no basis at all in the Greek for the qualification mature. Greek just talks about children or sons and and so by adding the adjective mature in English one is departing from the Greek and introducing an idea that might throw the reader of the Bible off what Paul is actually wanting to see (9:39)

Even in his paper, Dr. Moo expands more on this shifting that occurs:

Dr. Douglas Moo -The claim is made, for instance, that the translation aims to balance “the Word’s literal meaning” and “original message.” One worries that “original message” might open the door to bring into the translation ideas that the translator has, but which are not clear from “the literal meaning” of Scripture. This concern appears to have some substance, when one sees the many places where ideas with no basis in the original text are brought into the translation.

Some of these additions, to be sure, are relatively innocuous, stressing certain ideas that one might argue are present “behind the scenes.” In Romans 3:24, for instance, the translation reads, “His gift of love and favor now cascades over us.” “Grace” is found here in the original, but there is no reference to “love” in this context. These kinds of additions are found everywhere.

More problematic additions, however, are those that may shift the meaning of the text. In Romans 8:14, for instance, the translation has, “The mature children of God are those who are moved by the impulses of the Holy Spirit.” “Mature” has no basis in the Greek text, and by adding this qualifier, the verse is turned from a promise to all believers (which it is in context) to a promise limited to certain kinds of believers. (Dr. Moo's Paper)

There are various points throughout his whole “translation” that Simmons oscillates from one style of translation process to another, seemingly when it seems to best suit his style or message he wants to convey at that time. That would appear then to be more of a style of paraphrase than the original aim provided on the site. Dr. Moo goes on to summarize with the following:

Dr. Douglas Moo - Let me make a crucial point again: every translation from one language to another faces this problem. No translation philosophy avoids it. Yet the problem is generally more acute for meaning-based translations, since they are attempting to find colloquial English language to express the meaning of the original. Difficult decisions have to be made.

What it comes down to, is this then: good translations make good choices. I am not sure that good choices have been consistently made in The Passion Translation

Often one particular interpretation of a text has been chosen and rendered into appropriate English – often obscuring other options for its meaning. Another verse illustrates this point: Rom. 8:29. This verse begins with a verb that might mean something like “know about ahead of time” or “choose ahead of time.” The Passion Translation renders “he knew all about us before we were born,” locking us into one of the alternatives (Dr. Moo's Paper)

It is one thing to state that a translation is one sort of thing and have a few occurrences here and there where it is slightly different from that (which can and does occur within any translating, whether in general discussion or written format as not everything translates very well). But it is another thing to claim to be doing one thing and yet stylistically there are so many shifting’s it is hard to nail down what is actually going on. This is what occurs with the Passion. It states one thing, yet in reality with the text itself it becomes something completely different, changing from one style to another depending on what verse, chapter or book you are in.

Double Translation Principle Technique

Part of the reason that the shifting in style can occur so frequently is because of how Simmons goes through and does a significant amount of double or even triple “translating”, which becomes one of the most common principles in all of his work. This was something that I had seen in my cursory reading of the Passion when I had first picked it up. I know that there are other translations out there like the Amplified which give expanded explanations into certain key words, amplifying the text, normally by brackets and italicizing, to help the reader understand what the word means in Greek or Hebrew. It is basically like having a Strong’s concordance inside the text for specific words that are important. I don’t see much issue with that kind of idea when it is done correctly, which I think for the most part the Amplified has done it correctly. Yet that really is not the case at all with Simmons. That is partially because of the reasoning and foundation upon which he builds his double and triple “translating.” It isn’t just to give the definition of a word, but to give multiple definitions which then are shoehorned into the text. This comes from a “revelation” that God had given him about homonyms. But a lot of this really falls back on Simmons reliance on the “Aramaic” as well, as most of the additions that I have been finding seem to stem from that, not the Greek or the Hebrew the majority of the time.

One of the things that other translations do that the Passion does not do well at all, is that the “additions” or double or triple “translating” of these words are not always italicized. And that becomes a very big deal for a number of factors. If things are added and not italicized it gives the appearance that it is part of the text. I have no issue with having additional words put in if it helps to clarify or make something more readable, as how the King James or ESV for instance does this. If the text would not read well enough in the English language without having a specific word, then that is fine to add it for clarification sake. But if you are adding things and not italicizing them and they are not a part of the Greek or Hebrew, then there are major issues with that because then you are starting to give the impression of something that is not truly there, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

To me that is one of the scariest and most concerning aspects of the Passion as a whole. These double and triple translating of words without the use of italics for each of the words, whether implied or actually coming from the Greek or Hebrew (which doesn’t seem to be the case, instead mostly coming from the “Aramaic”) becomes ridiculously concerning and deceptive. Again whether that is intentional or unintentional, I leave up to each individual to come to that conclusion on their own.

A few of these issues mentioned above will be covered more extensively in another section, but lets see what people who are knowledgeable about the languages and are trained in translation have to say with some examples from Andrew Shead:

Andrew Shead - Double translation is Simmons’s principal translation technique, but his constant addition of images and ideas into the text is not confined within his double translations.

Sometimes he creatively alters the Hebrew (underlined below); elsewhere he creates stand-alone additions, or attaches them by hyphen to a word in the text. They mostly fall into two categories

(1) ‘Spiritual’ images, especially of light, height and mystery, designed to inspire feelings of awe and worship; all but the words in [brackets] have no counterpart in the Hebrew: Ray of brightness … shining (v. 2), singing (v. 3), spirit (v. 4), burning (v. 7), spirit-[wind] (v. 10), mystery-[darkness] (v. 11), blessing … treasure (v. 24), all at once … floodlight (v. 28), revelation … brightness (v. 28), worship (v. 31), ascend … [peaks of] your glory (v. 33), [warfare]-worship (v. 34), power within (v. 35), conquers all … lifted high … towering over all (v. 46), with high praises … highest [God] (v. 49), magnificent miracles (v. 50).

Additions aimed at stirring up ecstasy are unsurprisingly prominent in TPT’s praise psalms. In Ps 148:2–3 Simmons plays DJ to the psalmist, expanding the repeated imperative to ‘praise him’ (NIV) with ‘go ahead’, ‘keep it up’, don’t stop now’, ‘take it up even higher’. He rounds off Psalm 150 by inserting ‘crescendo of ecstatic praise’.

(2) ‘Corporeal’ images of touch, ardour and physical intimacy designed to intensify feelings of love: Passionately (v. 1), embrace (v. 1), around me (v. 2), in you (v. 3), wrapped (v. 4), sobs (v. 6), heart (v. 6), reached down into my darkness (v. 16), I was helpless (v. 17), held onto me (v. 18), his love broke open the way (v. 19), heart (v. 24), surrendering to him (v. 24), taste (v. 25), you love (v. 25), wrap-around God (v. 30),5 wrapped (v. 32), your wrap-around presence … stooping down (v. 35), your loving servant (v. 50).

Again, added vocabulary of physical and emotional intimacy is ubiquitous in the book, as evidenced in the frequent description of God’s people as his ‘lovers’. This is Simmons’s regular gloss for the Hebrew חסידים, which means ‘faithful ones’, or ‘godly ones’, but definitely not ‘lovers’. And he even uses it to translate words as neutral as ‘people’, e.g., Ps 95:7, where ‘we are the people of his pasture’ becomes ‘we are the lovers he cares for.’ (Andrew Shead)

Logic and Language Fallacies - Major Role In Errors and Issues

I am not someone who really claims to be really wise or smart or understand a lot of things. I have very shortly studied out things like language fallacies and logical fallacies on my own over the years. There was one course that I had in college for my Minor in Communication where we covered these as well, so I would say I am no where near a mastery of these and leave that to others profoundly more intelligent than myself. Yet there are certain things that an average person can pick up on, even without having mastered those sorts of things. Even with my basic knowledge and understanding of Logical Fallacies and Language Fallacies, I was able to pick up that something was going on within the text of the Passion in various areas, even if I didn’t know what they were called. Even within Simmons many sermons he will go back to certain fallacies, stating them as if they are facts and not an issue. Dr. Tremper Longman explains one of them during his interview with Mike Winger:

Dr. Tremper Longman - (Simmons) achieves his translation by utilizing a number of ill advised or simply wrong interpretive strategies.

Mike Winger - You mentioned the etymological fallacy and Chapter 4. Verse 14. Can you explain what is the etymological fallacy, and how does it relate to that example? 

Dr. Tremper Longman - Logical fallacy's when you look at a word and then from that, you think about it and you think about its original meaning and then impose that on the later text. Maybe an English example? Nice, I think, meant precise early on, but now it means something else in our everyday language and it would be equivalent to looking at text written to use that had the word nice and then imposing maybe it's original etymological meaning  (22:25)

Dr. Douglas Moo had seen this as well when he was doing his review for the Passion. He had noticed that Simmons makes the same categorical mistake of appealing to the Etymological Fallacy. He explained this to Mike Winger during their interview:

Mike Winger - Say that Brian Simmons uses this another one of the categories in your paper which I recommend people read down below that he uses something called false appeal to etymology this is again I think a major red flag for people who study languages but for people who don't it just kind of can go right over their heads can you help us understand what is a false appeal to etymology

Dr. Douglas Moo - Any English speaker widely understands that etymology or that is the formation of words is not always or maybe even usually a very helpful clue to its actual meaning. In the paper I note for instance the English word butterfly which we all know what it refers to, but if you would try to define it by etymology could try to combine a butter and flying you would probably hard press to come to the actual meaning of the word is. It's being used so etymology can sometimes be referred to when we just don't have any other evidence for how a word was being used. But on the whole linguist recognize that etymology is not a helpful way to define a word. And coming in on Romans 1:4 the passion translation talks about the Greek word horizo which means declare or mark out, perhaps a point. And the the footnote says well, we can kind of get a clue a little bit to the word what what this word means by noticing that the English word horizon comes from it and that's just wrong in so many friends I don't even know how to begin maybe English horizon came from great Rizzo but surely horizon and English spoken centuries after the Bible has no bearing whatsoever on the meaning of the Greek word horizo as we find it in Romans so (23:51)

He also writes more in-depth examples in his paper:

Dr. Douglas Moo - While not always affecting the translation, it should be noted that explanatory footnotes sometimes provide misleading or simply wrong information

In several notes, I saw, for instance, etymology is appealed to for a certain understanding of the text. However, while etymology – that is the “form,” or makeup of a word – can occasionally be helpful in defining very rare words, it is generally, as modern linguists all recognize, not a good guide to a word’s meaning.

Consider, for instance, the English word “butterfly”: it is doubtful that knowing what butter is and what a fly is will help much in defining the word. Yet we find such appeals scattered in the footnotes.

See, for instance, the comment on the Greek word usually translated “appointed” or “declared” in Rom. 1:4: “The Greek word for ‘set apart’ comes from horizo, meaning ‘the horizon.’” 

While there is an obvious similarity between the sound of this Greek verb and the English word “horizon,” there is no evidence that the verb ever means “horizon” (at least none of the dictionaries of ancient Greek that I possess list it as a meaning). The worry is that this kind of faulty linguistic principle has been used to justify certain renderings in the text. (Dr. Moo's Paper)

The simple explanation like what Dr. Moo provided gives such an understanding that anyone can comprehend it. It doesn’t take someone with a Doctorate in the English language to understand that you cannot just look to the roots of specific words to get their basic definitions. Yet this is exactly what Simmons does over and over again with his text. It creates these novel renderings of words, which then leads to double and triple translating of words, creating such excess that the text as a whole becomes significantly longer in almost every book (with just a few exceptions).

Dr. Tremper Longman also provides an example during his interview:

Dr. Tremper Longman - The footnote is that calamus is taken from a marsh plant known as sweet flag, which produces fragrant oil. The Hebrew word for this spice means purchased or redeemed

Even if that entomology is correct, which it's probably not, notice how he is introducing from the cross into there. That is totally foreign to the old testament setting. This is what I mean when I say imposing. (28:50)

He also writes about this within his paper:

Dr. Tremper Longman - He appeals to the etymology of a word in a way that opens him up to the criticism that he commits what is commonly called the etymological fallacy, which is looking at root etymology to discover a word’s meaning (4:14 is an excellent example of this problem).

He will sometimes use the Septuagint (Greek) as a source for his translation instead of the Hebrew. Now there are, sometimes, good textual reasons to do this, but in this case there are none (and he doesn’t offer any), leaving us with the impression that he just uses the Septuagint when he prefers the reading (that is, when it supports his general approach). (4:8; 5:8) ***

He will sometimes justify an unusual meaning for a word based on an appeal to a Semitic root. The example in 4:9 is a good example. It does not seem valid, but he does not tell us what Semitic language (Arabic? Aramaic?) attests such a meaning.

When it comes to interpretation of the meaning of specific metaphors he simply asserts that x equals y, without justification. He typically does not tell us why x equals y or show us other places in Scripture where the metaphor is used in such a way. (1:8, 11; 3:6; 4:1, 6; 5:11)  (Dr. Longman's Paper)

One of the other Fallacies that was mentioned previously as well was that of the Homonym Fallacy. Simmons talks about how this was one of the main “revelations” or “secrets” that God had shown him and has been pivotal in his “translation” work.

Brian Simmons - The Bible is full of homonyms, every word God spoke and is written in scriptures can have multiple meanings. Translators are forced to do one word out of two or three - 2/3rds of that meaning is put into the trash. So I went into the trash and I found the other 2/3rds of the meaning and it blew me away - (28:05)

Brian Simmons - Hebrew is nothing but homonyms. It is a homonymic language. In other words, every word God spoke and is written in the scriptures can have multiple meanings. I call it God's entertainment. I think he laughs when we read the Bible and say, you think that's all it means!? You know it's a Rubik's cube, it's God's entertainment. He has embedded into the scriptures such profound revelation on multiple layers and multiple levels. Okay a homonym, Hebrew is poetic and passionate and one word can mean many multiple things. Now when Jesus came to me and said I'm going to give you secrets, one of the secrets he gave me was that of homonyms. The Lord showed me it's the homonymic structure of Hebrew is going to be the key to understanding revelation in the last days, including the book of Revelation which you haven't got yet honestly. I did a research study into that word etcev, the Hebrew word for pain, but it's a homophone or a homonym that has multiple meanings. And one of the other meanings of pain in the Hebrew context is creativity. Creativity. And I put a footnote there in the book of Genesis to note that singing is a homonym that also means pruning the vines. It's a homonym and asok means kids, but it also means to take up weapons and go to war. Full of homonyms, full of secrets with multiple meanings. Poetic and passionate and one word can mean many multiple things. But what if for 2,000 years to church has been robbed of what Jesus really said?!? - (26:25)

Simmons says this kind of thing constantly within all of his speaking engagements. There is hardly a video that I have watched out of the countless hours of sermons, to see if I was understanding him, his theology and his views correctly, where he doesn’t mention directly the aspects of homonyms or gives various examples of these supposed homonyms. Though he states that this was something that “Jesus” had shown him for the Hebrew language, he didn’t just keep its usage to that of Hebrew for the Old Testament. No instead he integrated it right away into the New Testament for the Greek and his excessive use of the Aramaic. This makes no sense at all within the context of what Simmons states and how this “revelation” was given for Hebrew, yet he doesn’t constrain it to Hebrew only, but infused it into the Greek and “Aramaic” when he produced the New Testament. Dr. Longman gives this short response in part of his paper regarding this:

He appeals to homonyms to justify the meaning of words, but why should we think that both meanings are relevant to the translation or understanding of the verse (1:14; 2:5, 12)? (Dr. Longman's Paper)

If anyone takes just a moment to think about this sort of thing that Simmons is doing, it becomes apparently clear that it makes no sense what so ever. There are so many issues with it. If we did this to any sort of communication, let alone the most important communication we have, that of the Bible, there would be no way to understand any basic conversation or relay of information.

