ΕΝ ΕΦΕΣΩ

John Benjamins is kind of like the Brill of the linguistics world — yes, Brill also publishes linguistics. I’m just making the comparison because most people familiar with Biblical Studies are more likely to recognize Brill’s name than John Benjamin’s. In any case, the two publishers are similar in that they’re both situated in the Netherlands and book chiefly sell their books to libraries.

But I just discovers something that’s rather incredible about JB:

You can browse all their books online for free: HERE.

They provide a internet browser plugin and you can read their books online to your heart’s content!

Now this is relevant to you, the reader’s of my blog, because that oh, so expensive book that I’ve talked about from time to time, On the Meaning of Prepositions and Cases. The expression of semantic roles in Ancient Greek is published by JB — and thus, also available through JB’s Ebrary (again, HERE).

JB requires an account if you want to print or copy from their books — and that is what they’ll charge for. I haven’t yet found pricing for copying and printing, but I’m sure it’s there somewhere. Still, this is very exciting to me.

Go check out this great Greek book.

Many of you know that I was the New Testament chair of the ESV translation. This project has consumed thousands of hours, most of them enjoyable. I am happy with the ESV. As a formal equivalent translation done in the translation stream of the KJV / ASV / RSV, it has proven itself. And while the committee will be constantly looking at issues and questions submitted by people like you, my work on the ESV was largely done.

But a few weeks ago I received a most amazing email from my friend Mark Strauss (who I have been picking on lately in this blog). What was amazing was that just the night before I was sharing with Robin (my wife) how much I missed translation work. I learned so much on the ESV, things I have never taught in any Greek class at any level. I told her, “Wouldn’t it be amazing to be in the NIV committee? I would love it if I were asked to be on it.”

–Dr. Bill Mounce

Read the whole thing HERE (I’m guessing the Koinonia blog will pick it up with Monday’s with Mounce tomorrow).

My own comments:

I’m incredibly excited about this. Dr. Mounce is the ESV translator whom I hold in high respect. I think he will do a great job and I know that he thinks quite thoughtfully about both the Greek language and the English language with reference to usage. I most definitely wish him the best in this move and I hope he continues to develop his Greek skills and comprehension of the text and language.

James Spinti of Eisenbrauns just posted the following to the B-Greek list:

I just received Danker’s new Concise Lexicon and thought you might like
to know a bit more about it.

In the preface, he says that it is not an abridgement of BDAG, although
it owes much to it. It is also not a reworking of his earlier (1983)
Concise Lexicon. Rather, it is a fresh work that owes a bit to many
sources, including a modern Greek, a Ms. Krug, who offered insights that
he found helpful (this follows nicely with the recent thread on Greek NT
scholarship by modern Greeks). In fact, they even changed the title page from
the original  to include her name.

The entries are short, with a brief etymology (where known), a
definition, glosses, and references for the gloss. As befitting a work
of this sort, many irregular verb forms are listed, referencing the
correct lexical form.

I especially liked where he stated in the preface that Greek does not
exist to serve the translator and is unapologetic for coining
neo-logisms where English is inadequate.

This work certainly won’t replace BDAG, but it isn’t intended to. At
$55.00, it is more affordable for the beginning student, but I would
hope that whoever purchases it would eventually/soon use BDAG also.

(reposted with permission & with corrections, original HERE and HERE)

Recently two bloggers wrote reviews of Leland Ryken’s new book on translation: Understanding English Bible Translation (which I cannot link to for purchase with a good conscience).

One of them is written by Tim Challies, a self-employed web-designer with a degree in history from McMaster University, whose also done some interesting writing on culture & the church.

The other is written by Joel M. Hoffman, who has “a PhD in theoretical linguistics and has taught Bible in religious settings and translation theory at Brandeis University and at HUC-JIR in New York City”

Very different views of the same book.

Challies writes:

In Understanding English Bible Translation Ryken argues persuasively that there is much to gain in depending upon an essentially literal translation of Scripture and he argues equally well that there is potential for great loss if we turn instead to dynamic equivalents or other less-stringent translations.

Though not quite an academic book, neither was it particularly easy reading. Still, it did a good of presenting arguments for what Ryken calls an “essentially literal” approach to translating the Bible. <– That referred to Ryken’s first book; my mistake.

And Hoffman writes:

Unfortunately, Ryken’s work is marred by a disdain for scholarship, rhetoric disguised as argument, and a lack of attention to the very biblical text he claims to be investigating.

I’ll let you read the rest…

(HT: Bryan Lilly – I don’t actually read Challies’ blog…)

Mark Stevens has begun a series looking at the benefits of Logos Bible Software for using commentaries – in this case, several Word Biblical Commentary Volumes:

Word Biblical Commentary Series for Logos Review: Part 1

I’ll be looking forward to reading his thoughts.

Paul Helm over at Helm’s Deep offers a thoughtful but (in my opinion) problematic post on Dynamic Equivalence.

