scholarly journals Bible Translations in Sweden

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (4) ◽  
pp. 1107-1123
Author(s):  
Irina V. Matytsina
Keyword(s):  
Textual Analysis ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Fundamental Principle ◽  
Scientific Data ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Swedish Text ◽  
Hearts And Minds ◽  
Average Readers

The article focuses on approaches to Bible translation that existed in Sweden in different periods. Special attention is payed to what is to date the latest translation in 2000 (Bible 2000). On the eve of celebration of the 500th anniversary of the first translation of the Gospels (1526) this topic is particularly relevant and discussed more and more actively in works by Swedish researchers, first and foremost because a new edition of the next Bible translation is planned in 2026. This tradition goes back to 1540-1541 when translation of the full Bible was printed, known as the Gustav Vasa Bible (Gustav Vasas Bibel), which has made an impact on the hearts and minds of Swedish people for almost four centuries and formed the basis of Standard Swedish. The approach declared by Luther has become a fundamental principle of Bible translations into Swedish: text must convey precisely the message, spirit and content of the original, not literally, however, but in the language that is clear to uneducated people. The Gustav Vasa Bible was reissued twice: in 1618 (the Gustav II Adolf Bible) and 1703 (the Charles XII Bible). Whats more, every new edition was redacted officially. In 1773 Gustav III established the Biblical Commission and requested to replace the outdated text with a new one. However, there were numerous changes in the Swedish Language during the XXth century. Besides, the development of linguistics and translation studies, as well as new scientific data have formed the basis of a new Bible translation project that was launched in 1972 and ended up with publishing the Bible-2000. The translation is the result of collaboration between numerous scholars and average readers. It took almost thirty years to perform the work. In the end, a text was created which most people think is unique, as it strives to convey the style of each particular book. However, there is obviously a gap between the new text and the centuries-old tradition of Bible translation, because after textual analysis was complete, scholars and translators often took decisions about how to render separate words and whole phrases. Their decisions had nothing in common with established practice. Consequently, critics consider that the text of Bible-2000 is often greatly oversimplified, everyday, lacking its solemn beauty and magnificence.

scholarly journals History and theory of Scripture translations

2008 ◽  
Vol 64 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean-Claude Loba-Mkole
Keyword(s):  
Frames Of Reference ◽  
Functional Equivalence ◽  
Historical Overview ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Christian Communities ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
History And Theory

This article argues for the importance of Bible translations through its historical achievements and theoretical frames of reference. The missionary expansion of Christianity owes its very being to translations. The early Christian communities knew the Bible through the LXX translations while churches today still continue to use various translations. Translations shape Scripture interpretations, especially when a given interpretation depends on a particular translation. A particular interpretation can also influence a given translation. The article shows how translation theories have been developed to clarify and how the transaction source-target is culturally handled. The articles discuss some of these “theoretical frames”, namely the functional equivalence, relevance, literary functional equivalence and intercultural mediation. By means of a historical overview and a reflection on Bible translation theories the article aims to focus on the role of Africa in translation history.

scholarly journals The First Catholic Bible in Chinese: Gabriele Allegra and His Translation

2015 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-23
Author(s):  
Raissa De Gruttola
Keyword(s):  
Textual Analysis ◽  
The Other ◽  
Historical Background ◽  
Greek Text ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Biblical Study ◽  
Study Centre ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract Christian missionaries play an important role in the history of the relationship between China and Europe. Their presence in China has been widely explored, but little attention has been paid to the role played by the Bible in their preaching. From 13th to 19th century, although they did not translate the Bible, Catholic missionaries preached the Gospel orally or with catechisms. On the other hand, the Protestant missionaries had published many version of the Chinese Bible throughout the 19th century. It was only in the 20th century that the Franciscan friar Gabriele Allegra decided to go to China as a missionary to translate the Holy Scriptures into Chinese. He arrived in China in 1931 and translated from 1935 to 1961. He also founded a biblical study centre to prepare expert scholars to collaborate in the Bible translation. Allegra and his colleagues completed the translation in 1961, and the first complete single-volume Catholic Bible in Chinese was published in 1968. After presenting the historical background of Allegra’s activity, a textual analysis of some passages of his translation will be presented, emphasizing the meanings of the Chinese words he chose to use to translate particular elements of Christian terminology. This study will verify the closeness of the work by Allegra to the original Greek text and the validity of some particular translation choices.

