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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Genesis 3:15 "bruise"

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  • From: George F Somsel <gfsomsel AT juno.com>
  • To: kwrandolph AT email.com
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Genesis 3:15 "bruise"
  • Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 21:39:27 -0600

On Wed, 22 Dec 2004 21:16:43 -0500 "Karl Randolph" <kwrandolph AT email.com>
writes:
> Peter:
>
> When I hear "direct translation", most people are thinking of a word
> for word translation. For reasons discussed before, that is
> impossible.
>
> But the question is: how much paraphrasing can be done before it
> crosses the line from merely making the ideas in one language
> understandable in another, as a subset of translation, to becoming
> an original work of art pushing its own ideas? All of us have seen
> examples of such misuse of paraphrase, where it has become the boss
> rather than the servant of translation, hence why we are so leery of
> "paraphrase".
>
> Karl W. Randolph.
_____________

Karl,

Your "direct translation" is what is generally called "formal
equivalence." I too tend to favor that approach. I would suppose that a
translation which claims to derive from the original language texts but
which tends to simply reword an existing translation would be called a
paraphrase, but a translation derived from the original language texts
but which does not faithfully represent those texts would simply be a
poor translation. This is not to say that one must restrict his language
to the glosses supplied in the lexica. I frequently make use of a
thesaurus to find an acceptable synonym which I feel most accurately
conveys the thought of the original or which is more comprehensible to
today's readers.

george
gfsomsel
___________




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