2 TRANSLATIONS USED IN THIS RESEARCH
2.4 German translations
My main emphasis in this research is on the Finnish and English translations, and that is why they were treated in more detail. I will give a short description of the history of the German Bible versions that I use in this study. The main reason for using German translations is that the Finnish thoroughly dynamic translation contains only the NT, and there was a need for a baseline when studying the OT examples. Then, it would be impossible to study German Bible translations without the Lutherbibel, which has been enormously important in the German speaking world. BB, the dynamic translation, contains only parts of the OT. This means that when studying the OT examples, only in the category of formal translations are there three versions available.
There has been plenty of discussion especially on the new edition of the Lutherbibel (LB), called Lutherbibel2017, in Germany.54 There has also been some criticism of the dynamic and communicative versions such as GNB.55
There is a long history of Bible translations in German. There were some medieval versions, but when Luther started the Reformation, he also started translating the Bible, and the result was the translation that carries his name, the Lutherbibel.56 The main point of this section is to present the theoretical background of these translations.
This information has been made available, for example, on the website of Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.57
Lutherbibel (LB)
There are three reasons to choose this translation. Firstly, it is a formal one; secondly, it has been influential in the German-speaking world, and especially in Protestant countries; and thirdly, it is still in use.
There had been several medieval versions already before Luther, in the 14th century.
These translations were made from Vulgate, and not from the original languages, Greek or Hebrew. A new translation was needed, partly because there were several
54 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft has published several works on the topic, such as Die Revision der Lutherbibel 2017: Hintergrunde, Kontroversen, Entscheidungen Gebundenes Buch, by Hannelore von Jahr, Christopher Kähler and Jurgen-Peter Lesch, a collection of articles published in 2001 Die Gesichte der Lutherbibelrevision:
von 1850 bis 1984, edited by Klaus Dietrich Fricke and Siegfried Meurer. Then, the journal Evangelische Theologie dedicated its issue 76/4 2016 to the discussion on Lutherbibel 2017. The topic of Bible translations in German has also been discussed in the book “Was Dolmetschen fur Kunst und Arbeit sei”: Die Lutherbibel und andere deutsche Bibeluberetzungen; Beiträge der Rostoker Konferenz 2013, edited by Martin Rösel. The language of the German translation has also been discussed in works such as Bibel in gerechter Sprache?: Kritik eines misslungenen Versuchs by Ingolf U. Dalferth, and Gerechte Sprache als Kriterium von Bibeluberetzungen:
Von der Entstehung des Begriffes bis zur gegenwärtigen Praxis by Hanne Köhler. Since I use the 1545 version of the Lutherbibel, it would not be so fruitful to delve deeply into the discussion on the Lutherbibel 2017 in this research.
55 This criticism includes, for example, the article Gottes Wort oder Menschenwort. Moderne Bibelübersetzungen unter der Lupe, by Rudolf Ebertshäuser.
56 Schaff 1910. http://www.bible-researcher.com/luther02.html. Accessed on 26. Nov 2016.
57 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft: https://www.die-bibel.de/bibeln/bibelkenntnis/wissen-bibeluebersetzung/
deutsche-bibeluebersetzungen-im-vergleich. Accessed on 17. Jan 2017. This website also describes how the translations were made and how they would reach the goal of mediating the message of the Bible to their implied audience. There is a website, where there is a short description of the German Bible versions. Each translation also has its own website, where there is also information available on that particular translation.
separate states, tribes, and dialects in the Germany of Luther’s time, and partly because the emphasis of the Lutheran reformation was on the word of God in the language of the people.58
The Saxon dialect was the basis of the language of LB, and it popularised the dialect that was previously used at the Saxon court. This became the High German dialect.
The version itself was, according to Schaff, an idiomatic reproduction of the Bible, and the first German classic, in the same way as KJV was the first English classic. Authors of the later German golden age are more or less indebted to LB for their style.59
The translation is named after Luther, because he was the main translator. He was familiar with the original languages as well as vernacular German. The first edition of the NT was published in 1522, and after that, the OT translation committee was founded. The whole Bible, including the Apocrypha, was published in 1534. There were several editions of the NT and the whole Bible after these first ones. The latest edition of the whole Bible, by Luther, was published in 1545, the year before Luther’s death. The text has been edited several times since then. The latest edition is the Lutherbibel 2017.60 In this research, I use the 1545 edition in the form that is available on the Bible Gateway internet page. The writing system of that version is modern, which makes it easier to read than the original translation.61
The rise of Protestantism can be clearly seen in the translation.62 For example, Luther emphasised the faith alone, and translated Rom 3:28 with the phrase allein durch den Glauben. This, of course, meant that Paul was now in direct verbal conflict with James (2:24). Luther then relocated the letter of James to the end of the NT.63 He saw the letter as an “epistle of straw” due to its “lack of evangelical character”.64
Luther aimed to use a language that is pure and clear German.65 His translation was criticised especially by Catholics for changing the expressions that the Latin translation uses and replacing them with ordinary German ones. One example of that is in Luke 1:28, where an angel greets Mary. According to Luther, the literal translation of the Latin would not be clear to a German audience, so he uses the phrase du holdselige, which is clearer to the implied audience of the translation. He states that the best option would have been to translate the greeting simply as Gott grusse dich Liebe Maria, which is a normal way of greeting someone in German. That would have been too radical a change to the Latin translation, according to Luther.66 He also added the word ‘only’ to the text in Rom 3:28, and according to him, the word was implicitly present in the text, though not explicitly. He emphasised that he is writing German, not Greek or Latin, so adding the word allein to the text makes it clearer to the reader
