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Featured The Harm of Dynamic Equivalence

Discussion in 'Bible Versions & Translations' started by John of Japan, Sep 10, 2019.

  1. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    I have some time this week before starting teaching on Monday, and one of our translation students is interested in the translation philosophy of Dynamic Equivalence (DE) in the Good News Bible, often the source text (ST) for Wycliffe people and other Bible translators. (DE, invented by Eugene Nida, was later renamed functional equivalence because of misuse of the original term, but we'll use DE.) So to help me with that, first I'm going to define and describe DE, then go through the GNB John 3.

    First of all, it is important to note that Nida was neoorthodox, so his translation theory is based on the neoorthodox view of the inspiration of Scripture. Nida wrote, “Neo-orthodox theology has given a new perspective to the doctrine of divine inspiration. For the most part, it conceives of inspiration primarily in terms of the response of the receptor, and places less emphasis on what happened to the source at the time of writing” (Eugene Nida, Toward a Science of Translating, 1964, p. 27.).

    Therefore, the goal of a DE translation is the experience of the reader in the target language, more so than the authorial intent of the original document. The term “receptor” is very important in DE, so I avoid it in favor of "target." It refers to the reader of the Bible translation, who is assumed to react to Scriptures in an existential way, experiencing something which is not necessarily eternal truth but merely subjective truth for the immediate present.

    Nida wrote, “Dynamic equivalence is therefore to be defined in terms of the degree to which the receptors of the message in the receptor language respond to it in substantially the same manner as the receptors in the source language” (Nida and Tabor, The Theory and Practice of Translation, 1982, p. 24). This is called "reader response."

    So, why don't I like DE, other than the fact that it is based on neoorthodoxy?
    1. It often misses the nuances of the original language by making the target language primary.
    2. It usually seeks to make ambiguity explicit, therefore defeating the purpose of the ambiguity used by the original divine and human authors.
    3. It often adds material that the translator thinks necessary to make meaning explicit.
    4. It sometimes leaves out what it considers to be repetition, meaning some of the character of the original is lost ("Verily, verily....).
    5. It actually looks down on tribal people, thinking they are not bright enough to understand the meaning without extra words being added.
    6. Etc. etc.
     
    #1 John of Japan, Sep 10, 2019
    Last edited: Sep 10, 2019
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  2. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    The first English version done with DE was the Today’s English Version (TEV; the book title was Good News for Modern Man; now called the Good News Bible), translated by liberal Baptist Robert Bratcher. In the first edition, it was notorious for translating “death” for the Greek haima in Rom. 3:25, Col. 1:14 and 20, etc. The outcry was so great that this was corrected in later revisions.

    I will compare the GNB as found on Biblegateway.com to the NA28 Greek text. I'll give the GNB verse, then the Greek, then comment.

    1. There was a Jewish leader named Nicodemus, who belonged to the party of the Pharisees.
    1 Ἦν δὲ ἄνθρωπος ἐκ τῶν Φαρισαίων, Νικόδημος ὄνομα αὐτῷ, ἄρχων τῶν Ἰουδαίων·
    JoJ: “Who belonged to” is not strictly literal, but not too bad. There is one added phrase in English, “the party of.” I think this adds information that is not accurate. In some languages, it might be misunderstood as a political party. The Greek simply has “a man of the Pharisees,” and that is how I would translate it, though I might add a footnote to explain “Pharisees.”

    2 One night he went to Jesus and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher sent by God. No one could perform the miracles you are doing unless God were with him.”
    2 οὗτος ἦλθεν πρὸς αὐτὸν νυκτὸς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ· ῥαββί, οἴδαμεν ὅτι ἀπὸ θεοῦ ἐλήλυθας διδάσκαλος· οὐδεὶς γὰρ δύναται ταῦτα τὰ σημεῖα ποιεῖν ἃ σὺ ποιεῖς, ἐὰν μὴ ᾖ ὁ θεὸς μετ᾽ αὐτοῦ.
    JoJ: This rendering adds “the miracles you are doing” instead of just “these miracles.” This makes explicit what is ambiguous. There is no need for that, since miracles are in the recent context of John ch. 2.

    3 Jesus answered, “I am telling you the truth: no one can see the Kingdom of God without being born again.”
    3 ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ· ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἄνωθεν, οὐ δύναται ἰδεῖν τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ.
    JoJ: The GNB leaves out “and said,” but that is the way the Apostle John wrote. If you simply say “Jesus answered” you are not portraying the Apostle John’s style accurately. It may sound a little strange to the ear in some languages to say, “Jesus answered and said,” but so what?
     