And since comments are turned off over there, I write these thoughts here:

1) I would suggest that Paul Helm has fallen into the same trap that many have in terms of the label Dynamic Equivalence in misunderstanding what it actually means — which is the very reason why Nida changed the terminology to Functional Equivalence. And indeed, I would go even farther and suggest that we should be using the term Meaning Based Translation methods.

2) He writes, “If the result of translation which aims at keeping to the original as faithfully as can be results in some puzzlement and ignorance when the text is read, so be it. It is the task of the Christian ministry to explain the Scriptures, as Philip explained them to the Ethiopian eunuch.”

I would suggest that this sort of statement leads us in an unhelpful and false direction. The difference between us today and the Ethiopian eunuch is that the eunuch could understand the words himself without translation. When a translation adds extra puzzlement and difficulty, we’ve entered completely different territory. A translation should be easy to understand where the text is easy to understand and difficult where the text is difficult.

3) He also writes, “Nor am I proposing to comment on whether or not paraphrasing the Bible, instead of translating it, is the best method of conveying its message to culturally-remote peoples.“

I would suggest here that we tend to forget in modern culture (used with its historical sense not its philosophical sense), that we are just are culturally removed — if not more so — than the so called culturally remote people groups. Thus to make a distinction between them is far from helpful.

The rest of the post is a discussion of the phrase “dynamic equivalence” and its problems, which goes back to my very first statement. The term “Dynamic Equivalence” is a misleading term and shouldn’t be used.

Finally I’ll say to his link at the bottom: “[Michael Marlowe’s ‘Against the Theory of Dynamic Equivalence’ (http://www.bible-researcher.com/dynamic-equivalence.html) offers wise comment and telling evidence of the slippage that occurs in the search for dynamic equivalence.]“

I would suggest that Marlowe’s article does not offer wise comment and telling evidence. Rather, what it does offer is a failure to understand the issues in translation methodology with reference to meaning based translation method. I would instead point you to Meaning-Based Translation: A Guide to Cross-Language Equivalence, 2nd edition by Mildred Larson, which does a far better job discussing the issues (with the caveat that the discussion of metaphor across languages has a few problems) – or perhaps Willis Barnstone’s The Poetics of Translation: History, Theory, Practice, which is a relatively easy read, cheaper, & helpful.

This one is my favorite: (T)NIV[i] 2011

This has already gone around quite a bit already, but I thought that I might as well make the anouncement too being that translation is one of the interests of this blog:

The official press release says:

The global board of Biblica today announced its intention to update the New International Version (NIV) of the Bible, the first time it has been revised since 1984. The Committee on Bible Translation (CBT), the independent body of global biblical scholars solely responsible for the translation of the world’s most popular Bible, is slated to finish its revision late next year, with publication in 2011. The announcement was made at Trinity Christian College in Palos Heights, Ill., the site of the historic first meeting of the CBT in 1965.

Some of the places you can find more information thus far are the new NIV Bible 2011 website, which has the press release and also a box for asking questions.

And these blog posts:

This Just In: the NIV to be Updated as “NIV 2011″; TNIV to be Discontinued (Rick Mansfield’s This Lamp)

BREAKING NEWS: NIV to be updated! (Better Bibles Blog)

BREAKING NEWS: NIV to be updated! (Christianity Today’s Blog)

Exciting Announcement about the NIV Translation (Zondervan’s Blog)

USA Today

It sounds like the TNIV and the 1984 NIV will both disappear with this new revision.

A variety of Bloggers have also picked up on it. These are the ones I’ve seen so far (at least that I can find again):

NIV Update Slated for 2011 (David Stark)

New NIV Update set for 2011 (Brian Fulthorp)

It Figures… (Nick Norelli)

Zondervan will discontinue putting out new products with the TNIV

They’re Going to Revise the NIV? (Jim West)

TNIV Going Off the Market, New Version of the NIV Coming in 2011 (Justin Taylor)

Finally, I think all of this is hilarious in light of Mark’s post just a little bit ago:

What I Dislike Most About the TNIV…

He says:

But as the influence of language study (and seminary) wanes, and the number of Greek textbooks grows, there is a new kind of Greek textbook every Greek student should beg, borrow or sell a kidney to get a copy of: A.-F. Christidis’ A History of Ancient Greek: From the Beginnings to Late Antiquity.

Before I leave North America, I plan on owning this book somehow.

And you should too. How many NT students have even a cursory grasp of the Greek language beyond the NT, LXX & may the Apostolic Fathers?

Read the full post here: Douglas Estes – Greek Students, Sell Your Kidney! Why you need to read Christidis

Ark Art Boulet popped up in my google reader this morning with a video and comments on Discoll’s use of Targum Neofiti, which is pricariously uses to show that the Trinity is in Genesis 1:1.

Now granted its definitely a better argument than saying that Jesus, the Alef & Tav are in Genesis 1:1 in the Hebrew Object marker, BUT. Its still a poor argument.