Dan Reid explains how.
(Reid is senior editor for reference and academic books at InterVarsity Press, where he has worked since 1986.)
His first “reviewing sloth” is most significant:
The author failed to write a different sort of book, the sort of book that I prefer; and so I dislike this book.
These two excerpts from Moisés Silva illustrate some ways that Bible translation is complex:
Silva, Moisés. “Are Translators Traitors? Some Personal Reflections,” in The Challenge of Bible Translation: Communicating God’s Word to the World; Understanding the Theory, History, and Practice: Essays in Honor of Ronald F. Youngblood (ed. Glen G. Scorgie, Mark L. Strauss, and Steven M. Voth; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2003), 37–38 (emphasis added in paragraph 3):
During my student days, while looking over a Spanish theological journal, I happened to notice an article on a topic I knew would be of interest to one of my professors. When I brought it to his attention, he asked me whether I would be willing to translate the essay into English for him. Since Spanish is my mother tongue, he figured I’d be able to come up with a rough translation quite quickly. I thought so, too, but to my surprise, the project became a nightmare. I labored over virtually every sentence and felt burdened that at no point was I communicating in a truly satisfactory manner what I knew to be the “total” meaning of the Spanish. Possibly for the first time I sensed what factors may have motivated the old Italian complaint, Traduttore traditore—“A translator is a traitor.”
This incident was rather puzzling and troubling to me. [Read more…] about Thank God for Good Bible Translators and Translations
Gordon D. Fee and Mark L. Strauss, How to Choose a Translation for All Its Worth: A Guide to Understanding and Using Bible Versions 
(Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007), 35–36.
One of the surprising, and from our perspective unfortunate, recent developments in the story of English translations is the reappearance of an old argument that “literal” versions are more compatible with the doctrine of the verbal inspiration of Scripture. We say “old,” because this is precisely what drove Robert Young . . . to produce a version vis-á-vis the KJV (first ed. 1862). . . .
Our first point, then, is that, as with beauty, “literal” is in the eye of the beholder, in this case meaning “in the perception of the user.” This is why we have tried to avoid the word “literal” in this book and have often put it in quote marks when we use it—because those who use it tend to have such a wide range of meanings. Unfortunately, it is also often used in the literature simply as a rhetorical device over against “meaning-based” versions.
Second, much of this rhetoric represents a poor understanding of the doctrine of verbal inspiration, which historically does not refer to the words as “words in themselves,” but “words as they convey meaning.” [Read more…] about Translation and the Doctrine of Inspiration
That’s the goal of Bible translation. If you speak more than one language, then you can easily think of more examples like the ones below.
Gordon D. Fee and Mark L. Strauss, How to Choose a Translation for All Its Worth: A Guide to Understanding and Using Bible Versions (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007), 25.
There is a common perception among many Bible readers that the most accurate Bible translation is a “literal” one. By literal they usually mean one that is “word-for-word,” that is, one that reproduces the form of the original Greek or Hebrew text as closely as possible. Yet anyone who has ever studied a foreign language soon learns that this is mistaken. Take, for example, the Spanish sentence, ¿Como se llama? A literal (word-for-word) translation would be, “How yourself call?” Yet any first-year Spanish student knows that is a poor translation. The sentence means (in good idiomatic English) “What’s your name?” The form must be changed to express the meaning.
Consider another example. The German sentence Ich habe Hunger means, literally, “I have hunger.” [Read more…] about Reproduce the Meaning
This is a follow-up to my post yesterday about Bible translation.
I’m grateful for different Bible translations on the spectrum from the more formal equivalent (like the NASB) to the more functional equivalent (like the NLT). While a mediating translation like the NIV may be optimal overall, I respect the other translation philosophies and benefit immensely from their translations.
I have a lot of friends who advocate a more formal equivalent philosophy and who prefer the ESV as the all-around optimal translation. I respect that. (The last two churches I’ve been a member of use primarily the ESV, and the one before that uses primarily the NASB.)
This is what I emailed one of those friends yesterday (slightly edited): [Read more…] about How to Disagree about Bible Translation Philosophy
Next month I’m planning to teach a class called “Greek Reading” at Faith Bible Seminary, and they asked me to devote a half-day to the topic of Bible translation.
I’ve spent a good deal of time studying New Testament Greek. For example:
But my knowledge of NT Greek is merely novice-level compared to the best NT professors and Bible translators. Further, I had never thoroughly studied the topic of Bible translation.
This class has given me the opportunity to read over 100 books and articles in my library on Bible translation. As with just about any subject, the more you study it, the more you realize how much you don’t know. (That’s one reason I’m planning to interview Craig Blomberg during class next month.)
I recommend other helpful resources at the end of this post, but one book stands out as the best all-around resource on Bible translation that I’m aware of:
Gordon D. Fee and Mark L. Strauss. How to Choose a Translation for All Its Worth: A Guide to Understanding and Using Bible Versions. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2007.
It has at least seven strengths: [Read more…] about The Best All-Around Book on Bible Translation
“The worst thing about idols, as the Hebrew scriptures so tirelessly point out, is that they are utterly useless when you need them most (Jer. 2:28).”
—Christopher J. H. Wright, “Editorial: ‘All Our Gods Have Failed,’” Themelios 18, no. 3 (1993): 3:
I still remember one of my theology professors taking our class to a room with a piano in it. He sat down at the piano and presented a “Middle C concert” to us. He just kept hitting Middle C over and over.
His point was that that’s a bad way to do theology because truth is truth proportionally.
And that’s a danger for one-issue organizations—whether they are advocating a particular view of worship, creation, gender roles, revival, or whatever—because they tend to overemphasize the importance of their one issue:
[I]t often seems to be the case that organizations with such narrow focus and which have been formed for the conscious purpose of advocating that position in opposition to a position viewed as biblically flawed . . . tend to over-speak their case.
—Rodney J. Decker, “The English Standard Version: A Review Article,” Journal of Ministry and Theology 8, no. 2 (2004): 11n17.
I’m not opposed to one-issue organizations in principle; I happily support some and thank God for them. I’m merely pointing out a common weakness.