    #2 John of Japan, Sep 10, 2019
    Last edited: Sep 10, 2019
  3. RighteousnessTemperance&

    RighteousnessTemperance& Well-Known Member

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    In other words, because it’s too much like preaching. :Wink
     
  4. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    Hmm. Never thought of it that way, but.... :Coffee
     
  5. Revmitchell

    Revmitchell Well-Known Member
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    I wont have anything to do with DE
     
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  6. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    Here are more verses:

    4 “How can a grown man be born again?” Nicodemus asked. “He certainly cannot enter his mother's womb and be born a second time!”
    4 Λέγει πρὸς αὐτὸν [ὁ] Νικόδημος· πῶς δύναται ἄνθρωπος γεννηθῆναι γέρων ὤν; μὴ δύναται εἰς τὴν κοιλίαν τῆς μητρὸς αὐτοῦ δεύτερον εἰσελθεῖν καὶ γεννηθῆναι;
    JoJ: The GNB leaves out “to him.” It translates with “asked” instead of “said,” but that’s not a big problem. It adds the word “grown” to “man” though that word is not in the original Greek, and adds unneeded information. (Ever heard of a man who was not grown?) It adds the word “certainly,” which is unneeded. It changes a rhetorical question to a declarative sentence, which looks down on the reader as someone who cannot understand what a rhetorical question is.

    5 “I am telling you the truth,” replied Jesus, “that no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.
    5 ἀπεκρίθη Ἰησοῦς· ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω σοι, ἐὰν μή τις γεννηθῇ ἐξ ὕδατος καὶ πνεύματος, οὐ δύναται εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν βασιλείαν τοῦ θεοῦ.
    JoJ: What Jesus actually said was, “Truly, truly, I say to you.” By paraphrasing those words, the translator, subtracts an element of redundancy from the teaching method of Jesus, and actually somehow makes Jesus sound boring. The second half of the verse paraphrases the Greek needlessly.

    6 A person is born physically of human parents, but is born spiritually of the Spirit.
    6 τὸ γεγεννημένον ἐκ τῆς σαρκὸς σάρξ ἐστιν, καὶ τὸ γεγεννημένον ἐκ τοῦ πνεύματος πνεῦμά ἐστιν.
    JoJ: The GNB renders the Greek “flesh” as “physically of human parents.” There is no need for the words “human parents,” which is redundant and paraphrastic, not in the original. It paraphrases the double use of “flesh” in the Greek, thus losing the impact of the original.
     
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  7. Just_Ahead

    Just_Ahead Active Member

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    So what Bible do you read?
     
  8. Just_Ahead

    Just_Ahead Active Member

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    As a student and church member I heard Dr. Bratcher speak several times. I also attended college with some of his family members.

    Below is a link for an online obituary for Bible translator Robert Galveston Bratcher (1920-2010). To read the obituary posted by his family, click on the link below, and after reading his obituary if you care to read some condolences from family and friends, click on the link "View All Messages" at the end of the obituary.

    View Robert Bratcher's Obituary on NewsObserver.com and share memories
     
    #8 Just_Ahead, Sep 11, 2019
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  9. RighteousnessTemperance&

    RighteousnessTemperance& Well-Known Member

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    Dynamic equivalence may not be full paraphrase, but does take liberties, and both can be much like preaching—very much like preaching—and thus be very problematic. Naturally, those who disagree with such preaching won’t like it. Those who agree may not object, may even like it. Not arguing for DE, just noting similarities of effect.
     
  10. RighteousnessTemperance&

    RighteousnessTemperance& Well-Known Member

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    JoJ, I appreciate your frustration with DE, but it doesn’t help to get so close to the trees that you can’t see the forest. In true form, allow me to mess with you here just a bit. :)

    “Grown man” is obviously idiomatic English, hardly worth faulting here. It’s just the sort of thing a person using Koine English might say in such a circumstance. Plus, the TEV uses it in place of “old.”

    Rhetorical? I had always thought either Nicodemus was that stupid or he thought Jesus was. Even his own family thought he was going off his rocker.
    Reordering the words is hardly paraphrase, and conveying teaching style sounds like a bit of a stretch. In fact, to get the full effect, might it not be more honest to transliterate as "Amen, amen"?
    Redundant? The KJV (and the Greek?) leaves this open to mean anything born, not just humans, right?
     
  11. Just_Ahead

    Just_Ahead Active Member

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  12. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    When I first picked up my copy, I was fascinated by those drawings. I think they added to the actual book, though not part of the translation per se.
     
  13. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    I have no frustration with DE. I simply oppose it. :D But go ahead and yank my chain.

