# Cognitive equivalence



## MW (Sep 29, 2009)

For those interested in the philosophy of translation, I believe the following brief post by Paul Helm will prove very helpful in clearing away alot of the fog involved in modern discussions.

Helm's Deep: Dynamic Equivalence - Is there such a thing?

I consider his view of the possibility of cognitive equivalence to be a welcome remedy to the relativism which has prevailed in recent decades.


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## Prufrock (Sep 29, 2009)

Thanks for posting that. Last night, I was reading in Heinrich a Diest's _Theologia biblica_. I noted particularly one of his theses on scripture, in which he stated that the *Interpretation* of scripture is either an interpretation of words or of things; the former is called a "Version," the latter, an "explication," which "must be done from scripture itself, in accordance with the analogy of faith."

In other words, he notes that a version or translation is, indeed, an interpretation (which many paraphrasists and dynamic equivalence-ists like to state), but it is an interpretation of words, not things, and must differ by nature from an explanation.


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## MW (Sep 29, 2009)

Paul, that is excellent. Are you reading from an online source?


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## Prufrock (Sep 29, 2009)

Rev. Winzer, I don't believe the work is available on-line.


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## steadfast7 (Sep 29, 2009)

I appreciate the thread and link to Helm's article. I'm in the midst of considering bible translation as a career path, and have had my share of struggles with some of the approaches being used today. From my exposure to the work of the biggest bible translation and missions organizations, like Wycliffe, UBS and New Tribes, it seems that meaning is upmost in their priority when producing a translation. This is Contrary to Helm's proposal: "Of course all translation involves compromise. But since the Christian revelation presents itself as the truth of God, the preservation of truth, cognitive equivalence, literal accuracy, should be the translator’s goal, even at the expense of immediate intelligibility. If the result of translation which aims at keeping to the original as faithfully as can be results in some puzzlement and ignorance when the text is read, so be it."

I'm not sure if this is the case acrosst the board, but from my talks with seasoned bible translators coming from the Wycliffe tradition, transliterations are to be avoided at all cost. They are even reticent to transliterate words words like Amen and Hallelulah, which most Christian communities in history have appropriated, and is one of the few things that provides some Christian unity across cultures. In their translation philosophy, the translation MUST be meaningful. Strange and foreign words need to be contextualized into the vernacular as much as possible for it to be of benefit to the people.

After some exposure to languages and having spent a third of my life in Asia, I do understand the point they are making. Sometimes we take for granted many things that make the Bible so easy to translate into English:

1. English is largely derived from Greek and Latin. the vocubulary and grammatical structure is very similar. Thus, even extremely literal translations are intelligible in english. English also has a larger vocubulary than most, if not all, languages.

2. Western Christianity is by far the longest and most wide spread of the Christian traditions. This allows for theological vocubulary to be so familiar and come so naturally to most of us.

3. The KJV was critical in its influence on the development of the english language. biblical vocabulary, idioms, sentence structures, concepts have been transposed and integrated with the culture at a very complex level.


There are about seven thousand known languages in the world, and some of them are VERY strange. Some languages do not have words for abstract concepts at all, much less equivalents for "Rabbi" or "Messiah." I've heard of languages that do not have the verb "to be," thus making the task of translating "I AM THAT I AM" very challenging indeed! Another example is "brother" in Chinese, for which the generic term does not exist; one must specify if the brother is an older or younger brother.

While most of us here would want to side with Helm with preserving literalism at all cost, this is simply not possible in most languages, lest the translation becomes utterly unintelligible. All translations (that are meaningful) are interpretations; one cannot get very far attempting a word for word translation. 

the theology behind this, which i am beginning to accept, is that the Bible itself is contextualized, ie, it is incarnated into culture. The timeless truths must be decontextualized, understood, and re-contextualized into the host culture in a meaningful way for it to truly be the living and active word of God to all peoples.

I do agree that increased skill in exegesis among an indigenous community will require that they learn the original languages, no doubt about that. The process, however, will not be as simple as it was for us westerners.

that's my take on it, so far, but I'd like to dialogue more. 

Thanks again for the post!


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## TaylorWest (Sep 29, 2009)

Yes, that was a good article by Helm. Well worth the time.


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## MW (Sep 29, 2009)

steadfast7 said:


> While most of us here would want to side with Helm with preserving literalism at all cost, this is simply not possible in most languages, lest the translation becomes utterly unintelligible.



