Nicholas J. Theocarakis wrote:
>I owe an answer ro James Ahiakpor's question why
>I did not translate the text in French. I am
>guilty of cut and paste from the text provided
>by the National Library of France. I assumed,
>however, that people in this list are not
>offended by a few lines in beautiful French and
>that they would prefer to read the great Galiani
>in the original than the traduttore traditore
There is a good reason for the Italian proverb. I
can't say much about economic articles, since I
read them only in English, but I know from my
experience in reading (or more accurately,
re-discovering) the Bible in Greek, and
especially the New Testament. The differences
between the Greek and its English translations
can be large and small, and in some cases so
decisive as to be a totally different gospel. For
example, there is the translation of the word
dikaiosune and it cognates, which can be
translated as either "righteousness" or "justice"
and which is a frequently used word in the Bible.
When Jesus redefines morality as a "hunger and
thirst for dikaiosunen," is he calling for
justice or for righteousness? I suggest that a
gospel of righteousness and a gospel of justice
are two very different gospels. The King James
translates this word consistently as
righteousness, while the Latins, and those who
follow that tradition, translate it as
"iustitiae." There is no particular problem in
the Greek, because in the Bible (as in
Aristotle), justice is righteousness and
righteousness justice. But in English, the ideas
become separated, and hence we have to make a choice.
At one time, education and languages went
together, and no one could consider himself an
educated man or women without having some
recognized "international" language. But alas, I
am not an educated man in this sense, and must
read most things in English. This is not too bad,
but one must realize that there are limits and
dangers in translating ideas from one language to another.
"translator, traitor" indeed.
John C. Medaille
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