Much criticism of the New World Translation involves the rendering of certain texts in the New Testament considered to be biased in favor of specific Witness practices and doctrines.^{[93][94][95][89][96][97]} These include the use of “torture stake” instead of “cross” as the instrument of Jesus’ crucifixion;^[93] the use of the indefinite article (“a”) in its rendering of John 1:1to give “the Word was a god”;^[93][98] the term “public declaration” at Romans 10:10, which may reinforce the imperative to engage in public preaching;^[93] the term “taking in knowledge” rather than “know” at John 17:3 to suggest that salvation is dependent on ongoing study;^[93] and the placement of the comma in Luke 23:43, which affects the timing of the fulfillment of Jesus’ promise to the thief at Calvary.^[99]

In its review of Bible translations released from 1955 to 1985, The HarperCollins Bible Dictionarylisted the New World Translation as one of the major modern translations.^[68]

The New Catholic Encyclopedia says of the New World Translation reference edition: “[Jehovah’s Witnesses]’ translation of the Bible [has] an impressive critical apparatus. The work is excellent except when scientific knowledge comes into conflict with the accepted doctrines of the movement.” It criticizes the NWT’s rendering of Kyrios as “Jehovah” in 237 instances in the New Testament.^[69]

In 2004, Anthony Byatt and Hal Flemings’s anthology ‘Your Word is Truth’, Essays in Celebration of the 50th Anniversary of the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (1950, 1953) was published. It included essays responding to criticism of the New World Translation from non-Witnesses, and included a bibliography of reviews of the work.^[70]

Regarding the New World Translation‘s use of English in the 1953 first volume of the NWT (Genesis to Ruth), biblical scholar Harold Henry Rowley was critical of what he called “wooden literalism” and “harsh construction.” He characterized these as “an insult to the Word of God”, citing various verses of Genesis as examples. Rowley concluded, “From beginning to end this [first] volume is a shining example of how the Bible should not be translated.”^[71] He added in a subsequent review that “the second volume shows the same faults as the first.”^[72] Rolf Furuli, a Jehovah’s Witness and a former professor in Semitic languages, notes that a literal translation that follows the sentence structure of the source language rather than target language must be somewhat wooden and unidiomatic. Furuli adds that Rowley’s assessment based on his own preference for idiomatic translations ignores the NWT’s stated objective of being as literal as possible.^[73]

Samuel Haas, in his 1955 review of the 1953 first volume of the New World Translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, in the Journal of Biblical Literature, states: “this work indicates a great deal of effort and thought as well as considerable scholarship, it is to be regretted that religious bias was allowed to colour many passages.”^[74]

In 1981, biblical scholar Benjamin Kedar-Kopfstein stated that the Old Testament work is largely based upon the formal structure of biblical Hebrew.^[75]

In 1952, religious writer Alexander Thomson wrote of the New World Translation: “The translation is evidently the work of skilled and clever scholars, who have sought to bring out as much of the true sense of the Greek text as the English language is capable of expressing. … We heartily recommend the New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures, published in 1950 by the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society.”^[76] In 1959, Thomson added that on the whole the version was quite a good one, even though it was padded with many English words which had no equivalent in the Greek or Hebrew.^[77]

In 1953, former American Bible Society board member Bruce M. Metzger concluded that “on the whole, one gains a tolerably good impression of the scholarly equipment of the translators,”^[78] but identified instances where the translation has been written to support doctrine, with “several quite erroneous renderings of the Greek.”^[79] Metzger noted a number of “indefensible” characteristics of the translation, including its use of “Jehovah” in the New Testament.

In 1954, Unitarian theologian Charles F. Potter stated about the New World Translation: “Apart from a few semantic peculiarities like translating the Greek word stauros as “stake” instead of “cross”, and the often startling use of the colloquial and the vernacular, the anonymous translators have certainly rendered the best manuscript texts, both Greek and Hebrew, with scholarly ability and acumen.”^[80]

F. E. Mayer wrote: “It is a version that lends support to denial of doctrines which the Christian churches consider basic, such as the co-equality of Jesus Christ with the Father, the personhood of the Holy Spirit, and the survival of the human person after physical death. It teaches the annihilation of the wicked, the non-existence of hell, and the purely animal nature of man’s soul.”^[81][82]

