Re: Pater Noster (purely linguistically)

As a Latinist and labeled as the U of Canterbury's Classics Dept's scholar in
the early 1990s, I was wondering if anyone could help me with this question:
how many Latin translations of the Bible are there?  I'm well aware of the
Vetus Latina translation, though I don't have a copy of it, and I've got a
copy of the Vulgate, and a copy of the Psalms in English and Latin, the
latter being one of these latter-day translations, because it is rather more
literate than the Vulgate.

I'm aware that there were a relatively large number of Latin translations
during the time of the Renaissance and Reformation, because the translations
of key words were of theological importance, ergo everybody had to get their
theological ammo ready ...  I just don't know how many translations there
actually were, and how many are available to the general public via means
such as the ever-present pdf files.

Thanks

Wesley Parish

On Fri, 03 Dec 2004 04:22, And Rosta wrote:
> Chris Bates:
> > I think religeous texts are almost always amongst the most difficult
> > things to translate. I remember hearing once about a missionary who
> > wanted to translate the bible into the local language, but this was
> > somewhere where they didn't have donkeys, horses or anything similar.
> > How do you translate the story of the birth of Jesus without mentioning
> > a donkey!?! You could translate it as "big four legged beast that
> > carries things" I suppose, but if you don't mention that these were
> > common place then readers not familiar with donkeys or horses etc might
> > assume that this beast is a miracle rather than something you see every
> > day. So you have to include way more than just one word just to get
> > across the basic idea of Mary riding on a donkey.
>
> Eugene Nida, with a lifetime of Bible translation behind him, has
> written a book on this matter, the title of which I would google
> up for you, were I not sat on a train at the minute.
>
> >  One thing I do often wonder is, given the fact that the bible has
> > already been translated into english, why don't they retranslate it into
> > modern english so everyone can easily understand it? At the moment it
> > can be quite a dense and difficult text for the average person to
> > follow. I guess actually I've answered my own question: no priesthood
> > wants to make itself partly redundant, so the bible will stay difficult
> > to follow so that priests are still needed to interpret it properly. I'm
> > sorry for being so cynical. But anyway....
>
> Eh? There are a number of Present Day English versions (at least
> of the NT, though necessarily not the Book of Common Prayer, afaik
> -- these two being the source of the bestknown debts/traspesses
> versions). Presumably some are available online too.
>
> --And.
>
> --And.
--
Wesley Parish
* * *
Clinersterton beademung - in all of love.  RIP James Blish
* * *
Mau e ki, "He aha te mea nui?"
You ask, "What is the most important thing?"
Maku e ki, "He tangata, he tangata, he tangata."
I reply, "It is people, it is people, it is people."

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