Have you ever heard someone talking about a particular English Bible translation and saying it's the best? I've heard that said about the ESV, the NIV, the NRSV, the NLT and The Message. Can they all be the best?
I was sitting in a Translation Priciples lecture recently and started to think about the different English translations and what their relative strengths are. Before I get there, let me outline the three different kinds of translation.
1. Some translations are literal or"word for word" translations. This means that they try to translate each word as closely as possible to the word that was used in the original Greek (or Hebrew/Aramaic in the Old Testatment). The ESV is a good example of this. This means that you will be able to see the language structure and word choice of the original language more clealy (though you are still reading it all in English).
2. Some translations are "meaning based" translations, which means that they first take a whole idea (might be a sentence or a clause) in the original language and translate the meaning of that idea into English. So the sentence structure will be more different to the original language than in a more literal translation, but it will also use more natural English. The NLT is a good representative of this approach, which is also sometimes called "dynamic equivalence".
3. Some translations are "paraphrases". These go further than the "meaning based translations" and apply the point of what was said in the original to today's situation and might even change what is being talked about to make the same point. The Message is usually placed in this category. Some people say that The Message, though it might be very helpful, is not a translation at all because it changes the meaning too much.
The risk with using a too literal translation is that the language might be too unnatual English to be understood properly (I have heard some people say that the ESV is too difficult for their children, even teenage children, to understand). The risk with a meaning based translation, and especially a paraphrase, is that you may not have understood the meaning correctly, and therefore what you translate might be wrong.
In summary literal translations run the risk of being unintelligible, other types of translations run the risk of being wrong!
These are not three discrete categories, they're a continuum, so the NIV andNRSV are placed somewhere in between the literal and meaning based translations.
To repesent the strengths and weaknesses of each approach, I came up with this little table:
Before explaining my table I should say that I'm talking about good translations here. There can also be very bad, literal and meaning based translations and bad paraphrases, but I'm not including those in my analysis.
Ideational Meaning is what people usually mean when they say "meaning". When we say "John walked out the door" the ideational meaning refers to this person called John and that he moved, putting his feet in front of one another to go out the door.
I think that meaning based translations do ideational meaning best. Literal translations don't convey the ideational meaning quite as well, because the meaning can be obscured when it uses foreign idioms or phrases. Paraphrases don't attempt to accurately convey the ideational meaning.
Textual meaning refers to how what is read relates to the rest of the text. For example in Mark chapter 2 Jesus refers to himself as "the son of man". The ideational meaning of this phrase is "I", people used this phrase to refer to themselves often. But on a textual level we can see that Jesus might have used this phrase to remind people of something else - in this case maybe the passage from Daniel 7.
Since they use a "word for word" translation strategy, links between texts can be most easily seen in literal translations. (From the introduction: "The ESV is an "essentially literal" translation that seeks as far as possible to capture the precise wording of the original text and the personal style of each Bible writer.") This is not always as clear in meaning based translations - though footnotes can help - and it is not clear at all in paraphrases.
Affectual meaning relates to how reading the passage effects readers' emotions. How are we to feel when, for example, Jesus is betrayed, or when he dies, or when he is transfigured, or when he feeds the five thousand? The original readers might have felt a certain way about something, but because we are so far removed from their culture we might miss some things and not be affected the same way.
Affectual meaning is best conveyed by paraphrases (as long as you belong to their target audience, if not the meaning can be lost on you, or misunderstood). Their aim is to affect the emotions of the readers and motivate the reader. In paraphrases there is no question of the original language affecting the grammar structure used, thus they are best at conveying affectual meaning, meaning based translations are next, and literal translations come in last in terms of affectual meaning because the English used is the least natural, and therefore affects our emotions the least.
In summary, meaning based translations (like the NLT) convey the ideational meaning the best. Literal, or word for word translations (like ESV) convey the textual meaning the best. And paraphrases (like The Message) convey the affectual meaning the best.
So when people say that the ESV is the best translation I would say:
• Yes it is! If you're studying the original text and want help understanding the Greek, or if you want to know what the original language says, but can't study the original language.If people say that the NLT is the best translation I would say:
• But no it's not! If you want to read the bible in natural English, nor if you want your heart, as well as your head, to easily understand what you're reading.
