a New Hebrew Bible to Rival the King James
December 24, 2018 9:43 AM Subscribe
After More Than Two Decades of Work, The pre-eminent scholar Robert Alter has finally finished his own translation. “A sachet of myrrh is my lover to me,/All night between my breasts”
At my old job at a small liberal arts college, all faculty had to participate in teaching the freshman seminar “great books”-type course (“common intellectual experience”)—even the mathematicians and physicists. There were a variety of readings, from Gilgamesh to Descartes to the Bhagavad Gita. Which was kind of cool when it was sold as a voluntary teaching choice, but less cool when it became clear that it was a requirement of getting tenure. But I digress.
Anyway, there was a section on reading from Genesis, and we used the Alter translation, which I really liked. “When God began to create Heaven and Earth....”
Sounds like a good Christmas present for my dad.
posted by leahwrenn at 1:23 PM on December 24, 2018
Anyway, there was a section on reading from Genesis, and we used the Alter translation, which I really liked. “When God began to create Heaven and Earth....”
Sounds like a good Christmas present for my dad.
posted by leahwrenn at 1:23 PM on December 24, 2018
So, sure, one could use as authoritative the consensus earliest known texts or fragments of text and spend many years becoming fluent in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Koine Greek.
Bloch's translation is specifically of the Masoretic Text of what Christians call the Old Testament: it's almost entirely Hebrew, with Daniel and part of Ezra being the only substantial parts in Aramaic. None of it (as far as I know) has been translated from another language, and the Jewish textus receptus has been basically unaltered for well over two thousand years.
The Septuagint sometimes reflects (in translation) a coexisting textual tradition of similar antiquity but the differences are pretty damn small and a translation is, by definition, not "original". If that term is to have any meaning at all then the Masoretic Text is the original text: there are simply no extant textual traditions competing with it.
posted by Joe in Australia at 1:35 PM on December 24, 2018 [6 favorites]
Bloch's translation is specifically of the Masoretic Text of what Christians call the Old Testament: it's almost entirely Hebrew, with Daniel and part of Ezra being the only substantial parts in Aramaic. None of it (as far as I know) has been translated from another language, and the Jewish textus receptus has been basically unaltered for well over two thousand years.
The Septuagint sometimes reflects (in translation) a coexisting textual tradition of similar antiquity but the differences are pretty damn small and a translation is, by definition, not "original". If that term is to have any meaning at all then the Masoretic Text is the original text: there are simply no extant textual traditions competing with it.
posted by Joe in Australia at 1:35 PM on December 24, 2018 [6 favorites]
If that term is to have any meaning at all then the Masoretic Text is the original text
I'm not sure I think this is true. It invokes the idea of a Biblical urtext without acknowledging the fact that (a) this probably never existed and (b) even if it did we know very little about it. It's only "the original text" with reference to a particular religious tradition, not considered as a text itself.
the Jewish textus receptus has been basically unaltered for well over two thousand years.
I don't think "well over" is justified by the scholarship, is it? "About" seems as far as we can go, no? There is plenty of evidence that the Masoretic Text is remarkably consistent to other texts from (and maybe slightly before?) the Common Era, but is there really anything much to support the view that it was particularly consistent prior to this?
posted by howfar at 2:25 PM on December 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
I'm not sure I think this is true. It invokes the idea of a Biblical urtext without acknowledging the fact that (a) this probably never existed and (b) even if it did we know very little about it. It's only "the original text" with reference to a particular religious tradition, not considered as a text itself.
the Jewish textus receptus has been basically unaltered for well over two thousand years.
