Threads from Henry's Web

Tag: Bible Translation

  • Translation and Inspiration

    In posting recently on translation I’ve noticed that many people connect one’s idea of inspiration with one’s approach to translation. The assumption seems to be that a person who believes in some form of verbal inspiration, especially verbal plenary inspiration, will necessarily favor a formal, word-by-word, or literal translaltion. Of these terms I prefer formal, in that the most literal translations do not manage a word-by-word equivalence, but rather account for the grammatical form and structure of the source language in the form and structure of the text in the receptor language as far as possible.

    My own involvement in these debates sometimes tends to foster that very viewpoint. I have a non-verbal view of inspiration, in that I believe God inspires messengers with messages through various experiences, which may include a verbally dictated component, rather than dictating words. In Ezekiel 1, for example, my understanding is that God presented Ezekiel with a vision and Ezekiel searched for the words with which to present what he had seen, accounting for the slightly confused nature of the text. Because of my view of inspiration, one might assume that I would support a theory of translation that is message based rather than individual word based.

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  • Rick Mansfield on the ESV

    Rick Mansfield has made an excellent post on the controversy with the ESV. He makes a number of excellent points, but I’d like to quote one paragraph from near the end:

    My contention is not with the ESV. But I do have great problems with the inaccurate rhetoric that I often hear from proponents and endorsers of this translation. I have favorite translations, and I have written about a number of them on this blog. While I talk of their qualities that I like and appropriate uses for them, I go out of my way to try to do so without needlessly putting down other versions of the Bible. I’ve probably been harder on the ESV on this blog than on any translation, but usually it’s been in a context of addressing the audacious and often fallacious claims made for it by ESV supporters. This idea that literalness equals greater accuracy or literalness equals greater faithfulness to the original text is pure nonsense if the rendering is so literal that the author’s intent and meaning is unintelligible to readers and hearers. Antiquated vocabulary and sentence structure do not give a translation greater authority–it merely limits readership in an contemporary setting.

    I actually have very little against the ESV. It does have some awkward readings, but none of them are things that make it hard for me to use. I’ve recommended it to pastors who are uncomfortable with some of the gender-accurate (which they will call gender-inclusive) language in the NRSV. It provides an option to avoid the archaic language used in the RSV for prayer, and still keep to that general tradition.

    But it is currently being pushed forward by some people almost as a new “one true version” and this is more than questionable, it’s potentially dangerous. I too have my favorite versions, but no single version becomes the standard. The particular reasons used in support of the ESV are often inaccurate as well.

  • Man, Mankind, or People – Genesis 1:27 and Genesis 6:5-8

    On my Threads blog I comment on Pastor Mark Driscoll’s theological basis for using the ESV at Mars Hill Church. In that article Driscoll makes a special point of the translation of the Hebrew “‘adam” in Genesis 1:27 by the NRSV and NLT:

    Translations such as the New Revised Standard accommodate this by wrongly translating “male and female” in Genesis 1:27 as the androgynous “humankind.” The New Living Bible translates it as the genderless “people.”

    I commented in that previous post on this point, quoting the NRSV translation which does include the words “male and female” but which translates the Hebrew “‘adam” with “humankind” where the ESV uses the word “man.”

    Now I can see no indication that there is any special emphasis put on the masculine by the use of “‘adam” in Genesis 1:27. In fact, the verse is a clear case of both male and female being included in the definition of the word “‘adam.”

    But I wonder if Driscoll and other critics of the NRSV, NLT and many other versions who use this translation of “‘adam” think the same thing about Genesis 6:5-8:

    5 Now the Lord observed the extent of the people’s wickedness, and he saw that all their thoughts were consistently and totally evil. 6 So the Lord was sorry he had ever made them. It broke his heart. 7 And the Lord said, “I will completely wipe out this human race that I have created. Yes, and I will destroy [one instance of “‘adam” not directly translated] all the animals and birds, too. I am sorry I ever made them.” 8 But Noah found favor with the Lord. — Genesis 6:5-8 (NLT, emphasis mine)

    I’ve bolded each case of a translation of the word “‘adam.”

