At 03:55 PM 12/22/2004, you wrote:Jim, I am also more or less at one with all of your concepts - except your continuing confusion between NLT and NWT. I just reject your use of the words "paraphrase" and "paraphrastic" as quite contrary to general and technical usage. And I note your apparent retraction of your earlier claim that NIV is a paraphrase and not a translation.
Jom:
All translations are paraphrases, at least to a certain extent.
agreed
First of all, on a grammatical basis, what is good grammar in one language often is nonsense in another. Already by adjusting the word order, one does a low level of paraphrasing.
agreed again
Secondly, and more importantly, lexemes often have meanings in one language that have no equivelant in another. Sometimes it will be broader, including meanings that are rendered by two or three different lexemes in the target language, sometimes narrower, sometimes a sentence is required to explain a concept that one word does in the originating text. This is not even counting figures of speech, literary devices and euphamisms.
absolutely
Because of these problems, all translations are paraphrases.
i agree and coutldn't agree more. Nonetheless some translations are more "paraphrastic" than others. For instance, the ASV stays fairly close to the hebrew and greek texts whereas the NIV and the TEV and the NWT stray rather widely from the mark. In this respect they resemble paraphrases such as the living bible much more than they do translations like ASV and NASB.
These same problems exist even working as a lexicographer, let alone translater.
We are, I think, at one.
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