Linguistic Variations in Early Ladino Translations

2014 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-48
Author(s):  
Ora (Rodrigue) Schwarzwald

The differences between early Ladino liturgical translations andhalakhictranslations, both of which were based on Hebrew sources, are analyzed in this study. The liturgical translations include the Bible, Pirke Avot, the Passover Haggadah, and the Siddur as well as biblical citations in these sources. The halakhic translations includeMesa de el alma(Shulḥan Hapanimin Hebrew) which is a translation ofShulḥan Arukh, the translations ofḤovat Halevavot, and the halakhic instructions in the prayer books. While there are no significant variations in orthography between the two kinds of translations and morphology demonstrates few differences, syntax, discourse analysis, and lexicon reveal great variability. The halakhic translations demonstrate simplification, explicitation, normalization, and a small amount of interference, whereas the liturgical translations adhere to very strict norms of word-for-word translation. It was also found in both kinds of texts that the western translations from Italy and the Netherlands done by former converted Jews (anusim) follow Spanish norms more than the eastern Ladino conventions of the Jews in the Balkans and Asia Minor.

Author(s):  
Cornell Collin

Is God perfect? The recent volume entitled The Question of God’s Perfection stages a conversation on that topic between mostly Jewish philosophers, theologians, and scholars of rabbinic literature. Although it is neither a work of biblical theology nor a contribution to the theological interpretation of scripture, The Question of God’s Perfection yields stimulating results for these other, intersecting projects. After briefly describing the volume’s central question and contents, the present essay situates the volume’s offerings within the state of the biblical-theological and theological-interpretive fields. In its next section, it considers—and compares— The Question of God’s Perfection with one twentieth-century theological antecedent, the Dutch theologian K.H. Miskotte. In closing, it poses questions for ongoing discussion. The Question of God’s Perfection: Jewish and Christian Essays on the God of the Bible and Talmud, edited by Yoram Hazony & Dru Johnson. Philosophy of Religion – World Religions 8. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2019. ISBN 9789004387959


Though the existence of Jewish regional cultures is widely known, the origins of the most prominent groups, Ashkenaz and Sepharad, are poorly understood, and the rich variety of other regional Jewish identities is often overlooked. Yet all these subcultures emerged in the Middle Ages. Scholars contributing to the present study were invited to consider how such regional identities were fashioned, propagated, reinforced, contested, and reshaped — and to reflect on the developments, events, or encounters that made these identities manifest. They were asked to identify how subcultural identities proved to be useful, and the circumstances in which they were deployed. The resulting volume spans the ninth to sixteenth centuries, and explores Jewish cultural developments in western Europe, the Balkans, North Africa, and Asia Minor. In its own way, each chapter considers factors — demographic, geographical, historical, economic, political, institutional, legal, intellectual, theological, cultural, and even biological — that led medieval Jews to conceive of themselves, or to be perceived by others, as bearers of a discrete Jewish regional identity. Notwithstanding the singularity of each chapter, they collectively attest to the inherent dynamism of Jewish regional identities.


2021 ◽  
Vol 34 (2) ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Hendrik L. Bosman

Jacobus Eliza Johannes Capitein (1717-1747) was a man of many firsts-the first black student of theology at the University of Leiden in the Netherlands, the first black minister ordained in the Dutch Reformed Church in the Netherlands, the author of the first Fante/Mfantse-Dutch Grammar in Ghana as well as the first translator of the Ten Commandments, Twelve Articles of Faith and parts of the Catechism into Fante/Mfantse. However, he is also remembered as the first African to argue in writing that slavery was compatible with Christianity in the public lecture that he delivered at Leiden in 1742 on the topic, De Servitute Libertati Christianae Non Contraria. The Latin original was soon translated into Dutch and became so popular in the Netherlands that it was reprinted five times in the first year of publication. This contribution will pose the question: Was Capitein a sell-out who soothed the Dutch colonial conscience as he argued with scholarly vigour in his dissertation that the Bible did not prohibit slavery and that it was therefore permissible to continue with the practice in the eighteenth century; or was he resisting the system by means of mimicry due to his hybrid identity - as an African with a European education - who wanted to spread the Christian message and be an educator of his people?