    To me it's poor Engish--idiomatic perhaps, but not good English. In a Bible translation I believe we should have a high level of English (and I don't mean archaic language). I once talked to a Buddhist man in Japan who bemoaned the modern Japanese versions as lacking dignity. He believed a holy book should sound elevated. It wasn't too long ago that the only Bibles in Japanese were in the beautiful classical Japanese.
    Nicodemus was highly educated, and certainly not stupid. And I don't believe he thought Jesus was stupid, but he couldn't follow the metaphor Jesus was using. So he simply used a rhetorical question to show what he thought of the ideas Jesus was expressing. There may have been some sarcasm in that question.
    We'll agree to differ, then.
    Nope, won't do that. The Greek word ἀμὴν in this context means "Truly." It has turned into a loan word in English and many other languages, but a loan word rarely means the same as the word in the language it came from. Example: California sushi (寿司) would be laughed at in Japan, and the American idea of the ninja (忍者) is so far from the Japanese original as to be a joke.
    The redundancy is unnecessary, since in the context it is clear in the Greek that a human is meant (τις in v. 5).
     
  14. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    Thanks for the comments. Stay tuned.
     
  15. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    Very interesting. Thank you.

    In my research on Nida, I learned that when Nida asked him to do a translation of the NT for Southern Baptists, he translated Ephesians, but was so discouraged by the negative feedback that he decided to quit--but of course didn't (Philip Stine [Nida's friend], Let the Words be Written, p. 81). Bible translation is not for intellectual wimps. :)
     
  16. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    7 Do not be surprised because I tell you that you must all be born again.
    7 μὴ θαυμάσῃς ὅτι εἶπόν σοι· δεῖ ὑμᾶς γεννηθῆναι ἄνωθεν.
    JoJ: Not bad. The GNB does make the verse southern, “you…all” (ya’ll), adding the word “all.” But the translator’s purpose is to bring out the plural “you,” which modern English does not have, so that’s not bad.

    8 The wind blows wherever it wishes; you hear the sound it makes, but you do not know where it comes from or where it is going. It is like that with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”
    8 τὸ πνεῦμα ὅπου θέλει πνεῖ καὶ τὴν φωνὴν αὐτοῦ ἀκούεις, ἀλλ᾽ οὐκ οἶδας πόθεν ἔρχεται καὶ ποῦ ὑπάγει· οὕτως ἐστὶν πᾶς ὁ γεγεννημένος ἐκ τοῦ πνεύματος.
    JoJ: The GNB leaves out the word “and” after “wishes.” The rest of the verse is fairly good.

    9 “How can this be?” asked Nicodemus.
    9 Ἀπεκρίθη Νικόδημος καὶ εἶπεν αὐτῷ· πῶς δύναται ταῦτα γενέσθαι;
    JoJ: The GNB here again deletes the Apostle John’s style, leaving out “and said.” Also, it makes a plural tauta (these things) into a singular (this).
     
  17. Deacon

    Deacon Well-Known Member
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    Hypothetically wondering John,

    Do you frown at a NT's author's use of dynamic equivalence when quoting Scripture from the LXX?

    and​

    Will there be an accompanying thread titled, The Harm of Highly Literal Translations?

    Rob ;)
     
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  18. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    In the light of DE's stated goal of reader response, I don't consider those quotes to be DE. Nida's theory is a modern departure from what used to be called "free translation." So, NT quotes from the LXX may have some of what I call "micro paraphrase," but not DE. But that's a whole 'nother thread.

    Now brother, you know that's not part of my narrative. ;) In fact, Uncle Miya liked good old Young's, because it helped him understand the original. So, maybe a thread on "How Overly Literal Translations Help." :Biggrin
     
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  19. John of Japan

    John of Japan Well-Known Member
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    Folks, one help I hope this thread will be is to present DE as not just another form of paraphrase or free translation. It was a mostly new idea (not completely, though) in 1964 when Eugene Nida published Toward a Science of Translating. His terminology was misunderstood and misused, so he renamed it functional equivalence in his 1986 book with Jan de Waard, From One Language to Another.

    His friend wrote a book about Nida's ministry, and said:

    “Nida later felt that the term 'dynamic equivalence' had been misunderstood and was partly responsible for translations like the Living Bible. Some translators used the term 'dynamic' to refer to translations that had impact and appeal. But since he had in fact defined 'dynamic equivalence in terms of 'functional equivalence,' he began to use this latter term instead. ‘Functional equivalence' was introduced in From One Language to Another, co-authored with Jan de Waard" (Philip C.Stine, Let the Words Be Written, 2004, p. 51).

    P.S. My son heard Stine speak at a regional ETS meeting, and Stine was adamant about pronouncing Nida's name correctly. So if you want to sound educated about DE, here it tje proper pronunciation: Nigh-da (not knee-da).
     
    #19 John of Japan, Sep 12, 2019
    Last edited: Sep 12, 2019
  20. Van

    Van Well-Known Member
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    If the translator or translation team misunderstands the text, then function equivalence becomes functional non-equivalence and dynamic equivalence results in dynamic non-equivalence.

    Word or phrase meaning for word or phrase meaning provides less opportunity for agenda driven mistranslations.
     
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