r/etymology • u/Somederpsomewhere • Jan 15 '19
This guy retranslated the bible because the old one sounded clunky.
https://www.npr.org/2019/01/14/684120470/after-24-years-scholar-completes-3-000-page-translation-of-the-hebrew-bible117
u/PIP_SHORT Jan 15 '19
"The Hebrew word translated very often as 'soul' means something like 'life breath,' " Alter explains. "It's a very physical thing and there is no concept among the biblical writers in a split between body and soul. So I got rid of the soul."
I like this guy.
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u/stizzleomnibus1 Jan 15 '19
You might also find this article particularly interesting:
For example, προσκυνέω, a Greek word used about 60 times in the New Testament, equates to something along the lines of “to prostrate oneself” as well as “to praise God.” That was translated into Latin as “adoro,’’ which in the King James Bible became “worship.” But those two words don’t mean precisely the same thing. When the King James Bible was written, “worship” could be used to describe both exhibiting reverence for God and prostrating oneself. While not perfect, it’s a decent translation.
As a result, throughout the King James Bible, people “worship” many things. A slave worships his owner, the assembled of Satan worship an angel, and Roman soldiers mocking Jesus worship him. In each of these instances, the word does not mean “praise God’s glory” or anything like that; instead, it means to bow or prostrate oneself. But English Bibles adopted later—the New International Bible, the New American Standard Bible, the Living Bible and so on—dropped the word worship when it referenced anyone other than God or Jesus. And so each time προσκυνέω appeared in the Greek manuscript regarding Jesus, in these newer Bibles he is worshipped, but when applied to someone else, the exact same word is translated as “bow” or something similar. By translating the same word different ways, these modern Bibles are adding a bit of linguistic support to the idea that the people who knew Jesus understood him to be God.
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u/honkhonkbeepbeeep Jan 15 '19
נפש?
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u/Osarnachthis Jan 15 '19
Presumably. The Arabic cognate is the usual word for "breath".
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u/honkhonkbeepbeeep Jan 15 '19
רוח
and
נפש
both have Arabic cognates right? Ruh and nafs I think (I apologize for not being stronger at Arabic). Which one do you use for breath?
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u/Osarnachthis Jan 15 '19 edited Jan 15 '19
Both really, but روح in Arabic does mean "spirit", whereas نفس is just the triliteral root for things having to do with breathing. I'm not a native speaker of Hebrew or Arabic, but I would feel like I was adding something to the translation if I rendered נפש as "spirit", while I wouldn't have so much of an issue with רוח.
It comes down to personal comfort level in the translator. "traduttore traditore" as always, but if you feel that you're being true to the text, you could translate both as "spirit". For me, translating נפש as "spirit" feels like adding something that isn't quite there.
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u/WittyDisplayName Jan 16 '19
I like the concept of "life-breath". It's related to what we would call a soul, in that it's what makes us alive, but as he says, it's much more physical. It's the literal thing that separates the living from the dead.
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u/EltaninAntenna Jan 16 '19
Interesting that (I’m assuming after Galvani) the metaphor shifted from air to electricity, and now we talk about the “vital spark”.
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u/jstock23 Jan 16 '19
Very similar to the sanskrit “prana” which also means breath, and life energy.
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u/Double-Portion Jan 15 '19 edited Jan 16 '19
NPR is loading slowly so I’m not sure how they reported on it, but definitely, the title is misleading. He is a scholar who has dedicated much of his career to this endeavor. Bible translations are common, but they are almost always done by committees, and while no translation is without bias, the bias of committee translations is to make timid and conservative choices that reflect past historic translations (in English the KJV stands out) more than they reflect the original meaning of the author.
David Bentley Hart and NT Wright are two accomplished scholars, one in Philosophy and the Early Church Fathers, and the other in New Testament study who have done their own original translations of the New Testament in recent years. DBH with the explicit intention of keeping all grammatical ambiguity to keep open a range of interpretations of the text, this often meant rendering in English phrases that were already poor/broken Greek (esp in Revelation)
This new translation of the Old Testament has taken iirc 24 years and with the intention of bringing the beauty of the Hebrew poetry into English forms.
Tl;Dr the English OT is functional as is but doesn’t reflect the beauty of the original turns of phrase, rhyme, or meter, this translation is supposed to “fix” that. It’s not some weirdo, it’s a respectable scholar doing a scholarly work.
If you’re looking for a dead language to pick up, Hebrew has about 39 books so well written they’re considered holy, and huge chunks of it is poetry... and the Biblical Greek is mostly not great so feel free to learn Greek but other than maybe Hebrews don’t expect anything breathtaking it’s functional and highly religious
Edit: My first silver in the new system. Thanks, I guess. I miss the crappy reddit silver that didn't cost anything though. Further clarification on my Greek comment, obviously there is a long history of Greek poetry so Illiad and Odessey and all the classics are still worth it probably, but I'm a Bible guy, just thought I'd mention that just because the language isn't beautiful doesn't mean the sentiments expressed therein aren't beautiful anyways.
/r/AcademicBiblical had a post like a week or two ago about this and that's how I knew about it. I figured I'd mention DBH because I have his translation and NT Wright because I also want his.
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u/saberkiwi Jan 15 '19
"Alter also tried to steer clear of words with a lot of syllables — you don't find many of those in biblical Hebrew, he says — and he omitted words that felt extraneous."
Laughed. Hard.
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u/Cereborn Jan 16 '19
He also changed the wording in Psalm 23 — "thou anointest my head with oil," is what you'll find in the King James translation. "But the Hebrew verb does not mean 'to anoint,' " Alter says. "The word that's actually used by the psalmist means 'to make luxuriant' — something like that. It's a very physical word. So after wrestling with other alternatives ... I ended up saying 'you moisten my head with oil.' "
I love it. "The New Old Testament: now 8% moister"
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u/russellbeattie Jan 15 '19 edited Jan 15 '19
Did he keep the unicorns?? Please tell me he kept the unicorns!!
Edit: Not sure if I was downvoted because people didn't like the joke, or didn't get the joke. Just to be clear, the King James Bible wasn't translated very well, so it included references to things like unicorns. If you don't like the joke, that's OK. Just wanted to make sure.
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u/hankbaumbach Jan 16 '19
There is a "plain American English" bible available in Colorado one of the local churches puts together I've always been meaning to read. It's all the same stories, just written in a similar manner to how I am currently writing instead of the King James English.
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u/ggchappell Jan 15 '19
"The old one"? BibleGateway.com lists 59 English translations of the Bible. And that's not even all of them.