So, probably not quite what you meant but I find annoying nonetheless… Bible translation
It’s almost impossible to find an English translation that doesn’t allow tradition to seriously skew how ideas are presented. And I say this as a secular scholar (and someone who recognises that the oldest greek text we have is very very very old). Messing with the translation just leaves it open to criticism unnecessarily.
Here are some examples…
An “angel” in the new testament is not a distinct thing. The word simply means “messenger” and was the mundane, every day, word for messenger. It was the word used if someone came from the next town over to tell you something in person. Without any of our cultural baggage added on top the angel Gabriel appearing to Mary is - on face value - Mary being surprised to encounter a man who told her things. Same for Zechariah (both in Luke 1). It’s only when you get to the shepherds the field that the messenger is accompanied by a heavenly glow. But this idea that they’re perfect beings clad in white with wings is completely absent from the text and, imho, promulgated by the persistent use of the word “angel” when it should simply say “messenger”. (The NT itself goes on to say people have had such messengers as guests in their homes without realising, implication being they often look and sound like regular people. Hebrews 13:2)
Same for “baptism”. This is also a traditional translation of the completely mundane word “immersion”. It’s translated that way to retain the idea of baptism as a distinct church idea. But the text literally says “John the Immerser” not John the Baptist. And he stood in the river Jordan immersing people. Which gives a very plain mundane view of what was happening - he was dunking people in the water as a purification rite - something that already existed in Judaism. The traditional translation is used so that churches can wedge in their own view of what baptism is - say, a delicate sprinkling of water from a font or some such.
Even the word “church” itself. The church in the new testament is never a building. It means “assembly” (of people). So the “church” can meet anywhere, and in fact met in houses or sitting on the ground in the temple courts. Allowing a special Christianised word like “church” to be used instead of the mundane translation “assembly” let’s people think whatever they want to picture church as instead of what the text is directly saying.
While we’re on that, Jesus’ name is actually Joshua (if we want to be consistent) and his mum is Miriam. Names that are far too obviously Jewish and connected to the old testament, so we get a traditional rendering of “Jesus” and “Mary” and so on which makes them all sound a lot more white Anglo Saxon.
In a similar vein “testament” is just a weird translation of “covenant” which itself is just a religious way of rendering the word “pact” or “agreement”. The old testament is a pact between God and the Jewish people made through Moses. When the plain meaning is made clearer then other meanings shine through more clearly, namely, the behaviour standards of the old testament “pact” were exactly that, requirements of a pact between God and the Jews. They were never universal requirements that the Jews were supposed to go out and make the rest of the world follow. This translation choice is used by the modern church to obscure the fact that the old testament moral codes were a distinctly Jewish thing - because the modern church would like to piggy back on Leviticus when it suits its narrative.
Finally, the word “Bible” itself doesn’t appear in the bible. Bible means “library” or collection of writings. It doesn’t appear in the any of the writings because none of the Bible writings are self-aware that they’re going to be compiled into such a collection. The word “scripture” is used (literally “writing”) when Peter’s talking about things Paul’s written but that’s about it. When translated straightforwardly it takes the “holy” shine off things and it’s clearer to see these are people making “writings” to communicate with each other or remember things that have happened. A far cry from the “inerrant word of god” that the church traditionally turned the new testament into.
I could go on, but rant over…
(Edit: to be fair the Greek new testament writes Jesus’ name as “ee-soo-ss” which sounds closer to Jesus than Joshua but at any rate they’re the same name and if old testament Joshua had been around he’d have been called “ee-soo-ss” too. No doubt about Mary though, in the Greek it’s written “Mariam”, that is, “Miriam”, like Moses’ sister)
Edit: Part 2 - https://lemmy.world/comment/12751501
Ha!
Worth saying though, even the “biblically accurate angel” meme (funny as it is) is generally wrong. The weird things covered in eyes are not called “angels” in the bible, they’re variously called … (deep breath) … seraphim, cherubim, ophanim, chayot ha kodesh, erelim, or hashmallim. English translations generally call these “heavenly creatures”.
Messengers (“angels”) in the old testament look like regular people too.
This is such an incredible write up! Thank you.
It goes to show how organized religion is a cancer because of propaganda. If they had the literal translations and actually read it on their own with the context that these are a collection of historical thoughts about the world then things would probably be SO much different.
This is fascinating stuff. Is there anywhere where more of this kind of thing is written down?
This is what I’ve picked up through several decades as an evangelical, ex-evangelical and a student. I’ve not come across a specific book that lays it out like this. I’m sure there are though. If not and I write one I’ll let you know!
Edit: I’d recommend anything by Bart Ehrman for an accessible scholarly approach to this kind of stuff (he has a blog and plenty of lectures on YouTube)
Do you have any sources about this stuff? Looks like something interesting to read.
This is far too interesting to let you starve us like this ! Please continue your writing !
Since you asked nicely :)
A few more where “churchy” words are invented rather than the bog standard everyday term that was used…
Repent - this just straight up means “change your mind” (perhaps “change your heart / ways”). It doesn’t connote anything to do with church confession or being on your knees or talking to a church leader. It sort of means “sort yourself out”. I find it slightly more endearing (and less preachy) to imagine first century Jewish men walking around Judea saying “change your ways! The rule of God is about to happen!”. That almost sounds exciting. Artificially translating it as a word that we nearly never use outside of a church context makes “repent!” sounds far more judgemental and confrontational than it actually is.
Apostle - this means being “sent out” and there are far more suitable everyday words that mean exactly what a first century hearer would have heard. “Emissary” is one. But also the sense of “ambassador”. So Jesus appoints 12 ambassadors to go out and spread the message. Makes sense. It ties far more nicely with the fact that Jesus conceived of a “government of God” that was heavenly rather than earthly. So since we already have a well working concept of an ambassador for that, there’s no need to keep the Greek and invent a church word like “apostle”. (I also think “ambassador” trends to spell out the special role that these original people had being sent directly by Jesus, whereas there are all sorts of Christian sects today using the title “apostle” in a somewhat casual way that I think, in part, is because no-one knows what an “apostle” is - it’s a church word - and that means the meaning can be bent at will)
Deacon - this just straight up means “helper”. In Acts 6 the “ambassadors” find that haven’t enough time to distribute food, so 7 helpers (deaconos) are recruited. Less high faluting, and far more down to earth. Every assembly of believers has a helper or two. Makes sense.
Presbyter - this is a church leader in some branches of church. It means “elder”. Through the new testament, the believer communities have multiple “elders” the same way any village would have its own gathering of elders. It was a mundane everyday social role that connoted maturity and wisdom. Timothy, a young leader appointed by Paul, gets told not to worry that he’s young for this reason. When Paul finally goes up to Jerusalem to meet Peter and the other original believers after many years he’s not even interested in “job titles”. He just seeks out “those reputed to be pillars of the community” (Galatians 2:9). Leadership in the new testament was far more relational and communal that the profession it turned into. Keeping the original mundane descriptive terms (which were not job titles) would help with this.
Pastor - means shepherd. I’ll let this one pass because “Pastor Barney” sounds infinitely less weird than having “Shepherd Jim” and “Shepherd Tom”. Though I believe these are some corners of Christianity where this is done. Even so, no-one has the title “pastor” in the new testament. And Jesus positively discourages the disciples from using titles in multiple places.
Bishop - again this is from a Greek word that’s ended creating its own word instead of being translated. It originates from the Greek word “overseer”. Or, perhaps even more mundanely, “manager”. In the new testament it’s somewhat interchangeable with “elder”.
Priest - this is a complicated one. In the old testament, the people doing the sacrifices at the temple were kohen. We translate that now as “priest” in English but - badly. As we saw above in the new testament the new Christian communities had elders (or managers) with a handful of helpers. The word for elder - the Greek presbyteros - is what eventually morphed into the English “priest”. But this simply meant an elder in a community and had nothing to do with offering sacrifices in a temple. So why in English translations is it the old testament temple workers who are called “priests” whereas the new testament leaders are now called “elders”? Well. In the first century, having communities of believers looked after by elders had a distinctly communal feel and was a far cry from the old Jewish temple system, lead by “sacred men” who did the sacrifices. However, Christian thought slowly evolved to understand that even though Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross had done away with the need for the Jewish temple system, the “elders” in church were sort of invoking Jesus’ sacrifice when they organised the communion meal (eucharist). So eventually what started as a mundane word for village elder came to absorb the idea of being a holy man making sacrifices, a “priest” by our modern understanding of the word. So then both new testament leaders and Jewish temple leaders got called “priests” even though the words used for their respective roles in the bible are totally different. But this suited the then Catholic church just fine, as it had evolved to see a similarity of sorts between the old temple priests and the new church priests. Then the reformation happened (16th century). And a bunch of Bible scholars said “wait a minute… these aren’t the same thing at all” and on their way out of the Catholic church as Protestants they decided the new testament leaders are very much not making sacrifices and if the old testament is going to have “priests” then the new testament translation should revert to “elder” to keep things nice and clear. And that’s what we’ve got now in most English translations like the NASB, NIV and so on. Meanwhile, Catholic translations of the Bible tend to keep both the old testament and new testament leaders both called “priests”.
This is simplified and there’s more to it but you get the idea.
End of part 2
What a fun read. Thanks for writing.
I wish Hebrew was easier to learn. I’m not religious but used to be a devout muslim until my 20.
I still retain a fascination with the historical aspect of the Abrahamic faith cuz of how intertwined they are.
At least in my flavor of faith “angels” specifically mentioned forged from light and Jibril/Gabriel have a specific role as messenger.
I always chuckle when reading something and realizing it so obvious my faith is the little brother of the three.
On subtitles - when the person on screen literally says a word in english but the subtitles replace it with another word.
Or when the character is bilingual but the subtitle just says: [speaking a foreign language]
Zoe: swears in Chinese
Subtitle: “[SPEAKS GALACTIC LANGUAGE]”
FU, everyone knows that that’s a real language and probably a very juicy phrase that would be absolute golden to know for some other occasion!
^(PSA there exists a site with every phrase translated and explained)
On subtitles - when the person on screen literally says a word in english but the subtitles replace it with another word.
Depending on the word, this is actually sensible since borrowings tend to change the meaning of the words being borrowed.
A silly example of that is the Japanese garaigo “ダッチワイフ” datchiwaifu. It’s a borrowing from English “Dutch wife”, and recognisable as such… but you definitively don’t want to translate it as such, as in Japanese it conveys “sex doll”.
ivxferre is right, so I’ll just state of a few examples:
Baito, which in fact comes from the German arbeit and means a part time job.
Apiiru, which comes from the English appeal but actually means to emphasize or play up something as a way of making yourself more attractive or making a point. For example, you can say “He looks like a good guy but that’s all apiiru”.
Cureemu, which is supposed to be the English claim but refers to complaints or having an issue with something in general.
I’m actually fine if the subtitles have to be truncated to communicate the same meaning in less space.
I actually find it harder to comprehend the subtitles when someone tries to be as accurate as possible, especially if the subs transcribe every little stuttering. I’m here to learn the stuff they people on screen are trying to say, I’m not interested in the subtitler’s scholarly digression into the finer points of what they’re hearing.
Some person in reddit once did a hilarious thing where they whipped out a full blown IPA transcript and started analysing the finer dialectual points of a viral video, trying to pinpoint the origin of the speaker. It was hilarious. Probably even more hilarious to linguists. But the point is, that whole thing was not what we were there for, we were just discussing a viral video.
I do this for a living so I have a few words about it.
1. Obsessing over the meaning of individual words, and wrecking what the text (or dialogue) says on a discursive level. I see this all the time with Latin, but it pops up often in Japanese too - such as muppets translating “貴様” kisama as simply “you…” (literal translation) instead of something like “bastard” or “piece of shit” or whatever. Sure, “貴様” is “ackshyually” a pronoun, and then what?
2. Not paying attention to the target audience of the translation. JP→EN example again - it’s fine if you keep honorific suffixes as in the original if the target audience is a bunch of weebs, we get it. But if you’re subbing some anime series for a wider audience, you need to convey that info in some other way. (Don’t just ditch it though, see #1.)
3. Not doing due diligence. It’s 4AM, you got more work than you have time for, you need to keep pumping those translations. Poor little boy, I don’t bloody care - spell-proof and grammar-proof the bloody thing dammit. “Its” for possessive, “it’s” for pronoun+verb; “por que” if question, “porque” if answer; “apposto” if annexed, “a posto” if it’s OK.
4. Abusing translation notes. If your “TN” has four or more lines, or the reader already expects one every single page, you’re doing it wrong.
About #4, where do you even see TN nowadays? I’m pretty sure I haven’t seen one in years.
I have seen several shows that combined both honorifics and localization e.g. Prinzessin Beispiel-sama (princess example-sama).
Sure if the translation is targeted to folks that would also watch Ghibli (because those audiences can range between casual to hardcore) but I like the hybrid approach.
Poor little boy, I don’t bloody care - spell-proof and grammar-proof the bloody thing dammit. “Its” for possessive, “it’s” for pronoun+verb; “por que” if question, “porque” if answer; “apposto” if annexed, “a posto” if it’s OK.
This is a good sentiment for general writing.
(also, at least on-line, if you notice later that you messed up, then fix it!)
There was that one time the translator fucked up royally and I lost my shit in The Devastation of Baal by Guy Haley.
To understand we have to look at the pronoun „you“ and it’s German equivalents “Ihr“ and “du“. English doesn’t differentiate between a formal and an informal “you”. It’s just “you”. So you can use “you” in both ways and the reader gets the meaning and tone from context.
For example: “My lord, you have to act!” Gives you everything you need and you know from context how the power dynamics between the characters are.
The German equivalent for that sentence would be: „Mein Herr, Ihr müsst handeln!“ To be fair, you can confuse the possessive pronoun “Ihr” with the regular plural pronoun “ihr”. Both of which are completely different. That’s German for you.
But our translator used the common “du”. The sentence “Mein Herr, du musst handeln!” Not only makes my ears bleed, it also makes no sense in universe. You cannot stand before one of the most well known and revered ANGELS OF MOTHFUCKERING DEATH and say “du”! You uncivilised donkey!
We have the same principle in French with (so learning Ihr in German was easier!), but frankly this is a reason why I prefer working in an english professional setting. Some people, generally older, get offended if you ever use the ‘du’ with them. But some others will want to look shill/younger and will get offended or mock you if you use ‘du’ with them. So yeah, using “you” to talk to the queen, my boomer customer or my nephew makes it so much easier!
censorship / changing the original meaning to fit the translators personal agenda
And then getting mad if the publishers of a book/comic/whatever get fed up with it that they decide to replace you for poor quality translations, with human reviewed AI translations no less.
These were the best I can find right now on short notice.
