The Word of God in English: Criteria for Excellence in Bible Translation

I will not walk you through the books itself. However, as an owner of an online Bible Translation Magazine ([...]), I have had the opportunity to read nearly thirty books on this subject alone. Dr. Ryken has done an excellent job in defending the Word of God, as opposed to the dynamic Equivalent's altering it. When I initially read this book, it was like reading a John Grisham novel, I could not put it down. If you are not sure of which type of translation to choose from, this is where you start. Below, I hope to add a thought or two on this subject as well, which could hardly keep pace with Dr. Ryken.A WORTHY TRANSLATION IS AN ACCURATE TRANSLATIONIf asked what the number one priority in translation is, most translators would argue that the biggest responsibility is accuracy. However, if this conversation were between a translator of a literal or verbal corresponding (word-for-word) mindset and one of the functional equivalent (sense-for-sense, meaning-based) mindset, the next question would be, `what do you mean by accuracy?' The functional equivalent translator would most certainly say, `to render the Biblical meaning of the original language text as accurately as possible into English.' The literal side would return with, `to render the words of the original language text into an English equivalent (corresponding) word or phrase as accurately as possible.' The functional equivalent translator is to re-express what they believe the original language text means into English, removing the need of interpretive reading for the modern-day Bible student; the literal translator wants to re-express what the original language text says into an English equivalent, leaving it up to the reader, to determine the meaning for himself.How does the Bible reader know what the Bible means if they do not know what it says? If the reader is given what a translator has determined the meaning as, and not what it says, how does the reader determine its meaning as being accurate? Are they not shortchanging the reader from the right of having access to the very words of God; but instead, feeding them a regurgitated interpretation of what another thinks it means?A word-for-word corresponding equivalent translator expects the reader to ascertain the meaning of the words that were used by studying and researching the text, with helps of course: word study dictionaries, lexicons, commentaries, and the use of exegetical principles, as well as by the Christian that is carrying on the Bible study with them. The sense-for-sense translator must believe that the reader is too ignorant and too lazy to ascertain the meaning by study and reaching out to those helps, so they provide it for them. If the reader has the meaning already in front of him by way of the translator, he has no way of getting back to what the texts says, to determine if the meaning is, in fact, correct. All translators know that there is theological bias in all of us, and we will at times, bend things to have it our way. Looking at the worst-case situation first, some translators violate grammar and syntax to get a theologically important verse to read the way they want it to, and we are to trust them to give us a translation already interpreted for us?1 John 2:5, 15; 3:17; 4:9; 5:3 (New American Standard Bible, ©1995)* in him the love of God has truly been perfected* If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him* how does the love of God abide in him* By this the love of God was manifested in us* For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments1 John 2:5, 15; 3:17; 4:9; 5:3 (New International Version, ©2010)* love for God is truly made complete* If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them* how can the love of God be in that person* This is how God showed his love among us* this is love for God: to keep his commands1 John 2:5, 15; 3:17; 4:9; 5:3 (New Living Translation, ©2004)* . . . obey God's word truly show how completely they love him* when you love the world, you do not have the love of the Father* how can God's love be in that person* God showed how much he loved us* Loving God means keeping his commandments"Love of God" and "love of the Father"--what did the apostle John mean when he penned those words? Was he referring to the love that God has for us, or to our love for God, or the love that comes from God and is expressed through us to others? B. F. Westcott understood this to mean "the love that God has made known," while F. F. Bruce came to an opposite conclusion: as meaning "our love for God." The reader of John's epistle would have had to determine what John meant by the words that he used. Today's reader should be given the same responsibility; he must determine what was meant by the corresponding English words in an essentially literal translation. The sense-for-sense functional equivalent translations have come to opposite conclusions, meaning that both cannot be right. Therefore, it is best that the reader be given what was said, and carry the responsibility of determining what was meant by what was said.Words and