The Art of Translation

One of the podcast I like to listen to is called "the Bible for Normal People."  The episode this week was an interview with Robert Alter called "The Art of Translating the Bible."

Have you ever thought of translation as art?  Well-crafted writing is art, so I can imagine that translating the written word from one language to another could be considered an art. 

Do you remember in the story of Samson (in Judges), Samson tells 30 men at a party that if they solve his riddle, he will buy them each a set of clothes? They finally coax the answer out of Samson's wife, so he loose the bet.  He goes to Ashkelon, a Philistine city, and kills 30 men, takes their clothes, and gives them to the 30 men at the party.

Or at least that's what most translations say.

But Alter talks about this in the podcast.  He says that the word for clothes used when the bet is made is slightly different than the word for clothes when Samson kills the 30 men.  Alter says if you translate it a little bit differently, then the meaning changes.  The second word that is translated a clothes is only used one other time in the Bible - in the telling of the war between the supporters of King Saul and of the (to be) King David.  It has to do with a warrior - and modern translators say that the word here is a piece of clothing.  But that isn't what warriors take when they slay a foe - they don't take clothes, they take armor.

Alter says that Samson doesn't kill 30 ordinary men - he kills 30 warriors.  And he brings back their armor.  

Think about the difference that makes in how we read the story.  The first way - killing 30 men and taking their clothes - makes Samson look like man who doesn't want to pay for 30 sets of clothes, so he kills men and takes their clothes instead.  If you think of it as 30 warriors with 30 sets of armor, imagine the different message that it sends to the 30 men at the party.  "I am Samson.  I can kill 30 WARRIORS just on my own."

Art.