Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>]

The problem of translation “literally” is that sometimes there 
is no equivalent from one language to the other.

For example, in the example below WYKYR  wayyakir  has the 
meaning of to look at for the purpose of recognition. In English, 
there is no such term, we have two words and ne’er the twain 
shall meet, but in Hebrew both concepts are combined into one. 
Therefore, to give the full meaning of the Hebrew into English, 
we would need a sentence to render the one word in Hebrew. 
Thus when Jacob looked at Joseph’s cloak, “He looked at it and 
recognized it.”

Another problem is that sometimes a word in one language will 
have two or more terms in the target language depending on the 
context. For example X+)  chata  has the meaning of “to err” 
when referring to an archer missing his target, i.e. he erred in 
his aim, and in the moral sense “to sin”. Or there are two 
different words emphasizing nuances that are not available in a 
single word in the target language except by adding explanation. 
The wooden translation so satisfying to the scholar who 
recognizes the nuances becomes mistranslation to the one who 
does not know the original language.

(In the case of X+) I wonder if the English “to sin” is losing its 
relevance, its meaning, much as “iniquity” long ago became a 
meaningless term? Thus, would a consistent translation “to 
err” be a more accurate translation for 21st century English 
outside of narrow theological circles? The same is true for the 
Greek hamartanoo.)

To give a modern equivalent, my son knows Linux so well he 
prefers to enter commands by typing them in, but I would be 
lost without X-windows and KDE (which is why I usually use a 
Mac). Likewise, when making translations, I aim for the 
windows user and not the one who knows it well enough that he 
can type in long commands.

The argument for strictly literal translation sounds good, but 
in practice it doesn’t work.

Yours, Karl W. Randolph. 

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jan-Wim Wesselius" <jwwesselius AT mail.thuk.nl>
<snip>
> A. It is almost generally accepted that the exchanges between Jacob and his
> sons in Genesis 37:32-33 and Judah and Tamar in Genesis 38:25-26 are
> connected through the recurrence of the words hakker-na, 'do recognize!',
> and wayyakker, 'and he recognized' in both, but it proves nearly impossible
> to find an idiomatic translation which fits in both chapters, so that this
> striking connection is lost in nearly every ancient and modern translation.
<snip>
> Jan-Wim Wesselius
> Theologische Universiteit Kampen
> Postbus 5021, 8260 GA Kampen
> tel. 038-3371 662; fax 3371 613
> e-mail jwwesselius AT mail.thuk.nl
> visitors: Oudestraat 6, Kampen
> 
-- 
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