Posted on 05/19/2015 9:48:39 AM PDT by US Navy Vet
Shakespeare used the early modern English of his day to formulate poetic verse and prose. It would be tricky to try to “update” that and it is sensible to strive to understand his language and worldview. On the other hand, modernization of English has not at all stifled poetry and prose by new authors.
Et tu, Brute?
=
Even you, Ethan?
And that is the bottom line. KJV is not any “truer” than any well-done modern translation, and sometimes it is misleading. I could wish that more versions would go down the road that the Amplified Bible did. Everything else is a tradeoff as to what will go into compact diction.
These would virtually constitute brand new works.
Google for “Redneck Romeo and Juliet” for one hilarious “fan fiction” take.
Anyhow, back to the Israel and Saudi Arabia thing. It is interesting that they represent, respectively, the current governments of the holy lands of the Jewish and Islamic faiths, respectively. And both are in (earthly) jeopardy from events in Iran. It wasn’t that long ago that Saudi Arabia officially despised Israel so much that it wouldn’t even label Israel’s area of a map with anything more than “Palestine.” But being under threat changes one’s point of view, no?
I think things are getting more and more, uh, interesting. I also think it is happening exponentially. It’s why I have the tag line I do. You wouldn’t believe how much change a year can bring.
I believe leaders are preparing their plans against the US and our allies, to be carried out while Obama is in office. We are in the calm before the storm.
Hence my tag line.
Of course I’ve seen West Side Story and many other movies and plays that have been excerpted from other works. How many times has Romeo and Juliet been done in variation? Perhaps thousands of times. IMHO That does not address the issue. The English language has the largest vocabulary of any language, yet most people do not, or can not, use it. English is a precise language and that is the reason it is the universal “Commercial” language. French, a Romance language, is the “Diplomatic” language of the world.
Your argument that Germanic language speakers accomplished more regarding science and technology bears a closer scrutiny. It seems to me you are dismissing an enormous list of doctors, scientists, and inventors from France, Spain, Portugal, Italy, who in many cases paved the way to today’s world. Marie Curie, the Lumiere brothers, Da Vinci just for starters, and don’t forget the great mathematician and philosopher Blaise Pascal whose theory is still valid four hundred years after his death.
“Maybe.”
In the foreseeable future, Iran’s part, at worst, is to produce a few uranium fission bombs. Think Nagasaki. Israel could simply smoke Iran in comparison, as could the USA. I’m not all that worried about Israel or the USA from that standpoint.
I’m not saying that ONLY English and German speakers can invent, etc. I’m just saying the language can make it easier and does affect how you see the world. An eskimo “sees” snow differently than most people BECAUSE they have so many words for so many different kinds of snow.
Your language limits or enhances your mind’s ease in understanding and communicating things. But you can accomplish anything if you have the ability and motivation, even if your language is Swahili. It will just be harder.
I would not peg English as all that inherently precise. Its large vocabulary helps because there are so many nuances possible in describing a thing. But if you want precise, go to something like Latin.
Perhaps it is rather like learning a foreign language. We start by “translating” to our native tongue in our minds when we hear or read the new language. BUT, there arrives a time when we no longer translate, but understand what someone is saying and can respond without the mental “translation.” Unfortunately rather than expanding our vocabulary as I was taught when I went to school back in the “Dark Ages,” today’s approach is to make everything shorter and quicker so it can be sent on an I phone or some other device. We are losing our language and our understanding of it. Are we really smarter because our schools no longer teach us how to read and write?
Think Nagasaki.
This shows just how small the yield of some of those bombs are:
http://www.nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/
English is the universally accepted language of Commerce, precisely because contracts and agreements can be written with exact meaning due to the large vocabulary available. The diplomatic language is French because of the nuances available in the French language...thereby assuring the ability to “interpret” the document in more than one way.
Latin is the base of the Romance languages and is also very influential in the roots of English. But then English does have its vagaries....Great Britain English, Cockney English, American English, Australian English, and so on.....
Have a happy day pondering “of what do I speak?”
Ezekiel 38 is coming.
+1
“I’m with you. But one of the problems I have with the KJV is stuff like “In my fathers house are many mansions.” That is a TERRIBLE translation of the original Greek.”
It’s not “a TERRIBLE translation” at all. In fact it was an entirely accurate rendering of the Greek when the KJV translators did their work.
What you have missed is that it is English that has changed since 1601. “Mansion” used to mean “A separate dwelling in a large house or structure.” You can still find that definition listed as archaic in current dictionaries:
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/mansion
“English is a precise language and that is the reason it is the universal “Commercial” language. French, a Romance language, is the “Diplomatic” language of the world.”
Koine Greek was and is a far more precise language for conveying philosophic and theologic ideas than is English. For one thing has verb tenses that simply don’t exist in English.
Kinda freaky.
We are watching the build-up to it, in real-time.
You are correct that much of the criticism of the KJV is based on changes in the language, not on poor translation. The KJV is actually a pretty good translation, and is probably unrivaled by any translation into any language as literature.
However, if the purpose of reading the Bible is to become aware of God’s will, then it needs to be understandable to people today, not to scholars of Jacobean English.
BTW, one of the things that blew me away was when I discovered how many people believe the KJV itself is inspired of God, and that later more accurate translations are not.
It sure looks that way. If so this could be one of the most interesting times in all of history. But it also could be a false start or just a coincidence. If it does play out as my dispensationalist friends believe it won’t be nuclear. What could be nuclear is a lesser known reference in Isaiah to Damascus becoming a heap of ruins. Damascus is the longest continuously inhabited city in the world, or close to it, so it’s never been destroyed before. ISIS is dangerously close to conquering all of Syria. A Damascus ruled by ISIS would be on a lot of target lists.
Well people need to read translations that they can understand, and if they choose the KJV they need a primer on English circa 1601.
Some of the arguments about the superiority of the KJV have to do with the Greek texts that it was translated from- the Textus Receptus assembled by Luther’s old sparring partner Erasmus of Rotterdam. It’s not just backwoods preachers who have believed that the Textus Receptus is a superior manuscript, some have been major scholars. It’s above my pay grade so I just follow the debate from the outside.
Problem is, Greek is not widespread as is English....perhaps due to the fact that England once ruled the seas. Philosophic and theological ideas do not have a place in “Commerce” and contract law.”The sun never sets on the British Empire” was true for a long time and spread the use of English throughout the world. Let us all hope that Chinese is not forced down our throats.
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