Consider time, translations when using biblical texts to form opinions
As an English and languages, literatures and cultures double major studying at a liberal arts institution, I’m no stranger to translated texts. In fact, as a Civitas student, I’m intimately familiar with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, whose essay “The Structure of Responsible Life” is the basis for Augustana’s honors program.
We read the English translations in class, but I often wonder how much nuance has been lost in the move from language to language, not to mention the 80-odd years of semantic drift — in German and English — since Bonhoeffer was writing during World War II. The fields of religion and philosophy were built upon academics arguing over doctrine’s most minuscule details, but surely doing so with a text after it has been doubly distorted by translation and time is completely pointless.
I was born with a passion for linguistics, but I was also born a Baptist. I grew up hearing verses from the Christian Bible twisted and turned into various English translations, knowing that each of my pastors and teachers preferred a different version of the text. I’d sit in a row of grey chairs in the church sanctuary, or in a lift-lid desk at school, or on hard blue bleachers during chapel, and I’d listen to a sermon that revolved around a single passage, phrase or even a lone word. Inevitably, I found myself wondering about context every time.
My experience with the Upper-Midwest flavor of Baptist Christianity showed me time and time again that parts of the Bible could be pulled from their English contexts within chapters or stories and used by modern readers with that context disregarded — which did not feel like a promising sign for a teenager who spent her time thinking about ancient Hebrew.
If the Christians who surrounded me struggled even to consider the modern English contexts of Biblical text, I knew that bringing up the fact that the Bible was written across the span of 1500 plus years by some 40 people over two millennia ago was a no-go. And that little point about translation from ancient languages to modern English? Forget it.
I no longer consider myself a Christian, but I still think about how regularly these complicating factors of time and translation are overlooked. Religious texts can be easily weaponized, politicized and used at whim: Consider Genesis 9:6 or Jeremiah 1:5 in relation to abortion issues; Leviticus 18:22 or 1 Corinthians 6:9–10 as pertains to same-sex marriage controversies; and Ephesians 5:22–24 or 1 Timothy 2:11–15 regarding gender role stereotypes. Modern readers often apply these and many other English verses and use them to address contemporary issues without thought for the time that has passed or the translations that have taken place.
I write this with a plea for today’s Christians: Please take these factors into consideration as you form opinions. I am not asking everyone to brush up on their Aramaic — although it should not be out of the question for serious theologians — but to remember that there exist a variety of factors which have distorted the original meanings of religious texts.
When you interpret a passage, bear in mind that we are centuries removed from its historical context and that the language it was written in is no longer spoken by anyone living in its original form. Engage with the text with a critical eye. By whom was the passage written, and to whom? Why was the author writing? When and from what language was it translated? Who did the translating, and what did they believe?
Though scholars have studied the Bible extensively for centuries, there are things that we as modern readers do not and likely cannot understand, being so far removed from the time during which it was written. Nevertheless, great research by diligent academics does exist that attempts to fill in the gaps where context, linguistic and historical, is missing. One just has to be willing to look.
