Interchange Types

[kphoger]

I mean, with any sort of creative work (I know, this is a translation of the Word of God so some people would say that the humans involved are not actually creating anything, but play along for the sake of the point) if the creator asks someone's honest opinion and they get it, "I don't care for it" is an option that should be on the table, or else why bother asking? I'm sure lots of people wouldn't care for the stuff I've spent a lot of time writing and drawing, and that's okay. The risk someone isn't going to like it is part of the inherent risk of being an artist, whether that art is translating, writing, drawing, or anything else.

Huh.  I don't think of translation as something that fits under the "art" umbrella.  To me, it's more of a scholarly endeavor.  Admittedly, there is an art to language–which is especially relevant, considering that this version of the Bible was firmly within the dynamic equivalence camp–but, to me, it's not at all the same thing as disliking Coldplay or Frida Kahlo.

[Scott5114]

I tend to think of anything that involves some sort of subjective creative license as being art, although there are obviously degrees to it. So under that definition, it would be a form of art. I'm not really familiar with the languages involved in translating the Bible, but with most language pairs there are things like colloquialisms that don't have a 1:1 match between the two languages, so a translator has to choose the best way of rendering such things. Since the translator has some degree of discretion in what "sounds best", I would consider it to be art, even if not quite as artistic as music or other forms of literature.

But the fun thing about art is that it's so subjective that even the answer to "what is art?" is subjective.

[kphoger]

I'm not really familiar with the languages involved in translating the Bible, but with most language pairs there are things like colloquialisms that don't have a 1:1 match between the two languages, so a translator has to choose the best way of rendering such things.

It's just like translating from any other language, except that there's nobody around who speaks it anymore to ask for advice.   

For example, in the whole homosexuality debate, there's a term that's found in a book of the Bible written by Paul of Tarsus (who also wrote like half of the New Testament).  It's a Greek compound word whose two parts can be found in a verse from Greek versions of the Old Testament (originally written in Hebrew) produced around the same time.  There's debate about exactly what the compound word means:  is it just a literal mashup of its two parts (like toothbrush), or is its meaning derivative but much less literal (like butterfly)?  Translators can't exactly go over to ancient Israel and ask language professors what the word means.  So they look to see what the word means elsewhere in the same book;  he didn't use the same word elsewhere in the same book.  So then they look to see what it means in other books he wrote;  he didn't use it in any other book either.  So then they look to see what it means in other Christian literature of the period or earlier;  no other Christian writer used it up to that point either.  So then they look to see what it means in secular writings of the period or earlier;  no secular writers had used it either.  From all appearances, Paul invented the word.  So then they look to see what it means in writings shortly after the period;  its earliest few uses after that point are ambiguous and could go either way.  So yeah, it can be a challenge in a way that, say, translating from modern Dutch into modern Portuguese isn't.  But otherwise, translation is translation.

Anywho, I frequently translate between Spanish and English, and I consider it more scholarly than artistic.

[MCRoads]

[SNIP!]

What it reminds me of was this.

Ohhh, oh noooo!
I don't feel as bad now.