If people say that The Message is the best translation I would say:
• Yes! Because it is written in very nice English, which speaks to my heart well, and it also clearly shows the meaning. I especially like reading the Old Testament prophets in the NLT because I find I need it written in natural English to really understand what's happening since their situation and culture and also the genre is very removed from what I'm used to.
• And No! Because it isn't so easy to see how one passage relates to others, and also some of the ambiguities in the original language are lost. For example 1 Timothy 2:15 where the NLT has "women" the Greek word would be more accurately translated "he" or "she".
• Yes! Because it speaks to my heart well and applies the message to my own culture, which gives me encouragement very directly, and means that I am affected strongly by each encouragement and each rebuke.Want to share any thoughts about this with me? What did you think of my graph? Which translation do you like best and why?
• But also No! In some ways The Message changes the meaning a little too much, and I'm never quite sure when biblical author's writings end and the interpretation of the translator begins. The Message is really more like good preaching. It is powerful and it hits home. But the message of The Message must also be tested against a translation which sticks more closely to the original text.
As a post scipt I should also say that not all these positives and negatives have the same weight for me, and so there is a translation that I prefer above the others. Other people will have different priorities and different background and will therefore will prefer a different translation to me.
I acknowledge Kirk Patston who first told me about the three types of meaning though under different names in a very interesting Old Testament lecture. The idea has been adapted from the linguist Michael Halliday.
10 comments:
Great post, and there's so much to comment on, but first:
The risk with a meaning based translation, and especially a paraphrase, is that you may not have understood the meaning correctly, and therefore what you translate might be wrong.
Can you translate anything without first understanding the meaning correctly? That is, if you don't understand the meaning correctly in the first place, how do you translate it?
Yes, I see your point, that section could do with being more nuanced.
I guess what I mean is, if you have a mother tongue translator who doesn't understand the bible very well. If they stick to translating literally (from a related language) then they're less likely to go astray than trying to make a freer translation.
Literal translation is still the safer option for many translators. Though I do see the risks of that too - literal translation can be completely wrong sometimes.
Thanks for that comment Michael - what other comments do you have?
I've been posting on this topic a lot over at betterbibles.com where I noticed you've recently commented on the 'Bible translation foundations' series going on. Fun hey? ;) Here's the summary of what I think, but if you're really game you can read the whole thread under 'Bible translation foundations - accuracy'. Just thinking about it again wears me out....
Anyway, I think that discussion of translation methodology needs to include the topic of 'language features'.
Off the top of my head, here's a list of language features (as they relate to translation):
lexicon
grammar
syntax
topic/comment
style
register
theme
development/climax/conclusion
participant reference
background/foreground
allusion
idiom
discourse units
figures of speech
collocation
focus
implicit information
unknown ideas
key terms
impact
rhetorical questions
culture
There are a lot more than that, but that's the idea.
Literal translations mainly capture the first three - grammar, syntax, and lexical consistency. Lexical consistency often helps with allusion, so we can include that one. But literal translations often violate tons of the other features. Are those features not important? I would say that they're definitely important, but for some reason many translations are happy to get the first three right and forget about the rest.
You wrote:
2. Some translations are "meaning based" translations, which means that they first take a whole idea (might be a sentence or a clause) in the original language and translate the meaning of that idea into English. So the sentence structure will be more different to the original language than in a more literal translation, but it will also use more natural English.
I think that translation philosophy/discussion needs to expand on this. It's not that dynamic translations simply take the idea or meaning and translate that into English - they take the genre, style, register, climax, implicit information, theme, allusion, idiom, etc, etc, etc, of the original, and try to match those in the target language with the appropriate forms.
All translations are stronger on some features and weaker on others. But I believe that literal translations are only strong on a few features, and some of those features aren't particularly important (Syntax? Unless you're translating for Bible students etc., what's so important about faithfully representing Greek syntax in English if that very syntax brings with it a different focus, register, genre, and collocation?). I would much rather get those features right and have a translation weak on representing Hebrew grammar, than the vise-versa.
The risk with using a too literal translation is that the language might be too unnatual English to be understood properly ... The risk with a meaning based translation, and especially a paraphrase, is that you may not have understood the meaning correctly, and therefore what you translate might be wrong.
