Friday, February 3, 2012
Bombshell: Wycliffe insiders admit allah used in Bible translations as "cultural bridge"
Verified sources within Wycliffe have contacted The Daily Jot confirming that Wycliffe has replaced God the Father with allah in many Arabic translations of the Bible and Bible resources. The sources, who took great care to remain unidentified due to fears of harsh retribution, collectively are "torn as to what they should do. Do they stay and try to stand for right or resign in protest?" One source summed up the situation, writing, "many of the intellectuals in Wycliffe are convinced that this is just cultural bridge building and Western Christians are not sophisticated enough to understand what they do. Therefore, they are keeping it as secret as possible."

Missionaries from around the world have confirmed that Wycliffe has indeed replaced God the Father with allah in many translations. Most are thankful for the Jot exposing the error. Some have been been critical, nonetheless, they confirmed that allah is used instead of God the Father. One wrote: "I am sorry to say that you haven't a clue of what you speak. Had you asked anyone with even the faintest familiarity with the millions of Arab Christians...you would have discovered that Allah is the word used in every Arabic Bible translation ever produced; and that millions of Arab Christians pour out their hearts in worship and intercession to Allah, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." It's worse than we thought!

Pastors in Turkey are urging that a new translation replacing God the Father and Son of God with Muslim-friendly words is "a very, very, very serious error and mistranslation." A missionary there said: "This is a big controversy here in Turkey. All the Turkish pastors oppose this new translation. They have asked Frontiers to not distribute this book in Turkey, but Frontiers refused. They refused to stop working on it. This is very arrogant. This is being done to "reach" Muslims. We should preach the Gospel to Muslims in power with signs following' using the example of the Apostle Paul. This method works and is scriptural." One missionary said Wycliffe reps fought to leave out some 100 verses of another translation.

2 Peter 2:1 says, "But there were false prophets also among the people, even as there shall be false teachers among you, who privily shall bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them, and bring upon themselves swift destruction." Multiple independent sources confirm that Wycliffe leadership believes it knows best about how to translate the Bible and how to treat the Muslim issue regarding the Holy Scriptures. Even some missionaries are convinced that using allah for YHVH is the right thing to do. There has been a tremendous compromise of the Word of God.

One proponent of changing names of God to Muslim friendly terms told World Magazine in a May 2011 article, "On the day of judgment, will those who might have heard and believed the Gospel stand up to accuse such Christians of hindering their salvation? Only God knows." I would be among the last to knowingly hinder someone's true salvation, but I hope to be counted as among the first to stand for the Word of God, which includes that allah is not YHWH.

End Note: This has been a very eye-opening week covering this story. It has been a "shoot the messenger" week. The personal attacks are very interesting. They range from not having standing to write about the issue because I do not bring the gospel to millions of people as does Wycliffe; another is that this is a very complicated issue and without years of experience, I cannot possibly know what I am talking about; another is that if I haven't lived for 20 years in a Muslim country, I just don't know; another is that I do not know the origin of the word "allah"; another is that as a Christian I should not criticize another Christian; another is that I am attacking and slandering Wycliffe (I guess these intellectuals do not know the difference between slander, the spoken untruthful and malicious action, and libel); another is that allah has been used as YHWH for so long that it is impossible to change it. For people that say you shouldn't criticize other Christians, they have done their fair share of it, some viciously.

In these days there are many errors with what is being taught in Christianity. We need to be able from time to time to have an open discussion about them, examine them and correct them. In reality, there is only one true God if we believe the Bible to be the inerrant and infallible Word of God. He has a name. It is not allah. Allah is a different god, they are not the same. That in of itself is quite simple. The other issues of changing or omitting the familial names are also quite simple. You don't do it. Or if you have to for some reason, you footnote it with an explanation. Then don't do it again.

Just because something has been done for years upon years as a tradition of man, it doesn't mean that it should not be changed if it is wrong. And just because someone has been doing it wrong, it doesn't mean they are evil or bad (many dedicated people have given their lives to this good work), they have been led in error. The problem, however, with interchanging allah with YHWH is that the two are not the same. To do so is wrong. As the one missionary critical of my writing proudly said: "...millions of Arab Christians pour out their hearts in worship and intercession to Allah, the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." To him, there is nothing wrong with this and it is quite proper. To me, it is inaccurate to the point it is heresy. There needs to be a correction here. My prayer is that Wycliffe will listen and do the right thing. I am hopeful that there is not another agenda in play. Time will tell.

Have a Blessed and Powerful Day!