58 Schaff 1910. http://www.bible-researcher.com/luther02.html. Accessed on 26. Nov 2016; Wenz 2018, 163.
59 Schaff 1910. http://www.bible-researcher.com/luther02.html. Accessed on 26. Nov 2016.
60 Wenz 2018, 163–164; Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.
61 Bible Gateway: https://www.biblegateway.com/. Accessed on 16. Sep 2019.
62 Schaff 1910. http://www.bible-researcher.com/luther02.html. Accessed on 26. Nov 2016; Wenz 2018, 164.
63 This has had an influence on Finnish Bible translations, as well: translators of the 1933/38 Bible followed Luther’s example and located the letter of James in the same place as Luther had relocated it.
64 Schaff 1910. http://www.bible-researcher.com/luther02.html. Accessed on 26. Nov 2016.
65 Luther 1530, 550.
66 Luther 1530, 53–554.
and actually mediates the message that was intended by the original author.67 These examples show that even though Luther was a skilled linguist, first and foremost he was a theologian:
Luther war ein versierter Philologe, aber als Philologe immer auch und zuerst Theologe und Kirchenmann, der sich der Verkündigung des Evangeliums Jesu Christi für die Menschen seiner Zeit und seines Raumes verpflichtet wusste, die ihm persönlich und von Amts official wegen anvertraut waren.68
BasisBibel (BB)
There are plenty of dynamic translations available in German, but I chose the BasisBibel (BB) for this research, due to its availability in digital form. BB is a modern version. It was published in both electronic and book form by Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.
The whole NT was published in 2010, and Psalms in 2012. The main reason for the translation is that there is a trend in Germany that the majority of the people are more and more estranged both from the church and from Christianity as a whole. That is why there is a need for a Bible version that meets the special needs of this modern day.
It was mainly targeted at young people who may not have any links to a church. BB was made by a group of translators, but there is no information on the website about their theological background.69
BB is a communicative version. This means that communicating the message is seen as the priority. One reason for this is that in the modern day, readers of the Bible may not have the same amount of previous knowledge and understanding of it as previous generations had. That is why a communicative translation suits this time better.70 The communicative emphasis can also be seen in the language structure. It is kept simple, and sentences do not have more than 16 words. The reason for this is that the translators wanted to make sure that the message of the book is easy to grasp for a reader.71
There are two types of translations: formal72 and communicative. Hannelore Jahr states that BB is a communicative version, but it is closer to formal translations than other communicative versions in German. She writes:
Dennoch blieb das Desiderat einer Übersetzung, die sich enger an die Form des Originaltextes hält, ohne dadurch wieder schwerer verständlich zu werden.
Allerdings schien diese Anforderung eher einer Quadratur des Kreises zu gleichen als einer realistischen Möglichkeit. Aber genau hier verortet sich die BasisBibel: Sie bleibt kommunikativ, nähert sich dabei jedoch zugleich wieder stärker an die Form des Ausgangstextes an als bisherige kommunikative Übersetzungen. Möglich wird
67 Luther 1530, 551–552.
68 Wenz, 2018, 164.
69 BasisBibel; Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.
70 BasisBibel.
71 BasisBibel; Jahr 2010, 3/6.
72 Jahr 2010, 1/6: Philologisch.
dies, weil mittlerweile durch die sog. neuen Medien andere Wege für die Vermittlung von Hintergrundsinformationen zur Verfügung stehen als im Zeitalter der reinen Printmedien.73
An interesting point, and relevant for this research, is that according to the principles of a communicative version, concepts should be translated according to their context, but the translators of BB use the same German equivalent when possible, and in this way this translation has a coherence in translating theological concepts.74 This may lead to difficulties in communicating the message of the text, if the words that are used in translation are strange to the implied audience. Since BB is available in digital form, it is possible to use footnotes that are clear and easy to access with just a click.75
The version follows three principles of communicative translation: 1) Variability of the terminology: translational equivalents of a concept should vary according to its context. 2) Restructuring: the information of the original text is restructured and reproduced in a different order in the target language. 3) Explication: background knowledge that is no longer known to present readers is brought into the translation.76
The translation is also published in a digital form. It is a reader-friendly version.