Another risk with literal translations is that it might not just be unnatural, it might unknowingly change original language features to different ones in the target language. An example I gave at BBB is:
___________________________________
Luke 23:48 – And all the people that came together to that sight, beholding the things which were done, smote their breasts, and returned.
We translated this literally into the Kwaya language and readers assumed that the people smote their breasts because they were angry, because that’s the only reason to them that someone would smote their breast/chest.
The attitude that you can just translate literally and it will be mostly accurate is ill-founded.
There are tons of reasons why a literal translation of this is at first glance understandable, but under scrutiny changes all sorts of things.
For example, beginning a sentence with ‘And’ in Kwaya does not have the same emphasis as in English or Greek.
Using relative clauses in Kwaya does not have the same meaning, nor is it used in the same contexts as in English or Greek.
Simply stating “and returned” in Kwaya does not make much sense without specifying to where they returned.
Kwaya has a word for ‘things’, but to use it in this context would mark the language as strange. They use a word that means issues/matters.
So, if you translate literally, you are changing the meaning and emphasis and register and style etc of all sorts of things. The result is an inaccurate translation.
___________________________________
You're right that different translations simultaneously are and aren't the best translation, because often it depends on what audience you're translating for, and what aspects of the original you're trying to capture and represent. For this reason, I highly rate the NLT, because it does so well with English discourse - register, style, background/foreground, climax, idiom, figures of speech, impact, collocation. It doesn't do so well with Greek/Hebrew grammar, lexical consistency and syntax. But I'm not so concerned about those features, as I am about the other ones. I actually think that The Message does pretty well on a lot of these language features. But I don't use The Message when I'm trying to figure out what Peter originally said. But most readers in the world wouldn't be able to look at a literal translation and understand the significance of word order/choice and grammar anyway.
Lastly,
I guess what I mean is, if you have a mother tongue translator who doesn't understand the bible very well. If they stick to translating literally (from a related language) then they're less likely to go astray than trying to make a freer translation.
Yes, if it's a related language (like you said). But that only works if those language features are common to each language. If you're translating from Greek to Kwaya, a literal translation messes up sooo many of those language features, and the result is a translation that is at best strange, and at worst wrong. A misplaced relative clause in Kwaya can turn the climax of a story into background information, and people will be sitting there wondering when the point of the story is going to be made!
We actually use computers here to help us do initial literal translations from one language to another related language. It works because their language features are so similar. But Greek and English aren't nearly as similar as people think, and the literal translations we have of Greek mess up all sorts of English language features, and sadly most people aren't even conscious that there is a change. They're just happy that the word order is right.
I agree about the NLT, I'm quite impressed with it. And yes, BBB is quite a fun discussion, I only discovered their blog recently so have also been enjoying reading the older posts.
Thanks for your thoughts, yes, I pretty much agree. I'm thinking of turning this blog post into a longer essay - Do you mind if I quote some of your examples and thoughts?
I remember reading the message a while back - can't remember what passage it was - but I was thinking "surely it doesn't mean this! This is too obvious". When I re-read a more literal translation (I think I was using the NRSV at the time) I realised that I'd never really understood the meaning, I'd simply read it. I think many people are similar, they think they understand the text when it has a "familiar ring" to it, and they understand all the words.
But it's hard to get your head around the idea that though you understand the words, you might have the meaning all wrong (I suggest it's almost impossible to understand this well, without having lived in another language and culture). I think it's this audience which appreciates the ESV - most Xcultural translators I know (in India) prefer the NLT - is that your experience too?
Your list of language features is a more micro-level idea than my types of meanings (by the way, I've added another type of meaning "pragamtic meaning" - how the reader (both original and from there, present) are intended to act according to the text.)
One of your features which I do wonder about is "theme", and also "development, climax, conclusion". If the typical story structure (I'll stick with narrative because I understand it better) is chiastic in the Bible, and non-chiastic in our culture, couldn't we do a translation which rearranges the stories to form more comprehensible units to modern day readers? Not sure how you'd go about that, but it's an idea.
Donna wrote:
Do you mind if I quote some of your examples and thoughts?
