Hi
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I thought I would share something I remembered the other day. Hope it sheds a little light for you.
When you translate publications for the Society, you often become aware of “logic gaps”. In other words, statements that are made in the publications make no sense when compared with the Scriptures that are supposed to support them. This is often because when a person reads a scripture, he engages in a form of eisegesis, adding meaning he has accumulated. However, in translation you often have to make these "implicit" ideas explicit, so the audience in another language can understand them. At that point, the idea is scrutinised, and often shown to be illogical, and lacking support. This is a problem for WT Translators. This is most damaging when it comes to theological paradigms the Society rely on. I'll give you an example.
In one language I was working on, we started having an argument about how to deal with Matthew 24:45-47. Some wanted to translate it as (back-translation) “Who are the faithful and discreet slave class that will appear in the future, who will provide things(food) to others they are charged with looking after?” I kid you not, this was the type of translation that was seriously considered.
Of course, I argued against this, stating it was “interpretation” rather than “translation”, was anachronistic, irresponsible, and altogether wrong. In order to prove my point, I had to resort to gathering evidence from various Bibles, WT publications, commentaries, and eventually the Society's Bible Translation Database, which confirmed that it was a singular form, not plural, and that explicit time markers, such as “the future” were frankly wrong. After this, the following translation, which I still did not agree with, but was a compromise, was decided upon. Of course this will sound clumsy in English since it is “back-translated”, but you get the idea -
“There are people who are under the authority of their Master. One (of them) will be picked by the Master. This person has faith, is loyal to God, and is wise. When other people need things at the right time, like a person who is hungry needs food, this individual will share things with them. Who is this (person)? Who really knows?”
So we used this compromise. And when we tested it, it was followed by a paragraph which said:
“So you see, Jesus said that in the future, in 1919, he would choose a group of people who would teach others the truth from the Bible. Who is this – it is JW's who are going to heaven.”
This provoked an immediate storm of protest from the people who we were testing this on. The various answers given were - “No he didn't.” “No, he said it was a person.” “No, he never said anything about a group of JW's.” And so forth. The funny thing was, the people we were testing this on were long-time JW's.
So we said, “ah but, in the Hebrew Scriptures, it says one person can be a class.” To which, I kid you not, the general response was one of the following two - “So what?” “What has that got to do with what Jesus said?”
One perceptive man waited till when he could speak to me alone and said:
“So you're telling me that the belief I have that Jesus chose a group of Christians, is based on a scripture where he was talking about an individual? So how do I know that the Witnesses have been chosen by God?” I really didn't know what to say to that – this man had spent his whole life as a Witness.
This was one of the first logic gaps that we came up against – and there were so many more.
PP