A common argument runs along the lines of, “Paul believes X, so here in Paul’s writing we have to make our translation say X.” For example, in translating Galatians 5:6 (recently discussed here, here and by me here), some people try to figure out what Paul believed about circumcision, faith, and love not only to…
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Clayboy has an informative and well-written post about the mistakes that often follow after someone tries the “what the Greek really says” argument: One of the biggest warning flags in a sermon comes when the preacher says: “Now, in Greek, the word is … which (literally) means …” Sometimes they know what theyre talking about.…
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I recently observed master teacher and musician Kenny Green telling children about the Jewish month of Adar. “Once Adar begins, we increase our happiness,” he explained, using the usual terminology. Then he added with a self-mocking grin, “yes, I talk that way at home, too.” There’s a Hebrew verb hirbah that means generally “to do/have/make…
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Because this is a blog about translation, I’m curious when people read it in translation. Recently the logs showed me that someone used Google to translate the blog from English into Turkish. I took a look at what the site looked like in Turkish, and then used Google to translate the Turkish back into English.…
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The KJV popularized the tradition of using italics to mark the English words of a translation that are not actually in the original Hebrew or Greek (or Aramaic) of the Bible. But I think this typographic custom creates the false impression that translation words come in two varieties, with the first kind supposedly representing words…
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Perhaps because understanding parts of speech is so central to learning a foreign language, translators often try to preserve parts of speech when they translate. But I think this is a mistake. We know from modern languages that parts of speech often have to change in translation, and I think we see cases where more…
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As always, I’ve returned from my week in Israel recharged and renewed. Also, as always, my visit has given me a lot to think about regarding translation. Modern Languages I believe that looking at modern languages can help us understand the nature of translation because it’s easier to know what modern languages mean, so it’s…
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From the About page: As a grammar lesson, I tried parsing Psalm 117. There is a possible usage of a ‘he’ marking the use of the vocative (BDB 1.i) but the article is missing on the first colon kol goyim and present on the second shavxuhu col ha’umim. It seems to me that ‘praise the…
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Recent posts from my Ancient Wisdom, Modern Lives:
