JUDAICA - Wisdom In Torah

Knox’s translation can be said to be a translation of a translation
of a translation.
Knox has many deft characteristics in his translation.
The poetry of the Bible is not printed as such. Describing
parallelism, he said “To our notions of poetic composition,
these remorseless repetitions are wholly foreign; when you
have read a page or two on end, they begin to cloy.” Knox was
always looking for “what an Englishman would have said to
express this.”
His translation of the acrostics in the Hebrew Bible (seven
Psalms, Prov. 31, and Lam. 1–4) appealed to him. In 1924, Knox
had already published A Book of Acrostics and to get a literary
taste of the original was his purpose: Ps. 25 (24 in Vulgate)
An Alphabet of Trust: “All my heart goes out to thee … Belie
not the trust … Can any that trust in the … Direct my way,
Lord … Ever let thy truth guide … Forget not …”
Knox used “thou” throughout, and Latin spellings of
proper names, for example, “Osee” for “Hosea” and “Paralipomena”
for “Chronicles.”
Many of his translations are idiomatically pleasing. For
the Song of Songs 1:1: where RSV has “O that you would kiss
me with the kisses of your mouth! For your love is better than
wine,” Knox reads: “A kiss from the lips. Wine cannot ravish
the senses like that embrace.”
Acceptance. In 1943, Roman Catholics were given the
freedom to translate from the original Hebrew and Greek.
Knox’s translation has thus been dubbed the “last translation
of the Vulgate.” Other Catholic translations (Jerusalem Bible
[JB] and New American Bible [NAB]) have overshadowed the
work of Knox, although not for their prose style. Knox’s aspiration
was: “To secure, as far as possible, that Englishmen
of 2150, if my version is still obtainable then, shall not find it
hopelessly ‘dated.’” The translation still reads well, but is at
present out of print.
Revised Standard Version [= RSV] (1952) and New Revised
Standard Version [= NRSV] (1989). History. The RSV is the
most scholarly and most modern revision in the tradition of
the King James Version. In 1929 the International Council of
Religious Education already began to plan a revision of the
American Standard Version, which is a 1901 revision of the
KJV. In 1937 the council authorized a new version “which embodies
the best results of modern scholarship.”
The continuing committee of the RSV and NRSV has been
working and publishing for half a century: the New Testament
(1946), the Old Testament (1952), the books of the Apocrypha
(1957), a second edition of the New Testament (1957), an Oxford
Annotated Bible with a Catholic imprimatur (1966), an
ecumenical [for Protestants, Catholics, and Eastern Orthodox]
expanded edition with the Apocrypha (1977), a Reader’s
Digest Bible, which abridged the Old Testament to one-half of
its original length (1982), and most recently the NRSV (1989).
The RSV’s formal correspondent translation lends itself to an
effective use of a concordance, and one such was published by
Richard Whitaker in 1980.
bible
The RSV is a revision in line with the KJV, in contrast to
the New English Bible [NEB], which is a completely new translation.
In the Preface to the RSV: “The RSV is not a new translation
in the language of today… It is a revision which seeks
to preserve all that is best in the English Bible as it has been
known and used through the years.” In committee, a ⅔ vote
was needed to change the American Standard Version. The
RSV, then, aims to be a formal equivalent translation without
being wooden.
Principles and Representative Examples. The RSV and
NRSV translations are more radical than the slight alterations
in the New American Standard Bible [= NASB] or the New
King James Bible [=NKJV (1982)], which are both revisions
of the KJV. This does not make the RSV a radical translation.
Although the RSV is still more often a formal correspondent
translation, the guiding maxim seems to be “as literal as possible,”
and “as free as necessary.”
Many examples of modernizing the language of the
American Standard Version could be cited. At Gen. 31:36:
“Jacob was wroth, and chode with Laban,” became in RSV (and
NRSV): “Then Jacob became angry, and upbraided Laban.”
New forays into modern scholarship show something
more than a conservative attitude. Of 13 emendations of Isaiah
from the Dead Sea Scrolls, M. Burrows has changed his
opinion, “A brief review will show that even in these 13 places
the superiority of the manuscript’s reading is not always certain.
For myself I must confess that in some cases where I
probably voted for the emendation I am now convinced that
our decision was a mistake, and the Masoretic reading should
have been retained.”
In the NRSV (1989) there is a new concern for the use of
more inclusive language. The NRSV has been even more aggressive
than the NEB concerning this point. Ps. 54:3: where
the RSV had “insolent men” and “ruthless men” and the word
“men” was not actually in the original, the NRSV has rendered
“the insolent” and “the ruthless.” Ps. 1:1: “Blessed is the man
who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,” has become in
the NRSV: “Happy are those who do not follow the advice of
the wicked.” The “Fathers” of Israel are now “ancestors.” The
expression “son of man” in Ezekiel is now rendered in NRSV
as “mortal.” Yet, masculine metaphors, such as referring to
God as “Father,” were left intact. There is another type of inclusive
language that refers to “people of color” that was also
considered in NRSV. RSV had in Cant. 1:5: “I am very dark, but
comely,” while NRSV has: “I am black and beautiful.”
RSV retained “thou” in prayer and praise addressed to the
Deity. NRSV drops these remaining occurrences of “thou” and
“thy” from the RSV. Another interesting update in language
includes Prov. 6:6 in the RSV: “Go to the ant, O sluggard; consider
her ways, and be wise.” while the NRSV has: “Go to the
ant, you lazybones; consider its ways, and be wise.”
In NRSV there are many textual changes, especially in
Deuteronomy and Jeremiah. The books of Samuel are most
affected by text-critical considerations. The sheer number of
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