I’m curious about what folks’ thoughts are on translations that engage in reordering some verses, either because they feel the logical argument of the text is better served or they have document evidence of an alteration. Rick’s recent post on Matthew 5:28 prompted me thinking about Job 31 again and I was reminded that the REB has transposed verse 1 to follow verse 5:
What is the lot prescribed by God above,
the portion from the Almighty on high?
Is not ruin prescribed for the miscreant,
disaster for the wrongdoer?
Yet does not God himself see my ways
and take account of my every step?I swear I have had no dealings with falsehood
and have not gone hotfoot after deceit.
I have taken an oath
never to let my eyes linger on a girl.
Let God weigh me in the scales of justice,
and he will know that I am blameless!
If my steps have wandered from the way,
if my heart has followed my eyes,
or any dirt has stuck to my hands,
then may another eat what I sow,
and may my crops by uprooted!If my heart has been enticed by a woman
or I have lurked by my neighbour’s door,
may my wife be another man’s slave,
and may other men enjoy her.
For that would have been a heinous act,
an offense before the law:
it would be a consuming and destructive fire
raging among my crops.- Job 31:1-12 (REB)
What do you think? Is verse transposition in error or is it functionally the same as consulting different manuscript witnesses to conject a possible reading of a difficult passage?
12 Comments
This made me think of Mark 9:44 and 46 which are missing in the NIV because they’re recognized as emendations. There is always tension in these cases between the original text, the classical translation and the demands of modern language. I’m pretty sure a Hebrew scholar would not be happy with the reordering of Job that you’ve mentioned but the translators thought it most clearly expressed the original ideas in modern language. As long as everyone in your faith community is using a translation that they can agree on a lot of these issues will go unnoticed.
In recent years we have been learning a lot about information structure and it often clearly shows that to emphasize the right things in a particular translation we need to have them ordered differently from the original. However, this almost always meets with strong resistance from translators and church goers since it departs from the “original.”
In recent years we have been learning a lot about information structure and it often clearly shows that to emphasize the right things in a particular translation we need to have them ordered differently from the original.
Ironically, it was this willingness to depart from the “originals” that really led me to adopt the REB – the translators’ functional reorganization of some of Paul’s thoughts in his letters clarified the text unlike any other translation I had been reading.
As long as everyone in your faith community is using a translation that they can agree on a lot of these issues will go unnoticed.
Currently, that would be the NIV…
El, every translation does a word here or there, or even a phrase or two (2 Tim 4:1), so I don’t see it as a big deal to arrive a clarity in reading, if a committee so deemed. That’s my take.
I get words and phrases, but I wonder if the objection is as easily dismissed when blocks of verses are moved around. For example, in Job 41, the REB transposes 41:1-6 to follow 39:30, minimizing the description of Leviathan as hippo/whale in favor of an extended presentation of Behemoth, including the now uninterrupted 40:15-24 and 41:7-34.
Yes, quite interesting. I’ll have to consult Hartley’s commentary on Job in the NICOT series and see what he says.
BTW, did you catch NT Wrong on “El Shaddai.” That guy is a wild man…
URL: http://ntwrong.wordpress.com/2008/09/06/prosperity-gospel-gods-breasts/
the translators’ functional reorganization of some of Paul’s thoughts in his letters clarified the text unlike any other translation I had been reading.
El Shaddai,
What examples can you provide of this “functional reorganization”? You have me intrigued here …
John Hartley’s commentary (1988) predates the REB, and there’s no discussion on the issue.
@Mike: What examples can you provide of this “functional reorganization”?
1. Romans 8:5-6 … the NEB/REB rearranges the text as follows:
Compare that to the HCSB:
2. From 2 Corinthians 1:13-14, the NEB/REB:
Again, compare the HCSB:
3. Not from the writings of Paul, but the NEB/REB rearranged John 4:6b-8 to read as follows:
In all of these examples, the meaning or accuracy of the passage doesn’t change, but narratively they read better (in my opinion). The question is, can we accept these types of minor adjustments without squawking about changing the Word of God?
@TC: you’d have to go back further – the same transposition in Job is in the NEB, which published the OT in 1970. But again, these are the only two translations that I’ve seen make such radical suggestions with respect to verse transposition, though the REB has reversed a number of the more adventuresome readings in the NEB.
El, nothing on the NEB transposition either, except commenting on its rendering of “crocodile” and “whale.”