MeaningThe functional equivalent translator believes that somehow meaning exists apart from words. When asked in an interview for Christianity Today Magazine, "What do you consider your most important contribution to Bible translation?" Eugene A Nida responded: "To help people be willing to say what the text means--not what the words are, but what the text means." The interviewer goes on to ask, "How did you develop your ideas about Bible translation 50 years ago?" Nida replied:When I was at the University of California, Los Angeles, our professors would never let us translate literally. They said, "We want to know the meaning. We don't want to know just the words." I found that a number of the Greek classics had been translated very meaningfully, much better than the Bible had been translated. I thought it a tragedy to have the Scriptures in a form that most people misinterpret. Why should the Bible be so much more poorly translated than secular texts? I studied linguistics, Greek, Latin, and Hebrew, and I decided that we've got to approach the Scripture as though it is the message and try to give its meaning, not just to repeat the words.What is often left out of this discussion is that the goal of every literal translator is to convey the meaning of the Biblical language into the English language. The difference is that they believe this is best accomplished by giving the reader what was said, while Nida and his followers believe that the translator has to skip over what is said into the realms of translating what is meant by what was said, because "they [you the reader] don't understand the text," so says Nida.Does the translation seek to render into English what was said in the original language as correspondingly as possible? Take note that an accurate translation is not one that is going beyond the English equivalent, in search of rendering the meaning of those words, but is one that seeks to render the words of the original language text into an English equivalent (corresponding) word or phrase as accurately as possible. A translation is certainly inaccurate if the English edition does not correspond to the original, as a mirror reflection, in any of the following ways:(1) if all of the original words are not accounted for by an English equivalent;(2) if the translation has added to or taken away from the original in any way;(3) Finally, if the meaning that the reader could derive by the correspondingEnglish words has been affected, changed, in any way by an interpretive method.Roughly, six months after John starts preaching, Jesus comes to him at the Jordan. Jesus asks John to baptize him. At once John is in opposition to such an idea: "I have need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?"" Yet, despite John's objection, Jesus insists:Matt 3:15 (NUI) --having answered, but the Jesus said to him, "allow now thusly for fitting it is to us to fulfill all rightness" Then he allowed him.Matt 3:15 (LEB) --But Jesus answered and said to him, "Permit it now, for in this way it is right for us to fulfill all righteousness." Then he permitted him.Matt 3:15 (CEV)--Jesus answered, "For now this is how it should be, because we must do all that God wants us to do." Then John agreed.The reader of the Lexham English Bible, ESV, NASB, NW, and RSV will be reading the very words of God as they correspond in English: "to fulfill all righteousness." The reader of the Contemporary English Version will get the interpretation of God's words as, "do all that God wants us to do," which TEV renders as "do all that God requires." The TEV's interpretation is similar to a number of other functional equivalent translations (NEB, NLT, and NIRV). The literal translations give us the corresponding English words of what the Bible says, while the functional equivalent translations interpret those very words to mean "obedience", as understood by these translation committees.What is meant by "permit it now", by "for in this way", by "it is right", or by "for us to fulfill all righteousness"? It is up to each reader of the Bible, to determine what is meant by these words. It is not the job of the translator to interpret what was said, but to give the reader what was said, for interpretation. Just looking at one of the phrases, what is meant by "to fulfill all righteousness"? Is it referring to the doing of all that God asks or requires, in other words, obedience? Does it mean that John and Jesus were righteous individuals? Does it mean, by baptism that Jesus would be entering a path of a right relationship with his Father, a symbol of presenting himself to doing the will of his Father? Again, it is up to the reader to make the determination as to what was meant by the words that Jesus used. Sadly, the reader of the CEV, TEV and other functional equivalent translations do not have that choice, because a committee has made the choice for them.A WORTHY TRANSLATION MUST BE CLEARThe functional equivalent camp would make the argument that to be clear is to be immediately understandable. When they ask if the translation communicates the meaning that the author intented, they are focused on there being absolutely no barriers between the reader and the translation:(1) Idioms: a land that is "flowing with milk and honey" as opposed to "live in that rich and fertile land" of the TEV.'Deuteronomy 6:3(2) Similes: "you are the light of the world;" this is a very effective figure of speech, so effective that the functional equivalent translators do generally not set it aside.