127
Nor can we assimilate the countless translations and editorial fixes of words and
meanings.
37
13.4 Structures of Biblical Consciousness
Dust, ash, earth; sea, water, ocean… Herein, the phenomenology of translations
over edits, atop edits. Consider what one commentator/translator, Albert Pietersma,
writes of various translations from the Septuagint of Psalms: “Understandably, it is
especially idiomatic and figurative language that tends to suffer severely at the
hands of a heavily word-based, interlinear mode of translation.”
38
That “interlinear”
comes from James Strong’s 1890 Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible in which the
syntactic and grammatical collations were keyed in to both the Greek, from the
LXX (its normal abbreviation), or original Septuagint, and the original Hebrew,
with some Aramaic. The 39 books of the Tanakh—the acronymic reference to the
Old Testament’s Five Books of Moses (the Torah), the Prophets, or Nevi’im, and the
writings, or Ketuvim, which have collectively been translated into over 670 languages—represent legendary difficulties in terms of actually getting it right. This is
a curious dilemma for what is the most widely read book in the world. And it must
be remembered that the original Urtext (original) of the Old Testament is missing.
Not one page of it has ever been found. Moreover, because the paleo-Hebrewalphabet (known as Ashuri = Assyrian) is an abjad script (principally consonants),
the terminologies do not fit conventional categories of translation, that is, literal,
poetic, or generous. Interestingly, the earth is mentioned 1476 times in the Bible;
and heaven, 570 times.
At least, for all of its paradoxical truancies, the search for paradise in Sinai mirrors human evolution: gaps and discrepancies in translation, tortured souls (a
Christian portrayal of a horned, demonic Moses, inclement weathers, a Babel of
vernaculars, fragments and more fragments; the beauty of its location, contested
ideals, and a cumulative record of vanishing truths that remain with us. The Codex
is a summary of every ecological and ascetic paradox stemming from prehistory up
to and beyond year zero.
37 See page 2 of 80, Psalms, To The Reader, http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/nets/edition/24-ps-nets.pdf,
24-Ps-NETS-4.qxd, Accessed March 13, 2019; See http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/nets/edition/.
Accessed March 13, 2019.
38 Cincinnati: Jennings & Graham; See the “Interlinear Bible,” https://www.biblestudytools.com/
interlinear-bible/. Accessed March 13, 2019.
13.4 Structures of Biblical Consciousness
Nor can we assimilate the countless translations and editorial fixes of words and
meanings.
37
13.4 Structures of Biblical Consciousness
Dust, ash, earth; sea, water, ocean… Herein, the phenomenology of translations
over edits, atop edits. Consider what one commentator/translator, Albert Pietersma,
writes of various translations from the Septuagint of Psalms: “Understandably, it is
especially idiomatic and figurative language that tends to suffer severely at the
hands of a heavily word-based, interlinear mode of translation.”
38
That “interlinear”
comes from James Strong’s 1890 Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible in which the
syntactic and grammatical collations were keyed in to both the Greek, from the
LXX (its normal abbreviation), or original Septuagint, and the original Hebrew,
with some Aramaic. The 39 books of the Tanakh—the acronymic reference to the
Old Testament’s Five Books of Moses (the Torah), the Prophets, or Nevi’im, and the
writings, or Ketuvim, which have collectively been translated into over 670 languages—represent legendary difficulties in terms of actually getting it right. This is
a curious dilemma for what is the most widely read book in the world. And it must
be remembered that the original Urtext (original) of the Old Testament is missing.
Not one page of it has ever been found. Moreover, because the paleo-Hebrewalphabet (known as Ashuri = Assyrian) is an abjad script (principally consonants),
the terminologies do not fit conventional categories of translation, that is, literal,
poetic, or generous. Interestingly, the earth is mentioned 1476 times in the Bible;
and heaven, 570 times.
At least, for all of its paradoxical truancies, the search for paradise in Sinai mirrors human evolution: gaps and discrepancies in translation, tortured souls (a
Christian portrayal of a horned, demonic Moses, inclement weathers, a Babel of
vernaculars, fragments and more fragments; the beauty of its location, contested
ideals, and a cumulative record of vanishing truths that remain with us. The Codex
is a summary of every ecological and ascetic paradox stemming from prehistory up
to and beyond year zero.
37 See page 2 of 80, Psalms, To The Reader, http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/nets/edition/24-ps-nets.pdf,
24-Ps-NETS-4.qxd, Accessed March 13, 2019; See http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/nets/edition/.
Accessed March 13, 2019.
38 Cincinnati: Jennings & Graham; See the “Interlinear Bible,” https://www.biblestudytools.com/
interlinear-bible/. Accessed March 13, 2019.
13.4 Structures of Biblical Consciousness