The Bible Translator: Volume 1, Issue 3

Objects to the common disjunction of translation and paraphrase. Translation involves more than mechanical consistency and literal correspondence. It is the scientific art of making a message live in the language and hearts of a people. Illustrates the point from both English and aboriginal translations in the context of psychological terms, correspondence of metaphors, descriptive identifiers, metaphorical equivalents, and idioms reflecting cultural contrasts. View Less

Surveys the various uses of kurios in the NT which has the various meanings of “Lord,” “lord,” “master,” “owner,” or simply “sir.” The translator must not only be concerned with the range of meaning the kurios has in the NT, but also what the social equivalents of that range are in the receptor language. View Less

Committee report on orthographic difficulties in Yipounou, a Bantu language spoken in the Gabon region of Africa. List the problems and discusses the principles which guide missionary translators in reaching solutions to problems which involve the changing form of words and parts of words when they occur in different types of phonological contexts. Comments by the editor (Eugene A. Nida) are added to the report. View Less

Illustrates the difficulty of translating Indo-European abstract nouns into primitive (aboriginal) languages. Uses the problem words of (1) repentance and conversion; (2) offend and offense and (3) grace as examples and offers a solution to the difficulty. View Less

A literal translation of renderings in another language affords a basis for comparing syntactic and lexical problems. This translation of 2 Cor. 2:1–11, together with the accompanying notes, provides an insight into many of the complex problems of Karré which is spoken in the Oubangui Chari district of French Equatorial Africa. View Less

Discusses the problem of doublets and triplets that are synonymous but vary in degree of familiarity, politeness and deference in the Bali language. Discusses the advantages and disadvantages of these distinctions in translation and illustrates with the phrase “son of man." View Less

Three questions from a missionary translator among the Kapauku people in the Wissel Lakes region of Dutch New Guinea answered Eugene A. Nida. Asks concerning: (1) the legitimacy of following the Malay’s diglot form in publishing a translation of Mark; (2) the translation of “Holy Spirit”; and (3) the translation of “greet” when there is no abstract equivalent. View Less

Discusses the transliteration of words from the Malay language to the Kapauku language in Dutch New Guinea. View Less

Illustrates where Mazateco, a language spoken in the State of Oaxaca in southern Mexico, differs from Spanish, English and Greek so that certain types of syntactic adaptations must be made if the indigenous translation is to be understood by the people. View Less

While attempting to provide a translation of the NT which could be read by three diverse sub-dialects, three major types of problems were encountered: (1) the cultural circumstances in which the Quechua Indians live; (2) the grammatical problems of word order and cross reference; and (3) special terms which reflect particular cultural and linguistic difficulties. View Less