Biblical Hebrew Forum

[RSRICHMOND AT aol.com]

Randall Buth at biblicalulpan.org (don't I wish) notes - as long as we're off 
topic -

>>To what may this be compared?

English and German are sister languages like Arabic and Hebrew.

German Shakespeare is good,

English Shakespeare is Shakespeare.<<

German Shakespeare is "unser Shakespeare". The early 19th century 
translations of Shakespeare made by August Wilhelm Schlegel and Ludwig (or 
was it Ursula - sorry - I'm on the road today, and my major in German is 
nearing a half century in the past) really make Shakespeare a living writer 
for Germans, even more than he is for English speakers. Schlegel and Tieck do 
a remarkable job of creating a Shakespearian verse style in German:

Mitbürger, Freunde, Römer, hört mich an!
Begraben will ich Cäsarn, nicht ihn preisen.

When I was in high school reading Shakespeare in the original, I used to use 
Schlegel-Tieck for notes - they always come up with some kind of a meaning, 
even for the most corrupt passages - though they aren't always right.

But this is what literary or scriptural translation has to be - the 
re-creation of a voice in a new world. Biblical translators do have the 
special advantage of being informed by the Spirit.

Bob Richmond
Knoxville, Tennessee