A Note on the Logic of Translation

As a couple of Greek word studies have already been posted on the blog and in preparation of posting some portions of translation to the blog soon, it is probably best to address a couple things regarding translation and word study. Inevitably, a couple of questions come up when looking at the Greek word studies and translation that will be found on this blog. The main question that seems to come up is why some of (if not most of) the word studies and a good bit of translation that are found in this blog seem to come out differently then other English versions of scripture. In order to understand this one must first understand this crucial point, that many scholars have already said and point out, that:

“Any translation is really the translators interpretation of the scriptures.”

There is no such thing as a translation free from interpretational bias because there really is no such thing as a word for word translation.  Let’s provide 2 examples of this.

1. For simple confirmation of this one need look no further than the common example of the word “Love”. It is practically common knowledge today that in the Greek there are 4 different (and one could actually argue 5) words in Greek covering all the different aspects of the one English word we call “Love”(We have already addressed Agape in a post under Greek word studies and some of the other Greek words for love will be addressed in the greek word study portion of the blog in due time). However, our English translation rarely make a distinction worth a difference of these 5 Greek words because we don’t have a perfect word for word translation of them.
2. Another example is the fact that our English translations translate one word several different ways and are very inconsistent in this way. A simple example of this is the word Dikaiosynē which sometimes translators will render as “righteousness” and sometimes they will render it “justice”. This would not be a problem except that the English reader typically thinks the 2 English words mean 2 very different things. The translators are taking liberties here because they are not sure if an exact word for word translation exists and so they instead allow their interpretation of the context surrounding the word to dictate there translation. Note what AW Tozer states in frustration regarding this:                                              “In the inspired Scriptures justice and righteousness are scarcely to be distinguished from each other. The same word in the original becomes in English justice or righteousness, almost, one would suspect, at the whim of the translator.”                 One can see Tozer’s frustration here as the translators interpretation is the deciding factor of what word is rendered from the same Greek word Dikaiosynē.

The examples provided above are just two of several types of examples that could be addressed here but for the sake of brevity we will move forward with just these examples for now. What is trying to be addressed here is the fact that “all translation is interpretation“. With this being the case it could almost be said that translation is the translators interpretational commentary of the scriptures. Every translators theological lens, background, influences and assumptions find themselves in the translation itself. Therefore it is important to understand what the translators theological lens, background, influences and assumptions are.

The Greek word studies and translations that will be found on this blog are not different and with this in mind what needs to be explained is – The logic that was used in interpreting the Greek words and translation that will be found in this Blog:

The logical goal of the word studies and translation found on this blog is to render (as much as possible) a translation that is a good representation of what the original authors meant when they originally wrote it (and how it would have been perceived by its recipients in that time). Thus an early church understanding of the Greek words used throughout the Bible are heavily leaned on. Both early church and (often times specifically) Early church Fathers are leaned on for understanding of what a word meant in that time period over and above later theological traditional practices regarding a word. Some may argue this is the goal of all scripture interpretation and translation but this does not seem to be the case in many instances. (This will not be addressed here for sake of length of the post but has now been addressed in a follow up post titled “A History of English Bible Translation” where I try to explain why this may be the case.)

When it comes to reading the translations one may find on this blog, there are places (or more accurately even specific words) in the translation that may be translated quite a bit differently than most English translations. When this is the case you may want to check the Greek word studies on this site as many times the words may be addressed there taking into account the early church understanding (if a greek word study has not been posted addressing a word or phrase you are interested in from the translation feel free to message, comment, or ask me about it and I will try to provide my reasoning for you).  Lastly words will often be placed in parenthesis ( ) that really have been added to further clarify the text in certain instances. In light of this it should be said that if one wants a more literal translation try to read the translation without reading what appears in the ( ) but if one wants a more interpretational version from an early church understanding read the whole translation including what is in the ( ). In light of these last 2 if the writer says something that seems like itself should have been in parenthesis but is in the actual text itself it will bracketed with {} and pronouns will sometimes be replaced with there corresponding noun they are referring to and placed in [ ]. It is the hope of this translator that these features help the reader to understand this translation of the Greek text from an early church perspective and understanding of the Greek in the time period of which the letters were written.