In his review in Andover Newton Quarterly Robert M. McCoy reported in 1963, “The translation of the New Testament is evidence of the presence in the movement of scholars qualified to deal intelligently with the many problems of Biblical translation. One could question why the translators have not stayed closer to the original meaning, as do most translators. … In not a few instances the New World Translation contains passages which must be considered as ‘theological translations.’ This fact is particularly evident in those passages which express or imply the deity of Jesus Christ.”^[83][84]

In 1963, theologian Anthony A. Hoekema wrote: “Their New World Translation of the Bible is by no means an objective rendering of the sacred text into modern English, but is a biased translation in which many of the peculiar teachings of the Watchtower Society are smuggled into the text of the Bible itself.”^[85]

Julius R. Mantey, co-author of A Manual Grammar of the Greek New Testament and A Hellenistic Greek Reader, said about the New Testament of the NWT that it’s “a distortion not a translation.”^[86]

In 1982, Robert H. Countess in his critical analysis The Jehovah’s Witness’ New Testament wrote that the NWT “must be viewed as a radically biased piece of work.”^[87]

Theologian William Barclay concluded that “the deliberate distortion of truth by this sect is seen in the New Testament translation. … It is abundantly clear that a sect which can translate the New Testament like that is intellectually dishonest.”^[88]

Theologian John Ankerberg accused the New World Translation‘s translators of renderings that conform “to their own preconceived and unbiblical theology.” John Weldon and Ankerberg cite several examples wherein they consider the NWT to support theological views overriding appropriate translation.^[89]

In 2004, historian Jason BeDuhn examined New Testament passages that he believed “bias is most likely to interfere with translation” from nine of “the Bibles most widely in use in the English-speaking world”.^[90] For each passage, he compared the Greek text with the renderings of each English translation, and looked for biased attempts to change the meaning. BeDuhn states that the New World Translation was “not bias free”, adding that whilst the general public and various biblical scholars might assume that the differences in the New World Translation are the result of religious bias, he considered it to be “the most accurate of the translations compared”, and a “remarkably good translation”. He also states that “most of the differences are due to the greater accuracy of the NW as a literal, conservative translation”. Despite his positive review, BeDuhn said the introduction of the name “Jehovah” into the New Testament 237 times was “not accurate translation by the most basic principle of accuracy”, and that it “violate[s] accuracy in favor of denominationally preferred expressions for God”.^[90] In his rebuttal, Thomas Howe strongly criticizes BeDuhn’s positive review of the New World Translation, stating that BeDuhn’s main goal is to deny the deity of Christ.^[91]

Thomas Winter considered the Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures to be a “highly useful aid toward the mastery of koine (and classical) Greek,” adding that the translation “is thoroughly up-to-date and consistently accurate.”^[92]

The layout resembles the 1901 edition of the American Standard Version. The translators use the terms “Hebrew-Aramaic Scriptures” and “Christian Greek Scriptures” rather than “Old Testament” and “New Testament”, stating that the use of “testament” was based on a misunderstanding of 2 Corinthians 3:14.^[37] Headings were included at the top of each page to assist in locating texts; these have been replaced in the 2013 revision by an “Outline of Contents” introducing each Bible book. There is also an index listing scriptures by subject.

Square brackets [ ] were added around words that were inserted editorially, but were removed as of the 2006 printing. Double brackets were used to indicate text considered doubtful. The pronoun “you” was printed in small capitals (i.e., YOU) to indicate plurality, as were some verbs when plurality may be unclear. These features were discontinued in the 2013 release. The New World Translation attempts to indicate progressive rather than completed actions, such as “proceeded to rest” at Genesis 2:2 instead of “rested”. The 2013 release indicates progressive verbs only where considered contextually important.