Digitization of Bibles in Greater China (1661–1960)

2021 ◽  
Vol 72 (2) ◽  
pp. 241-254
Author(s):  
Simon Wong
Keyword(s):  
Historical Narrative ◽  
Seventh Century ◽  
Indigenous Languages ◽  
Chinese Han ◽  
Greater China ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
Eastern Christianity ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Language Groups

Bible translations in (or for) Greater China may be classified into three categories: Chinese, Han dialects, and indigenous languages. All these language groups witness translation activities by Protestant missionaries. However, in its earliest history, Bible translation was pioneered by missionaries of Eastern Christianity in the seventh century or even earlier, whereas from the Catholic side, clear historical narrative has recorded Bible translation work in the thirteenth century by John of Montecorvino (1247–1328) into a Tatar language. Sadly, this work was not preserved. The earliest extant Bible translation in this vast area was published in 1661 in the Siriya language of Taiwan. This article reports on two major digitization projects: digitization of old Chinese Bibles (1707–1960), including 51 translations in total, and digitization of Bibles in Han dialects/fangyan and indigenous languages (1661–1960)—about 50 languages (including dialects) and 60 translations. These two projects represent the largest and most systematic full-text digitization of the Bible heritage of the area ever undertaken.

scholarly journals Biblical conceptual sphere as a concept of Taras Shevchenko's idiostyle and its reverbalization in Ukrainian bible translations

2018 ◽  
pp. 155-170
Author(s):  
Oksana Dzera
Keyword(s):  
Word Of God ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The World ◽  
Complete Translation ◽  
Old Greek ◽  
Biblical Concepts

The article elaborates the analysis of Ukrainian translations of the Holy Scripture through the prism of Shevchenko’s metabiblical images. Biblical conceptual sphere is defined as a fragment of biblical picture of the world shaped on the basis of Old Hebrew, less frequently Old Greek imagery and represented by the totality of concepts which are connected through overlapping, interrelation, hierarchy and opposition and are thematically grouped. Verbalizers of biblical concepts contain the complex accumulation of senses reflecting correlations between God and people through specific world perception of ancient Hebrews. The mediating link between the Bible prototext and biblical metatexts is created by national translations of the Holy Scripture that shape national biblical conceptual spheres via multiple deviations of the Hebrew and Greek sources. The deviations affect national phraseology as well as individual authors’ interpretations of the Book of Books. Special attention is devoted to recursive deviation which manifests itself when a national biblical conceptual sphere and even national translations of the Bible contain elements of authors’ biblical intertexts. Taras Shevchenko’s poetry is viewed as the primary Ukrainian recursive biblical intertext. His idiostyle is characterized by the verbalization of biblical concepts through overlapping biblical and nationally-bound senses. Metabiblical images of Shevchenko’s idiostyle are tracked down to the Bible translation done by I. Khomenko and edited by I. Kostetskyij and V. Barka. The editors who represented the baroque tradition of the Ukrainian translation domesticated Khomenko’s version and introduced into it elements of the Ukrainian metabiblical conceptual sphere, predominantly Shevchenko’s metabiblical images. I. Khomenko himself did not approve of this strategy and regarded it as a violation of the Word of God. Yet the monastic order of St. Basil the Great that commissioned this translation did not consult the translator before publishing its edited version. Similar domesticating strategy is observed in the first Ukrainian complete translation of the Bible done by P. Kulish, I. Puluj, and I. Nechuj-Levycjkyj in 1903. Shevchenko’s influence is particularly felt in epithets specifying key biblical images, such as enemy (лютий / fierce) and heart (тихе / meek). Though each book of the Holy Scripture in this translation is ascribed to only one translator of the three it seems logical to surmise that P. Kulish, the founder of the baroque translation tradition in Ukraine, was the first to draw images from Shevchenko’s metabiblical conceptual sphere. The article postulates the necessity to perceive Shevchenko’s poetry as a complete Biblical intertext which not only interprets national biblical canon but also generates it.

scholarly journals Lexical Aspects of Russian Bible Translations

2021 ◽  
pp. 59-77
Author(s):  
G. A. Kazakov
Keyword(s):  
Public Perception ◽  
English Language ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Central Asian ◽  
The New Testament ◽  
The One ◽  
Church Tradition