I don't think "well over" is justified by the scholarship, is it? "About" seems as far as we can go, no? There is plenty of evidence that the Masoretic Text is remarkably consistent to other texts from (and maybe slightly before?) the Common Era, but is there really anything much to support the view that it was particularly consistent prior to this?
posted by howfar at 2:25 PM on December 24, 2018 [3 favorites]
Mod note: Deleted a comment, and several responses, that was preferring to argue about Christianity rather than address the actual translation project here, a notable work by a major Jewish scholar that translates the Hebrew Bible.
posted by Eyebrows McGee (staff) at 2:40 PM on December 24, 2018 [17 favorites]
posted by Eyebrows McGee (staff) at 2:40 PM on December 24, 2018 [17 favorites]
Anyway, there was a section on reading from Genesis, and we used the Alter translation, which I really liked. “When God began to create Heaven and Earth....”
The first verse of Genesis is very hard to translate!
In Hebrew it's: בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית בָּרָ֣א אֱלֹ'ים אֵ֥ת הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם וְאֵ֥ת הָאָֽרֶץ
The first word, בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית, would normally be read as "in the beginning of". The rest of the verse would normally be read as a statement: "God created the heaven (sky?) and the earth." How can we glue those two clauses together?
The KJV's solution is to use a comma as if it were a full stop or perhaps a title, something like "IN THE BEGINNING. God created the heaven and the earth." They don't print it that way, and a title of this nature would be an anachronistic literary device, but that's the only way I can understand their translation.
A traditional Jewish solution is to treat the second clause as if it were a unit: "In the beginning of God's-creation-of-the-heaven-and-the-earth". The problem with this is that in Hebrew, as in English, ou would normally use a different form of the verb "to create" in the phrases "[x]'s creation of" and "[x] created"
The NRSV has "In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth" but then hedges its bets with a footnote saying "Or when God began to create or In the beginning God created".
Each of these alternatives has its problems and they should really be thought of as translations of a different text than the one we actually have, because the Hebrew itself is murky and its precise meaning is hard to pin down.
posted by Joe in Australia at 3:18 PM on December 24, 2018 [16 favorites]
The first verse of Genesis is very hard to translate!
In Hebrew it's: בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית בָּרָ֣א אֱלֹ'ים אֵ֥ת הַשָּׁמַ֖יִם וְאֵ֥ת הָאָֽרֶץ
The first word, בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית, would normally be read as "in the beginning of". The rest of the verse would normally be read as a statement: "God created the heaven (sky?) and the earth." How can we glue those two clauses together?
The KJV's solution is to use a comma as if it were a full stop or perhaps a title, something like "IN THE BEGINNING. God created the heaven and the earth." They don't print it that way, and a title of this nature would be an anachronistic literary device, but that's the only way I can understand their translation.
A traditional Jewish solution is to treat the second clause as if it were a unit: "In the beginning of God's-creation-of-the-heaven-and-the-earth". The problem with this is that in Hebrew, as in English, ou would normally use a different form of the verb "to create" in the phrases "[x]'s creation of" and "[x] created"
The NRSV has "In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth" but then hedges its bets with a footnote saying "Or when God began to create or In the beginning God created".
Each of these alternatives has its problems and they should really be thought of as translations of a different text than the one we actually have, because the Hebrew itself is murky and its precise meaning is hard to pin down.
posted by Joe in Australia at 3:18 PM on December 24, 2018 [16 favorites]
"I am who am" is similarly fraught with ambiguity. "I am becoming what I am becoming" or "I will be what I will be" or "I cause to be what I cause to be" are all further valid possible translations. The Hebrew Bible, especially in the Torah, is full of these fascinating linguistic puzzles!
I find (along with many Jewish and Christian people) that these puzzles and ambiguities deepen my appreciation for the text and create fruitful areas for contemplating. (Others, of course, find ambiguity threatening, but they are missing out on the true beauties and complexities of the Scriptures.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 3:51 PM on December 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
I find (along with many Jewish and Christian people) that these puzzles and ambiguities deepen my appreciation for the text and create fruitful areas for contemplating. (Others, of course, find ambiguity threatening, but they are missing out on the true beauties and complexities of the Scriptures.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 3:51 PM on December 24, 2018 [8 favorites]
the Hebrew itself is murky and its precise meaning is hard to pin down.