The name Jehovah is a translation of the Tetragrammaton (Hebrew: יהוה‎, transliterated as YHWH), although the original pronunciation is unknown. The New World Translation uses the name Jehovah 6,979 times in the Old Testament.^[38] According to the Watch Tower Society, the Tetragrammaton appears in “the oldest fragments of the Greek Septuagint”.^[39] In reference to the Septuagint, biblical scholar Paul E. Kahle stated, “We now know that the Greek Bible text as far as it was written by Jews for Jews did not translate the Divine name by Kyrios, but the Tetragrammaton written with Hebrew or Greek letters was retained in such MSS (manuscripts). It was the Christians who replaced the Tetragrammaton by Kyrios, when the divine name written in Hebrew letters was not understood any more.”^[40] However, according to professor Albert Pietersma, since pre-Christian times « adonai » and the Tetragrammaton where considered equivalent to the Greek term « kyrios ». Pietersma stated that “The translators felt no more bound to retain the tetragram in written form than they felt compelled to render distinctively Hebrew el, elohim or shaddai.”^[41] Moreover, he considers that old manuscripts containing the tetragram, like the papyrus Fouad 266, “is evidence of a secondary stage.”^[42]

The New World Translation also uses the name Jehovah 237 times in the New Testament where the extant texts use only the Greek words kyrios (Lord) and theos (God).^[43] The use of Jehovah in the New Testament is very rare, but not unique to the New World Translation.^[44] Walter Martin, an evangelical minister, wrote, “It can be shown from literally thousands of copies of the Greek New Testament that not once does the tetragrammaton appear.”^[45] However, the translators of the New World Translation believed that the name Jehovah was present in the original manuscripts of the New Testament when quoting from the Old Testament, but replaced with the other terms by later copyists. Based on this reasoning, the translators consider to have “restored the divine name”, though it is not present in any extant manuscripts.^[46][47]

In 1984, a Reference edition of the New World Translation was released in addition to a revision of the regular volume.^[48][49] The regular edition includes several appendices containing arguments for various translation decisions, maps, diagrams and other information; and over 125,000 cross references. The reference edition contains the cross references and adds footnotes about translation decisions and additional appendices that provide further detail relating to certain translation decisions and doctrinal views.^[50]

The New World Bible Translation Committee included the English text from the New World Translation in its 1969 and 1985 editions of the Kingdom Interlinear Translation of the Greek Scriptures. It also incorporates the Greek text published by Westcott and Hort in The New Testament in the Original Greek and a literal word-for-word translation.^[51][52]

In 1978, the Watch Tower Society began producing recordings of the New World Translation on audio cassette,^[53] with the New Testament released by 1981^[54] and the Old Testament in three albums released by 1990.^[55] In 2004, the NWT was released on compact disc in MP3 format in major languages.^[56] Since 2008, audio downloads of the NWT have been made available in 18 languages in MP3 and AAC formats, including support for Podcasts.

In 1983, the English Braille edition of the New World Translation‘s New Testament was released;^[57] the complete English Braille edition was released by 1988.^[58] NWT editions have since become available in several additional Braille scripts.^[59] Production of the NWT in American Sign Language began in 2006, with the complete New Testament made available by 2010;^[60] sign language editions are also available for download.^[61]

In 1992 a digital edition of the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures—With References was released on floppy disk. Since 1994, the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures—With References has been included in the Watchtower Library on CD-ROM, available only to baptized Jehovah’s Witnesses.^[62][63] Both editions of the New World Translation are available online in various languages and digital formats.^[64][65][66] Since 2015, a Study Edition of the New World Translation has been gradually released online starting with the books of the New Testament, based on the 2013 revision with additional reference material.^[67]

According to the Watch Tower Society, the New World Translation attempts to convey the intended sense of original-language words according to the context. The New World Translation employs nearly 16,000 English expressions to translate about 5,500 biblical Greek terms, and over 27,000 English expressions to translate about 8,500 Hebrew terms. The translators state that, where possible in the target language, the New World Translation prefers literal renderings and does not paraphrase the original text.^[33]

The master text used for translating the Old Testament into English was Kittel’s Biblia Hebraica. The Hebrew texts, Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia and Biblia Hebraica Quinta, were used for preparing the latest version of this translation. Other works consulted in preparing the translation include Aramaic Targums, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Samaritan Torah, the Greek Septuagint, the Latin Vulgate, the Masoretic Text, the Cairo Codex, the Aleppo Codex, Christian David Ginsburg‘s Hebrew Text, and the Leningrad Codex.^[34][35]

Until the release of the New World Translation, Jehovah’s Witnesses in English-speaking countries primarily used the King James Version.^[7][8] According to the publishers, one of the main reasons for producing a new translation was that most Bible versions in common use, including the Authorized Version(King James), employed archaic language. The stated intention was to produce a fresh translation, free of archaisms.^[9] Additionally, over the centuries since the King James Version was produced, more copies of earlier manuscripts of the original texts in the Hebrew and Greek languages have become available. According to the publishers, better manuscript evidence had made it possible to determine with greater accuracy what the original writers intended, particularly in more obscure passages, allowing linguists to better understand certain aspects of the original languages.^[10]