Even just looking at this one sentence right now, if you took all the possible homonyms or definitions of each individual word, put them back to back and tried to form a sentence, not only would this one sentence be 100 times longer, you wouldn’t even be able to understand it and there would be no really true meaning in it whatsoever.

When we try and use the general idea that Simmons is expounding, it cannot translate into every practical usage within any language. It just makes no sense at all. The only way that this “works” is if someone goes thought and picks and chooses which words to focus on, which ones you should be using the supposed homonyms for, how many of them you should be using, which of the definitions are applicable and then how do you put that into a sentence to provide a cohesive statement. Generally what most translators do is based upon the context of the sentence, just like we do naturally with any conversation, we can pick up what is meant by a particular word and then that one word is used and put within the sentence to help the hearer or reader complete the idea.

When Mike Winger asked Dr. Tremper Longman about what scholars think about this (the usage of homonyms), this was what he stated:

Dr. Tremper Longman - They will recognize that there is what's called palicamey in the rare passage, maybe there is this double use but it's not a consistent thing (28:35)

So it can occur, but the frequency in which it does occur is not nearly even possible or feasible to the extent in which Simmons tries to make it happen within his text.

Dr. Douglas Moo and Mike Winger also discuss this as well:

Mike Winger - When you say linguists all know this etymology thing like would you say what would you say linguists all know about using homonyms to triple translate words and then form sentences out of them

Dr. Douglas Moo - Oh yeah that's that's very problematic. As well, a modern linguistic principle is that you give any word the least amount of meaning necessary to explain it in its context. Recognizing that very seldom and ordinary human speech do we intend to double meaning when we use a word. Yeah sometimes we are being very clever, maybe we're making a joke that depends on a double meaning of a word. That can happen we need to recognize that, but on the whole, that's not how languages work. And I'm sure all of us are aware of the danger of this kind of appeal to spiritual direction the spirit led me to, where the spirit told me that. I'm certainly not going to deny the importance of the spirit in our lives and the way the spirit leaves and guides and reveals things to us. Of course that happens, but you know I think of Paul in 1st Corinthians 14 where he tells the Corinthian prophets, okay you think you have a prophecy let's test it let's let's let's assess it in the light of what others are saying. And so any claim of that sort has to be tested by others and in this case especially it's very dangerous override the teaching of scripture by appeal to some kind of prophecy or spirit led kind of meaning. (25:55​)

Dr. Darrell Bock also explains the incredible issue with using things like homoyns as one of the foundational pieces of a persons “translations” when Mike Winger brought it up during his interview:

Mike Winger - All right now one more thing on the Aramaic Brian Simmons likes to talk about homonyms and words that have the same sound. But ultimately are different words, different meanings, but he uses homonyms to translate a lot of the time. When you see translation especially without italics you see additional stuff in the Passion, it's coming from supposedly homonyms. So his his translation gets a lot longer than other translations as a result and if Ephesians particular has 43% more words than say the ESV, King James or NIV by comparison. What what should I be thinking about this like is it legitimate to be appealing to homonyms to double and triple translate words and add new meanings? 

Dr. Darrel Bock - Well I think you've got two things going on you have to keep it's separate. The homonym issue is a problem because it's like lost manuscripts. I can play with homonyms and generate meanings that actually were not intended. So that's a problem. The idea of a paraphrase being longer than the translation is not that unusual because again a paraphrase is trying to not elaborate nuance oftentimes and to bring out the force of a passage that might not be expressed in the compact expression of the translation. So the fact that the text is longer than a translation because it has paraphrastic qualities then in itself is not a problem. But the homonym part of it is, because how do you know that a homonym is actually being evoked. And although the culture did play with homonyms in certain situations, to treat it as something that's regular or common, particularly in a Greek speaking context, based upon a language that isn't present and that the hearers don't necessarily share, is a problem - 10:10

Mike Winger - Okay so let's look at it because again and I just want the audience to know. You're saying, hey if this is as a paraphrase it's okay for to be longer, but when I'm hopefully pointing out and I love your thoughts on this, is the the reason why it's longer isn't just because it's a paraphrase, which is kind of your perspective on it. But he's saying no, no, no, I'm actually getting meaning that was thrown into the trash by other translators. That's his file? 

Dr. Darrel Bock -That's why I'm saying. It's important not to confuse the two things, because I'm saying if he's dealing with a homonym, that's a problem. If he simply being explanatory for a paraphrase, that's not.  (8:14)

When this idea of homonym was presented to Dr. Craig Blomberg, he gave one of the most easy to follow, practical explanations to Mike Winger:

Mike Winger - He (Simmons) says that one of the secrets that God showed him was homonyms and that while Greek, in his teaching here, Greek doesn't have tons of homonyms, Hebrew is nothing, this is his words, nothing but homonyms. And that God showed him this and so when he's translating he'll look for homonyms and multiple meanings and then he'll incorporate both of those meanings or three of those meanings into the text adding extra words to form those into sentences. That is what I mean. This is to me this is very testable claim. “Hey God show me homonyms” and then I can go to other people and say, “hey is that like legit? Did God show him something great there or is or is he just being weird?”

Dr. Craig Blomberg - Make up your favorite pair of English homonyms. Lead and lead. And half of my students can't even spell the past tense of lead correctly they think l e a d is the past tense as well as the present when in fact it's LED. L e a d when pronounced lead is the chemical element PB, I don't even remember what bizarre Latin word generated that. One of the few things I remember from high school chemistry. And if every time I said in good charismatic style, I've been led and I could make that mean I'm a chunk of graphite like you put in a pencil. It would just make a mockery of language. The whole point of homonyms is you have two words that are pronounced the same, they don't mean the same thing. And in almost every context you can't substitute one for the other or you totally change the meaning or come out with something nonsensical. And the same is true in Hebrew. Any true Hebrew scholar would tell you that  (1:29:15)

Randomly inserting things and other “techniques”

One of the techniques that Simmons appears to use quote often is explained by Andrew Shead when he did his review of the Psalms:

Andrew Shead - A clue to Simmons’s translation technique is his frequent elimination of the second verb in a verse and reversal or mingling of the elements of its two lines; he also tends to split logically subordinated sentences into simpler, unconnected sentences.

Psalm 50:6 is a good example (comparing ESV and TPT):

The heavens declare his righteousness, And the heavens respond: for God himself is judge!“

God himself will be their judge, And he will judge them with righteousness!” (Andrew Shead)

There are also plenty of times where Brian seems to insert additional words to make it more almost like a preaching point (more examples found in other sections). Mike Winger explains this to Dr. Longman when he brings up a strange addition in Song of Songs that doesn’t correspond to any original text:

Dr. Tremper Longman - Reading Song of songs 4:14 - alludes to the 9 fruit of the Spirit, but there is no mention of 9 fruits in the original text.

Mike Winger - I know from hearing his commentary he does that because he wants to relate it to the fruit of the Holy Spirit. So he's trying to draw a connection there. Oh, OK, so it's like a pretty preaching point that’s been put into the text.  (25:15)

The Passion’s Strange Style Choices

There are just so many unusual decisions that are made in regards to the style of how Simmons chooses to write things. Dr. Nijay Gupta explains this to Mike Winger:

I cataloged a lot of very unusual decisions. 

He will move from somewhat literal, to moderate to a lot of paraphrase, flourishes and embellishments, back and forth. I kind of feel whiplash when I am reading it in terms of kind of what he’s after in terms of style of translation (22:08)

If this text was really the first Bible given to a people group who did not have scripture within their own language yet, there would be certain things which would be a little bit more permissible and would not be judged nearly as severely, allowing certain things to slide a bit more until someone or other people could come in and fix it up more to give a better representation of Gods word to them. Yet even if aspects of this work stem from the very limited “training” that Simmons received while he was a part of New Tribes Bible Institute (Ethnos 360), many of the things which can be somewhat serviceable for a translation into a new language from English, are not serviceable in the same way to those in which a plethora of translations already exist and can come from the Hebrew and Greek into the language. Andrew Shead give light to this with the following breakdown:

This suggests that Simmons has adapted the method of translation, pioneered by Eugene Nida, of reducing Hebrew sentences to their simplest kernels, transferring those simple structures to English, and then freshly generating a semantically equivalent text. This is a tried and true method, common among translators who work to give language groups in the majority world their first Bibles. It can produce clear, faithful and accurate translations, but the method needs to be carried out with care to prevent meaning from being lost in the transfer process.

To counter the loss-of-meaning problem Nida stressed the importance of moving beyond linguistic meaning, by recognizing

(1) contextual specification of meaning, in which the relevant component of a word’s meaning is clarified through its interaction with other word-meanings nearby, and

(2) connotative meaning, namely, the reactions that words prompt in their hearers

It may be that Simmons has tried to respect these two elements of Nida’s method by means of

(1) his constant double translations, and

(2) his constant additions of emotive language.

However, Simmons has strayed so far outside Nida’s program that his work would not be recognized as legitimate by any Bible translation society in the world, past or present. (Andrew Shead)

Then even with all of the above, Brian Simmons goes through and perpetuates misapplications and misunderstandings of things like Church history which then creates “translation” mistakes. Dr. Longman explains this as well to Mike Winger:

Dr. Tremper Longman - The non allegorical reading has as coming to the church as in the past 70 years, though there is an element of truth to the fact that the allegorical interpretation of the song dominated for many, many years, but we can site a number of medieval interpreters who took it as a as love poetry rather than an allegory, but they were in the minority

I mean, you have to put it within its context. We're talking about a church that also advocated for celibate priests and also was trying to encourage the monastic movement. And had a very negative view of human sexuality. If you study it, you could see that that's a result of a cultural influence on the church connected with Platonic philosophy. So again, if you're going to argue that that means that the Song of Songs ought to be interpreted in the way that the early Church fathers interpret it, then you should also advocate for celibate ministers. (12:20)

Dr. Tremper Longman - Again, I don't know what's going on in his process of rendering the song of songs, whether he is reading it and the Hebrew and then in his mind, just taking that and imposing a kind of allegorical reading on it. So, but I could tell you that when you look up if you start like I did by looking at his translation and then looking at the Hebrew, there's a lot that I couldn't see where he got that from (21:10)

Dr. Longman gives a much more in depth explanation of the view that Simmons is trying to proport and how it its based upon a misunderstanding of church history. That when viewed actually in its whole context it doesn’t really make sense and is only a brief snapshot. Yet this isn’t the only time where Brian does this sort of thing. He also perpetuates a long standing mistranslation of 1st Cornithians 11 as well. Dr. Craig Blomberg gives us an in depth breakdown of how and why Simmons has most likely chosen to do this and the implications of such a view, along with why this should never be within a Bible, but has made it into the Passion while discussing this with Mike Winger:

Mike Winger - You also mentioned the communion passage, Chapter 11:27. You said that Simmons has perpetuated a long-standing misinterpretation of this passage in his translation can you break that down for us​ 

Dr. Craig Blomberg - How many times have have people heard a pastor or a preacher say if you haven't felt close to God recently, if you've been in willful sin, if you're rebelling against him, just just let the elements pass you by if they're passed out or you don't need to come up to the altar if you come up front. And because Paul talks about being worthy to accept communion. And even in settings where people don't say that, the ordinary churchgoer or parishioner will often wonder should they refrain because I'm just feeling particularly unworthy. Here again let me contrast translations the NIV of verse 27 says whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner. That's a single Greek adverb which we could render unworthily in an unworthy manner. Well what does that mean does that mean I kicked my feet up and I'm listening to reggae music while I sip the cup? Or am going to go back earlier in the passage what's the problem in Corinth verse 20 so then when you come together it's not the Lord's supper you eat for when you were eating some of you go ahead with your own private supper. This is the original church potluck meal. The rich could bring more food eat it all before the poor even all got there and they might not have enough for themselves. As a result one person remains hungry, and another gets drunk. Don't you have homes to eat and drink in or you despise the Church of God by humiliating those who have nothing. That's the context, being concerned for the poor members within the Christian community who don't have enough to eat or drink. Eating and drinking unworthily is then eating overeating and over drinking. Well that's hard to do in churches that just give you a teeny tiny little cup in a microscopic piece of flatbread but I'm speaking my own. But the idea of simply being utterly unconcerned for the poor. The poor fellow believer right within your own congregation to to be unaware or unconcerned. That's what it means to eat unworthily. And now and then you find churches who have recovered this and and teach it. If I go to the passion version I read verse 27 for this reason whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in the wrong spirit will be guilty of dishonoring the body and the blood of the Lord so let each individual first evaluate his own attitude and only then eat the bread and drink the cup. Verse 29 for continually eating and drinking with the wrong spirit. Well what is this wrong spirit? This wrong attitude. It's possible that somebody could make a link from that back to dissing those who don't have enough but given the history in the Christian Church of people being told examine your heart what's your attitude, are you doing this with appropriate reverence? Are you right with God? It just feeds into that without any further explanation

Mike Winger - which can create in my view as a pastor it just creates this anxiety and this instead of seeing the sufficiency of Christ's work in communion I see the insufficiency of my own works instead and and I'm actually thinking I have to be good enough to partake of this sacrifice that was meant for the one who was not good enough and yeah it's it's a sad emotional strain and stress to put into what what it's supposed to be the thing that relieves all that which is act like the work of Christ (56:05)

With each of these techniques and styles that have been implemented in the Passion, it just adds more and more to the cumulative issues. A person might think, “Ok, well that one thing is not really a big deal in the grand scheme of things,” and while that might be well and true, it is when more and more of these types of things pile up. If there are enough seemingly small holes in a ship, they are big enough to start to sink it. Even with the bulk of what has been explained so far, I would say the ship is barely above water, if not submerged already, but it is most definitely not afloat. This brings us to the next section of how there are substantial thematic and literary changes in the Passion, causing it to further sink beyond repair.