And really that's gotta be one of the hardest things to translate, when the original is ambiguous and whichever words you choose risk creating a misleading clarity that's not faithful to the original.
posted by straight at 4:09 PM on December 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
And really that's gotta be one of the hardest things to translate, when the original is ambiguous and whichever words you choose risk creating a misleading clarity that's not faithful to the original.
posted by straight at 4:09 PM on December 24, 2018 [1 favorite]
This is my friend’s former PhD advisor, as I learned when she linked me to this a few days ago! The really interesting bit to me concerns the translation of the word that was formerly rendered as “soul” (I exceeded my free article limit so I can’t look it up in the article right now). Does Alter’s grounding of the term in the physical world have any metaphysical implications about the the nature of the soul in general?
posted by invitapriore at 5:57 PM on December 24, 2018
posted by invitapriore at 5:57 PM on December 24, 2018
Does Alter’s grounding of the term in the physical world have any metaphysical implications about the the nature of the soul in general?
I think it means you need to know how big your soul is if you’re buying a men’s dress shirt.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 6:15 PM on December 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
I think it means you need to know how big your soul is if you’re buying a men’s dress shirt.
posted by Huffy Puffy at 6:15 PM on December 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
This is my buddy's dad! How exciting!
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:28 PM on December 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by grumpybear69 at 7:28 PM on December 24, 2018 [4 favorites]
"Does Alter’s grounding of the term in the physical world have any metaphysical implications about the the nature of the soul in general?"
"Soul" as we think of it in the English-speaking West owe quite a bit more to a) the Greek Neo-Platonist thinkers and b) Rene Descartes, than to anything that actually appears in the Bible (with some exceptions from the letters of Paul, who is Greek-educated so has a bit of Platonism in his thought). The Hebrew Bible doesn't seem to have much (if any) conception of a soul as separate from our corporeal being, and Jesus doesn't really seem to either. (And quite clearly the early Jewish-Christians were talking not about the eternality of the soul, but about physical, bodily resurrection, because there's no "you" without your meat-self. Whether you feel that an incorporeal and eternal soul is a fair interpretation of available text is up to you, but the early Jewish-Christians clearly did not, and if you're reciting the Nicene Creed you're reciting your belief in a bodily, physical resurrection into eternal life, not floaty incorporeal souls in the ether in heaven somewhere. Not that most Christians believe that and mainstream churches barely bother teaching it! But it's there.)
When Alter talked about changing nefesh away from "soul" I was like, "Well, usually 'breath' is better," and indeed that's where the NYT goes in the next couple sentences! And one reason for that is that we start Genesis with "In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was without form and void, and the spirit (ruah) of God moved on the face of the waters." The word ruah, rendered as spirit, is actually "breath" (or sometimes wind). The BREATH of God hovers over the face of the waters. And then God SAYS, "Let there be light." Creation is a spoken task, using the breath of God. So when we talk about nefesh as breath or throat, it ties back in to the ruah of God that makes creation -- as God is what God creates ("I cause to be that which I cause to be," see my comment above), you are what you speak, or you are that you breathe.
In Genesis 1:20: "And God said, let the waters abound with an abundance of creatures (nefesh) that live (hayah)" and you can already see how it would work -- it's not "creatures" that live, but rather they are BREATH that lives.
Genesis 2:7: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath (nishmat) of life; and man became a living soul (nefesh)." God breathes the breath of life into man, and man becomes a living breath. A living creature, a living soul.
Later -- much later -- early Christians conceived their Trinity as Father, Son, and Spirit -- literally breath, pneuma in Greek, ruah in Hebrew. Spiritus in Latin, which isn't as good a translation. The study of the Holy Spirit is "pneumatology," or breath-study.
And if you study Ancient Near Eastern thought you can spend a lot of time on their really complex set of beliefs around hearing/speaking, which ties into a lot of purity laws in the Torah, but the key point, that I think you can pick up even as a layman, is that Creation is an act of speaking, and God creates the universe with words and breath, and to be alive is to have that breath, and humans are creatures of both word and breath, and are different from animals in that they, like God, have both words and breath and so participate in the work of creation.