The article is devoted to the study of the lexical aspects of Russian Bible translations of the 19th—21st centuries in comparative coverage and is a continuation of a study pre-viously conducted by reference to English Bibles. A historical overview of the existing Russian translations is given (the Synodal translation and the texts preceding it, the New Testament of Bishop Cassian, the Bible of the World Bible Translation Center, the “Central Asian translation”, the translation of Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Bible of the Inter-national Bible Society, the modern translation of the Russian Bible Society, the “Zaoksky Bible”). Special attention is paid to modern editions. Samples of texts are compared according to the lexical parameters of adaptiveness, terminologicalness, style and literalness. On the basis of this comparison, a classification of the considered translations is proposed, and their typological features and interconnections are established. The lexical nature of translations is interpreted in terms of their sociolinguistic effect (public perception). The data obtained confirms the pattern previously found in the English-language Bibles — the inverse relationship between adaptiveness on the one hand and terminologicalness, high style and literalness of the translation on the other.  In terms of lexical characteristics, the Synodal and the “Central Asian” translations differ most from each other, which is probably due to their focus on church tradition and missionary goals, respectively. 

scholarly journals The Importance of Collaborative Discourse Analysis in the Training of Novice Translators

2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-25
Author(s):  
Eszter Ernst-Kurdi
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Interpersonal Skills ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Contrastive Analysis ◽  
Self Reflection ◽  
Collaborative Discourse ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Key Aspects ◽  
Translation Errors

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.

scholarly journals A Bíblia no mundo e no Brasil e a incidência de marcas ideológico-doutrinárias nas primeiras traduções brasileiras completas

2016 ◽  
pp. 49
Author(s):  
Marcelo Raupp
Keyword(s):  
Graduate Program ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Religious Groups ◽  
Santa Catarina ◽  
Dual Purpose ◽  
Doctoral Thesis ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
The Bible

http://dx.doi.org/10.5007/1980-4237.2014n16p49Este artigo visa apresentar um resumo da tese de doutorado defendida pelo autor em 20/03/2015 no Programa de Pós-Graduação em Estudos da Tradução da Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina. A pesquisa que culminou na tese teve duplo objetivo: 1) mapear a transmissão e a tradução da Bíblia no Brasil e no mundo e 2) pôr em evidência as marcas ideológico-doutrinárias que podem ser observadas nas primeiras traduções bíblicas completas feitas por diferentes grupos religiosos de matriz judaico-cristã presentes em território brasileiro.ABSTRACTThis article aims to present an overview of the doctoral thesis defended by the author in 03/20/2015 at the Graduate Program in Translation Studies at the Federal University of Santa Catarina. The research that resulted in the thesis had dual purpose: 1) to map the transmission and translation of the Bible in Brazil and worldwide and 2) to highlight the doctrinal ideology brands that can be observed within the first complete Brazilian biblical translations, made by different Judeo-Christian religious groups present in Brazil.Keywords: Bible transmission; Bible translation; translators’ doctrinal ideologies.

scholarly journals The Zulu version of the old testament from a typological perspective

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 212-225
Author(s):  
Victor Porkhomovsky ◽  
Irina Ryabova
Keyword(s):  
Old Testament ◽  
Hebrew Text ◽  
Translation Strategies ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Sacred Objects ◽  
Canonical Text

The present paper continues typological studies of the Bible translation strategies in different languages. These studies deal with passages and lexemes in the canonical text of the Biblia Hebraica, that refl ect ancient cultural and religious paradigms, but do not correspond to later monotheist principles of Judaism and Christianity. The canonical Hebrew text does not allow of any changes. Thus, two translation strategies are possible: (1) to preserve these passages in the text of the translation (a philological strategy), (2) to edit them according to the monotheist principles (ideological strategy). The focus in the present paper is made on the problem of rendering the name of the ancient Semitic goddess ’ashera, attested as the companion of the supreme gods in certain traditions and pantheons (’El /’Il/, Ba‘al, YHWH). Two strategies of rendering the name of ’ashera are attested in different Bible translations: (1) to preserve the name of the goddess (philological strategy), (2) to eliminate this name or to replace it with the names of her fetishes and sacred objects (ideological strategy). The Zulu case of rendering the name ’ashera is particularly looked at in this paper.

scholarly journals Textwahrheit und Übersetzen. Beobachtungen an neueren Bibelübersetzungen

2013 ◽  
Vol 23 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Radegundis Stolze
Keyword(s):  
Literary Form ◽  
Target Language ◽  
Original Text ◽  
Ethical Implications ◽  
Bible Translation ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Original Message ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Individual Interpretation

