I've never read it, but what are your objections to it? Our pastor has referenced it, but only once.
I want to be as charitable as possible, but the fact of the matter is Simmons is a liar. He claims to be a trained linguist, which he isn't. He claims to have been directly involved in translating the Bible into the indigenous language of the Paya Kuna in Panama. This is highly doubtful.
But let's assume for the sake of argument he
is a linguist and translator. The Passion Translation isn't a translations but a paraphrase. He makes stuff up out of whole cloth. For example Acts 16:16 in TPT reads:
"One day, as we were going to the house of prayer, we encountered a young slave girl who had an evil spirit of divination, [the spirit of Python]. She had earned great profits for her owners by being a fortune-teller." (Brackets added)
Someone please show me the original Greek from which "the spirit of Python" was translated. But this is only one example; there are many, many more. And even if he is a linguist and translator, he's the
only person involved in TPT. It's his baby, created to bring
him glory, not God.
Simmons' story about how TPT came about seems to change according to his audience. Sometimes he says he translated it; other times he says God "downloaded" it to him.
He claims to have been given a vision of Jesus and He commissioned him to write John 22. Seriously? This alone is proof enough for me he's a con artist. There's no known Greek manuscript of John 22. What will Simmons do? Make it up like everything else I suppose.
Below is a pretty good video. And he's a link to some other videos:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=mike+winger+passion+translation