(Which also puts into a bit of perspective why the Gospel of John is so freakin' excited about introducing Jesus as "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.")
Which is all so much more fascinating and so much richer than just saying "soul"!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:00 PM on December 24, 2018 [39 favorites]
"Soul" as we think of it in the English-speaking West owe quite a bit more to a) the Greek Neo-Platonist thinkers and b) Rene Descartes, than to anything that actually appears in the Bible (with some exceptions from the letters of Paul, who is Greek-educated so has a bit of Platonism in his thought). The Hebrew Bible doesn't seem to have much (if any) conception of a soul as separate from our corporeal being, and Jesus doesn't really seem to either. (And quite clearly the early Jewish-Christians were talking not about the eternality of the soul, but about physical, bodily resurrection, because there's no "you" without your meat-self. Whether you feel that an incorporeal and eternal soul is a fair interpretation of available text is up to you, but the early Jewish-Christians clearly did not, and if you're reciting the Nicene Creed you're reciting your belief in a bodily, physical resurrection into eternal life, not floaty incorporeal souls in the ether in heaven somewhere. Not that most Christians believe that and mainstream churches barely bother teaching it! But it's there.)
When Alter talked about changing nefesh away from "soul" I was like, "Well, usually 'breath' is better," and indeed that's where the NYT goes in the next couple sentences! And one reason for that is that we start Genesis with "In the beginning when God created the heavens and the earth, the earth was without form and void, and the spirit (ruah) of God moved on the face of the waters." The word ruah, rendered as spirit, is actually "breath" (or sometimes wind). The BREATH of God hovers over the face of the waters. And then God SAYS, "Let there be light." Creation is a spoken task, using the breath of God. So when we talk about nefesh as breath or throat, it ties back in to the ruah of God that makes creation -- as God is what God creates ("I cause to be that which I cause to be," see my comment above), you are what you speak, or you are that you breathe.
In Genesis 1:20: "And God said, let the waters abound with an abundance of creatures (nefesh) that live (hayah)" and you can already see how it would work -- it's not "creatures" that live, but rather they are BREATH that lives.
Genesis 2:7: "And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath (nishmat) of life; and man became a living soul (nefesh)." God breathes the breath of life into man, and man becomes a living breath. A living creature, a living soul.
Later -- much later -- early Christians conceived their Trinity as Father, Son, and Spirit -- literally breath, pneuma in Greek, ruah in Hebrew. Spiritus in Latin, which isn't as good a translation. The study of the Holy Spirit is "pneumatology," or breath-study.
And if you study Ancient Near Eastern thought you can spend a lot of time on their really complex set of beliefs around hearing/speaking, which ties into a lot of purity laws in the Torah, but the key point, that I think you can pick up even as a layman, is that Creation is an act of speaking, and God creates the universe with words and breath, and to be alive is to have that breath, and humans are creatures of both word and breath, and are different from animals in that they, like God, have both words and breath and so participate in the work of creation.
(Which also puts into a bit of perspective why the Gospel of John is so freakin' excited about introducing Jesus as "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.")
Which is all so much more fascinating and so much richer than just saying "soul"!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 8:00 PM on December 24, 2018 [39 favorites]
This is really interesting stuff, and I want to read the translation. I like the snippet about a "sachet of myrrh".
I understand that 'spirit' and 'soul' have 2000 years of dualistic baggage, but I'm not sure a translation alone (rather than a commentary) can solve that. Spīritus simply means 'breath', related to spīro 'breathe, blow', as in respiration. And I'd defend 'soul' as a simple Germanic word, even if its own metaphorical origins are lost. (One theory is that it's "from the sea", because souls were supposed to live in the sea after death.)
posted by zompist at 8:55 PM on December 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
I understand that 'spirit' and 'soul' have 2000 years of dualistic baggage, but I'm not sure a translation alone (rather than a commentary) can solve that. Spīritus simply means 'breath', related to spīro 'breathe, blow', as in respiration. And I'd defend 'soul' as a simple Germanic word, even if its own metaphorical origins are lost. (One theory is that it's "from the sea", because souls were supposed to live in the sea after death.)
posted by zompist at 8:55 PM on December 24, 2018 [2 favorites]
Having grown up around people who believed that the KJV sprang whole and intact from nothing on Jan 1 of the year following the Resurrection, I'm happy to hear of a fresh modern translation from someone with a reverent but not revisionist Christian evangelical axe to grind.
