Adam wrote:As strange as it may sound, translation work is different from in-depth Bible study.
Very much so. I recently attended my first Bible translation conference, but I have very little background in Bible translation.
A few more things to clear up: the approach that I outlined is a fundamentally inductive approach. It is not about "the linguistics and semantics of translations", it is about studying the text and not translating it. I did not advocate the historical-critical method, I don't think I use it.
Obviously personal and practical application of Scripture is the goal, but in-depth Bible study helps us understand the text so that we are applying what it actually says. Not everyone does in-depth Bible study, not everyone needs to, but it's helpful for the body to have some people who do.
Adam wrote:In fact, one of the temptations that translators face it trying to get their translation to also be an interpreter and Bible teacher. I think there is a lot of danger in that because it becomes very easy to slip your own thoughts and interpretations into the text. I wrote a blog post on this topic that you can read at the following link (
http://pngboyd.blogspot.com/2017/09/tra ... style.html). I believe that our go-to translations should be in the ESV, NASB, NKJV camp. For languages like Enga, an ESV-style translation is virtually impossible. The best we can hope for is more of an NIV or NLT. (I find that to be quite frustrating by the way.) Translations like NLT, CEV, MESSAGE, etc. can be helpful to bring out some of the flavor of the source text, but they are only useful because we already have very good literal English translations that we can turn to to find out "what the text actual says". Of course, no translation can tell us exactly what the source text actually says, but translations like ESV, NASB, NKJV come pretty close.
I"d be interested in your feelings on HCSB, I find it does a pretty good job of being readable while still being accurate.
But for in-depth Bible study, I think the takeaway is that there are different kinds of translations for different purposes, and we should be aware of that when we study the Bible. I find the ESV, NASB, and NKJV to be very similar, making the same translation decisions when a passage can be legitimately understood more than one way, so I generally recommend that people use one translation from this group together with two translations outside this group - perhaps HCSB, NLT, etc.
Adam wrote:IWhen I come upon difficult verses, I am more of a mental processor and I spend time thinking deeply about the text. (I know that sounds a bit loosey-goosey, but it is honestly what I do and it is helpful.) I will also consult commentaries, cross-references, lexicons, various translations, etc. I am a bit leery of commentaries and don't find them particularly helpful with difficult translation decisions. Reading the Greek is usually quite helpful. But I would like to pursue some more concrete methods to help me interact with the text. That is why I am asking what others do because I think I will benefit from more hands-on interaction.
What these more concrete methods have in common is that they get you to interact with and see what is there, seeing the details in an individual sentence or clause or phrase, seeing how what is said in one sentence relates to the next, seeing the bigger picture for an entire passage ... and really, anything that helps you do that is good. As human beings, anything that makes us do something active is helpful - writing notes in the margins, drawing with colored pencils, reading the text out loud, annotating the text with tools like hypothes.is. Some of this is at a fine level of detail - perhaps noticing the relationship between two verbs. Some of this ties the larger patterns together - writing headings in the margins, drawing lines between parts of the text that are related.
But the hands-on part is only part of a bigger picture. Long prayerful walks, talking things out with other people, journaling, etc. are also really important to me for really understanding a text.
Manuscript Bible study is a very hands-on approach to inductive Bible study. I like the first two books mentioned on this page:
https://www.biblegateway.com/resources/ ... /resources
I have not looked at the other things it mentions. InterVarsity has really good resources for manuscript Bible study.
Adam wrote:I have also started reading a book called Deep Exegesis by Peter Leithart. It looks quite interesting, and I really like the Christocentric approach to exegesis.
Tell me about it, I don't know this book.
Is it biblical? Is it Christlike? Is it loving? Is it true? How can I find out?