Quaerendo ◽  
1986 ◽  
Vol 16 (2) ◽  
pp. 110-130 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Wim Wesselius ◽  
Peter T. Van Rooden

AbstractPublication by subscription is a sales technique developed in England in the seventeenth century. It was probably not introduced to the German-speaking countries until after 1725. The first hitherto known instances in the Netherlands date from after 1680. The article describes the publication of two linguistic works by Sephardic Jews which are the earliest known examples of works published by subscription in Holland and Germany. The first of the works concerned is the Hebrew Mikhlal Yophi, a commentary on the Bible of which an edition prepared by Jacob Abendana appeared in Amsterdam in 1662. An exchange of letters between Abendana and Antonius Hulsius is indicative of the former's attempts at recruiting subscribers. Abendana's efforts concentrated on Leiden, where in about 1660 he, his brother Isaac and the rabbi David Cohen de Lara, formerly of Hamburg, were living as private Hebrew tutors and booksellers. Abendana used an approbation of his book by the Leiden professors Cocceius, Heidanus and Uchtmannus to support his request for permission to dedicate his work to the States General. This was a more conventional way of acquiring funds from the state. At the same time the dedication, the approbation and a letter from the Basle Hebraist Johan Buxtorf jun. were intended to smooth the book's path to the Christian reading public. A case is also presented for the publication by subscription of David Cohen de Lara's Keter Kehunna (Hamburg 1668). Cohen de Lara's initiative goes back to the example set by Abendana, who, in turn, probably borrowed the idea from the London Polyglot. Finally some observations are presented concerning the conspicuous popularity of this method of publishing with Sephardic Jews interested in language. A comparison with the events surrounding the appearance of the Dutch translation of Athanasius Kircher's Mundus subterraneus, subscriptions for which were opened in 1678, makes it probable that Abendana's work was one of the first ever to be published by subscription.


2019 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-220
Author(s):  
Manon van der Laaken ◽  
Anne Bannink

The standard process for starting anamnesis in the follow-up cancer consultation is for the doctor to ask a ‘How are you?’ question. This question gives the patient the opportunity to give a gloss of their general condition and offer the first topic of discussion. Findings in earlier analyses of US and UK data in a broad array of medical contexts show that the question is ambiguous and hence patients may interpret it as social rather than medical. A discourse analysis of a corpus of 28 video-taped consultations shows that the ‘How are you?’ question in the context of Dutch follow-up cancer consultations is consistently interpreted by both doctor and patients as a holistic medical question, making relevant a – frequently complex and nuanced – medically oriented response. We suggest that this difference may have to do with the interactional norms of hospital visits in the Netherlands, and with the specific contextual parameters of return visits, more specifically with follow-up cancer consultations, which affect the way the HAY question is placed, intended and understood.


2012 ◽  
Vol 22 ◽  
pp. 125 ◽  
Author(s):  
Georgios THEOTOKIS

<span style="line-height: 200%; font-size: 11pt"><font face="Times New Roman">This study will attempt to examine two significantly different types of mercenaries serving the Byzantine Emperors - the Varangians and the Franks - from the mid-10th to the mid-11th centuries. Not structuring my analysis on a chronological basis but rather on the different enemies that these mercenaries were facing in different geographical conditions, the main objective of my research is to give answers to a series of questions; what evidence do we have about the organisation of the mercenary units of the Rus, the Varangians and the Franks and in what numbers were they descending at Constantinople? What were the political circumstances that led to their employment by the Emperors throughout our period of study? What was their standing in the Byzantine military establishment? Did they pose any threat to the central government? What evidence do we have about their battle and siege tactics and their overall role in each operational theatre?</font></span>


