PRINCIPLES GOVKL'XIXO BIKLK TRANSLATION. 



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that as a translation, and yet it conforms to the letter of the 

 rule of translating the thought and not the words. It would 

 be easy to multiply examples: — We are forbidden in the tenth 

 Commandment to covet our neighbour's ox or his ass. Who, in 

 these days, would covet an ox or an ass ? The one represented 

 to the Hebrew valuable property available for exchange, and 

 the other the means of locomotion. Would it therefore be a 

 translation of the Commandment to prohibit the coveting of 

 gilt-edged stocks or a motor-car ? 



The fact is that there are two elements of difficulty to be 

 overcome in making a phrase or passage in any language 

 intelligible to a man ignorant of that language — one is the 

 words and idioms of the language itself, another is the manner 

 of thought, habits, customs and surroundings which often give 

 their point to the words used. To take the first instance given 

 above : when the Hebrew words for bow, spear and chariot have 

 had their English equivalents substituted for them they have 

 been translated as far as the language is concerned, but to convey 

 the meaning of the passage in which they are used, their 

 employment as the names of the principal weapons of war, and 

 therefore symbolizing warlike operations, must be explained ; 

 this, however, is the function of the expositor or commentator,, 

 not of the translator. 



This illustration will, I trust, make clear what I mean when* 

 I say that, in my opinion, the duty of a translator is to put his. 

 reader who is ignorant of the language translated, as far as. 

 possible, in the position of one who know T s the language, and 

 that when he has done that, he has clone all that is required of 

 a translator. If he goes further, he passes beyond the function 

 of a translator and undertakes the duty of explanation and! 

 comment. 



One or two examples may make the application of this 

 principle clearer. Some translators have held that in the 

 phrase — " Behold the Lamb of God ! " the word — Lamb — is so 

 connected with the sacrificial system of the Jews, that a literal 

 translation will, to the minds of people to whom a lamb is just 

 the young of a sheep and nothing else, convey nothing of the 

 meaning which it had in the mouth of John the Baptist. They 

 would therefore propose to translate in some such way as this r 

 " Behold the sacrificial victim appointed by God." Xow, apart 

 from the objection that such a version omits the element, of 

 purity and innocence connected with the idea of a lamb, it will, 

 I think, be generally admitted that it is an explanation rather 

 than a translation. The most intimate knowledge of Greek 



