God's Communication Through the Translated Text

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This is a section of my term paper written for Philosophical Hermeneutics while working on my Master's of Divinity at Criswell College this past semester. It was written for Dr. Douglas Blount, an excellent professor of Theology and Philosophy who was one of the editors and writers for the Southern Baptist defence of the Baptist Faith and Message 2000 (an excellent book).

God's Communication Through the Translated Text 

By Manley C. Beasley

 Can God's written word be properly understood when translated to dialects other than its original language? This question may seem to be a serious problem for the Christian because it denotes a problem that is common to the modern belief of translation. We are attacked from every side by those who look to belittle the sufficiency of scriptures, and one of their weapons is the declared weakness of any translation to convey the the original text's meaning accurately. The phrase lost in translation has become so accepted that it's used as a metaphor for any inability understand what someone is saying. The argument usually centers around one language's word being insufficient for translating another language’s word. People make statements like “the English language doesn't have a word for that word in the Greek”, presuming that makes the meaning of that Greek word unknowable or having some special depth that those who don't know the Greek could ever grasp. The foolishness of this argument is twofold. First, if the word can't be known for lack of corresponding English signs, how can the wise translator know that there isn't a corresponding English sign unless the real meaning of the word is clear to him? If the meaning isn't clear it seems more plausible that the skill of the translator is probably the issue. If the meaning is clear to the translator then it must be assumed that at worst there isn't a single adequate English word though there assuredly must be a phrase that would suffice. To define a word is to give explanation of a word's meaning to those who are ignorant of that specific word. Once those who are ignorant familiarize themselves with the definition of the new word it has lost its mystery. When translating a word to another language it is sometimes necessary to use multiple words to accurately capture the meaning of the word being translated. This is similar to defining the word because there isn't a single word that suffices. This does not mean the word wasn't understandable in the new language, it only means that there are some differences between the two languages. Second, if the word denotes a concept that is not able to be understood because it signifies something unknowable, we can certainly find a word or phrase that can capture that transcendence. What must be understood is that language is never the problem because language only signifies actual meanings. Even if a brand new idea has come into view, a new word can be made into the sign for it. When someone says “there are no adequate words for this concept” they are really saying either they don't understand the concept themselves, or they think the person they're speaking to won't understand. If all else fails they can invent a new sign and provide the definition to those who need to know. The problems in translation don't come from language but from the ability of translators. As we've already established, language is fully able to convey meaning. If a person translating a text has the knowledge of the languages in question to be able to identify correspondent signs, they are fully capable of rightly translating the text. The scripture itself shows us this when we reflect on the story of the Tower of Babel and the narrative of the Spirit's outpouring at Pentecost. The Tower of Babel was being built because of the unity and cooperation men had because they still shared one language.¹ Genesis 11:7-9 tells us what God did.

7 Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech.” 8 So the Lord dispersed them from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city. 9 Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth. (Gen 11:7-9)

Because of the immediacy of the miraculous birth of languages, men could not understand each other. The result was the creation of the tribes and nations that we see spread all over the world. What is interesting is that these new languages were created by God Himself. Even though humanity's ignorance of the different languages caused them to not understand each other, it doesn't indicate that those new languages couldn't convey meaning. God's purpose was to disperse them over the face of all the earth, not take away their ability to communicate. It wasn't long until people started learning other languages and communicating again. By then God had accomplished His purpose and humans were spread out. Acts 2:4-6 shows us that a multiplicity of languages are capable of conveying identical meaning. Christ's disciples were praying together and the Holy Spirit was poured out on them.

4 And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other tongues as the Spirit gave them utterance. 5 Now there were dwelling in Jerusalem Jews, devout men from every nation under heaven. 6 And at this sound the multitude came together, and they were bewildered, because each one was hearing them speak in his own language.

What was being said by the disciples was heard in different languages. These different languages from every nation under heaven conveyed the identical meaning being communicated by those filled with the Spirit. The languages spoken by these multinational Jews were capable of saying the exact same things. This is supported further by translation done in the original texts of scripture. Although the New Testament is written in Greek, it consistently quotes the Old Testament which was written in Hebrew. Whether the writers of the New Testament translated from the Hebrew themselves or relied on the Greek Septuagint makes no difference because both options require the work of translation from the original Hebrew. The fact that both the Old and New Testaments are the inspired inerrant scripture proves that the Greek translations perfectly convey the meaning of the Hebrew texts. The Holy Spirit inspiring these quotations is just as accurate as the Holy Spirit inspiring the original text. We can also appeal to the fact that Christ Himself was not preaching and teaching in Greek but in Aramaic. The Holy Spirit again inspired the writers of the New Testament to translate His preaching into Greek. By this we can see that translation really does have the capability of conveying identical meaning across multiple languages. This is obviously important to missions and evangelism. If we are to preach the gospel to all nations we have to be confident that we can really proclaim the true meaning of the gospel in all of the languages of those who hear. If translation cannot be relied upon we could accidentally proclaim a contrary message Paul condemned in Galations 1:9. Since the gospel will succeed in saving people from all nations we can be certain that the languages of all people are capable of proclaiming an unadulterated gospel.

1 Gen 11:6