This is the ninth installment in a multi-part series concerning social media posts that are circulating and accusing the NIV and other modern English translations of the Bible of taking out important words and concepts, leaving out verses, and other nefarious things.
Read
part 1 here
Read
part 2 here
Read
part 3 here
Read
part 4 here
Read
part 5 here
Read
part 6 here
Read
part 7 here
Read
part 8 here
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Gender-Inclusive Language
One
of the objections raised against the New International Version is that it uses
“gender-neutral” language. When this allegation first started popping up, many
people were claiming that the NIV was capitulating to a radical feminist agenda
and removing masculine terms for God (such as Father, and the pronouns he, him,
and his). The NIV has not changed any of the masculine nouns or pronouns referring to God, so this accusation is without merit.
Now,
the explanation on this one is going to get a little more technical regarding
how languages work. It will be helpful (though not necessary) if you have had a
first-year class in a language that uses grammatical gender (such as Spanish,
Italian, Latin, etc.). I will use examples from Spanish, as that is the
non-English language I know best.
“Grammatical
gender” refers to a concept in linguistics where nouns can be classified as
masculine, feminine, or neuter. This has nothing to do with the actual
biological sex of a person or animal, but with how words are grouped. Spanish
has two genders: masculine and feminine. Koine Greek (the language of the New
Testament) has all three. English does not use grammatical gender.