(3) Metaphors: "he is like a tree planted by streams of water."'Psalm 1:3(4) Technical Terms: "mediator" of the NASB for "he" of the CEV.'Galatians 3:19, NASB.(5) Vocabulary Level: "their condemnation is just" of the ESV for "but God is fair and will judge them as well" of the CEV.'Romans 3:8(6) Religious Vocabulary: "to give his life as a ransom for many" of the ESV for "will give his life to rescue many people" of the CEV.'Matthew 20:28For the functional equivalent translator, "being clear," means nothing in the words of their translation is to be difficult to understand. They hold to this concept, even in the face of the Apostle Peter's words about the Apostle Paul's letters: "there are some things in them that are hard to understand." (2 Pet 3:16) Why did Peter find Paul's letters hard to understand? The 27 books of the New Testament were written on different levels. However, one could argue for the most part, they are not literary, and they are not common as a whole, more in the middle. For instance, Paul wrote at times in a literary Koine, as is true of Luke as well. Peter, Mark and John on the other hand, wrote on a much lower level. Regardless of this, idioms were still idioms, similes were still similes, metaphors were still metaphors, technical terms were used, higher levels of vocabulary, and religious terms.Clear to the functional equivalent translator also means transparent (able to see through). In other words, they are simplifying and removing on all levels, to allow today's reader to see through time, and fully grasp what was meant [as per the translator's interpretation], by the words of the original writer to the original reader, as though they were there. This is a fallacy in thinking, as we just learned from Peter, who did not readily understand Paul's letters, even though he was an apostle of the Christian congregation, let alone your lay congregation member of the first-century. Therefore, obviously, it is too much to assume that all the early readers of the Greek New Testament readily understood the text, because they readily understood the Greek of the day.For the essentially literal translator, they too see clear as being transparent (able to see through). However, they work to bring the text to the reader, not the reader to the text. They wish to make the original text transparent to today's reader, by using words that correspond to the original. However, it is much more than bringing the original language words of Hebrew and Greek to the modern reader in a corresponding English word. The Bible is full of idioms like "flowing with milk and honey." The simplest figure of speech is the simile ("you are the light of the world"). Though simple, it is very effective. The Bible is rich with metaphors, like "he is like a tree planted by streams of water." The world of the Bible is filled with whole other cultures that span 4,000 years of time, covering a variety of residences, foods and meals, clothing, home life, marriage, health, education, cities or towns or a nomadic lifestyle, and ways of spending time.We will investigate some scriptural examples, with the purpose of seeing if any of the following three principles are violated::(1) if all of the original words are not accounted for by an English equivalent;(2) if the translation has added to or taken away from the original in any way;(3) Finally, if the meaning that the reader could derive by the corresponding English words has been affected, changed, in any way by an interpretive method.The literal translation gives us the corresponding English words of what the Bible actually says, The functional equivalent translations interpret those very words to mean . . . . , as understood by these translation committees.Psalm 34:5 (English Standard Version)5 Those who look to him are radiant, and their faces shall never be ashamed.Psalm 34:5 (Contemporary English Version)5 Keep your eyes on the LORD! You will shine like the sun and never blush with shame.Psalm 63:11 (English Standard Version)11 But the king shall rejoice in God; all who swear by him shall exult, for the mouths of liars will be stopped.Psalm 63:11 (Contemporary English Version)11 Because of you, our God, the king will celebrate with your faithful followers, but liars will be silent.Ecclesiastes 9:8 (English Standard Version)8 Let your garments be always white. Let not oil be lacking on your head.Ecclesiastes 9:8 (New Living Translation)8 Wear fine clothes, with a splash of cologne!Romans 1:5 (English Standard Version)5through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of his name among all the nations,Romans 1:5 (New Century Version)5 Through Christ, God gave me the special work of an apostle, which was to lead people of all nations to believe and obey. I do this work for him.