Thematic and Literary Changes

Literary changes

The Passion seems to switch and shift the themes and literary style around for nearly every single one of the books at one time or another. This becomes more and more possible when it is the work of a single individual. It becomes easier to lose the overall “voice” of the original authors such as Paul, Luke, Matthew, the various writers in Psalms. Instead of them each having a unique vocabulary, literary style that aids in the presentation of their particular section, it becomes a single “voice,” that of Brian Simmons. It loses almost all of its literary style. At times the Psalms cease to be a particular type of Poetry found in the Hebrew text and change into something else completely. This is what Dr. Tremper Longman found when he did his review of the Song of Songs. It no longer was a text that could be interpreted in one way or another by the reader, instead it shifted into only an allegorical interpretation because of the “translator.” It is an incredibly strange phenomenon in any Bible to be able to read the “translators” views coming in so clearly through the text, whereas a standard translation simply provides the text as is without the overt declaration of “this is what I want the text to be.” Dr. Longman states:

The main problem with The Passion Translation’s treatment of the Song of Songs is that it treats the Song as an allegory of the relationship between Jesus and the individual Christian.  A translator should not import the allegorical interpretation into the translation, but rather, provide a commentary that would guide the reader into an allegorical understanding.  (Dr. Longman's Paper)

Within the Song of Songs, Simmons excludes every other literary possibility except that of allegory, forcing the text to specifically be and say certain things that are not inherent within the Hebrew according to Dr. Longman. It is the result of mixing and mistaking literary categories he goes on to explain in his paper and it goes beyond translation, but more more into interpretation:

Dr. Tremper Longman - There is a logic to this type of interpretation (not translation), but it is based on a clearly incorrect identification of the type of book (genre) the Song is. The reason why precious few people take the Song as an allegory today is because it has become clear that there are no indications in the Song itself that it is an allegory.

Let me explain the first comment that the Song shows no signs of being an allegory. Authors write in order to communicate to readers, and they present signals to the reader concerning how their words should be taken….  The Bible itself sends out various signals. Think of Jesus’ teaching often referred to as a “parable.” We could go on.

So, to summarize the above, the single biggest problem of The Passion Translation is that it treats the Song as an allegory of the relationship between Jesus and the Christian, which suppresses the primary message of the book. As the comments on particular verses below in the addendum attest, much of the translation cannot be justified by the Hebrew, but emanates from this faulty genre identification.

But there are other problems. He achieves his translation by utilizing a number of ill-advised or simply wrong interpretive strategies. I will briefly comment on these now. I will also cite selective examples from my comments on specific verses and their notes below. Note that the vast majority of my examples below are specific illustrations of how he imposes his inappropriate allegorical interpretation on the text. (Dr. Longman's Paper)

This is huge. A whole book of the Bible that Simmons has supposedly “translated” is now no longer a “translation,” but instead it is just an interpretation. Dr. Longman explains this to Mike Winger stating:

Dr. Tremper Longman - I think it's a love poetry and it's love poetry within the Bible which is trying to teach us things about God's desire within intimacy within a marriage. It also has theological meaning, within the bible, the rather pervasive metaphor being like a marriage, way to understand that, the more we understand God's intentions for human marriage in terms of it's intimacy exclusivity it's passion, the more we learn about and informs our understanding about the divine human metaphor in scripture. Our relationship with God should be intimate, passionate, exclusive

The problem with rendering it as an allegory is that first of all you cut all that out, the second thing is that you make some arbitrary connections between the text and the theological meaning (8:05)

Dr. Longman explains the implications of importing such a view into the text of scripture itself:

Dr. Tremper Longman - God is concerned about us as human beings and sexuality is a big part of who we are as human beings. Song of songs connects back to Genesis 2, man and the woman in the garden naked feeling no shame. God created us as sexual beings. In Genesis 3 that relationship is fractured through sin

Song of songs, as one scholar Phillis Triple put it, is about the already not yet redemption of sexuality. It encourages us or reminds us of God's good intentions for us within human sexuality in marriage. That is a really important message for Christians to hear these days.

That message is lost within the version of Song of Songs. So the primary message of the text is missing in this translation, which is a big deal if we care about the scripture and the message that God intends and the inspiration of scripture (9:00)

Within his paper, Dr. Longman thoroughly gives in depth examples on some of the history and and issues that present from automatically making the text an allegory:

Dr. Tremper Longman - The Bible does have allegories, but they too are obviously intended by the author/speaker to be taken as allegories (see Judg. 9:7-15; Gal. 4:21-31). There are no such signals in the Song of Songs. It is clearly a love poem. Reasons it was taken as allegory previously.

In retrospect, we understand that the obvious sexual language of the Song was suppressed because it was thought (influenced by Neo-Platonic philosophy) that the body, and in particular, sex, was hostile to spiritual growth….Thus, an allegorical reading of the Song was imposed on it, in order to “de-sex” it.  Again, please note the difference between the text being an allegory and an allegorical interpretation being imposed on it. The latter is what The Passion Translation does, and by so doing, it obscures the important message of the Song. 

When taken at face value, and particularly in the context of its ancient setting, the Song is a poem about human love and sexuality. To read it as an allegory obscures that important contribution that signals to us that God created us as sexual beings, and that sexual pleasure within marriage is possible, though not easy. Indeed, the Song is part of an important biblical theology of sexuality that begins in Genesis 2. In Genesis 2, we learn that sexual relations between a man and woman are part of his creation purposes for us. And this is not just for the procreation of children, but for the uniting together of a husband and wife (see Gen. 2:23-24). Genesis 3 explains why such intimacy is difficult today. Human sin ruptures the harmony between God and humans, and therefore, also between humans. The man and the woman hide from each other, and no longer can stand naked and feel no shame.

Furthermore, to repress the human relationship dimension of the Song is also to miss the important teaching of the Song about the healthy, vibrant relationship that God intends for a husband and a wife. Their relationship is one that is characterized by passion, mutuality, exclusivity, and more. We are getting a picture of the type of relationship that God wants us to enjoy, though there is (as I already stated) an acknowledgment in some of the poems that there are obstacles to such enjoyment

But again, let me hasten to point out that The Passion Translation is a serious problem because it represses the important teaching of the book laid out above, but also because, like the Fathers, it tries to assign specific theological meaning to the details of the Song (Dr. Longman's Paper)

The Song of Songs is just one of the easiest and clearest examples in the Passion on where a huge literary change is made, completely changing the context of the book as a whole and then also what results within the text internally and what can then be interpreted out of it. A last note that Dr. Longman explains is to tell of what an actual allegory is so that people can better understand that the Song of Songs is not that:

Dr. Tremper Longman - One more thing and that is, you know there are allegory. There is such a thing as a genre Allegory, but they are really, really obvious. They're not subtle. Pilgrims progress is an allegory, and that's a story about a man named Christian traveling to the Celestial city and running into things like this law of despond or onions. Other book, Holy Wars about. A main character, also named Christian, who just lost the city of Mansoul to Beelzebub, and now with the help of Lieutenant Wisdom, is going to take back the city of Mansoul. So I mean, that's an allegory, and the song of songs really has nothing, no indications being that type of. (15:00)

I would go on to argue that this is not just a one off example. This happens extremely frequently throughout the Passion. In some places it is just easier to see than others because of the literary styles that are there. Andrew Stead states that something similar happens, but this time it is in regards to an omission instead during his review of the book of Psalms:

Andrew Stead - In his listing of major genres in the Psalms (‘themes’, pp. 5–6) he completely omits the Psalter’s most common genre, namely, lament. And while the translation does include the lament psalms, it does not give them the expansive treatment that praise receives.

Tragically, this illegitimate layering of selective passions over the top of Scripture – mostly those of physical intimacy and breathless elevation – prevents TPT from showing us the actual dimensions, the ‘width and length and height and depth,’ of the love of Christ as it shines from every page of Scripture.

…Omission is rare, and mostly consists of the repeated words and phrases that characterize Hebrew parallelism. Clearly Simmons’s preferred style is not that of the Hebrew poets, who build argument through the juxtaposition of parallel ideas:

‘The cords of the grave coiled around me’ (v. 5) is omitted following a very similar line in v. 4; ‘I cried out’ (v. 6b) is omitted following ‘I called’ (v. 6a). Eight more omissions follow in the rest of the psalm, mostly of verbs or noun clauses repeated in parallel lines. (Andrew Stead)

He also goes onto share how there is other obvious genre shifting that occurs as well:

Andrew Stead - Simmons has changed the genre of the Psalms from Near Eastern poetry to poetic prose.

Notice in the following example, where I have laid out TPT as prose, how words are omitted (underlined in ESV) that would have created duplicate sentences saying the same thing, and words are inserted (underlined in TPT) that turn the remainder into a complex prose paragraph whose elements are logically joined into a narrative. A poetic flavor is added back into this prose by means of abundant alliteration, a technique used in at least every second verse, and by multiplying colorful, emotive, and exclamatory language wherever possible.

Psalm 18:4–6 ESV

The cords of death entangled me; the torrents of destruction overwhelmed me. The cords of the grave coiled around me; the snares of death confronted me. In my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help. From his temple he heard my voice;  my cry came before him, into his ears.

Psalm 18:4–6 TPT

For when the spirit of death wrapped chains around me and terrifying torrents of destruction overwhelmed me, taking me to death’s door, to doom’s domain, I cried out to you in my distress, the delivering God, and from your temple-throne you heard my troubled cry. My sobs came right into your heart and you turned your face to rescue me.

The effect is often striking, and would make for an interesting meditation on the psalms, albeit with a strong sectarian flavor. However, by eliminating the poetic techniques of parallelism and juxtaposition, TPT denies the reader the chance to follow the particular logic of the psalms.  By abandoning the ‘how’ of Hebrew poetry and replacing it with prose-poems we are left at the mercy of the translator’s impression of the theological story each psalm relates. (Andrew Shead)

He goes on to talk about different alterations that have then been done to the text of Psalms giving specific examples

Some types of change are very frequent, such as the conversion of [a] speech about God or others into speech to God (nine times in the psalm); [b] metaphor into simile (once); [c] concrete images into more abstract ones (about ten times, including the elimination of feet, deer, path, bow, rock, shield); and [d] the removal of historical references (including the removal of about half the references to enemies and nations). The examples show ESV → TPT:

Andrew Stead - Many English versions occasionally replace concrete images with more abstract explanations [c], according to their translational goals. However, the other categories are harder to defend. For example, in v. 28 the expression ‘keep my lamp burning’ refers to the preservation of the psalmist’s life (cf. Prov 13:9; 20:20, 27), and specifically to the preservation of the king’s life and therefore the life of the nation (compare 2 Sam 21:17 with 22:29). But Simmons lifts the image from its historical context and turns it into one of illumination: ‘you turned on a floodlight for me!’ Shifts from external events to internal states occur frequently in his translation.

Even the historical psalms in TPT, such as Psalm 106, tend to make historical people and places less prominent, though the majority of them are retained. Thus there are no tents in TPT 106:25, no Canaan in 106:38, etc. On the other hand, references to pagan gods are intensified: ‘works of darkness’, ‘serve their gods’, ‘demon spirits’, ‘dark practices’, ‘murder and bloodshed’ are all additions to the original text of Ps 106:34–39.

Other pieces of dehistoricizing and spiritualizing are more theologically loaded. ‘Inherit the land’ (Ps 37:9, 11) becomes ‘live safe and sound with blessings overflowing’ in v. 9 and ‘inherit every promise’ in v. 11. And in Psalm 22 the bulls of Bashan in v. 12 become ‘forces of evil’, and the dogs in v. 20 become ‘demons’. At each point Simmons explains in a footnote that these represent ‘the many demonic spirits’ who ‘were bent on destroying Jesus on the cross’. (Andrew Shead)

There are even cases that he talks about radical alterations as well:

The most radical cases of alteration involve the complete rewriting of a line or couplet, often resulting in a different meaning (e.g., the rewriting of Ps 18:25 as ‘Lord, it is clear to me now that how we live / Will dictate how you deal with us’, as the first element of the verse’s double translation).

Twenty times in the first twenty psalms the justification ‘implied in the text/context’ is added in a footnote, but the great majority of alterations and additions are unmarked.

In Psalm 13, for example, the four verses of lament are fairly modestly treated, but the final two verses of praise are more than doubled in bulk, changing the meaning of the whole psalm in the process. They do this first, by making David’s rejoicing something he will do conditionally on being rescued; second, by identifying God’s goodness to David with the therapeutic benefits of his suffering; and third, by the invention of two entire lines at the end that make the theme of the psalm the triumph of David’s confidence in the face of his enemies’ skepticism. Here is TPT vv. 5–6, with additions underlined and alterations in italics:

5 Lord, I have always trusted in your kindness,

So answer me, [Note: implied in the text]

I will yet celebrate with passion and joy

When your salvation lifts me up.

6 I will sing my song of joy to you, the Most High,

For in all of this you have strengthened my soul.

My enemies say that I have no Savior,

But I know that I have one in you! (Andrew Shead)

Then there are also examples of theological implication that can occur:

Finally, while most alterations have theological implications, sometimes theology seems to be the driving factor, serving either to advance the author’s favourite themes or to bring potentially problematic statements into his theological comfort zone. I will mention three broad types of theological alteration that pervade the translation.

(1) Changes aimed at explaining Christology, e.g., TPT Ps 22:31b, ‘And they will all declare, “It is finished!”’; TPT Ps 110:1, ‘Jehovah-God said to my Lord, the Messiah’. These changes can become perilous. The softening in TPT of Ps 22:1 – ‘Why would you abandon me now?’ – is explained by an addition to the biblical text in v. 24: ‘He was there all the time.’

(2) Changes that seek to soften extreme statements that modern readers find uncomfortable, such as the psalmist’s claims to be righteous. Here are examples from Psalm 18, NIV (or ESV) → TPT:

examples

I have kept the ways of the Lord → I will follow his commands (v. 21), I am not guilty → I’ll not sin (v. 21), I have been blameless → I’ve done my best to be blameless (v. 23), [I] have kept myself from sin → keeping my heart pure (v. 23), God … made my way blameless (ESV) → you’ve shared with me your perfection (v. 32)

Violent or unforgiving language is also toned down, whether by completely changing the meaning (e.g., TPT Ps 23:5, ‘You become my delicious feast / Even when my enemies dare to fight’), or by spiritualizing and blunting the force of the original (e.g., Ps 137:9, ‘Great honor will come to those / Who destroy you and your future, / By smashing your infants / Against the rubble of your own destruction’).

(3) Most troubling are changes that tamper with statements about God, whether it be his attitude towards sin (e.g., TPT Ps 51:4, ‘Everything I did, I did right in front of you’); judgment (e.g., TPT Ps 18:27, ‘The haughty you disregard’); or death (e.g., TPT Ps 88:5, ‘They’re convinced you’ve forsaken me, / Certain that you’ve forgotten me completely—/ Abandoned, pierced, with nothing / To look forward to but death’). Sometimes even God’s own character is impugned, e.g., TPT Ps 106:23, 26, ‘So you were fed up and decided to destroy them … so you gave up and swore to them’. (Andrew Shead)

There are plenty of other articles that breakdown the intricacies of how the Passion changes not only themes but also whole literary categories all throughout what was been written by Simmons. People have devoted pages and pages into showing this, but for time sake we have focused just on mostly the book of Psalms and the book of Song of Songs to show some in depth aspects. This is extremely problematic regardless of whatever a persons views are. If someone wants to call this God’s word, this clearly takes it well off the range of being applicable any more. Simmons cannot and should not be able to change whole themes and literary styles and say that it is true to the originals and an accurate “translation.” No instead this is simply interpretation wrapped in emotional language, commenting on scripture, masked in adjectives and adverbs. It cannot and should not be called the word of God and should not be used in churches, pulpits, nor even personal use with how much these changes impact the actual scriptures. It is not and should not be ok to put personal views or opinions into the Bible and call it scripture.