I remember first reading the New Int'l Version in college. While I respect it, it did read a bit like they replaced Charlton Heston with Harrison Ford or non-ironic Steve Martin.
posted by zaixfeep at 1:15 AM on December 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
I remember first reading the New Int'l Version in college. While I respect it, it did read a bit like they replaced Charlton Heston with Harrison Ford or non-ironic Steve Martin.
posted by zaixfeep at 1:15 AM on December 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
Eyebrows McGee: early Christians conceived their Trinity as Father, Son, and Spirit -- literally breath
This raises the important metaphysical question: Can God make a Tic-Tac that cannot freshen His breath?
posted by zaixfeep at 5:48 AM on December 25, 2018 [2 favorites]
This raises the important metaphysical question: Can God make a Tic-Tac that cannot freshen His breath?
posted by zaixfeep at 5:48 AM on December 25, 2018 [2 favorites]
Can God make a Tic-Tac that cannot freshen His breath?
An everlasting god-stopper.
posted by chavenet at 10:20 AM on December 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
An everlasting god-stopper.
posted by chavenet at 10:20 AM on December 25, 2018 [4 favorites]
I just want to say: Eyebrows, a while back you were casting about for a project and I believe a few of us suggested that you write on religious matters because you're so knowledgeable and engaging on the subject, and at least as far as I'm concerned, the suggestion stands.
posted by HotToddy at 3:35 PM on December 25, 2018
posted by HotToddy at 3:35 PM on December 25, 2018
Yeah, thanks so much for going into detail on that, Eyebrows, that was a great elaboration. It also very much clarifies what my friend meant when I asked how her research interests aligned with Alter’s and she noted an interest in the mysticism of the word as the main alignment, considering that it sounds like that notion is deeply embedded in those texts themselves.
posted by invitapriore at 4:45 PM on December 25, 2018
posted by invitapriore at 4:45 PM on December 25, 2018
“That Hebrew word, nefesh, can mean many things. It can be ‘breath’ or ‘life-breath.’ It can mean ‘throat’ or ‘neck’ or ‘gullet.’I've looked this up and I have no idea where he's getting the bit about throats and gullets from. According to Klein's Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language, the word “nefesh” (נפש) primarily means “breath”, with that meaning extended to breathing (i.e., living) things, and from there to one's identity as a living thing: one's personhood, one's emotions, and one's desires. It has cognates in other Semitic languages that show the same pattern.
I think that keeping this fundamental meaning in mind means that translating נפש as “neck” in Jonah 2:5 (sic, not 2:6) is misleading. The point is that the narrator was drowning: the waters were reaching his “breath”, as it were; he was going to start inhaling water. I can't think of a simple way to express “the point at which rising water prevents one from breathing” in English, but it's obviously a real thing and it's rather higher than one's neck. Whether this means that “neck” or “soul” or “me” (as some translations have it) is the best isn't at all obvious to me, but given the historical origin of this translation in a word that also means “breath”, I wouldn't say “soul” is necessarily a bad choice.
posted by Joe in Australia at 5:25 PM on December 26, 2018 [1 favorite]
"I've looked this up and I have no idea where he's getting the bit about throats and gullets from. "
Metonymy, especially with body parts, is incredibly common through the Hebrew Bible. Genesis 45 is generally translated as "And Joseph gave them wagons, according to the commandment of Pharaoh, and gave them provisions for the way," or similar, but literally it's "mouth," according to the mouth of Pharaoh. ("Mouth" meaning "instructions" or "commandment" appears a lot throughout the Hebrew Bible, there are several examples.)
