ONE BIBLE, MANY VERSIONS
Are all translations created equal?
By Dave Brunn
IVP. 208 pages. £11.99
ISBN 978 1 844 746 262
In this book, Dave Brunn, a Bible translator with many years’ experience in tribal languages in Papua New Guinea, turns the spotlight on Bible translations in the English language.
Specifically he examines two versions which claim to be ‘essentially’ or ‘strictly’ literal, the English Standard Version (ESV) and the New American Standard Bible (NASB), to see how literal they really are. In the first chapters he gives ample evidence that the ESV and NASB translators have frequently used a less literal ‘meaning-based’ manner, without which they would not communicate clearly in English. He suggests that these versions would be better dubbed ‘modified literal’ translations. The only criticism I’d give is that he doesn’t take sufficient notice of the footnotes in the ESV and NASB which in most cases give the more literal rendering. However, footnotes are often ignored and his argument stands nonetheless.
Word for word?
Next Brunn shows that a word-for-word translation is only rarely possible in the English NT, even though English and Greek are related (both are Indo-European languages). However, for the vast majority of world languages this type of translation is impossible, as they have a very different structure. In a fascinating chapter, he explains the difficulty of translating 1 Corinthians 13 into a language which has no noun for ‘love’. He asks, if God had required all faithful Bible translations to be literal, why would he design so many languages in a way that makes this impossible. He then cites examples of OT quotes in the NT which have changes of form, yet keep the original meaning.
Brunn attempts to bring the different camps in this debate together, underlining the value of Bible translations which communicate the essential meaning at phrase or sentence level, as well as those aiming to be literal at a word level. Like a microscope, a telescope and a wide-angle lens, all have something to contribute to our understanding of God’s wonderful truth in a complementary manner.
Who is this book for? For anyone who has recommended one Bible translation over another, or who wants a realistic picture of how the Bible has been translated into English. Some might be put off by the detailed analyses of the opening chapters, but do persevere, there is much wisdom here.