Opinion and Personal Views as Doctrine and theology

Questionable interpretation

All throughout the Passion, there are these little tidbits that are put into the text, almost like have a sermon preached to you as you read it. Though it can make for an enjoyable or even comical read at times, they are simply foreign to the text of scripture itself. These almost preaching points in the text are really just the result of Brian Simmons’ views of the Bible and his own doctrine and theology. I have watched a substantial amount of Brian Simmons preaching to better understand his view points, opinions, sayings, quotes, posts and most of all his writing. As it is quite a strange phenomenon that as you are reading scripture, a person can start to pick up on the opinions, views and beliefs of the person who is writing it. Like we had discussed in the section of single person translations, that does not occur when you have a committee who are all a part of the translation process. Individual believes or even thoughts are normally weeded out during the whole process because of the many revisions, critiques, editing, translating process. That way a particular individuals views don’t have a chance of coming through. There is that safety in numbers. But that is not the case with Simmons’ translation.

Dr. Douglas Moo explains how there are some very questionable interpretations that have been added to the book of Romans during his interview with Mike Winger:

Dr. Douglas Moo - We should all recognize that to the translate the Bible requires interpretation. There's no such thing, there's no possibility of translating the Bible without interpreting. So it's not the matter of interpretation per se that I want to criticize. Rather it's the questionable interpretations I find in Romans where one particular view gets locked in. An example here I know this is a very debated one, so I don't want to again come down too hard here, but Romans 8:29 Paul begins a string of verbs talking about how God has worked on our behalf to bring us to ultimate glory. The first verb in that string is a Greek word proginosko which is difficult to translate. There are at least two options there and the passion Bible we have, “he knew all about us before we were born”. Now that is a legitimate option for the meaning of the verb. Although all about us is is not really included in the name of the verb at all. So that's that's a bit going beyond the data I think. But again one particular view has been chosen here excluding the other view which is that it's choose beforehand or set love on us beforehand or something of that sort  (30:44)

He expands upon this during his paper providing other examples as well:

Dr. Douglas Moo - Similar to this last point, there are places where dubious claims are made about the text.

For instance, The Passion Translation translates the last phrase of Romans 1:5 as “the gift of apostleship.” The translation claims that “grace” led to the “gift of apostleship.” A footnote justifies this rendering: “Note that grace comes before service or ministry.” If by this note it is meant that the Greek word for “grace” comes before the Greek word for “apostleship,” then the claim is accurate

But the note rather suggests that the Greek suggests that the concept of grace comes before and leads to the concept of apostleship. For this, there is no basis in the text. Interpretations noted in the footnotes are often even more problematic.

A note on the Greek work doulos in Romans 1:1 claims that the word means “one who has chosen to serve a master out of love.” But doulos means simply “slave” or “servant”; and the millions of slaves in the Greco-Roman world in Paul’s day would have been quite surprised to learn they were serving their masters “out of love.” (Dr. Moo's Paper)

These sorts of additions really have no place. There was even a time during the interview that Mike Winger was doing with Dr. Craig Blomberg which not only shocked me, but also made a lot of sense based upon the sermons I heard Simmons teach about his views on the roles of men and women.

Mike Winger - But my view is if you want to have that debate you should have it after the translation not in the translation should represent the text you shouldn't try he's done and I've talked about that in the review of Ephesians we talk about the gender passage there but you also mentioned for Corinthians 1:14 and what were the issues you saw there

Dr. Craig Blomberg - 1 Corinthians 4:34 and following. May I clarify that what you're telling me is that from these other statements, Simmons would be an egalitarian.

Mike Winger -  Yeah very much so, very strongly. 

Dr. Craig Blomberg - So that is absolutely fascinating to me, because while there are passages that made me think that might be the case. I did not do any research on it when you come to chapter 14 the other famous Corinthian passage

Mike Winger - I got to pause you there I want people to recognize this you determined his particular theology from his translation?

Dr. Craig Blomberg - No I guessed at it. 

Mike - Yeah, but it's just weird that you can even guess at it however (36:34)

There really should be no way that a person can tell the theological views of someone, let alone even guess them, based upon the text of the Bible. Stop to think just a moment. What other Bible are you able to do that with? You might be able to possibly hint slightly at one thing or another. But with the Passion you can can do this over and over again as his biases come through more.

That is absolutely crazy. And yet the more that I read and the more that I listened to, it made complete sense to me of how and why certain passages are translated the way that they are. As I started to record quotes from his various sermons I could see exactly why he translated certain passages the ways that he did, especially in places like the Song of Song, the gender roles passages, places where the gifts of the spirit are mentioned, even parts of the death of Christ.

There will be another section where we actually go through and review some of the overall theology and doctrine that Simmons believes and then teaches as well. This is gathered from many hours of watching his sermons. But its this sort of thing that gives a basis for the claim that his views are found within his presentation of the Bible.

Changing/shifting textual focus and context

Many shifts to specific key aspects

One of the things that anyone who has spent time trying to preach learns is that when teaching or preaching, you want to say what the Bible actually says. You should not go through and cherry pick or try to change something to fit your particular view. If you take something out of its context or try to put a new spin on it to create a different meaning than what is in the text you can cause great error. This goes back to the previous section regarding Hermeneutics and Eisegesis and Exegesis. But one of the interesting things about the Passion is that even if you try to preach out of it and do proper exegesis in certain sections, regardless of your intent, you will not be able to be biblically sound. That is because the text itself is the result of Eisegesis. So no matter how good someone is at Hermeneutics or Exegesis, unless they know the actual Bible from other translations, the Passion is so skewed in certain places it just simply would be incredibly difficult to exegete certain places if you were to use only the Passion and to remain accurate.

One such example that Dr. Darrell Bock provided to Mike Winger was that of an Anthropocentric focus shift that occurs. That just basically means that the text shifted from God in a certain place to man instead because of how Simmons wrote it, whether knowingly or unknowingly. Mike asks Dr. Bock about this:

Mike Winger - For part of Ephesians you wrote the emphasis in chapter 1 turns from God to us too much can you explain that? 

Dr. Darrell Bock - I think maybe verse 8 might have been one of the at least what stood out to me as a good example of that verse 9 but anyway. Yes the point is, is that this is a praise song. In so you know blessed be the godfather of our Lord Jesus Christ who's blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly place. Everything that's being described in verses 3 to 14 which in Greek is one long sentence, it's actually looking at the praise of God as the major person to be focused on in the midst of the praise because that's the point of a praise song. It's the praise God for what he's done. But one of the things the paraphrase does is to flip it and to flip the emphasis on in terms of who we are in one way or another. And it isn't that we don't benefit from what it is God is done for us. That's certainly the case, but the emphasis in the section is to praise God for his giving us every spiritual blessing. For his election, for his ordaining us, for his sealing us with the spirit. You know for the redemption that he provides in Christ. I mean he's the one who's acting in every place and it's our attention is supposed to be drawn to him. So the emphasis to me it reflects a mis-emphasis of what a praise on is supposed to be. (12:32​)

Part of the passage that is supposed to have its focus on God is now changed to man instead in the Passion. Textual focus changes actually can adjust the whole context of the surrounding passages depending on what they are and where they are located. Dr. Bock goes on to say a little bit later:

Mike Winger - You said, Brian Simmons rendering of Ephesians 3:20 is, 'too anthropocentric,” can you walk us through this verse and explain?

Dr. Darrell Bock - This is what I said earlier, which is that the focus, this is something people often do with the Bible and frankly it irritates me okay. And that is when they replace the focus rather than the one who is receiving the benefit from God. The attention is drawn away from what it is God is doing to what it is we become. And again in referencing and referring to alluding to things like dreams and expectations. It almost makes God into our enabler. You know he enables what we desire and what we will. No it's the exact reverse. We are enabled to carry out what God gives us the capability to do in line with His will in his direction. That's the emphasis and so it implies this about miracles and about miracles being more than enabling presence to walk in his will. And and yet that's the emphasis of the last three chapters what God has given us enables us to walk with him to reflect his person and his character. That's why he doesn't and isn't because of our dreams or our expectations. So when I mean too anthropocentric in this passage I mean way too anthropocentric 

Dr. Darrell Bock - Ephesians 3:20 - Yup and now that's precisely the misdirection. What we're supposed to be responding to God and his direction and his leading in the capability he gives us to do his will not the reverse (17:32​)

Dr. Bock does not mince words when describing how this shift is not just a subtle one, it is something that becomes very overt to those who are willing to take a few moments and really examine the passage. As a result Simmons takes the reader to a place where they cannot know on their own without prior Bible understanding and reading. This is an example of where the text delineates from other standard translations.

Another section where Simmons goes through and changes specific context and focus is that of Ephesians 2. It is here that Dr. Bock explains to Mike that Brian Simmons provides believers with a greater authority than what scripture intended within that specific place (whether it is the case in other places is up for discussion):

Mike Winger - Now in chapters 2 verses 1 through 10 you said that Simmons translation gives us more authority than we have in the passage can you explain what you meant by that?

Dr. Darrell Bock -What we benefit from Christ authority in that passage. It's not authority that we possess independently. So the last part of my explanation says it, it says it is the authority that we are seated, that's being focused on. But we do not have that authority, we have access to it that's what he wants him to realize. He wants us to realize and this actually to 1 to 10 is an extension of the prayer. So even though there's a chapter break we're still talking about the same thing and so the point is  that you know by being co heirs with Christ and and co members etc. That we have access to the same power and access to the same God and we get that through Christ. So it isn't that we bear independent authority the authority and really the enablement that we have the power that we have in the New testament is about enabling we see. Because we have the spirit of God, we have we get from him. It's important to say that what's being talked about here is an authority over principalities and powers. The book is making the point, the epistle is making the point that the power that we have access to in God through Christ is greater than any power that stands against us. Any principality or power spiritual malevolent force that operates against us. This is said real succinctly in the New testament line that says greater is he using us than he was in the world. And so that is a point that Paul is making but this authority is derived it's not inherent  (15:50)

There is a difference between scripture and interpretation. Yet it is no longer scripture with the Passion as the interpretation is simply placed in the midst of the text without warning and thereby changing the context. Some might say, “but really though, that authority is found in other places in the Bible.” That might be true, even if that was granted (depending on what they mean by authority and the specific places they might mention), the fact of the matter is that it is not mentioned here. Something might be theologically true, though it is not mentioned in a certain verse. But that is where it would be mentioned in a footnote, not put within the body of the text. A good Bible would simply make a cross reference to another scripture rather than put it in the heart of the scripture itself. That again changes the context and the focus of what that actual passage is talking about.

There are also spots where Simmons has gone through and shifted from the cooperate church to the individual. Now Brian is not alone in doing this, as much of Western Christianity, specifically American Christianity, has a huge me focus. The basic American way is focused on me, myself and I and that has most definitely entered into the church as well. Instead of focusing on how certain things are meant for the whole church and not individuals, many go through and try to make it applicable to themselves. We see this often with our favorite Bible stories like David vs. Goliath, with Daniel and the lions den, etc. Pretty much insert any standard famous Bible account and then people use eisegeses to put themselves into the text saying, “yes that is just like me and I can do those sorts of things as well because this Bible person has done it as well”. While there are specific things that the Bible does make available for the individual believer, not everything in the Bible is applicable for individuals. I have heard the quote before that there is much in the Bible that is descriptive, but there are some things that are prescriptive. Dr. Bock gives Mike Winger an example within Ephesians where Simmons does just this:

Mike Winger - There's a number of times you mentioned how Brian Simmons changes Ephesians, so that when it speaks to the corporate church, it sounds like it's speaking to individuals. Some examples were 2:22, 4:13, 4:22-24 why why should that issue be something we care about

Dr. Darrell Bock - Because the West has ended up just creating a distorted reading of the Bible. Because we tend to think of our spirituality strictly in individualistic terms. Whereas in the Bible, the emphasis normally is much more corporate. It's how I'm connected to other people and how we function as a group that's important. It's a little bit like the English language where we use the word you and we don't know what I'm talking about you, meaning you singular, you as in you all as we like in the south. Okay and there are a lot more you all's in the Bible than used generally speaking. So you want to think corporately, generally speaking, as opposed to just strictly individually. Individualistically we tend to think of ourselves as being in this hermetically sealed spiritual bubble in our walk with God and God likes the burst that bubble and connect us to other people. (20:38)

This changing and shifting of focus and even context happens not only in the book of Ephesians, but all throughout the Bible. A careful reading of some of your favorite passages will help to illuminate that this occurs everywhere. Some places are worse offenders than others, more noticeable, whereas there are some that are a bit more subtle and require closer attention and rereading of.

In 1st Corinthians, Dr. Blomberg does his review and noticed that in chapter 10 there was a reversal of Paul’s meaning in a specific place. He explains this to Mike Winger after Mike brings this up:

Mike Winger - you also give a number of examples from 1st Corinthians that you say are actually misleading That's your term for them could you walk us through a couple of those examples could you explain that

Dr. Craig Blomberg - I think to do a proper job of this, I'm not actually one of those people that thinks NIV stands for the nearly inherent version, but I think they've done a competent job with chapter 10 verse 13 and nobody has touched it or revised it since I've been on the committee. Here is a good understandable, not word for word not woodenly literal, but very accurate translation in the NIV of 1st Corinthians 10:13. No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind and God is faithful He will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear, but when you are tempted you will also provide a way out. And while we're talking about what we wish the Bible would have said I wish the sentence would have stopped there, “and you are tempted he will also provide a way out”, but it doesn't. It ends by saying, “so that you can endure it.” We are not promised escape from every temptation from every trial. We are promised the power to bear up under them as a couple of other translations put it. Now here is the TPT we all experience times of testing which is normal for every human being, but God will be faithful to you. He will screen and filter the severity nature and timing of every test or trial you face. That sentence should be in italics, there's nothing corresponding to that in the Greek so that you can bear it. Right. That's where the verse ends. That's not where the TPT ends. And each test is an opportunity to trust him more for along with every trial God has provided you a way of escape that will bring you out of it victoriously. Flatly the opposite of what Paul himself wrote the way of escape is escaping from sin. Of escaping from succumbing to temptation, so that you can bear up under the trial. Which is in the TPT but in the middle of the verse and then superseded by the last sentence that I just read

Mike Winger - So this could change and this is actually common misconception where Christian say things like God won't give you more than you can handle. And it's really only a promise that we we will not be forced to sin, He will provide the ability to not sin in that circumstance. It doesn't speak about limiting circumstances in this in the sense that you know you won't give more than you can handle, but this is this is now reversed in the Passion Translation. I think that that was a good example of that.  (52:03)

Now in many of the places that these changes occur, they are not to huge theology or doctrine related issues like for what the New World Translation does to the deity of Jesus. If the Passion did that overtly in many locations, it would make what we are doing here in this review significantly easier. Yet because there are these small changes, little additions here and there, tiny omission for this, how there is reliance upon texts and languages that simply don’t have manuscripts to back them up and a foundation upon signs, wonders and miracles with an agenda of emotion to be put into the text, it vastly accumulates into something that is no longer scripture.