Exodus 12: "Then Moses called for all the elders of Israel, and said unto them, Draw out, and take you lambs according to your families, and kill the passover." It's obvious Moses means kill the passover sacrifices, but it literally says "kill the passover."
Men "cover their feet" when they're peeing or having sex, feet frequently meaning penis, except when hand means penis, and then hand sometimes means monument, like an obelisk, which looks like a penis, and then hand sometimes means monument which means children, since children both come from penises and are the monument/memorial to your existence and your blessings from God. "I shall make for you a monument and a name." (Isaiah 56; and also the name of the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, Yad (a hand) Vashem (and a name) -- as many of those killed in the Holocaust did not have children. The original verse refers to eunuchs who cannot have children, but God makes for them an everlasting monument (yad/hand/penis/monument) and a name that shall not be cut off (so it's both punning on penises that the eunuchs don't have, and making a serious promise); the museum likewise is an everlasting monument that remembers the names of those that died so they are not forgotten.)
Some of these metonymies are so familiar to us they pass without notice (like saying "Judea" when you mean "the people of Judea"); others are so strange to us they render passages incomprehensible without footnotes or a freer translation.
I don't love "throat" or "gullet" -- I find it easier to follow the many valences of a word in strict translation, with footnotes -- but Alter is clear that (in places) he's trying to render unfamiliar and archaic Hebrew poetic language in more vivid English that captures the feel of the original, and to capture a metonymy here. And certainly being "up to your neck" in trouble is a common enough saying in English.
Also Rashi renders nefesh as throat a few times, and if it's good enough for Rashi, it's good enough for me. :)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:52 AM on December 27, 2018 [7 favorites]
Metonymy, especially with body parts, is incredibly common through the Hebrew Bible. Genesis 45 is generally translated as "And Joseph gave them wagons, according to the commandment of Pharaoh, and gave them provisions for the way," or similar, but literally it's "mouth," according to the mouth of Pharaoh. ("Mouth" meaning "instructions" or "commandment" appears a lot throughout the Hebrew Bible, there are several examples.)
Exodus 12: "Then Moses called for all the elders of Israel, and said unto them, Draw out, and take you lambs according to your families, and kill the passover." It's obvious Moses means kill the passover sacrifices, but it literally says "kill the passover."
Men "cover their feet" when they're peeing or having sex, feet frequently meaning penis, except when hand means penis, and then hand sometimes means monument, like an obelisk, which looks like a penis, and then hand sometimes means monument which means children, since children both come from penises and are the monument/memorial to your existence and your blessings from God. "I shall make for you a monument and a name." (Isaiah 56; and also the name of the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, Yad (a hand) Vashem (and a name) -- as many of those killed in the Holocaust did not have children. The original verse refers to eunuchs who cannot have children, but God makes for them an everlasting monument (yad/hand/penis/monument) and a name that shall not be cut off (so it's both punning on penises that the eunuchs don't have, and making a serious promise); the museum likewise is an everlasting monument that remembers the names of those that died so they are not forgotten.)
Some of these metonymies are so familiar to us they pass without notice (like saying "Judea" when you mean "the people of Judea"); others are so strange to us they render passages incomprehensible without footnotes or a freer translation.
I don't love "throat" or "gullet" -- I find it easier to follow the many valences of a word in strict translation, with footnotes -- but Alter is clear that (in places) he's trying to render unfamiliar and archaic Hebrew poetic language in more vivid English that captures the feel of the original, and to capture a metonymy here. And certainly being "up to your neck" in trouble is a common enough saying in English.
Also Rashi renders nefesh as throat a few times, and if it's good enough for Rashi, it's good enough for me. :)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 7:52 AM on December 27, 2018 [7 favorites]
Yes my favorite of these is when God sucker punches Jacob in the ‘hip’
posted by bq at 8:27 AM on December 27, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by bq at 8:27 AM on December 27, 2018 [1 favorite]
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