I've read worse books, but I've rarely read a book so exasperating. Here is my one sentence summary: "Behold, thou stupid scoundrel, if thou wouldst partake of the Holy Scripture, pray thee donst countervail the text as handed down to us in the Elizabethan English spoken in the Heavens, unless betimes thou wilst succor the churl with the ESV (at bookstores now)."In other words, this book is derogatory, misguided, and biased toward the archaic. It is also illogical, laughably inconsistent, and one-sided. However, for those deeply interested in this topic, I do recommend reading it. Why? It will help you to understand the thinking and arguments of the KJV Only crowd, that apparently is morphing to the ESV Only crowd.To my complaints:Misguided. The author never successfully breaks away from an underlying attitude that the Bible was effectively written by King James in English. Nor does he seem to have a grasp on the basics of translation. For example, not even the most literal of translations is "word for word." Try translating an everyday Spanish phrase word for word: "¿Como se llama?" becomes "How yourself call?" Even accounting for syntax it is still an unwieldy "How do you call yourself?" We could improve the English grammar to "What do you call yourself?" but native English speakers do not normally use this phrase. Obviously, the correct translation is "What is your name?" The Greek to English translation challenge is similar:Luke 8:30 "What to you is the name?" [literal] "What is thy name?" [KJV] "What is your name?" [NIV]I want to be clear: he does give lip service to these basic ideas, but then proceeds to development his argument as if they were not fundamental concepts.Illogical. The author groups all translations into two camps: literal and virtual paraphrases. Various terms are used for these two types (word for word, essentially literal, dynamic equivalence, etc.) but no allowance is made for the fact that there is a spectrum of translations from the actually literal (and effectively unreadable) such as an Interlinear Bible, to an admitted paraphrase, such as The Living Bible or The Message. The two questions that logically arise are, "Is there an ideal level of equivalence in translation?" and "Is paraphrasing to be avoided?" In other words, the goal is a readable English version of the Word that does not stray from its original meaning, given that most of us won't typically be reading the texts in the original languages, even with the actual word for word English included. The author avoids these questions, and simply places the ideal label on a "essentially literal" strategy, without ever clearly defining what that means (except by example: the oft-quoted ESV).Inconsistent.At the end of a section on literary quality, the author states, "it is as simple as that," meaning that the poetry will be captured if you just translate the words. Absurd. Then, the entire second half of the book is devoted to methods for capturing the various aspects poetry, all the while ignoring the actual word for word translation!Similarly, in trying to capture the "world" of the text, the apparent goal is to transfer the reader to England in the time of Shakespeare rather than the Holy Land of Jesus or the Patriarch's day.However, by far, the most exasperating aspect of the book is the numerous examples given by the author, which contradict the very point he is making. It is not clear if he assumes the reader is a "churl" and won't check, or if he just doesn't understand the subject at all. My favorite example is from Psalm 88:18, which literally says, "my acquaintances - darkness." This could be interpreted in parallel to the earlier part of the verse as "my acquaintances are in darkness" [NASB], or in contrast "darkness is my only friend" [HCSB]. The "preferred" version "my companions have become darkness" [ESB], doesn't even make any sense, let alone being a poor example of fidelity to the text, the subject of the chapter!As for my other charges: Biased and one-sided? Just go out and by the ESV and don't bother with the book length promotion. Derogatory? Are dynamic equivalence promoters really "antinomian?" A literal translation is "one who rejects the socially established morality." I suspect he meant a more dynamic translation: "dopes."And thus we now have some insight into how this issue is approached by those with a more archaic mindset. But what should be the modern approach to seeking the best possible translation? First of all, is there a negative side to having a wide array of translations? How do we deal with the changing nature of current English? What impact do we allow to our modern reading, the past interpretations that have had significant impact on the history of our language? The author did raise all these questions, but unfortunately did not adequately answer them.My conclusion is that the primary problem with developing a standard English translation is the limited understanding of language among native English speakers. We've had our own tongue as the world-wide lingua franca for so long, we expect it must be that way in heaven, and don't bother to study language in school.One final question: how did the publishers get so many respected Christian leaders to endorse this book? "Most important read of the millennium?" "Brilliantly convincing?" This is, actually, disturbing. In the case of the on-line Amazon evaluators, I assume that the bias toward five stars is due to the fact that they didn't actually read the book (including many who didn't bother to finish it, and then reward it with one star). But it would also appear, from reading the endorsements, that the recommendations were not based upon a critical reading of the material presented, but preconceived notions of which Bible is superior!Do read the book, but then direct your exasperation-sparked energy toward a search for a more rational exposition of this important topic.

This is a 'must read' for those who want to understand which translations of the Bible really are the 'Word of God' and why it matters.