With that being said though, Dr. Blomberg did seem to think that there was at least a passage or two that could hint at a problem for the doctrine of the Trinity in the Passion. He brought this up with Mike Winger after Mike asked the following question:

Mike Winger - Oh let's talk about the the Yahweh verse so in 1st Corinthians 15:47. It says Yahweh there you pointed out that that was a potential problem relating to the doctrine of the Trinity could you explain that to us

Dr. Craig Blomberg - Jesus God the son is not the same as Yahweh God the Father who in turn is not the same as the third person of the Trinity the Holy Spirit the classic trinitarian confessions of faith even when we admit all that is hard to understand or that we can know only analogically certainly says that all three persons are co-equal but they are all distinct persons and you do not you you find the word Lord curious in the Greek Adonai in the Hebrew and Jews regularly substituted Adonai for Yahweh we don't actually know it's probably closer than Jehovah but we don't know for sure because they didn't pronounce it it was too sacred they didn't even put in the vowels so it's just four unpronounceable consonants. There is no place in scripture where Jesus is equated with Yahweh in the sense that they are indistinguishable you can call either one of them Lord you can call the Spirit Lord because Lord can mean master as well as God deity but to say the second man first man is Adam the second man is Jesus to say Jesus is Yahweh you don't have two separate persons anymore you just have of course the Spirit isn't here but yeah you've blurred the distinction between God the Father and God the son now that you said is it's not not only is there a theological thing there but for people to know this is a textual critical issue it's like why are you putting Yahweh into this text in the first place it's not justified from the Greek generally 

Mike Winger - Exactly in his footnote he actually says as translated from the Aramaic and this is in the 2020 edition which I don't know if if if that has a footnote the other one didn't they added a bunch of new footnotes. Its in the 2018 as well and there's no Aramaic so it can't be translated from it  (1:01:11​)

There are also specific instances where there was a primary focus of a verse is taken out. Mike Winger brings this up to Dr. Craig where he states:

Mike Winger -   So you said that an entire clause is missing this is in chapter 10 verse 25 so what what is the clause that's missing that should be in this verse.

Dr. Craig Blomberg -The TPT says, “yes you are free to eat anything anything without worrying about your conscience” interesting. Can I eat nails? Probably not, wouldn't taste good. Might do me in. Eat anything sold in the meat market. The Makellon is the Greek word there. Paul has been contrasting some Corinthian scruples about ever eating meat that had a prayer to some pagan god spoken over it. A kind of blessing making it, if we want to mix metaphors horribly, making it kosher for the pagan world. But kosher of courses, that Jewish term and he is saying somebody praying over chunk of meat that you find in the marketplace doesn't do a single thing to that piece of meat. Even if they think it does, you're free to buy it, you're free to eat it. Now some of you may have eaten some of that identical meat in an idols temple in one of the pagan temple worship services in Corinth. No, no don't do that. That's participating in worshiping and even though those idols are nothing they don't really exist, there is demonic power behind them. So don't get caught up in pagan worship. And now he's summarizing what he's been saying. Which is why he starts off with ,a so, here. But it sounds like this whole issue of distinguishing between the meat sold in the marketplace. The meat eaten as part of a temple worship service has gone out the window because there's no reference to what is sold in the marketplace. It's just gone and I can't even find an Aramaic justification for it and a footnote 

Mike Winger -   No footnote at all now. So you lose a major thing that he's trying to teach here in this passage because of the missing phrase. So you might remember it and maybe he felt like this was unnecessary repetition. I don't know, but it was there, it is there  (1:07:26)

This is pretty big. Simmons has gone though and simply removed a whole phrase or clause which is missing from the Passion. This is not again one of those sections in which will completely change a theology or a doctrine that is foundational. But it is there as an evidence that it can and does occur in the Passion. There are these sorts of omissions that happen, whether it occurs knowingly because of an intent of the author, or because of a mistake during an editing process or was just deemed as redundant, I am not sure. But this was just one of the events in which this occurs in the Passion that a scholar has specifically pointed out. There are plenty of other instances where this occurs which can be found in other articles on this site or on others.

Italicizing some things, but not everything added is italicized

It’s not adding to the Bible Simmons claims

There is and has been a rich tradition in Bible translation where if there is a word that has to be inserted to help the overall flow of a sentence, though it is not found in the manuscript texts of Greek or Hebrew, that it is ok to add that word as long as it is italicized. But generally, depending on translation style, the translation should use as few words as necessary to convey what is found in the historical texts we have from the early manuscripts. The KJV, the NKJV, the AMPC, and a few others do this. It is to help the reader differentiate and say, “oh that wasn’t in the Greek, but now this sentence makes sense when it is put in there”. Each word or pairings of words should normally correspond with a specific Greek or Hebrew word. That is how we can have things like the KJV or ESV with the Strong’s Concordance paired up each individual word (basically). That is why most of the time a lot of the standard translations will be near a similar word count to one another in most passages, varying here and there slightly, but not too profoundly off.

An example of words being italicized would be like 2nd Peter 1:20-21. It occurs several times in the KJV:

knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation. For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

The AMP Bible states the following:

But understand this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of or comes from one’s own [personal or special] interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God.

It is ok to be able to do something like this, or even put things in brackets like the Amplified does if you are consistent within its usage. Yet when you are not, then there is the chance to give readers the impression that something that is in the text that is not italicized is actually a part of the original and could have potentially been missing. If a translation or a “translation” says that they will be italicizing, it should be consistent if not it can appear as if certain things that are not that are in addition to the text are adding to scripture. The Bible does warn about adding to scripture in both Deuteronomy 4:2 and Revelation 22:18-19. Though the context of each of those is the Law provided to Moses and also to the book of Revelation, it does seem like one of the principles that would basically be in place for all of the text of scripture, that we should avoid adding to or subtracting from it.

This is specifically what Brian Simmons states in one of his talks and that he is not adding to the text:

“Rightly so we get really concerned about not adding to the Bible. I get it, I am 100% with you. The Bible warns us about that. But did you know that it also says, don't take away. What about all the things we have taken away from the scriptures. I feel like I am going back to the cutting room floor and picking up the flavor, emotion, passion and putting it back into the Hebrew text especially.”

His basic view is that he is not adding to the text, but mostly restoring or recovering these things that people have “intentionally or unintentionally” removed. So he is doing us a favor and helping to uncover what the “scholars” or “academic braniacs” have deliberately taken out. Yet for those who actually know the languages of Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic there really is not justification for those sorts of claims whatsoever. There has been nothing that is “left on the cutting room floor” for Brian to pick up and put back in there. Even if there was, it still doesn’t justify the fact there there are copious amounts of places where Simmons chooses not to put things into italics that are clearly additional pieces of information. Whatever the justification, whether Aramaic, emotion, picking up what was “taken out”, a “revelation” from God, each of those fall short. What would stop someone else from saying those same exact things to create a Bible of their own, which then reads significantly different from not only most standard translations, but even from the Passion as well? The New World Translation could make a lot of those same arguments, but in the end they would still be wrong.

If a work is set on using italics or brackets for their translating purposes, it should be used consistently and have all applicable additions italicized. And sadly the Passion just doesn’t do that. This really is one my biggest issues that I have with the Passion and I think makes it incredibly deceptive, again whether intentionally or unintentionally, that becomes the result. Especially for those not as familiar with scripture, it is much more difficult for them to spot these things, which becomes very troublesome.

This was such a big deal that within the academic paper that Dr. Craig Blomberg did, he specifically mentioned this:

To be sure, Simmons does claim that, whenever he inserts something that doesn’t correspond to the ancient Greek (or Hebrew), he puts the English in italics. Unfortunately, he doesn’t follow through on this pledge with any consistency

On numerous occasions, such insertions are not italicized at all. It is one thing, as with the LBP or The Message, to acknowledge producing a paraphrase all in the same font, so that readers know they have to consult a real translation to find out what the original said. It is much more misleading, however, to claim to be distinguishing translation from paraphrase but then to do so very inconsistently. (Dr. Blomberg's Paper)

Mike Winger and Dr. Craig Blomberg bring this up in their discussion and state the following:

Mike Winger - So you're you're getting the wrong impression that the question here is not, is that cannot be theologically supported or can you can you support this with an interpretation. The question is, is that creating the right perception in the mind of the person reading the text about what the scripture is saying and the inconsistent use of italics is confusing?

Dr. Craig Blomberg - If they were to compare that with any other more standard translation and believed the idea that whatever isn’t in italics is actually corresponding to to the original, then they would say my goodness I can't rely on a single one of these other translations because they all left a sentence (out). That in English, lets see how fast I can count, 17 words in it, and they just left that out. Well no we didn't and Simmons put it in (30:38​)

There are a multitude of examples that can be given for this provided from various scholars as they started to do their reviews of the Passion. Dr. Longman brings this up in his paper:

Dr. Tremper Longman - On many occasions, there is no Hebrew behind his translation, and he does not indicate this with italics (see 2:10). Song of Solomon (Dr. Longman's Paper)

Dr. Darrell Bock and Mike Winger discuss this as well:

Mike Winger - All right and then there's places where you've said entire sentences are actually added to the text and chapter 1 verse 19. You mentioned a whole sentence that was added what sentence

Dr. Darrell Bock - It's the reference advertisement in 19. The advertising that goes on. I have the text in front of me as it works through you trying to bring out the implication of what that that text would mean and the fact that we have access to this power is then leads into the application. But it's not doctrinally off it's just not in the verse. If it's accurate or not and in this particular verse he does it. So it's in a book that's presenting itself as a translation. He has a whole sentence here there's no italics there's no footnote. No way for you to know that what has been done here is an elaboration by the person doing the rendering  (13:59)

Dr. Blomberg brings up other points in his paper:

Dr. Craig Blomberg - For example, in 1 Corinthians 1, the first italicized segments appear in verse 11, which reads, “My dear brothers and sisters, I have a serious concern I need to bring up with you, for I have been informed by those of Chloe’s house church that you have been destructively arguing among yourselves.” The first italicized clause is indeed an insertion, but a natural one for a paraphrase, and it fits the immediate context well.

The expression “house church” is inserted because the Greek has just “those of Chloe.” But even the most formally equivalent translations have something like “some of Chloe’s people” or “household,” simply to make sense in English. This kind of addition need not even have been flagged, because it was necessary to create a meaningful English sentence, although it was certainly fine to have italicized it.

On the other hand, verse 4 has already referred to Paul thanking God for giving the Corinthians “such free and open access to his grace” when nothing in the Greek at all corresponds to “such free and open access.” Theologically, the phrase is an accurate descriptor of God’s grace, but it should have been italicized. 

In verse 12, we read, “And I need to bring this up because each of you is claiming loyalty to different preachers. Some are saying, ‘I am a disciple of Paul,’ or ‘I follow Apollos,’ . . .” Again, as contextually appropriate as the clause, “each of you is claiming loyalty to different preachers,” may be, it translates nothing from the Greek, which moves directly from what might simply be rendered, “I say this,” to “because some are saying . . .” By Simmons’ own criteria, the clause needs to be italicized.  (Dr. Blomberg's Paper)

Dr. Blomberg goes on to explain other sections where this occurs:

Dr. Craig Blomberg - Sometimes, more is at stake than just what is or isn’t in italics. In 6:7, the text is greatly expanded to read, “Don’t you realize that when you drag another believer into court you’re providing the evidence that you are already defeated? Wouldn’t it be better to accept the fact that someone is trying to cheat and take advantage of you, and simply choose the high road? At times it is better to just accept injustice and even to let someone take advantage of you, rather than to expose our conflicts publicly before unbelievers.” 

A woodenly literal translation might read, “Already it is an entire defeat for you to have lawsuits among you. Why not rather be wronged? Why not rather be defrauded?” Thus, in reality, almost all of TPT’s first question should be in italics. Just a few verses earlier, wording that is not italicized does not only not correspond to anything in the original text; it adds ideas that are probably not at all what Paul intended.

In 6:4, we read, “Don’t you realize that you are bringing your issues before civil judges appointed by people who have no standing within the church?” Not only does nothing in the Greek correspond to “appointed by people,” but this addition in fact changes what “who have no standing within the church” modifies. Now, it is not the judges who have no standing within the church (what Paul wrote), but the people who appointed them, when in fact nothing in the context suggests Paul cares anything about who appointed them.

 Immediately after this, verse 5 continues with, “What a shame that there is not one within the church who has the spirit of wisdom who could arbitrate these disputes and reconcile the offended parties!” What a shame that “and reconcile the offended parties” isn’t in Paul’s text! Sometimes in a fallen world, even Christians don’t reconcile or don’t reconcile right away. That is an extra step beyond arbitrating disputes that Paul doesn’t say anything about at this point.  (Dr. Blomberg's Paper)

Again the main reason why this becomes such a big deal is because in the end, it ends up deceiving people into thinking that what is in the Passion is indeed God’s word. That whatever is not italicized comes from the Greek and the Hebrew (again Aramaic is really a non-starter and is non-existent in the books thus far that Simmons has translated).