In October 1946, the president of the Watch Tower Society, Nathan H. Knorr, proposed a fresh translation of the New Testament, which Jehovah’s Witnesses usually refer to as the Christian Greek Scriptures.^[11] Work began on December 2, 1947 when the “New World Bible Translation Committee” was formed, composed of Jehovah’s Witnesses who professed to be anointed.^[12][13] The Watch Tower Society is said to have “become aware” of the committee’s existence a year later. The committee agreed to turn over its translation to the Society for publication^[14] and on September 3, 1949, Knorr convened a joint meeting of the board of directors of both the Watch Tower Society’s New York and Pennsylvania corporations where he again announced to the directors the existence of the committee^[15] and that it was now able to print its new modern English translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures. Several chapters of the translation were read to the directors, who then voted to accept it as a gift.^[14]

The New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures was released at a convention of Jehovah’s Witnesses at Yankee Stadium, New York, on August 2, 1950. The translation of the Old Testament, which Jehovah’s Witnesses refer to as the Hebrew Scriptures, was released in five volumes in 1953, 1955, 1957, 1958, and 1960. The complete New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures was released as a single volume in 1961, and has since undergone minor revisions.^[16]Cross references which had appeared in the six separate volumes were updated and included in the complete volume in the 1984 revision.^[17]

In 1961 the Watch Tower Society began to translate the New World Translation into Dutch, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish; the New Testament in these languages was released simultaneously in July 1963 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. By 1989 the New World Translation was translated into eleven languages, with more than 56,000,000 copies printed.^[18]

The New World Translation was produced by the New World Bible Translation Committee, formed in 1947. This committee is said to have comprised unnamed members of multinational background.^[19] The committee requested that the Watch Tower Society not publish the names of its members,^[20][21] stating that they did not want to “advertise themselves but let all the glory go to the Author of the Scriptures, God,”^[22] adding that the translation, “should direct the reader… to… Jehovah God”.^[23] The publishers believe that “the particulars of [the New World Bible Translation Committee’s members] university or other educational training are not the important thing” and that “the translation testifies to their qualification”.^[23]

Former high-ranking Watch Tower staff have identified various members of the translation team. Former governing body member Raymond Franz listed Nathan H. Knorr, Fredrick W. Franz, Albert D. Schroeder, George D. Gangas, and Milton G. Henschel as members of the translation team, adding that only Frederick Franz had sufficient knowledge in biblical languages.^[24][25] Referring to the identified members, evangelical minister Walter Ralston Martin said, “The New World Bible translation committee had no known translators with recognized degrees in Greek or Hebrew exegesis or translation… None of these men had any university education except Franz, who left school after two years, never completing even an undergraduate degree.” Franz had stated that he was familiar with not only Hebrew, but with Greek, Latin, Spanish, Portuguese, German, and French for the purpose of biblical translation.^[26][27]

In 1989 a Translation Services Department was established at the world headquarters of Jehovah’s Witnesses, overseen by the Writing Committee of the Governing Body. The goal of the Translation Services Department was to accelerate Bible translation with the aid of computer technology. Previously, some Bible translation projects lasted twenty years or more. Under the direction of the Translation Services Department, translation of the Old Testament in a particular language may be completed in as little as two years. During the period from 1963 to 1989, the New World Translation became available in ten additional languages. Since the formation of the Translation Services Department in 1989, there has been a significant increase in the number of languages in which the New World Translation has been made available.^[28][29]

At the Watch Tower Society’s annual meeting on October 5, 2013, a significantly revised translation was released. Referring to the new revision, the publishers stated, “There are now about 10 percent fewer English words in the translation. Some key Biblical terms were revised. Certain chapters were changed to poetic format, and clarifying footnotes were added to the regular edition.”^[30]

The Pericope Adulterae (John 7:53 – 8:11) and the Short and Long Conclusions of Mark 16 (Mark16:8–20)—offset from the main text in earlier editions—were removed. The new revision was also released as part of an app called JW Library.^[31] As of July 2019, the 2013 edition of the New World Translation has been translated into 29 languages.^[32]