Recently many new German bible translations have appeared. The article first presents a comparison of paragraphs from ten different translations, with examples taken from the New Testament. This shows some basic trends. On the one hand, the objective of bible translation is Christian education, edification and worship usage. On the other hand, some translations focus on the cultural information, easy readability and inclusive language. Such orientation accepts purposeful adaptation and thus modifies the original text. And there are a few translations that constitute the product of an individual interpretation of the text, and its presentation in a literary form. The discussion of these translation trends is complemented by a critique of the prominent focus on the language rather than on the message, and the question of a text's truth and a translator's linguistic awareness is raised. The traditional translation criticism distinguishing between literal and target-oriented translation, and even cultural adaptation, is integrated here by a discussion of the procedural, functional, objectivistic and ethical implications of the new bible translations. One feature of all recent projects of bible translation seems to be a pedagogical concern. Authors think that they need to guide readers in their interpretation, because those may be unable to understand the very old, strange and often opaque text; or they might misunderstand it and thus miss the true message; or they should learn something about the historic culture; and last but not least, traditional patriarchal attitudes promoted by Christianity should be overcome with a new text. The idea is that people's thinking can be directed by language. Thus the question is raised, whether a translation should also be an interpretation. In a critical view of the interpretive translation, this article presents the hermeneutic approach to translation. This implies a well-informed openness as an attitude towards the original message, rather than a method. The focus is neither on language structure nor on the addressees, but on the text's message. This includes the problem of understanding a written text, what is never a matter of fact. The text's theological exegesis is a prerequisite for the translation, but the value of that translation is not only based on that. Translation aims at a faithful representation of the message and opens the direction of a text, but the individual interpretation is always done by the readers themselves. When the translator as a reader identifies himself with the message, s/he will cognitively produce formulations apt to give resonance to this message. The translator becomes a co-author of that text, and just as for the original author, one will never totally govern the readers' understanding. The translator's voice will be more convincing, when only one person is responsible for the text production, different from the team works in various official projects of bible translation. Even if the bible as such is a composition of many different books and pieces of texts, these manifold voices may be better noted by one translator alone, rather than by many contributors, each of whom as a specialist only translates one book. Finally, the stylistic shape of the target text is decisive. The bible translator should have an excellent knowledge of the target language, in order to present various nuances. Translating is not an information about an original text, it represents that original message in another language.

Translation types and niche translations: Comparing five Afrikaans translations

2021 ◽  
Vol 55 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sebastian J. Floor
Keyword(s):  
Scientific Work ◽  
Translation Studies ◽  
Translation Theory ◽  
Adequate Model ◽  
Bible Translations ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Reverse Situation ◽  
Market Niche ◽  
Translation Type

Before the introduction of the dynamic-equivalent translation method by Eugene Nida, most Bible translations, in terms of translation type, were literal and formal correspondence translations. With the expansion of Bible translation globally over the past 60 years, alternative translation types started to appear – sometimes claiming uniqueness and even superiority. That, in turn, led to a reverse situation where ‘literal only’ or ‘literal-superiority’ claims were made. This has been a cause for significant debate and controversy. The purpose of this comparison of translation types is to indicate how translations differ from each other on a continuum and to determine if some versions in Afrikaans align with translation typology. The method followed in this article is to classify translation types in two main groupings: more literal and more dynamic; and four subtypes: corresponding translations, resembling translations, clarifying translations, and simplifying translations. In light of this classification, five publications of the Bible in Afrikaans are compared to Bible publications in English and Dutch. This study has found that each of the five Afrikaans translations does fit under one of the four types for which the criteria were laid out. The finding was that the typology applied to Bible versions in English, Dutch and Afrikaans. This typology implies that translations from different types are not necessarily in competition with each other, but that they complement each other. Each version in Afrikaans has then been compared to each other in terms of an end-user market niche and, based on that, there seems to be a continuing need for versions in all the different types. Translations do improve over time as translation theory and source-language scholarship evolve, but the validity of each type and publications in each type argue for versions of several types to endure.Contribution: This article is not the first attempt to describe translation types. Several translators, as well as some functionalist translation studies did important scientific work in this regard. However, this article’s principal contribution to translation studies is to propose a simplified yet adequate model of four translation types with new terminology, terms which do not overlap but are descriptive of function. And then secondly, to align each type with scripture engagement and the translation niche.

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