Dr. Blomberg proceeds to explain how and why Simmon’s lack of italics is deceptive:

Mike Winger - so in your a review you notice the problem of the lack of italics in the passion translation can you explain for us how do I italics work in a translation and why is this a problem in the passion translation in first Corinthians

Dr. Craig Blomberg - Italics is simply one way that people have chosen, including Bible translators, to indicate when words are added that don't correspond to anything in the original text. If you go back to all kinds of additions of the King James version, you will see italics, you'll see them in the new American standard Bible. You won't see them for the most part in some of the most recent translations because translators understand now that that their goal is not to in a very wooden way go word by word. And say well the Greek speaker often left out a form of the verb to be when it was clear from the context. I a small child in my youth did such and such. Even in English I don't have to say I was a small child in my youth, but I might put that into smooth it out and that would be perfectly legitimate. But older translations often did whenever there was a word that was added or perhaps even a phrase for clarity's sake, would put things in italics. And as you start the passion version it sounds like from their introductory matter and their practice that that's what they intend to do. And there are plenty of places where words and phrases and tire sentences are put in italics and almost always that is accurate in that those don't correspond to anything in the the original languages. The problem is it's about half as many italics as are needed. There are equally significant words, phrases and sentences that don't correspond to anything and they're not in italics. And so once you've set up that that guideline for people then that deceives them all the more, that any place you don't see italics this this must be the real thing. (24:29)

They follow up that conversation slightly later adding in this:

Mike Winger - yeah he does tell people I mean he's italics and then you mention one specific example that I think might help people see what you're talking about and it was first Corinthians one versus 11 and 12 and in that example you said you showed not just that there's a lack of italics but rather it shows an inconsistency in one place using italics in another knot which then creates an expectation that ends up being misleading

Dr. Craig Blomberg - The Passion Translation reads 1:11 and 12 “my dear brothers and sisters I have a serious concern I need to bring up with you”, and that sentence, “I have a serious concern I need to bring up with you”, is in italics and properly so. It continues, “for I've been informed by those of Chloe or Chloe's house church” and house church is put in italics rightly so. The Greek simply says those of Chloe and we have to interpret what that means. “That you have been destructively arguing among yourselves” so far so good. Verse 12 and “I need to bring this up because each of you is claiming loyalty to different preachers” the Greeks simply has, what I mean is, most of that is all inserted. And it is probably an accurate interpretation. Because then following the Greek accurately Simmons continues, some are saying I am a disciple of Paul, I follow or I follow Apollos or I am a disciple of Peter the rock and some say I belong only to Christ and only is put in italics correctly. And then goes on but let me ask you and that's put in italics correctly now we're into verse 13. But nothing and I need to bring this up because “each of you is claiming loyalty different preachers” does not correspond to anything in the Greek even if that is what's going on (27:29​)

Yet a good majority of what I have found is even though Aramaic is not always mentioned in the footnotes, it normally becomes the basis for these additions that are not italicized. So in Brian’s views, these are a part of the text, but because of the unwillingness of these other “scholars” or “braniacs” to use the Aramaic, that is why their text is missing out and he’s just putting it back in. This is what the majority of people who haven’t really dug into the Passion, the background, the author, his believes, the sources and even listening to a good amount of his speaking don’t always understand. Without the Aramaic, most of the Passion’s “passion” falls by the wayside and there really is not much text left. If people can begin to understand even just this, the Passion starts to make a lot more sense in the choices that are made. When I saw this, I had an “Ah ha!” sort of moment and it all started to click. I understood the basis of Simmons choices and the depth to which it goes. Because of this it doesn’t even necessarily matter if he makes a few small changes here and there to specific instances that are mentioned in these interviews or from various blog posts, websites or articles that I make. It is so pervasive that to really fix it, Simmons would and should start over completely from scratch to try and fix this pervasive issue. If he believes that God indeed has called him to make a translation, there are a lot of things that would need adjustment before he should begin again. These sorts of things would include learning Greek and Hebrew from trained professionals, taking classes and being trained in Bible Translation, Hermeneutics, Exegesis, Church History, Textual Criticism, which textual sources are reliable and should be used in translating, joining a committee of translators and teaming up with them to have things peer reviewed, edited, revised and reformulated before ever even thinking about starting to write a few more lines of a “translation”. I know that might seem harsh, but to be faithful to the most precious material things we have in this world, the Word of God, the Holy Scriptures, it would be best to put his work on hold and begin those endeavors. I think it would aid him greatly and to then start afresh as the current issues that are in the Passion are just too pervasive to root out. It is at a foundational level that the whole thing would have to be leveled to start again and I for one would encourage him to do so.

Double and Triple “Translating”

What is meant by this?

Throughout our review of the Passion, I have used the phrase “double and triple translating.” This has occurred many times, but here is a basic definition or understanding of it put so well from an article from New Life Christian Community:

“Double translation is simply taking a word that means one thing and making it mean two things. For example, “I love you,” according to the NASB is changed to, “I passionately love you and I’m bounded to you,” in the TPT”

“The addition to the text takes Simmons’ own ideas and embeds them into God’s holy Word as the inspired meaning. Basically, Simmons practices “double translation” in almost every verse in order to give his own understanding of the text.” (New Life)

This is being done so much because of the sources that Brian is using, specifically his views of Aramaic, his desire to put emotion back into the Bible that he thinks that other “scholars” and “braniacs” have taken out, the “revelation” of homonyms that God revealed to him, to create novel renderings of the text, and to infuse signs, wonders, miracles etc into the text to create a “revival” Bible. These are just some of the basic reasonings that I have found which would lead me to the “why” behind Simmons’ logic. Andrew Shead provides his ideas on why it is being done so much:

Andrew Shead - It might seem intuitively true that when a Hebrew word does not have a precise English equivalent, what is needed is to use more than one English word. But TPT demonstrates just how wrong this can be.

The whole point of meaning-based translation is that a sentence is more translatable than a word. It is context that adds the required precision of meaning, not double translation, which only serves to distance the reader from the original. 

When the Septuagint translators encountered a phrase they could not easily replicate in Greek, they often ensured that their paraphrase had the same number of words as the Hebrew – what scholars today call ‘quantitative literalism.’ The point is that every unnecessary word in a translation takes it one step further from accuracy

Simmons has produced a text so far removed from the original that it no longer counts as the Bible

And this is even before we remember TPT’s lack of interest in textual and linguistic accuracy. So frequently does TPT misrepresent or ignore the original text that one is forced to conclude that its author had little interest in representing the meaning of the original as preserved in the manuscript tradition.

 Instead he abuses ancient witnesses, pressing them into the service of his own novel ideas about what the text ought to say.

 In Nida’s words, this is not a linguistic translation; it is a cultural translation, and hence it is not a legitimate Bible. (Andrew Shead)

Shead and others who are more familiar with languages and language structure than I am, seem to have noticed some methodologies behind this double translating:

Andrew Shead - “Linguistically TPT is just as questionable. One of its most frequent techniques is to find words with more than one meaning, and create a double translation containing both of them.”

This is sometimes legitimate, since poetry in particular can play on the double meaning of words. But context must determine case by case whether word-play is intended, and Simmons clearly does not feel himself bound by this.

Take Ps 18:2, ‘my God is … the horn of my salvation’. The word קרן, meaning an animal horn, is frequently used as a metaphor of strength (e.g., Ps 75:11; 89:17; 92:10, etc.). But there is one verse where horn, because of its shape, is used to mean ‘ray of sunlight’ (Hab 3:4, where it is in parallel with ‘brightness’ and ‘light’), and Isaiah uses it once with the meaning ‘hill’, to create a rhyme (Isa 5:1)

A related verb means ‘to send out rays’, but the horn’s shape underlies all these derived meanings. Simmons ignores the core meaning of the word (strength) and creates a double translation combining all the derived meanings: ‘You are Salvation’s Ray of Brightness / Shining on the hillside’. He also makes the false claim in a footnote that the root word means ‘ray of brightness or hillside’. It means neither.

If we did not know what קרן meant, we could still make a pretty good guess from a context as strong as this. Simmons derails the verse with his fanciful misuse of the dictionary. This is a relatively minor error for Simmons, because at least the three words in question go back to a single word (‘horn’). There are many places, like Ps 117:1, ‘Praise the Lord,’ where things get worse.

Simmons’s double translation is ‘Shine with praise to Yahweh!’ A footnote claims that ‘the word for praise is taken from the word shine’. This is a basic fallacy, which falsely assumes that the Hebrew הלל = ‘shine’ must be the same word as הלל = ‘praise’, just because they look the same. It’s equivalent to translating ‘He bowed before the Queen’ as ‘He bent forward before the Queen like the front of a ship,’ because two unrelated words just happen to be spelled ‘bow’. (Andrew Shead)

Brian Simmons does this all over his text. One of the easiest places to find it is in a basic search of the words Christ in a normal Bible and then compare each of those locations to the Passion’s same verses. Normally Christ will be translated into Christ, Messiah, Anointed, Anointed One etc. Sometimes this can be beneficial, yet the majority of the time it is not and is just using additional words or phrases to say the same thing. It is an interesting thing to study out. Simmons has seemed to dial it back slightly on the latest edition of the Passion because several people have made mention of this, but it is still there.

Significant Verse Lengthening

How and why does this happen?

As we covered in the previous article about Double and Triple Translating, most standard English translations, whether word for word or meaning for meaning are going to have a pretty similar word count when everything is said and done. You can check this out for yourself. Simply pull up your most favorite chapter or verses and then count out how many words are in that specific section in your top 5 most beloved translations. Then pull up those same verses or chapter in the Passion and count them out. See how they compare.

I will do that right now. It is 7/13/21 when this part of the article is being written and I am reading the book of Acts with my children. So I will choose Acts 7, verses 13-21 to review between my top 5 translations just to be extra fair compared to the Passion. Here is the breakdown:

So again this was a randomized sampling just done today without any previous knowledge of the specific area compared between all of the different Bible translations. Here were the specific numbers: ESV 174, KJV 172, NIV 173, NASB 188, NLT 168 and TPT 230. For all other Bible translations besides the TPT, the overall average was 175 words used to convey the verses of Acts 7:13-21. Yet the Passion has 55 extra words within that one section. That is almost 24% longer than nearly all of the other translations. Those extra 55 words could possibly not change the overall context much, or it could greatly change specific meanings or the whole chapter. That depends on what those 55 specific extra words are. Even counting up the amount of Greek words used in these few chapters comes to about 150 words. So even comparing then the Passion to the Greek, the Passion then becomes an extra 80 words and about an extra 35% longer.

I had initially heard that the Passion was just longer as a whole, especially in certain verses. An article from Christian Patriot Daily states the following:

“One of the main issues that biblical scholars and theologians have with this particular version, is that its sole creator, Brian Simmons, seems to have changed some of the text to what he wants it to say, rather than securing its literal meaning. In doing so, Simmons has added new material that makes some passages of Scripture at least 50% longer than the original.” (Christian Patriot Daily)

I had even heard of this from the article review of Andrew Shead when he reviewed the Psalms

He achieves this (reintroducing passion and fire to English Bible readers) by abandoning all interest in textual accuracy, playing fast and loose with the original languages, and inserting so much new material into the text that it is at least 50% longer than the original. The result is a strongly sectarian translation that no longer counts as Scripture; by masquerading as a Bible it threatens to bind entire churches in thrall to a false god. (Andrew Shead)

I thought, no this really cannot be the case. There is no way that a text could really be that much longer, especially when it states that it should be used as a primary source for serious study in both churches and at home. I mean I know that the Amplified can be and is longer than most standard translations, but it specifically markets itself as amplifying certain key words and then brackets those so the reader is well aware and is normally used as a supplementary Bible, used to compare between translations (at least that has always been my impression of it, so I could be wrong). Yet the Passion is vastly different.

So I endeavored to do something that I didn’t see anyone else doing. And that was to literally go through the top 3 translations of ESV, NIV and KJV and count up the quantity of words used not only per chapter, but per book, find the average of those and then compare that to the Passion. That way there would be a somewhat stable basis of an average English translation compared to the Passion, which claims to be the same sort of thing, yet the statistics really bare that claim to be 100% false.

Looking into the numbers background

I am not going to lie, this took me quite some time and was utterly grueling to do. I don’t really recommend it. But I did it so that others wouldn’t have to. I have had one other person who was able to check my work and did spot some slight differences which I have since corrected or were so close it wasn’t worth it for a small number change (within about 100 or less), (big shout out to Christian Sommer, thanks for all of your hard work!!!).

The main way that I did it was to go through and use a basic Bible software program like Bible Gateway, copy and paste the verses of just the plain text (without verse numbers, headers, footers, cross-references etc) into a Word document file, and do that for each chapter. I would then go through and write down the quantity of that chapter for each translation (ESV 2016, KVJ, NIV 2011 as those are the versions Bible Gateway has on their site, I am not familiar if they have been updated as well somewhere, but that is the base of what I am going off because the Passion Translation is powered by Bible Gateway, so using a similar source seemed like a good idea). Then I go back and add them all up to see what the cumulative quantity of words used per book would be for each translation. For the areas like Psalms, I tried to start after what his headers would show where it starts at things like “For the Pure and Shining One” (as that was not the song titles that were still in the text, that was who they were being addressed to like other translations, just slightly different) along with the song instruction information. I would do this so long as there would be something “similar” in the ESV, NIV or KJV, if it wasn’t in one, then I wouldn’t put that information in my number tally. I tried to remain consistent with that to make sure that I was getting the same numbers as previous times. Then I would add up the three standard translations, divide that number by 3 to get the average of what a basic English translation would be and see the difference between that number and the Passion. Did they match up, were they different, if they were different how much so etc?

I had done this about 2 years ago or so and since then Simmons has updated his translation. So it has forced me to go back and recalculate my numbers (ughhhh, but again thanks Christian for helping me double check my work :) you are awesome!). Yet, I have retained my original numbers in this Google Spreadsheet that anyone can access. You can compare the previous information to the updated ones and see how much Simmons has changed his work from one edition to another. I most likely will not be constantly checking to see if the numbers from the ESV, KJV or NIV are being updated as I am not aware of new versions of those that have come out. People are more than welcome to check my math on things as I can make errors doing it, but tried to put each of the chapters numbers to help show my work. If people find there are specific parts of my numbers are wrong I am more than willing to update, feel free to send me the updated information via a Spreadsheet with what I have (for any version) and what you find and I can update. I again used Bible Gateway and used the page options to removed cross references, footnotes, verse numbers and heading.

I have not yet decided if I am willing to do this for each new addition that comes out, but it would be interesting to see the data comparisons on a macro level and which specific areas he drastically changed, which ones he added too, which ones he took away and then on the micro level what those changes were and where they might have stemmed from. If there are people who are wanting to do something like that let me know and I would love to partner with you on it (I just don’t have the time to invest in that currently)!!

One last thing. I am not a mathematician. I was horrible at math as a kid growing up, it was my least favorite subject. There might be some errors within my calculations. I tried the best that I could to double and triple check my work to make sure that my results were accurate (from the counting up the words per chapter/book per translation, to the averaging of the standard Bibles, to finding the difference between the Passion and the general averages). That is part of the reason this sort of stuff takes so long and is so terrible to do. If I am wrong in anything, I am more than willing to change the results if it can be shown where I am in error. I am personally fine with a difference +/- a percent or two, or even from the overall total about 100 or so from the overall grand totals per book, as I know I am human and can make mistakes. As a whole though, the data will reflect how distorted the Passion is, even if I am a percentage or few numbers off here and there. But I never want to intentionally falsify data or results. I try to give credit where credit is due for Simmons in my below reviews and say where I think he drastically needs work. I attempt to be as fair, objective and balanced as I can be.

The Results

2020 Passion Update

Below is a basic breakdown of the Google Spreadsheet - Passion 2021 Word Count that I have created. It shows for each individual book what the quantity of words used per book are (see the spreadsheet if you want the chapter by chapter breakdown). These are the most up to date numbers that I am aware of and should give a good breakdown for people to look into. As you can see just by taking a quick look at the picture below, the Passion is almost always higher than any other of the 3 standard translations. On average, out of the ESV, KJV and NIV, almost every time that there is a spot that the Passion has less words than another translation it is normally the KJV.