    Now my question is this: Is there a particular masculine component here as well? Was God much more angry at the men than at the women? Did he determine to destroy the men, and wipe out the women as a side-effect?

    Note: For more on translation methods, see also posts by Wayne Leman, Richard Rhodes and Peter Kirk. These were all posted since my initial post over on my Threads blog.

  • Mars Hill or Planet Mars

    Peter Kirk has weighed in on the subject of my previous post in his post Mars Hill Church: on a different Planet?

    He says:

    I have looked at the original text (well, a scholarly edition of the Greek text) of Romans 3:24 and cannot find the word “justification” there. There are no English words, only Greek ones. In fact this word is not in any of the translations Driscoll quotes, but I guess he is referring to the word “justified”.

    I guess I wasn’t the only one to see the problem there! All of Peter’s post is well worth reading.

  • The Impossibility of Verbal Plenary Translation

    I have heard many good things about Mars Hill Church in Seattle, despite some theological disagreements (with whom do I not have such disagreements?) so I was disappointed to receive the following via e-mail from a friend: Theological reasons for why Mars Hill preaches out of the ESV.

    This isn’t intended as an attack on the ESV. I put the slogan “the best Bible version is one you read.” If you find your Bible reading life lighting up when you read the ESV, then by all means use it for reading and study. If the carefully gender accurate language of such versions as the NRSV grates on your nerves, then by all means use it, but admit that it’s because of your language tastes, and not because of theology. If you’re reading the ESV because you think it is theologically more correct, or because it more accurately and clearly conveys the message of scripture to the populace in general, then I urge you to think again.

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  • On Bible Translation from realmealministries.org

    From realmealministries.org comes a brief discussion of Bible translations and how to make your choice of one to use. There is some good material here, though obviously in such a short presentation it cannot be tremendously detailed.

    Since this is also a favored topic of my own (see Bible Version Selection Tool), I’d like to call attention to it.

  • NASB to NASB95 in Isaiah 27

    In my materials for my Bible Translation Selection Tool, I only have one entry for the New American Standard Version even though that version was revised in 1995. The major change was the removal of archaic language in prayer–no more thee’s and thou’s. A few other changes were made.

    In preparing an entry on exegesis of Isaiah 27 I noticed some differences between the two editions. There are three changes for the NASB95, and one phrase that it seems odd was not changed.

    Here are the four items:

    Verse NASB NASB95
    3 Lest anyone damage it, So that no one will damage it,
    The change is minor, but perhaps it makes God’s activity in guarding the vineyard more positive. I’m not sure if modern readers would hear any difference unless it was pointed out to them.
    8 Thou didst content with them by banishing them, You contended with them by banishing them,
    Changes language that addresses God to modern forms.
    12 It will come about in that day, that the LORD will start His threshing

    		In that day the LORD will start His threshing
    This is what I would call a “student exercise” type of change. This translates a common Hebrew idiom often translated “It came to pass” or just “It happened” but when translated into modern English it is more of a form of punctuation. Generally modern translators count on English punctuation to translate this idea adequately. Thus it has been removed.
    13 It will come about also in that day, It will come about also in that day
    This is the non-change that I noted. Verses 12 and 13 start identically in Hebrew. I’m uncertain why one was changed to a more natural English rendering, while the other was not.

    The changes here are not terribly significant, but this little review will give you an idea of the extent, or lack of it, of the changes to the NASB95.

  • Idolatry and Male Representation

    The new, young associate pastor was praying, and in her prayer she referred to God as “Father-Mother God.” Silence settled over the congregation as mental gasps replaced “Amens.” The associate pastor had transgressed the unofficial line. You can represent God as vengeful or loving, gentle or angry, gracious or demanding, present or distant, but don’t you ever present God as male and female.

