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b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] NIV v' NWT translation policy

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  • From: Peter Kirk <peter AT qaya.org>
  • To: "Read, James C" <K0434995 AT kingston.ac.uk>
  • Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] NIV v' NWT translation policy
  • Date: Thu, 17 Nov 2005 02:23:58 +0000

On 16/11/2005 23:28, Read, James C wrote:

Putting all our pre-indoctrinated ideas aside and having considered
the merits of both the NIV and the NWT translations, could it be
that a 'good' translation would be a balance of the two?


I must say I doubt it. I think it would be a curate's egg, good in parts! But then I don't consider consistency to be a merit, in cases where words are used in various senses. Well, you seem aware of the danger when you criticise "exagerated faithfulness to any one particular word".

James and some others, you might be interested in the Better Bibles Blog, http://englishbibles.blogspot.com/, to which I am an occasional contributor.

...
My programme will soon be sweeping the internet in a manner similar to
Google's algorithm (crawling from link to link) and will parse and store
the frequency of every word and combination of words (mistakes included)
in every modern language that the visible web has to offer.
This database of word/phrase frequencies will be the basis of a new database
of numbers. Each unique number will represent one 'concept', which I believe
to be common denominator of all languages. And through intelligent self
correction mechanisms the programme will decide when a particular phrase
can map to a particular concept. As the entire algorithm is guided by concepts
(with meanings) and phrases alone it will not be able to produce unnatural
language yet will remain faithful and consistent in its mappings.


Sounds fascinating! Please keep us posted about your progress.


...
Nor will it fall into the trap that the NIV has of denying the right to interpret
the text of the reader by forcing any particular random idiom which supports
any particular doctrine as idiomatic translations will only be performed as a
result of careful meaning establishing mechanisms which map contexts to idiomatic
expressions.


This is not fair criticism - although I don't want to claim here that NIV is better than any other translation. There is nothing random about how NIV was translated, but its wording was carefully chosen by a large and varied team of scholars, who also know the English language and how phrases are used in it just as well as your computer is likely to be able to learn it. These scholars did of course have their biases, and the resulting translation is not entirely free of them. But I don't believe that it is possible even in principle for translation to be free from such biases. It certainly is not true of NWT, which, as an example, biases the understanding of nephesh and `olam by its choice of the particular consistent renderings "soul" and "to time indefinite". (NWT has been accused of other kinds of bias, of course, but I don't want to get into such matters which chiefly concern the NT.)


When my project is complete the entire source code will made available under open
source license so that the code can be subjected to rigourous international
peer review. This will be to ensure that I am not allowed to inject my own personal
beliefs into the mechanism (something which we are all guilty of from time to time).

Good!

--
Peter Kirk
peter AT qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk AT qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/





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