I looooooove translation notes...
I really do. Such a geeky thing to enjoy, but there you have it. Alternate meanings, clarifications, more literal translations for comparison... mmmmm. Happiness.
On that general note the use of diction and language in The New English Bible makes me incredibly happy. My toes curl at some points, even, because it's just that delightful. Mom says this is because I am an Anglophile. I protest that I am not. We haven't settled that one yet.
(I still say that I'm not, not really, that I just love language, really, really, truly, all kinds of language, verbal and visual and physical, there is so much language in the world, so many things people and animals say to each other through movement and vocalization and deliberate manipulation of the physical environment.)
But, here, see:
All prophetic vision has become for you like a sealed book. Give such a book to one who can read and say, 'Come, read this'; he will answer 'I cannot', because it is sealed. Give it to one who cannot read and say, 'Come, read this'; he will answer, 'I cannot read.'
Isaiah 29: 11&12
Or this:
Does the wild ox consent to serve you,
does it spend the night in your
stall?
Can you harness its strength with
ropes, or will it harrow the furrows after
you?
Can you depend on it, strong as it is,
or leave your labour to it?
Do you trust it to come back
and bring home your grain to the
threshing-floor?
Job 39:9-12
I just. Eeee. I can't even fully explain why, except that it's just, I like it - and I couldn't reproduce the formatting on that last one fully in html, it just ends up unreadable, but - and. Yeah.
*flails!* "Shall I offer my eldest son for my own wrongdoing, my children for my own sin?" which. Here, here's the NRSV's rendering of that line: "Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?"
I like 'em both, but, y'know, it's just good to read a different sensibility.
(So long as it's not that danged stupid paraphrase that manages to make everyone sound like idiots. I hate those. Mind, some of the people in the Bible are idiots - *cough*Rehoboam*cough* - but not everyone.)
On that general note the use of diction and language in The New English Bible makes me incredibly happy. My toes curl at some points, even, because it's just that delightful. Mom says this is because I am an Anglophile. I protest that I am not. We haven't settled that one yet.
(I still say that I'm not, not really, that I just love language, really, really, truly, all kinds of language, verbal and visual and physical, there is so much language in the world, so many things people and animals say to each other through movement and vocalization and deliberate manipulation of the physical environment.)
But, here, see:
All prophetic vision has become for you like a sealed book. Give such a book to one who can read and say, 'Come, read this'; he will answer 'I cannot', because it is sealed. Give it to one who cannot read and say, 'Come, read this'; he will answer, 'I cannot read.'
Isaiah 29: 11&12
Or this:
Does the wild ox consent to serve you,
does it spend the night in your
stall?
Can you harness its strength with
ropes, or will it harrow the furrows after
you?
Can you depend on it, strong as it is,
or leave your labour to it?
Do you trust it to come back
and bring home your grain to the
threshing-floor?
Job 39:9-12
I just. Eeee. I can't even fully explain why, except that it's just, I like it - and I couldn't reproduce the formatting on that last one fully in html, it just ends up unreadable, but - and. Yeah.
*flails!* "Shall I offer my eldest son for my own wrongdoing, my children for my own sin?" which. Here, here's the NRSV's rendering of that line: "Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?"
I like 'em both, but, y'know, it's just good to read a different sensibility.
(So long as it's not that danged stupid paraphrase that manages to make everyone sound like idiots. I hate those. Mind, some of the people in the Bible are idiots - *cough*Rehoboam*cough* - but not everyone.)