    I was preparing a communion service with a slightly non-traditional text. Someone reading the material brought a portion of it to me. Was I sure I wanted to use this passage? Wasn’t it feminized? My text had crossed the line. I can represent God as just about anything, but never use feminine language. The feminized language in question? ” . . . gather us under your wing as a hen gathers her chicks . . .” (Matthew 23:37; Luke 13:34).

    We constantly use images for God, mental images, yes, but images nonetheless. And there is nothing wrong with mental images, provided you don’t cast them in stone–real stone or mental stone. The Bible uses plenty of images of God, including the feminine image of divine wisdom as used in Proverbs.

    The problem comes in when you fix the images in place so that they become your picture of God instead of allowing God to constantly interact with you, shatter your images, and grow you up. As I previously commented on this:

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  • Adjusting my Attitude about Wallace and Burer on Romans 16:7

    I’ve watched the discussions on Romans 16:7 for some time, and had read Wallace and Burer’s article in the Journal for Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (Fall 2001). My conclusion at the time of reading was that while Wallace and Burer had shown some additional possibilities for this translation, I did not think that they had established a probability that their choice was the correct reading. In fact, I regarded it as somewhat improbable in the context of the passage itself.

    I did follow Suzanne McCarthy’s comments on this (links gathered here), which made me realize that the Psalms of Solomon parallel was not nearly so parallel as I had imagined. But until I read the article again this morning I really didn’t see precisely how important it was that the preposition “en” was never mentioned by Wallace and Burer in their paragraph on this passage. That one point simply means that this passage, which they claim is the closest parallel to Romans 16:7, is simply not parallel at all. I’m coming late to the party, and I can’t explain how this didn’t strike me earlier, but I find the omission shocking.

    I use Dr. Wallace’s intermediate grammar in my teaching, and keep it amongst my most referenced Greek texts. I normally find that one can argue against Dr. Wallace’s positions using nothing but his own references, so thorough is he in explaining the details of each position. (I don’t know anything beyond this article of Burer’s work.) I think this is a point that needs to be corrected, especially considering that the point in question has now been carried into a note in the NET on Romans 16:7.

    Obviously, we don’t discard a scholar’s work on the basis of one error–there would be nobody left standing. But I consider it very important either to correct the parallel between Psalms of Solomon 2:6 and Romans 16:7 or to make clear the opposing view that the presence of an additional preposition “en” means that these two passages are not, in fact, parallel. I maintain, however, my earlier view that even in the presence of such a parallel, Wallace and Burer’s case would not be made.

    Relevant quotations and links are found in Peter Kirk’s post today, Dr Wayne Grudem’s latest errors.

    I provide the two passages in Greek for those who are interested:

    οἱ υἱοὶ καὶ αἱ θυγατέρες ἐν αἰχμαλωσίᾳ πονηρᾷ, ἐν σφραγῖδι ὁ τράχηλος αὐτῶν, ἐν ἐπισήμῳ ἐν τοῖς ἔθνεσιν. — Psalms of Solomon 2:6

    ἀσπάσασθε Ἀνδρόνικον καὶ Ἰουνιᾶν τοὺς συγγενεῖς μου καὶ συναιχμαλώτους μου, οἵτινές εἰσιν ἐπίσημοι ἐν τοῖς ἀποστόλοις, οἳ καὶ πρὸ ἐμοῦ γέγοναν ἐν Χριστῷ. — Romans 16:7

  • Two Posts on Translation

    Since I divided my blog into three, I have tried to make “just link” posts rare, but I did want to call attention to two posts that I have just written. First, on the Participatory Bible Study Blog I have put some comments about the Clear Word Bible, which is finally a Bible translation that I thoroughly dislike, though this post will only illustrate a small portion of that.

    The second is a blank verse version of Psalm 103 posted on my writing blog. I’m not sure I’m very good with this form. In fact, I’m pretty sure I’m pretty weak at it, but I like trying to present Biblical passages in modern forms.

    Enjoy–or not. 🙂