There are a few times that there is another translation that is higher, strangely its normally the KJV and its found in Isaiah and Revelation. But for the Passion almost every chapter, with exception of the ones below, are higher than the other 3 translations, but I want to be as open as possible pointing out times that the Passion does not exceed the other translations. (Isa 2, 3, 4, 7, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 23, 24, 26, 27, 28, 30, 31, 34, 35, 36, 55, 60, Acts 1 KJV, Rev 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16, 18, 19, 20, 21). Normally the Passion is higher than the other 3 translations, especially the ESV and NIV. There is a total of 40 chapters out of the 515 chapters Simmons has done thus far that has a higher quantity of words than another translation, but it is usually just 1 translation the KJV that is slightly higher the overwhelming majority of cases. That is roughly 7.77% of the time that another translation has a higher amount of words in a chapter than the Passion, but again normally not by much.

Over all of the Passion, with the exception of the chapters mentioned above, it is exceptionally higher and accumulates to greater quantitative differences compared to the other translations. Even compared to the KJV (the highest quantity of words in the 3 translations), it is roughly 55,555 extra words compared to that, or to the average of all 3, it is at least 61,131 extra words. Out of the lowest of all three translations (the NIV), it is about an extra 64,995 words. And even compared to the ESV, it is roughly an extra 62,818 words.

Let me repeat that, 61,131 (give or take if my numbers are off even slightly). That means that there is enough extra words in the Passion “Translation” to have at least an extra book of Psalms, Song of Songs and about half of 2nd John than the average of these 3 other standard translations. That is wild! Enough extra material to have a whole additional book of Psalms, Song of Songs and a bit of 2nd John into the average and then you would be up to the amount of extra words the Passion has.

Take just a few moments and look at the numbers breakdown.

Those numbers become quite alarming when you think about it. There is so much extra information in there that it can completely change not only a specific verse, depending on the content and word choices being used, but it can also then change around the subject of that verse (as we discussed previously), it can also change around whole chapters as well. How can that not change things for a “translation” that is supposed to be used as a primary Bible? When I had first discovered this, it became dumbfounding. Here are a few facts that I have uncovered through this

• Highest total extra words compared to the average is Psalms roughly an extra 13,577, then Luke at 5971 extra, then Proverbs at 4584 extra, then Matthew at 4098 extra, then Romans 3929 extra for the top 5

• Lowest total extra words compared to the average is 2nd John at 77, Philemon at 79, 3 John at 98, 2nd Thessalonians at 150, Jude at 196

• Highest average for extra words per chapter is Luke with 248 extra when compared to the average, Romans at 245 extra words on average per chapter, Colossians at 233 extra words on average per chapter, then Ephesians at 224 extra words on average per chapter, and Philippians at 203 extra words on average per chapter for the top 5

• Lowest average for extra words per chapter are Revelation at 17, Isaiah at 31, 2nd Thessalonians at 50, Titus at 75, 2nd John at 77 for the top 5

Now this is exemplified on a much larger scale. There are so many additions that there is over half of Simmons “translation” that has at least 100+ extra words per chapter compared to the average of the three translations. In fact 53.6% of all of the Passion’s 515 chapters that have been “translated” thus far have at least 100+ extra words per chapter. 53.6%….. Here is the full breakdown:

• 300+ extra words per chapter 24 Chapters of the Passion or 4.7% - (4.7% - 24 of 515 chapters)

  • Ps 119, Song 5, Matt 26, Mark 14, Luke 1, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 22, John 8, Acts 7, Rom 1, 3, 8, 16, 1 Cor 1, Gal 3, 4, 5, Col 2, Heb 11, 12

• 200+ extra words per chapter 62 chapters of the Passion plus the 24 of the 300+ is 17% - (17% - 86 of 515 chapters)

  • Ps 18, 31, 37, 68, 78, 89, Prov 1, 3, 8, 10, Song 2, 4, Matt 22, 23, 24, 25, Mark 12, 15, Luke 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 23, John 1, 5, 7, 9, 10, 12, Acts 14, Rom 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 12, 15, 1 Co 3, 15, 2 Cor 1, Gal 1, 2, 4, Eph 1, 2, 4, 5, Phil 1, 2, Col 1, 2, 3, 1 Tim 1, 2 Tim 2, 3, Heb 10, Jam 1, 1 Pet 1

• 100+ extra words per chapter 190 chapters of the Passion plus the 62 of 200+ and the 24 of the 300+ or 53.6% - (53.6% - 276 of 515 chapters)

  • Ps 5, 7, 19, 22, 25, 32, 33, 34, 35, 39, 40, 41, 42, 44, 45, 47, 49, 50, 51, 55, 56, 57, 59, 60, 62, 66, 69, 71, 73, 74, 77, 80, 81, 84, 86, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 94, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 118, 139, 145, Prov 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 23, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, Song 1, 6, 8, Isa 1, Matt 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, Mark 1, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 15, Luke 2, 4, 5, 13, 21, 24, John 2, 3, 4, 6, 11, 13, 14, 16, 17, 18, Acts 2, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 24, Rom 10, 11, 13, 14, 1 Cor 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 2 Cor 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, Gal 6, Eph 3, 6, Phil 3, 4, Col 4, 1 Tim 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 2 Tim 1, 4, Heb 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 13, Jam 2, 3, 4, 5, 1 Pet 2, 5, 2 Pet 1, 2, 1 John 2, 3, 4, Jude 1, Rev 2, 

I will let those numbers sink in for a few moments by recapping all of those numbers that I put above in a simple form.

Half of his “translation” has over 100 extra words per chapter. THAT IS CRAZY. That in no way, shape or form would be conducive to say that it is like any other standard translation. Even how there are parts that have over 300+ extra words, that is ridiculous.

• Psalm 119 has an extra 714 words than the average of ESV, KJV and ESV (719 extra from ESV, 682 from KJV and 739 from NIV). WHAT!?!?!

• Song of Songs 5 has an extra 427 words than the average

• Matthew 26 has an extra 323 words than the average

• Mark 14 has an extra 336 words than the average

• Luke 1 has an extra 300 words than the average

• Luke 6 has an extra 322 words than the average

• Luke 7 has an extra 375 words than the average

• Luke 8 has an extra 335 words than the average

• Luke 9 has an extra 404 words than the average

• Luke 10 has an extra 350 words than the average

• Luke 11 has an extra 336 words than the average

• Luke 12 has an extra 320 words than the average

• Luke 22 has an extra 374 words than the average

• John 8 has an extra 355 words than the average

• Acts 7 has an extra 310 words than the average

• Romans 1 has an extra 320 words than the average

• Romans 3 has an extra 327 words than the average

• Romans 8 has an extra 441 words than the average

• Romans 16 has an extra 319 words than the average

• 1 Corinthians 1 has an extra 327 words than the average

• Galatians 3 has an extra 337 words than the average

• Galatians 5 has an extra 367 words than the average

• Hebrews 11 has an extra 346 words than the average

• Hebrews 12 has an extra 309 words than the average

Another interesting fact is that out of the 31 books that Simmons has translated thus far, 30 out of the 31 of each Bible books chapter 1 is higher than the ESV, KJV, and NIV.

With all of this I will say though, that the latest books that Simmons has done, Isaiah and Revelation do have some of the lower overall quantities of extra words added per chapter though, so it seems like he has started to make a few steps in the right direction.

I am sure there are a lot of other statistics that could be mentioned, but for now I think that gives a good starting basis for people to start thinking about and how absolutely out of proportion the Passion is and aberrant from quantity statistics.

Comparing 2020 vs 2016

One thing that I have seen right away in looking between the two versions (2020 update and the 2016 update), is that Simmons has gone through and started to remove words. That could be a good thing, but it also be that he has removed certain words but added others in their stead (a thorough look through would be needed for each place there are these removals to see what was removed). Eventually we will get to specific key words that Simmons uses but here is the basic rundown of takeaways doing this. Most of the books in which he does this, it really is not that substantive. From what I can tell between the two editions, there have been roughly 3388 words taken out of the Passion (just roughly an extra 61,127 words to go to make it closer to a standard translation).

Yet there are a few books where there is a much higher percentage of removal of words than others (See the link for specifics, but the Book of Galatians is a major one). Thus far the changes that I have found are:

• Psalms takes out 1,025 words (a little under 7 words per chapter removed),

• Luke takes out 626 words (around average of 26 words per chapter removed),

• Matthew 486 (around average of 17 words per chapter removed),

• Galatians 415 words (around average of 104 words per chapter removed),

• Song of Songs 215 (around average of 27 words per chapter),

• John 191 (around average of 9 words per chapter),

• Mark 179 (around average of 11 words per chapter),

• Romans 82 (around average of 5 words per chapter).

Feel free to take a look at the sheet breakdown to see the differences between the two. Here is the link for the 2019 version that I had started if people want to compare. I don’t believe that the ESV or NIV have had an update since then so their quantities would not have changed, only the Passion’s numbers have changed.

Google Spreadsheet - 2019 Passion Word Count

When I had done my initial review of the earlier version in about 2018 or 2019, I had even tried to give Simmons a bit of the benefit of the doubt and tried to compare the Passion to the highest available option between the three translations instead of the average of all three. If someone would want to do what I had done above with each of the comparisons and the average but doing it for the 2019 word count I had done feel free to and let me know (I just don’t have the time to do it right now).

Here were my results from then when I had done it to the highest possible option, comparing the Passion between the ESV, KJV and NIV

• Passion translation most extra total words in a chapter is Ps 119, 687 extra words

• Highest total extra words is Psalms at 13 - 943 extra words, then Luke 5 - 572, then Prov 4 -240, Then Matt 3 - 866, Then Romans 3 - 728

• Highest average extra words/chapter 1) Galatians 247, 2) Romans 233, 3) Luke 232

• Lowest average extra words/chapter 1) Revelation 1, 2) Isaiah 8.4, 3) 2 Thes 36

• Lowest total extra words Isa 555, 1 Pet 562, 1 John 477, 2 Pet 361, 1 Thes 304 Jude 185, Titus 169, 2 Thes 107, 3 John 81, 2 John 66, Phile 57, Rev 31

• Average words extra per first chapter is 149.9

  • Seems strange that every book, minus Acts, has the first chapter where there is a decent amount extra added

• Before Isaiah was just released, that was only 16 chapter that were shorter in Passion (3.1%), but with now, it is roughly 7.8% of all the Passion The amount less though on average is 30.1 words difference

Overall Conclusion

Thing that shocked me is that the 2 latest chapters written in the Passion have the lowest amount of extra words added, Revelation and Isaiah. Overall that doesn’t mean that it is still accurate, just not as much overall that is significantly extra, quantity wise in both Isaiah and Revelation, there are other translations that have more words per section that beat out Passion Translation. So it could be that he actually is now trying to lessen the amount of double and triple translating of words, sentences and whole chapters.

When over half (53.6%) of the "translation" has over 100+ words per chapter, 17% has over 200+ words and 4.7% has over 300+ words per chapter how can there not be doctrine, theology, context and theme changes?

That again is not looking at the actual words used in those places yet, just looking at the raw data/quantity of words used between the top other 3 translations. In another section that is going to be coming up, we will look at 100 popular buzz words chosen at random which are heavily used in the New Apostolic Reformation and compare that between 9 other of the most popular translations to see where the Passion lands and if it then shifts into a sectarian translation.

Thus far, in just the word count alone compared to the three most popular level translations, the Passion is categorically different and would have more changes than even something like Jehovah’s Witnesses New World Translation. Though they focus on changing important major sections that focus on key doctrines and theology, such as the deity of Christ, the Passion might not do that, but there is such a substantial amount of quantitative additions that it creates more differences at such a higher degree of occurrences than the New World Translation.

Creates Alterations to the text

Alterations
An alteration can come in many different forms and styles. Within the Passion that definitely occurs quite often. Whether it be alterations such as styles of writing from things such as metaphor into a simile, changing to things like abstract instead of them being more concrete or even taking out different parts that are supposed to be historical. Andrew Shead explains this giving a set example:

Andrew Shead - Some types of change are very frequent, such as the conversion of [a] speech about God or others into speech to God (nine times in the psalm); [b] metaphor into simile (once); [c] concrete images into more abstract ones (about ten times, including the elimination of feet, deer, path, bow, rock, shield); and [d] the removal of historical references (including the removal of about half the references to enemies and nations). 

Many English versions occasionally replace concrete images with more abstract explanations [c], according to their translational goals. However, the other categories are harder to defend. For example, in v. 28 the expression ‘keep my lamp burning’ refers to the preservation of the psalmist’s life (cf. Prov 13:9; 20:20, 27), and specifically to the preservation of the king’s life and therefore the life of the nation (compare 2 Sam 21:17 with 22:29).

But Simmons lifts the image from its historical context and turns it into one of illumination: ‘you turned on a floodlight for me!’ Shifts from external events to internal states occur frequently in his translation. (Andrew Shead)

One of the scholars that Mike Winger had hired to do a review of the Passion, Dr. Craig Blomberg had seen this sort of thing occurring quite frequently. He had written specifically about this within his paper, mentioning both the use of different words or missing words/phrases. He gives examples of that for his review of 1 Corinthians:

There are some stock renderings throughout the letter.

- Apparently, whenever “Christ” is deemed to be titular, it is translated as “Anointed One” (e.g., 1:1, 2, 7, 9, 17, etc.).

- When Peter is called “Cephas,” “Peter the Rock” is inserted (1:12, 3:22, 9:5, 15:5).

 - The temple is usually transformed into something even more poignant— “the inner sanctuary” (3:16, 17 [2X]) or “the sacred temple” (6:19; cf. 9:13).

- Most of TPT uses gender-inclusive language for human beings, but occasionally, TPT reverts to a generic “he” or “his” for no obvious reason. 

- Sometimes, one is surprised that a mysterious phrase is not paraphrased (e.g., “flesh and blood” in 15:50).

- On at least one occasion, an entire clause appears to be missing: in 10:25, there is nothing corresponding to “that is sold in the marketplace” after the permission to eat anything.

- There is one flat-out grammatical error of the kind one does not expect to see in a “Bible,” when the bulk of 7:9 declares, “The urgency of our times mean that from now on, those who have wives should live as those without them” (italics mine). But the correct wording should have been, “The urgency of our times means that. . .” (italics mine).

- In 7:20, we might chalk up “everyone should continue to live faithful in the situation of life in which they were called to follow Jesus,” to a colloquialism, but it really ought to be “live faithfully in the situation.”

- The end of 2:9 sounds too sexually charged with, “these are the many things God has in store for all his lovers” (though it is not nearly as bad as calling Jacob, Simmons’ name for James, in Jas. 1:1 God’s “love-slave”!).

- The rendering of 7:18 (“it would be futile to try to undo the circumcision”) makes it sound like Simmons is unaware of the Roman surgical procedure known as epispasm, which through skin grafts did indeed reverse circumcision.

- “Even if you can gain your freedom, make the most of the opportunity,” in 7:21b, sounds like a reversion to the older, now debunked translation that Christian slaves should not try to gain their freedom, even if they have the chance. 