Sure, if I can read it when you’re done. ;)
But it's hard to get your head around the idea that though you understand the words, you might have the meaning all wrong (I suggest it's almost impossible to understand this well, without having lived in another language and culture)
Totally. Living in Africa has changed the way I look at a lot of things. I think the thing that’s had the most impact is seeing how a pre-modern society thinks. It’s very insightful, especially in the context of Bible interpretation. There are so many cultural passages in the Bible that they just get because it’s what they do. They even stone people to death right here in town! You know how James talks about not talking the seat of honour? Here they have seats of honour for special guests! That passage makes sense now not just figuratively but literally.
most Xcultural translators I know (in India) prefer the NLT - is that your experience too?
Yes. Although sometimes the culture has been influenced by missionaries of old and there’s a desire to cling to the KJV, even though they understand it way less than even we do. Swahili has its own ‘KJV’ that all the churches use. It uses holy Swahili.
(cont)
Your list of language features is a more micro-level idea than my types of meanings
Yes, that’s true. Your ‘types of meanings’ are good too. It’s good to look at both the macro and micro level of translation. I’ve tried to break down the elements of language discourse so that we can compare apples to apples when arguing dynamic over literal. I think that’s the problem with labelling the translation debate as ‘literal vs. dynamic’. It doesn’t really show what that means – i.e., that literal means morphosyntactic equivalence, and dynamic means equivalence of all those other discourse features that I’ve listed as well as your categories, which in my opinion are far more important. As Dannii Willis put it on BBB, if you get the discourse parts right, why would you want to make it morphosyntactically equivalent as well (unless you're making an interlinear)?
I suppose you could kind of look at your categories as ‘results’, and my features are basically ‘methods’. For example, in order to achieve the result of Emotional Meaning, the translation needs to use the appropriate methods, i.e., equivalent register, style, collocation (so it doesn’t distract), culture, focus, etc. What makes a translation have appropriate Emotional Meaning? I think if we break it down we see the kinds of elements that I’m listing and that they’re used appropriately.
One of your features which I do wonder about is "theme", and also "development, climax, conclusion". If the typical story structure (I'll stick with narrative because I understand it better) is chiastic in the Bible, and non-chiastic in our culture, couldn't we do a translation which rearranges the stories to form more comprehensible units to modern day readers? Not sure how you'd go about that, but it's an idea.
Yes, I think that’s very valid. If the “theme” of a narrative in the Bible is developed using a natural method that was common and understandable to its readers, then using an unnatural method in the L2 to develop the theme means that you haven’t translated the “theme” properly. Something like “theme” is kind of “metalinguistic”. It’s not necessarily contained in the words themselves, but it’s there somewhere in the structure and the relation of parts at the discourse level. Literal translations completely miss the discourse level of language, which is the most important part of communication, IMO.
We attempt to do this in the languages we’re working on ("to form more comprehensible units"), which isn’t always easy, but for a genre like didactic narrative (stories with a moral) we’re pretty clear on how it’s supposed to work – set the background, introduce the participants, develop the story, insert additional relevant background using specific grammatical tenses, build the story to a climax, describe the ‘afterground’, and finish with a moral/conclusion. It’s amazing the kind of impact a Bible story can have on people when it’s set out in a format that they’re familiar with and that makes sense to them. They know what’s happening and why it’s happening. When we get it wrong, they often read a passage and at the end of it don’t even know that Jesus was making a point, or that so-and-so was an important character, or that a certain behaviour/action was supposed to be highlighted.
more comprehensible units
Yes, that’s the secret of translation – language is about units and sections and relationships, not just words. “What kind of unit is this in Hebrew? Ok, let’s translate that unit into Jita.” Translating the words accurately but the units inaccurately usually results in a translation that’s not understood how the author would have wanted it to be understood. Translators need to start becoming aware of these units, and what their features are, and focus more on translating those than the morphosyntax.
Hmmm... somehow the first part of my most recent comment hasn't been approved, only the part that says "(cont)". Is it still there somewhere? I had to break it up bc it was above the word limit.
Thanks for letting me quote you - if it does turn into an essay I'll pass it on to you. (Feel free to remind me).
Sorry about missing the post. I think my email swallowed it or something... should be fixed now.
Btw, where you are in India, do you feel like you have a fresh look into "seeing how a pre-modern society thinks"? I'm guessing there are a lot of similarities to Africa (although probably a lot of differences too, but not in the same way as there would be with, say, Australia).
And you're from Sydney? I'm an Adelaide boy, although I spent 7 years in California doing youth ministry before coming to Tanzania.
Post a Comment