Hades, Tartarus, Gehenna all rendered "hell"--Loyal translation?

Steven Craig Miller scmiller at www.plantnet.com
Thu Dec 30 12:49:47 EST 1999


To: Solomon Landers,

<< Sounds logical and reasonable enough, as you suggest, to just 
transliterate those words and footnote them. As for TARTAROW, why not 
something like "thrust them down into Tartarus," as Kenneth Wuest 
translates it? (Again, with a footnote, probably citing the LXX of Job 
40:15, where the substantive form EN TWi TARTARWi ("in the deep," Brenton) 
is found. >>

I have no substantial objection to such a method. I will note that Louw & 
Nida, in their lexicon, make the plea:

<< In many cases it is confusing to add still another term for a 
designation of hell by transliterating the Greek TARTAROS, and so most 
translators have preferred to render TARTAROW as either 'to cast into hell' 
or 'to keep in hell,' thus using for 'hell' the same term as employed for a 
rendering the Greek term GEENNA >> (1.25).

Of course, once one uses "Gehenna" for GEENNA, it would be inappropriate to 
translate TARTAROW with "to cast/keep in Gehenna." Using the term 
"Tartarus" (with a footnote) is one option, but also using Benton's 
solution ("the deep") is another possibility.

IMO it is a matter of personal taste, it is hard to argue that on this 
issue one translation is necessarily better than another. My own preference 
is that no matter what choice one makes, it should be footnoted.

-Steven Craig Miller
Alton, Illinois (USA)
scmiller at www.plantnet.com
Disclaimer: "I'm just a simple house-husband (with no post-grad degree), 
what do I know?"




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