Quote:
Originally Posted by ApK
I'd like to hear more about this, but am not sure if this thread is the right place.
Surely there must be a way to accurately express or explain the meaning in English?
I wonder if what you call "paraphrasing" might really be the interpretation or grammar and idiom that is required for all good translation? It's never a 'literal' process, as you'd have by just decoding a substitution cipher. Even translating "Hello" usually involves a "paraphrase" to "whatever the target language's term of greeting is."
In other words, I wonder if what we non-Greek-speakers need is a better translation.
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I also read Greek, but that is because I study biblical texts, and we have the same problem that Harry mentioned. There are constructs in Greek that do not exist in English, and since no one speaks that kind of Greek any more there are cases where we just can not know with a high degree of certainty what it means.
The simplest example I can think of is:
Acts 2:38 Peter said to them, “Repent, and each of you be baptized... (NASB)
Is a translation of:
Πέτρος δὲ πρὸς αὐτούς, Μετανοήσατε, [φησίν,] καὶ βαπτισθήτω...
(I know, I know, it is all Greek to you! Sheesh)
The problem there is the word βαπτισθήτω which is a 3rd person imperative. We do not have that construct in American English at all. This passage is one of considerable theological dispute, which would go away if we knew what a 3rd person imperative should mean. The best case I have heard is that is a order to a 3rd party to allow the event to happen. So in this case "and let them be baptized" is probably closer to the intended meaning, but since that version of Greek died out a long time ago, the debate will carry on.
Another example that is easy to point to is in Romans 12:1
The Greek says : τὴν λογικὴν λατρείαν ὑμῶν
And that could mean:
This is your spiritual worship
This is your logical worship
This is your reasonable worship
This is your spiritual service
This is your logical service
This is your reasonable service
There is just not enough information in the Greek to tell us which was meant by the writer. As with the first example, volumes have been written on which is write, and will carry on til the end.
To give you a reverse example, if you came across the expression:
Buy and large dogs are bigger then house cats
"Buy and large" could be a very hard expression to translate 1,000 years after the last American English speaker had died out.