The text itself can be short, and when the additional information is needed, a link is provided on the website. A reader can then use this information when needed, but it is not included or added into the text itself.77 In this way, a reader can, in a way, read the text in its original form and find the extra information easily, if needed.
Die Gute Nachricht Bibel (GNB)
The third German translation used in this research is Gute Nachricht Bibel (GNB), which could be defined as a thoroughly dynamic version. There have been several dynamic translations made in German, but GNB was the first translation of the whole Bible that was meant for an audience that is no longer familiar with traditional Christian language.78 This means that the text is meant to be easy to understand, and the language used in it is modern. GNB can also be seen as a parallel version, used with another, more literal translation. It was first published in 1982. It was renewed and the new version was published in 1997 and 2000.79 The aim of GNB was to be a translation that is clear and easy to understand, including for those who do not have theological background knowledge. That is why it is not enough just to translate the biblical text word by word.80 Since GNB was the first thoroughly dynamic translation of the Bible in German, it has received some criticism for being too liberal.81
73 Jahr 2010, 1/6.
74 BasisBibel.
75 Jahr 2010, 2/6–3/6, 4/6.
76 BasisBibel.
77 Jahr 2010, 2/6–3/6, 4/6; BasisBibel.
78 Ebertshäuser 2016, 43–47; Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft; Gute Nachricht Bibel.
79 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft; Gute Nachricht Bibel.
80 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft; Gute Nachricht Bibel.
81 Ebertshäuser 2016, 43.
The translation is an ecumenical one. It was published by Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, and made in co-operation with evangelical, Catholic and free churches, and it was the first German translation that was ecumenical throughout.82 The translation type is, according to the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft website, consistent communicative translation. This means that it is in communication with the readers. There are three main principles that guided the translators of GNB: 1) Restructuring: in some cases, the text is translated more freely, but in a way more faithfully, in order to make the text understandable to its readers. Occasionally, this restructuring means that two or more verses are combined. 2) Explication: the original text sometimes contains implicit features, known to the original readers. These features have been expressed explicitly in the translation. The website emphasises that there are no foreign matters brought to the text, but matters that are present in the original text in an implicit form. 3) Context orientation, which means that biblical concepts have been used in several ways, and they carry within them the whole spectrum of meanings.83
The aim of the version is to be clear for the reader and easy to understand. There are cases when, in order to reach this aim, the translators had to make changes in the grammatical form or structure of the translated text, in order to be clear and to be able to reproduce the message of the passage. There are also cases where a communicative version has to be far from a literal rendering of the original text. Then, GNB translators offer the literal version as a footnote. In this way, readers of the text can understand and see the process of translation.84
In the new version of GNB, the key concepts are made visible in the text. For example, Paul’s favourite concepts ‘faith’ and ‘righteousness’ are introduced and integrated into the translation. One example of that is Rom 1:17, where ‘righteousness’
is mentioned first and then explained to the reader:
In der Guten Nachricht macht Gott seine Gerechtigkeit offenbar: seine rettende Treue, die selbst für das aufkommt, was er vom Menschen fordert. Nur auf den vertrauenden Glauben kommt es an, und alle sind zu solchem Glauben aufgerufen. So steht es ja in den Heiligen Schriften: “Wer durch Glauben vor Gott als gerecht gilt, wird leben“.85 There is a great diversity of Bible translations in German. These versions represent several theological backgrounds, such as evangelical and Catholic traditions. There is also a diversity of theoretical backgrounds of the translation, due to the long history.
The dynamic equivalence theory is emphasised in this research, and that is why I will concentrate on the aforementioned translations.86
The ideal of translation has changed through the years, and according to Schaff, there is an evolution in Bible translations through history. Vulgate was an advance in accuracy. Then, 16th century Protestant versions were an advance upon Vulgate,
82 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft; Gute Nachricht Bibel; Ebertshäuser 2016, 43.
83 For example, the frequently used concept of ‘kingdom of God’ can be interpreted in several ways. When we pray “Let your kingdom come”, it can be a) a plea to God to raise his reign, b) a plea to God that his will would be done, c) a plea to God to complete his work, or d) the kingdom of God can refer to the new world of God. Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft; Gute Nachricht Bibel.
84 Gute Nachricht Bibel.
85 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft; Gute Nachricht Bibel.
86 Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.
in their idiomatic reproduction. Then, again, dynamic versions are an advance in communicating the message to new readers.87 Schaff then notes that translations and versions are imperfect. They are always interpretations of the text. It is not possible to produce a perfectly equivalent translation.
87 Schaff 1910. http://www.bible-researcher.com/luther02.html. Accessed on 26. Nov 2016.