And it's not just casual - it's politically (i.e., ecumenically) correct - most of the refs to "the Jews" have been altered to "the people" or "the Jewish authorities" or suchlike.
Something that is often forgotten about the Good News version is that is was designed to be of help to beginning readers and those for whom English was a second language.
I certainly won't disagree that the KJV created a "sacral register," but I think it's entirely valid to question whether that is appropriate. I think one positive development of the new translations is that they have called into question the "divine thunder" of the older translations. How did the Romans or the Corinthians hear the Epistles when they were first received? Did they hear "divine thunder," or did it sound like, well, a letter?
Translations can horribly distort the meaning and tone of the original source. For example, anyone familiar with the various Loebs translations of classical texts knows that the older translations (I believe that new ones are being produced) made some of the Latin texts sound very Victorian. We may generally approve of the "sacral register" of the KJV, but is that "sacral register" false to the text?
Commenting by HaloScan
