Forty Years With

The Concordant Version

by

Donald G. Hayter

It is forty years since I accidentally(!) came across a copy of the Concordant Version in the Reference Room of the local library. It had been placed there by a beloved brother long since gone to his rest. It immediately awakened an interest in me, and it was not long before I had a copy of my own and started using it for reading and study. It has been my constant companion since, and that first copy is much the worse for wear. It has accompanied me in travels in foreign lands, and afloat in a battle cruiser steaming in dangerous waters, with an enemy below and above. Even in these circumstances there was time to read and ponder its lifegiving words.

Since those early days it has been with me in quieter and more peaceful surroundings, and it has been my daily practice to read and seek to understand its message, and also to examine it closely, testing its renderings of the Original. I have scrutinized key words and phrases, and have proved, beyond a shadow of a doubt, its faithfulness and accuracy to the original text. I have tested both the Version and the Sublinear and have found the latter to be a faithful mirror of the Original, bringing over into the English the idiom and phraseology of the Greek and Hebrew, and presenting to the English reader a form of the original text better than any knowledge of the languages of inspiration could give him.

A student of the Sublinear is placed in a position of strength in discussing with the most advanced scholar any points of grammar or translation. The knowledge he has at his disposal in the Sublinear and Concordance is in advance of anything a university or course of instruction in the original tongues could give him.

This long period with the Concordant Version has not been a period of wholly tranquil spiritual experience. In the early days there was bitter opposition (not often vocal and informed) from relatives and associates, whose main objection was that it was a break with tradition and orthodoxy. The pillars and esteemed teachers of the sect in which I was nurtured, the Plymouth Brethren, did what they could to persuade me from using it. But the Lord has been my Steadfastness and enabled me to be faithful to the Version and the truth that comes to those who read and meditate its pages. Inevitably it leads to loneliness in spiritual fellowship, but this is a small price to pay for the joy and exultation, the peace and rest of spirit, and the ardent expectation which is the lot of the one who loves truth and secludes the word of truth in his heart. The one who has learned to prefer having his heart stirred by the unerring accuracies of the Scriptures rather than having his ears tickled by familiar sounding, but inaccurate phrases, accepts with fortitude the price that has to be paid for such a choice. Lonely we may be as to fellowship with our fellow saints, but never, no never are we really alone -- the Lord is always near. And in this we exult and thank Him.

© Concordant Publishing Concern