Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Peter Kirk" <peterkirk AT ozemail.com.au>]

Bryan, I appreciate your goal of encouraging people to appreciate good
Hebrew. And I understand that it is not your responsibility to teach
them good English. But perhaps you might accept some responsibility, as
a good citizen if nothing else, for not teaching them bad English!

In fact Samuel's Hebrew is not bad, or even idiosyncratic and unusually
abrupt. It is good Hebrew, which needs to be appreciated for what it is
and for being syntactically different from English. I chose one example
of a common idiom, see also Gen 27:45, 1 Sam 20:12,31, 2 Kings 6:13,
7:13, Ezra 4:14, Job 1:4,5, Jer 43:10 - from a search of the NRSV for
"send and". For more examples of this Hebrew idiom, see the article
"Send!" by John Ellington in The Bible Translator, Vol. 45 No. 2 (April,
1994): 228-238 - this should be available online at
http://rosetta.reltech.org/TBT/CD3/TBT.html. Ellington writes:

"...in common, everyday English it is rare indeed to hear the verb
"send" without an object. [excluding compounds like "send out" and "send
away"]

In spite of this many English versions of the Bible use the verb "to
send" without an object in a wide variety of contexts. In RSV, for
example, this happens more than fifty times. And the recently published
NRSV uses "send" as an intransitive verb over thirty times. Even such
modern versions as REB and NIV sometimes fall into the trap of
translating in such a way as to present the verb "send" without an
object. This almost always reflects a Hebrew original in which the verb
$FLAX [shalach] is used without an object. Frequently it involves a
construction where this verb is followed immediately by another verb."

So it seems that we have a construction which is common in Hebrew but
very rare and unnatural in English, outside Bible translations. I don't
think we should be promoting unnatural English when we teach Hebrew. Of
course this topic will quickly go off topic for this list, but is
regularly discussed on the b-trans list - subscribe via
bible-translation-request AT kastanet.org.

By the way, Wayne Leman pointed out off-list that his website
http://biblepacesetter.org/bibletranslation/ is temporarily down. He
pointed me to a list of Hebrew idioms at
http://www.geocities.com/bible_translation/otidioms.htm, but this is not
in fact the study I was referring to. He has done a separate study on
grammatical oddities in English Bible translations, which may be at the
same geocities website or linked to from it.

Peter Kirk
peter.r.kirk AT ntlworld.com
http://web.onetel.net.uk/~peterkirk/
 

> -----Original Message-----
> From: b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:b-hebrew-
> bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of B. M. Rocine
> Sent: 28 January 2003 00:07
> To: 'b-hebrew'
> Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Re: Grammar Texts Question
> 
> Hi Peter, you wrote:
> 
>  If your
> > students get too used to stretching English to its limits in
answering
> > your exercises, if and when they get on to serious translation (and
> > don't put yourself down, Bryan, the next generation of translators
of
> > standard English Bibles may cut their teeth on your course) they
will
> > find it hard to distinguish stretched English from standard English,
and
> > to switch back to the latter.
> 
> Oh, no.  Now I have to be responsible for teaching them English, too?
;-)
> (The truth is, at my school, I *do* teach  English, albeit in a
another
> course.)
> I do find your worry a touch fanciful.
> 
> If this sounds fanciful, look at some of
> > the wildly stretched supposedly English syntax in some modern Bible
> > translations. Wayne Leman, who moderates the b-trans list, has
collected
> > many examples (mostly New Testament); see
> > http://biblepacesetter.org/bibletranslation/. For example, there are
> > verbs which are always transitive in English, except for some reason
in
> > the Bible; one example, common in translations of the Hebrew Bible,
is
> > "send", as in "Send and bring him" (1 Sam 16:11 NRSV). In English
this
> > is a grammatical error! We really shouldn't teach students that this
is
> > an acceptable English rendering.
> 
> What's wrong with "Send and bring him"?  I think Samuel was using
> incorrect
> Hebrew!  Didn't you catch that?  His tone is abrupt.  I think he is
> irritated.  So are we to correct him in English?  I think a good
> translation
> gives correct for correct and incorrect for incorrect.
> 
> Don't worry about my course, though.  In stretching English to its
limits
> there is no need to tolerate the ungrammatical.
> 
> >
> > Also, I suspect that students want to learn Hebrew because they
don't
> > trust the standard translations and think they can do better. I was
> > surprised that you wrote the opposite.
> >
> 
> Take my statement in context.  *Within the constraint produced by
> targetting
> a wide audience*, the bookstore translations are worthy
accomplishments.
> Learning BH should equip people to criticize these translations in
more
> limited settings like class, church, and synogue (and the b-hebrew
mailing
> list!).  But first, to become a good critic, the student must learn to
> appreciate the Hebrew.  Appreciating the Hebrew, (a.k.a. hearing it,
> reading
> it, comrehending it) is my goal, and I think appreciating it is
distinct
> from translating it.
> 
> Shalom,
> Bryan
> 
> 
> B. M. Rocine
> Living Word Church
> 6101 Court St. Rd.
> Syracuse, NY 13206
> 
> ph: 315.437.6744
> fx: 315.437.6766
> 
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