[B-Greek] John 1:24
Stephen C. Carlson
scarlson at mindspring.com
Fri Dec 5 10:52:12 EST 2003
Iver Larsen <iver_larsen at sil.org> wrote:
>RSV and NIV disagree in the meaning of this verse:
>
>John 1:24 KAI APESTALMENOI HSAN EK TWN FARISAIWN. KAI HRWTHSAN AUTON...
>
>RSV: Now they had been sent from the Pharisees. (So) They asked him...
>NIV: Now some Pharisees who had been sent questioned him...
>REB: Some Pharisees who were in the deputation asked him...
>
>It seems to me that RSV is correct and the others wrong.
...
>Another problem with NIV and REB is the article in TWN FARISAIWN. From where
>does NIV and REB get the English pronoun "some"? And where do they get the
>relative pronoun "who" from?
...
>Can anyone tell me what is the origin or basis for the NIV and REB
>rendering? What am I missing?
It seems to me that the difference is in translation philosophy, in which
the RSV uses formal equivalence and the NIV uses dynamic equivalence.
In the NIV/REB rendering, EK TWN FARISAIWN is construed as a partitive,
and "some Pharisees" is the idiomatic way in English to render the partitive.
As for the "who," good English style generally prefers subordination
(hypotaxis) to coordination (parataxis), so they replaced the first clause
coordinated by "and" with a subordinate clause.
In the formal equivalence of the RSV rendering, the EK TWN FARISAIWN
and the paratactic construction were preserved in English. Readers used
to the RSV and other formal equivalent translations such as the AV and
NASB may be able to recognize and interpret correctly the non-idiomatic
translations of these expressions, but readers less familiar with "Bible-ese"
may not. On the other hand, if there is a (slim) possilibilty that EK is not
partitive here, readers of the dynamic equivalent NIV/REB will not be
aware of it.
As for which translation is "correct" and which is "wrong," it seems that
both the RSV and the NIV/REB succeeded at their goals, but their goals
are different -- and judging whose goal is "correct" or "wrong" is beyond
the scope of this list.
Stephen Carlson
--
Stephen C. Carlson,
mailto:scarlson at mindspring.com
"Poetry speaks of aspirations, and songs chant the words." Shujing 2.35
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