2010 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Zdenko Brusić

I will use the opportunity in the fourth number of the Archaeologia Adriatica journal which is dedicated to my friend and colleague J. Belošević to pay attention to the finds which were found at the sea bottom as a consequence of various shipwrecks or as discarded or lost objects in the Early Middle Ages period when Croatian state developed and existed. Monuments from this period belong to rich scope of the study and research of my colleague J. Belošević. In this case by underwater finds I refer to a specific category of monuments that I have already written about, and which can be dated to the mentioned period on the basis of analogies. Namely these are amphorae which exhibit considerable differences regarding their size, i.e. capacity from the earlier types dated from the 5th to 7th centuries. These Byzantine amphorae, as they are usually referred to, have characteristic massive handles which are usually higher than the vessel's opening whereas base of the amphora is oval in shape, without pointed end characteristic of the earlier amphorae. Forms are usually piriform or ovoid, and their height usually does not exceed 40 cm. Remains of a shipwreck with amphorae of this type were discovered near the island of Mljet in the mid-1970s and the site had already been devastated. I discovered another site with the remains of the Byzantine amphorae and some other objects in the sea in front of the Ždrijac site in the vicinity of Nin when I was working as a curator of a regional archaeological collection in Nin in the 1960s. Byzantine amphorae were also found in 1995 in the Bay of Pijan in Savudrija where rescue underwater archaeological excavations of an important ancient port near Aquileia were undertaken due to building and extending a quay. Great part of the remaining amphorae which I present in this paper are older finds without exact data about the findspot and circumstances of discovery, such as the upper segment of an amphora from Umag or an oblong amphora with large handles which are significantly higher than its opening from Poreč (presently in the Regional Museum in Poreč). Three almost identical amphorae have piriform bodies and massive handles with a triangular cross-section which are higher than the amphora's opening. One of them was found near the island of Žut long time ago, presently it is in the Šibenik City Museum, the second was taken out of the sea in a fishing net between the islands of Silba and Olib, and the third one is from the Trogir port. There are several more amphorae corresponding to these finds: upper segment of an amphora from Ždrijac in Nin and two somewhat larger amphorae, one of which was found near the island of Ošljak near Zadar long ago (presently in the Archaeological Museum in Zadar) and the other from the Kovačić collection on the island of Hvar. A larger segment of a smaller oblong amphora of the similar shape was found in the 1970s near the island of Vela Arta near Murter. An upper segment of an amphora with a distinct neck and opening and large massive handles with triangular cross-section was found in the sea near the cape of Gospa od Gradine in Rogoznica, presently also in the Šibenik City Museum. We also need to mention finds from the port of Hvar found in 1991 and amphorae from the churches of St. Michael in Ston, St. George on the island of Vis and St. Barbara in Trogir. Underwater explorations along the Asia Minor coastline and in the Black Sea brought to light similar examples of amphorae on the basis of which N. Günsenin and Ch. Bakirtzis created a chronology, classifying them into several types dated from the 9th to 13th centuries. For an amphora from the collection of the Franciscan Monastery on the island of Krapanj we can find closer analogies, and probably also production centers on Peloponnesus. Without individual analysis of each of our amphorae, we can easily notice difference in the height of the handles which are often higher than the amphora's opening. Other evident differences include size and forms of amphorae as well as their diversity in relation to amphorae from the same period found in Turkish/Pontic region and the remaing part of the Balkans. These insights about the typological differences between our amphorae and the aforementioned ones in the Asia Minor region open up possibilities for hypothesizing about other, possibly local workshop centers in the area of today's Albanian littoral or the rest of the eastern Adriatic coast. All together, our coast shows the most impressive picture of maritime trade in the early medieval period on the basis of density of finds of the mentioned amphorae. Trade with glass products was also present in this period along our coast as indicated by the remains of a shipwreck near Cape Stoba on the island of Mljet where a certain amount of glass sets was found together with amphorae. Some of complete glass items found on a shipwreck near Serçe Limani can be related to some finds from the terrestrial sites on the basis of analogies, such as a glass flask from the grave (no. 322) at the great necropolis from Ždrijac in Nin which can be related to the workshop centres of the eastern Mediterranean since similar flask was found on the shipwreck from Serçe Limani in Turkey.


2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-25
Author(s):  
Eszter Ernst-Kurdi

This paper outlines the key aspects of effective translator training regarding content, method and assessment drawing on a growing field of research in Translation Studies. The training of translators—whether in the professional or in the Bible translation context—should be influenced by the demands of the field as well as the profile of the students and therefore focus on the most required and most often lacking competencies in novice translators. The author suggests that collaborative discourse analysis is particularly beneficial in the training of beginner translators as it hones their skills in self-reflection, in handling discourse level translation problems, in providing a contrastive analysis of the SL and the TL and in correcting their most common translation errors. In addition, this method provides the learners with the opportunity to grow in teamwork and interpersonal skills which are also crucial competencies for a translator.


2021 ◽  
Vol 49 (2) ◽  
pp. 166-184
Author(s):  
Linda Duits ◽  
Floor Boschhuizen

Abstract Representation of sex work in the Netherlands: a comparison between Jojanneke in de prostitutie and Filemon op de Wallen Since 1999, sex work in the Netherlands has been partly legalized. Despite a reputation of tolerance, Dutch media represent sex workers as victims, opening the door to more restrictive policy. In this article, we report on a discourse analysis of two documentary series, Jojanneke in the prostitution (2015) and Filemon in the Red Light District (2017). We show that stigmatizing discourses dominate the former: sex work is brought as a gruesome, criminal practice, that even as a chosen profession is unattractive, where Dutch natives and escorts are the exception to the rule and where women lack agency. The latter title is more ambivalent. Discourses of sex work as work dominate, but it also emphasizes that sex work is an unattractive profession where Eastern-European workers are naive victims and that is inextricably related to crime. Recommendations for journalists to counter stigma are made.


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