What a difference a misplaced punctuation mark makes! Consider this classroom scenario.
Teacher: Make a statement from the following sentence by inserting punctuation marks at appropriate places:
“woman without her man is nothing”
Male Student : “Woman, without her man, is nothing!”
Female Student : “Woman! without her, man is nothing.”
See how the meaning of a sentence is changed completely by placing punctuation marks at different places.
Now consider what harm a misplaced comma can do to Scriptures. In Lk 23:42, Jesus said:
“Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in Paradise.”
This is how most bible translations put it. But the bibles used by some cults put it this way:
“Truly, I say to you today, you will be with me in Paradise.”
See the subtle change in position of the second comma? By placing the comma after “today”, it gives rise to the belief of soul sleep after death to awake a future reunion with the Lord. But the bible says that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord:
“Yes, we are fully confident, and we would rather be away from these bodies, for then we will be at home with the Lord” (2Cor 5:8). Therefore, the second comma has to be before “today”.
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