Also, please tell me that you will avoid using worn out phrases like “formal equivalence,” “literal/free translation” or even “dynamic equivalence.” In most modern professional translation work, these phrases are seen as only being useful for very small chunks of text. It is impossible to have an entire Bible translation that is a “literal translation” or a “free rendering.”

I agree, Jonathan. I would like to see all English Bible version advertising and documentation drop these labels for the reason you have said. No single Bible version is one or the other. There is always a combination of approaches.

I personally prefer talking about degrees of naturalness and degrees of grammatical wordings. Of course, there’s also the matter of accuracy, which is a separate issue, unrelated to how closely a translation mimics the forms of the biblical language texts. A translation can import syntax from the biblical languages to English and so cause inaccuracy in communicating the meaning of the original texts. The versions which most accurately communicate the meaning of the forms of the original texts are those which express that meaning using only English syntax and lexical combinations and, obviously, are exegetically accurate, as well.

Paul: I’ll also look forward to a public sample of the translation.

NIV: a cloud hid him from their sight

HCSB: a cloud received Him out of their sight

Good job Eugene Peterson for getting this one right.

“The airplane flew low over the houses, then a cloud received it out of my sight.” Really?

I’m echoing Wayne sentiments, in that it’s hard to pick up these strange sound Bible English terms/phrases unless you’ve had some practice untraining your ears from years of Biblish.

I would really like to see Bible translators be more specific about their primary target audience (and “churches” is not specific enough) and the intended use of the translation. This gives people a better idea of how, when and where the translation can/should be used. Also, please tell me that you will avoid using worn out phrases like “formal equivalence,” “literal/free translation” or even “dynamic equivalence.” In most modern professional translation work, these phrases are seen as only being useful for very small chunks of text. It is impossible to have an entire Bible translation that is a “literal translation” or a “free rendering.”

“The rich is destined for punishment.”

No, that’s not grammatical in English, although the original Hebrew it is attempting to translate was grammatical. In English an adjective substantival like “the rich” only is plural and so must take plural subject-verb agreement. If the Hebrew adjective is singular, then we have to include some English “filler” word to make the English grammatical, such as:

“The rich one is destined for punishment.”

or

“The rich person is destined for punishment.”

Few reading groups are able to catch such grammatical problems. Many stylists, especially if they are familiar with Bible English do not catch this kind of ungrammatical English. It requires English scholars or linguists who are committed to checking so meticulously to ensure that a translation has only grammatical English. It requires a great deal of self-discipline not to approve Bible English which is ungrammatical in standard dialects of English.

We also did not replicate the NET workflow, which is more of a wiki. That experiment had its novelty and identity (soial location), and it seems to serve conservative Protestants with academic needs because of the notes.

The CEB involves over 500 readers (convened by paid leaders in focus groups) located in 13 denominations, who send in feedback embedded on documents to our project web site. The difficult part of the development process is keeping the workflow linear enough to avoid “loops” that delay a project for years. In fact, the old school approach took 10 to 17 years for a major translation to complete, due to systemic looping. The RSV was in development from 1934-1951, and the NRSV from 1974 to 1989. The NIV from the mid 1960s (indeed started by one denomination, CRC) until 1978/1984. The Catholic NAB revision might be aiming for a record 20-something years of development.

One sort of loop is where two translators or editors go back and forth correcting each other, without closure. Each year of delay can cost a translation project half a million dollars in expenses, in part because staff are be hired to work on products and promotion, and then wait for closure.

Matthew will likely be available for PDF download tomorrow at http://www.commonenglish.com, which is the official web site for the emerging translation. Just a splash page for now, more to come.

We do want your feedback, with a link for comments. For example, this translation uses contractions. With some exceptions based on social location, nearly all readers appreciate contractions once they remember that they don’t need to use a special ecclesisial voice register when reading the Bible aloud. Last night after a presentation, a denominational official (not my own) mentioned to me that contractions were not used in the Greek or Hebrew. By analogy, one could say yes, perhaps they were. In Hebrew pronouns are usually contracted on the ends of nouns or verbs. In Greek pronouns are often embedded in the conjugation of verbs. Of course this kind of compressed syntax is not identical to how we contract pronouns or negations in English, but the analogy seems to be a parallel. What do you think?