The Bible Translator: Volume 17, Issue 1

Translating the Psalms must appeal to a wide variety of usages, and no one version is likely to be suitable for all purposes. Discusses five particular questions and considers the difficulties they raise and the possible answers which may be explored: (1) the divine names; (2) verbal repetition; (3) paraphrase; (4) explanatory additions or modifications in translation; and (5) problems of metrical structure and division of the text. View Less

A study of the word monogenes in its historical and biblical usage. The RSV and other versions are correct in rendering the word “only” rather than “only begotten”, as reflected by the historical and biblical usage. If the word were only begotten it would be monogennetos. View Less

The problem of translating simple narrative passages from the gospel of Mark into Satere, a tribe of northern Brazil, was complicated by the character referents. Questions were asked “Who is speaking here?” or “Who is helping whom?” The analysis of referent ties is presented in three sections: narrated conduct (a report of action), narrated conversation (a report of the conversation), and narrated condition (a report of the state of being). View Less

An examination of the attempt to resolve the textual, lexical, and metrical difficulties in this verse. The problems are in the Hebrew preposition min, the verb yir’eh which lacks an object and in the punctuation which in the Masoretic Text. View Less

The personality of the Holy Spirit is an essential doctrine of the Christian religion and is revealed throughout the Old and New Testament. The doctrine of the personality of the Holy Spirit does not depend on the terms which denote him. But in the Bantu language there is a peculiar problem of the division of nouns and pronouns into quite a large number of categories or “classes,” differentiated by various prefixes, with intricate concordial agreement with related words and sentences. Certain of these “classes” have broad significance, e.g. personal, material, abstract, argumentative, diminutive, etc. Thus in the Bantu languages there are the personal classes and sub-classes of miscellaneous in content; e.g. kinship terms and proper names of persons derived from common object words in other classes. View Less

An argument for a simple form of English in Bible translation both in Britain and America. Neutral idioms for such words which are understood differently on both sides of the Atlantic could be combined for Bible translators into one that would not jar or puzzle readers on the other side. An example is Matthew 26:34 in the use of “cock” which is more common in Britain, and “rooster” which is more common in America. View Less

A discussion of the words artos or artoi in the NT. The plural should be rendered “loaves”, but it is in the singular which seems often deprived of its being translated “loaf”. View Less