- The rendering of 7:36 is particularly confused, making Paul’s example to be about a man committed to celibacy who changes his mind (“if a man has decided to serve God as a single person, yet changes his mind and finds himself in love with a woman, although he never intended to marry”), while in verse 38, the man already has a fiancée. And, of course, finding oneself in love is a very anachronistic modern concept and reason for marriage. More examples of both good and bad paraphrases could be offered. (Dr. Blomberg's Paper)

Dr. Blomberg though wasn’t the only one who had seen this occur. Dr. Nijay Gupta brought this up as well during his interview with Mike Winger, stating that there are even redefinitions of words that occur within the passion as well:

Dr. Nijay Gupta - A big part was inconsistency. Sometimes he will use brother and sister language. Sometimes he uses friends when the scripture uses brothers and sisters. He does weird things like converting a rhetorical question into an indicative statement as he does in 1:10.

One thing i thought was real strange was he keeps referring to things like legalism and the doctrines of Judaism and the Jewish religion. I find that kind strange as if Paul’s current experience was not religion, which would be hard to prove 

Mike Winger - Passion translation adds the word religion a great number of times where other translations just don't have that word, it's just added into the text. Every time and i looked up a bunch of them. Every time it's in a very negative connotation it's a bad word. But in James where it says that religion that God likes, you know is approved by God. He changes that and he won't put the word religion there, even though he translates that same word as religion in the verses prior. In other words he has added a bunch of negative connotations with the word religion. He’s removed the one which should most obviously be a positive connotation with the word religion and this is just to confirm what you are suggesting here. “He adds religious to this like it's a negative thing”. This is pervasive and this is his preaching points put in the text

Dr. Nijay Gupta - This idea that legalism and the problem is legalism that's kind of a modern imposition. The issue is a little more delicate than that so i felt like that is really really forced. His use of faith language is kind of all across the map and it was unclear. Sometimes it's human faith, sometimes it's the faithfulness of the messiah.  (39:55)

Andrew Shead also provides various examples of where Simmons goes through and creates sand alone additions to the text of the book of Psalms, over and over again. Sometimes it just few words, a phrase or even for some reason he decides to hyphenate things

Andrew Shead - Sometimes he creatively alters the Hebrew (underlined below); elsewhere he creates stand-alone additions, or attaches them by hyphen to a word in the text. They mostly fall into two categories (1) ‘Spiritual’ images, especially of light, height and mystery, designed to inspire feelings of awe and worship; all but the words in [brackets] have no counterpart in the Hebrew: Ray of brightness … shining (v. 2), singing (v. 3), spirit (v. 4), burning (v. 7), spirit-[wind] (v. 10), mystery-[darkness] (v. 11), blessing … treasure (v. 24), all at once … floodlight (v. 28), revelation … brightness (v. 28), worship (v. 31), ascend … [peaks of] your glory (v. 33), [warfare]-worship (v. 34), power within (v. 35), conquers all … lifted high … towering over all (v. 46), with high praises … highest [God] (v. 49), magnificent miracles (v. 50)

Again, added vocabulary of physical and emotional intimacy is ubiquitous in the book, as evidenced in the frequent description of God’s people as his ‘lovers’. This is Simmons’s regular gloss for the Hebrew חסידים, which means ‘faithful ones’, or ‘godly ones’, but definitely not ‘lovers’. And he even uses it to translate words as neutral as ‘people’, e.g., Ps 95:7, where ‘we are the people of his pasture’ becomes ‘we are the lovers he cares for.’ (Andrew Shead)

Yet it is not just additions that go through and change the text. There are plenty of examples throughout all of the Passion that can be provided for omission as well. These can create alterations in the text as well. Some ear easier to see than others. Andrew Shead also gives us a breakdown with Psalms of this occurring and some possible reasons of why.

Andrew Shead - Omission is rare, and mostly consists of the repeated words and phrases that characterize Hebrew parallelism. Clearly Simmons’s preferred style is not that of the Hebrew poets, who build argument through the juxtaposition of parallel ideas:

‘The cords of the grave coiled around me’ (v. 5) is omitted following a very similar line in v. 4; ‘I cried out’ (v. 6b) is omitted following ‘I called’ (v. 6a). Eight more omissions follow in the rest of the psalm, mostly of verbs or noun clauses repeated in parallel lines.

Even the historical psalms in TPT, such as Psalm 106, tend to make historical people and places less prominent, though the majority of them are retained.

Thus there are no tents in TPT 106:25, no Canaan in 106:38, etc. On the other hand, references to pagan gods are intensified: ‘works of darkness’, ‘serve their gods’, ‘demon spirits’, ‘dark practices’, ‘murder and bloodshed’ are all additions to the original text of Ps 106:34–39. (Andrew Shead)

Dramatic Alteration (possible meaning shift)

Again Andrew Shead provides plenty of examples in just the text of Psalms to show how these alterations can shift the course of the text into something that it never was nor should be. In these specific cases he shows how there are different meanings that happen because of Simmons changes and also how there could be possible theological changes as well:

Andrew Shead - The most radical cases of alteration involve the complete rewriting of a line or couplet, often resulting in a different meaning (e.g., the rewriting of Ps 18:25 as ‘Lord, it is clear to me now that how we live / Will dictate how you deal with us’, as the first element of the verse’s double translation).

Twenty times in the first twenty psalms the justification ‘implied in the text/context’ is added in a footnote, but the great majority of alterations and additions are unmarked.

In Psalm 13, for example, the four verses of lament are fairly modestly treated, but the final two verses of praise are more than doubled in bulk, changing the meaning of the whole psalm in the process. They do this first, by making David’s rejoicing something he will do conditionally on being rescued; second, by identifying God’s goodness to David with the therapeutic benefits of his suffering; and third, by the invention of two entire lines at the end that make the theme of the psalm the triumph of David’s confidence in the face of his enemies’ skepticism. Here is TPT vv. 5–6, with additions underlined and alterations in italics:

5 Lord, I have always trusted in your kindness,

So answer me, [Note: implied in the text]

I will yet celebrate with passion and joy

When your salvation lifts me up.

6 I will sing my song of joy to you, the Most High,

For in all of this you have strengthened my soul.

My enemies say that I have no Savior,

But I know that I have one in you! (Andrew Shead)

Shead notes some possible theological changes that can happen then:

Andrew Shead - Finally, while most alterations have theological implications, sometimes theology seems to be the driving factor, serving either to advance the author’s favorite themes or to bring potentially problematic statements into his theological comfort zone. I will mention three broad types of theological alteration that pervade the translation.

(1) Changes aimed at explaining Christology, e.g., TPT Ps 22:31b, ‘And they will all declare, “It is finished!”’; TPT Ps 110:1, ‘Jehovah-God said to my Lord, the Messiah’. These changes can become perilous. The softening in TPT of Ps 22:1 – ‘Why would you abandon me now?’ – is explained by an addition to the biblical text in v. 24: ‘He was there all the time.’

(2) Changes that seek to soften extreme statements that modern readers find uncomfortable, such as the psalmist’s claims to be righteous. Here are examples from Psalm 18, NIV (or ESV) → TPT:

examples

I have kept the ways of the Lord → I will follow his commands (v. 21)

I am not guilty → I’ll not sin (v. 21)

I have been blameless → I’ve done my best to be blameless (v. 23)

[I] have kept myself from sin → keeping my heart pure (v. 23)

God … made my way blameless (ESV) → you’ve shared with me your perfection (v. 32)

Violent or unforgiving language is also toned down, whether by completely changing the meaning (e.g., TPT Ps 23:5, ‘You become my delicious feast / Even when my enemies dare to fight’), or by spiritualizing and blunting the force of the original (e.g., Ps 137:9, ‘Great honor will come to those / Who destroy you and your future, / By smashing your infants / Against the rubble of your own destruction’).

(3) Most troubling are changes that tamper with statements about God, whether it be his attitude towards sin (e.g., TPT Ps 51:4, ‘Everything I did, I did right in front of you’); judgment (e.g., TPT Ps 18:27, ‘The haughty you disregard’); or death (e.g., TPT Ps 88:5, ‘They’re convinced you’ve forsaken me, / Certain that you’ve forgotten me completely—/ Abandoned, pierced, with nothing / To look forward to but death’). Sometimes even God’s own character is impugned, e.g., TPT Ps 106:23, 26, ‘So you were fed up and decided to destroy them … so you gave up and swore to them’. (Andrew Shead)

There are of course many other examples that can be made. All that would be required is a careful investigation of a persons favorite book, chapter or sometimes verses. Just reading them, comparing them to the Greek or Hebrew, if someone is able to, or even just a few other translations helps a person to see these changes. Taking the text by itself or if someone is unfamiliar with the text as a whole it is easy to miss these sorts of alterations. Yet a good solid understanding or comprehension of a certain passage, the context of it, the history, even knowing the original language can aid a person in spotting these alterations that might normally go unnoticed.

Creates a Moving Target

In theory its a great thing

Why would someone not like it if there are changes being made to the Passion? This at first might seem slightly strange. Simmons seems to be doing what the critics of his text are wanting, making changes. He states during an interview:

“I asked the Lord once, “Why are there so many critics?” And he said because they will make me a better man and a better translator. So I’ve done my best to listen to the critics. I’ve made hundreds of changes in the text over the last eight years. We plan on revising the work every two or three years and put out a new edition.  (Brian Simmons - Premier Christianity)

Simmons does seem committed to making his text better, which I can commend. He does appear to have a willingness to listen to some of his critics and take their feedback and implement changes based upon that. That is good. Yet there is still a lot going on under the surface it seems, but I don’t want to provide just speculation, I would like to provide examples and evidence.

Throughout all of the other articles, I have been pointing out various issues, things that need changing, correction, to be taken out, things put back in. And yet in a sense if Simmons does this it creates a slight issue. In theory its a great thing, why wouldn’t you want to improve the Passion from the feedback given?

Well one major issue is that when he does this, it creates what some might call a moving target, taking the “worst” offending parts that are so obvious they are wrong and then changing them which seems to improve the text. As soon as someone or multiple people point out the issues and it gets enough coverage, Simmons is able to swoop in, make the “changes” to make it more agreeable, which then makes it appear as if the argument that people have made regarding that verse or issue is invalid or negates the points they made, thus taking away any power within what they are saying. Yet even though that one issue might be gone in one sense, there are still other possible issues from the changes made and he doesn’t really explain why he has done that. Especially when he states in various places that these are “revelations” or “downloads” that he received from God, it is peculiar that he would make changes to those things which God revealed.

If he really is receiving these downloads or revelations from God directly, why would he need to make changes in the face of opposition, criticism or people coming against it? Would Paul have made changes to Ephesians if he would have received push back or feedback from critics? This again points back to why would you work as a solo “translator” and not include lots of people in the process like a standard translation does? A lot of those early issues that people continue to point out would have gotten weeded out in the editing and reviewing process. And with its popularity, why would you not use actual scholars who are trained in the various fields who are experts to help you make your “translation” significantly better?!?

If for instance either myself or another individual points out a specific verse that is in major error and then Simmons sees that, comes along and changes that one verse, someone could say, “See he made it better, he addressed the issue and now its good to go.” The only thing with that is that there are not just a handful of problems within the text. Some things are so much easier to spot, so blatantly obvious and have been pointed out multiple times by multiple people that it has forced Simmons to change things. It is so ingrained into every part of it, that there would need to be a complete over hall. If one verse is changed, there are still 10’s to 100’s of adjustments that still need to occur in that chapter alone, let alone the whole book. Simmons states that he has made hundreds of changes to the text, but what is needed is a complete overall. Hundreds don’t address the underlying issues. What is needed is thousands of changes if not a complete rework from the ground up, starting over completely would be advisable in almost every area.

One of the tactics that Simmons has used on multiple occasions is to either shift the focus to something else trying to negate or minimize the original discussion topic, creating a red herring or creating a strawman. This can be best seen in the exchange between Holly Pivec, who had offered some criticisms of Simmons text, pointing out specifics on her review on Amazon of the Passion. Simmons then had responded to her in an exchange, but has since deleted it. Holly also breaks it down a bit more in her article seen here Apostle Brian Simmons--the 'Purple Haze Tactic' — Holly Pivec. Simmons had written back to her stating:

Simmons - 2. My critics are valuable to me as I translate, because of this, I’ve revised the translation because of Holly’s objections. I believe it will make the text more clear and readable to those who resist the “prophetic” ministry of today which is taught throughout the N.T. Thanks Holly. I invite further questions or objections, they make me a better translator.

Before I present Holly’s response to this, which I think is fantastic, let me point out a few things. There is nothing within her original post about how she is in significant “opposition” to the “prophetic ministry of today which is taught throughout the New Testament.” All that she had done in her initial post is say that there are additions to the text which do not appear in the text nor any manuscripts of the New Testament which could support the usage of things such as prophetic singing, transference of anointing, or apostolic decrees. Those words are not used in any manuscript and are instead smuggled into the text via earlier versions of the Passion. They since have been removed because Simmons has received such push back (rightly so) from people who believe in continuationism and also people who believe in cessationism. The reason that so many bring it up, from both camps, is that it is just not in any manuscripts and is instead imported because of the presuppositions and eisegesis of Simmons.

Holly goes through and responds to Simmons’ and states:

I applaud Simmons for being open to correction. But I ask him directly: Mr. Simmons, what changes did you make exactly and to which specific verses? As a matter of transparency, it is important for you to be specific--and not vague--about the changes you made in your translation and the reasoning for those changes. And I hope that your reasoning was not based solely on my critique, but that you actually consulted New Testament scholars. I am also concerned about Simmons' statement that the revisions will make the text "more clear and readable to those who resist the `prophetic' ministry of today." I believe Simmons included this statement for two main reasons. The first reason is to suggest that my concerns about his translation are based merely on a bias against NAR teachings about "prophetic" ministry and, thus, are not legitimate concerns. In other words, he is using NAR insider language to insinuate that his supporters should not listen to me because I am resistant to "prophetic" ministry. This is a sleight-of-hand maneuver, which Simmons appears to have done in an attempt to get people to ignore the serious critiques I raised about his translation. The second reason is to assure his NAR supporters that he did not make any substantial changes to his translation, but only reworded it so that the "prophetic" teachings would be more palatable to his critics. In short, Simmons does not admit that his original translation was inaccurate--only that it needed to be reworded so it would be "more clear and readable to those who resist the `prophetic' ministry of today."

In essence, Pivec brings up that fact that Simmons uses these styles of tactics to skirt around the issue and is essentially telling his “followers” to not trust feedback given by someone because they oppose his or other peoples giftings and belief in signs, wonders, miracles, the prophetic or even the 5 fold ministry. Whether that is intentional or not, that is the end result. Rather than address the argument that Holly had made or the logic behind it, she and others like her are branded as “bad” because they challenge the “authority” of either the apostolic ministry or the prophetic, which Holly didn’t do. She simply pointed out that the text was reworded to include things that simply aren’t there.

An Idea
One of the things that I had thought of, others probably had this idea as well, for Simmons or any other person who is producing a Bible, was to have either a list

Biblical

“Bible Verses

• Bullet points