Let's not forget that this was likewise not possible for English until translators dared to make up "Bible words" which have now become common. I strongly believe the Bible can shape the theological conception of a language. It seems that this element of "faith" is lacking in the modern philosophy of translation.


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## steadfast7 (Sep 29, 2009)

Yes, certainly the ministry of teaching is indispensable to bible translation and missions. Air dropping New Testaments onto a village in Papua New Guinea will simply not do. But then again, how does this relate to our belief in the clarity of Scripture? Some of the Reformers believed that the average ploughboy could read the bible and accurately derive the major doctrines of scripture. 

What I'm finding is that in the English tradition, we began with literal translations (KJV), and as time moves on, the culture feels the need for paraphrases and contextual translations. In the mission field today, believers first receive a very loose translation, and in time as the chuch matures, they move towards literal.

One case study involves my experience in Thailand. The first edition of the Thai was largely based on the KJV. From my observations among the people, its a very difficult translation to understand. Many of them opt for a new dynamic equivalent version, which apparently makes a huge difference.


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## steadfast7 (Sep 30, 2009)

armourbearer said:


> Let's not forget that this was likewise not possible for English until translators dared to make up "Bible words" which have now become common. I strongly believe the Bible can shape the theological conception of a language. It seems that this element of "faith" is lacking in the modern philosophy of translation.



it should be appreciated that the introduction of Bible words to the point that it was understandable and natural to the vernacular was a process that took centuries, and it was birthed within cultures (Greek and Latin) that were very educated and text based. Such is not the case on the mission field today with the remaining tribal groups still needing a bible. Many of them are still oral based and illiterate, and not only do they not have biblical or theological words, they may not even yet possess simple nouns like snow, wine, or bread. 

Translation teams need to make a judgment call. Either they present a bible that has 20-30% unintelligible words, or they try their best to contextualize the bible into terms that make sense to the locals. I sympathize with their desire to give the people a bible that they can understand, even if it is a far cry from a literal translation. I think what they basically do is produce something like a NLT or Message, with the hope that as the culture becomes more biblicized, more terms will gradually be introduced into the shaping of their very culture. Keep in mind that our English bibles are also contextualized. We are not an exempted culture.

The wider theological question is whether God can still communicate his truth to his elect in spite of defective translations - I certainly hope so!


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## MW (Sep 30, 2009)

steadfast7 said:


> Translation teams need to make a judgment call. Either they present a bible that has 20-30% unintelligible words, or they try their best to contextualize the bible into terms that make sense to the locals.



I would find it surprising if a person, who believes the Bible is the Word of God, suggested that the message of the Bible should be altered to suit the capacity of those who are yet to learn and understand it.


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## rbcbob (Oct 1, 2009)

> it should be appreciated that the introduction of Bible words to the point that it was understandable and natural to the vernacular was a process that took centuries, and it was birthed within cultures (Greek and Latin) that were very educated and text based. Such is not the case on the mission field today with the remaining tribal groups still needing a bible. Many of them are still oral based and illiterate, and not only do they not have biblical or theological words, they may not even yet possess simple nouns like snow, wine, or bread.
> 
> Translation teams need to make a judgment call. Either they present a bible that has 20-30% unintelligible words, or they try their best to contextualize the bible into terms that make sense to the locals. I sympathize with their desire to give the people a bible that they can understand, even if it is a far cry from a literal translation. I think what they basically do is produce something like a NLT or Message, with the hope that as the culture becomes more biblicized, more terms will gradually be introduced into the shaping of their very culture. Keep in mind that our English bibles are also contextualized. We are not an exempted culture.



This sounds much like the translation philosophy of Eugen Nida, father of the Dynamic Equivalence Theory of translation. Nida had a disdain for the concept of the very words of Scripture being inspired. His philosophy has been sharply criticized by theologians as well as secular linguists. See:





> The Bible-translating institutions with which Nida is associated have been criticized for their translations into both Third-World and 'First-World' languages. Thus Prickett (1979 p. 263) responds to the preface of the Good News Bible ("every effort has been made to use language that is natural, clear, simple and unambiguous") by saying that "religion is not about things that are natural, clear, simple and unambiguous". Meschonnic (1973 pp. 339, 348) says that Nida's method is suited to exporting0 a certain version of American Protestant morality to the Third World. Given this institutional goal, the poetic language, the historical context and even some of the theological content may appear irrelevant to the translator. In the view being proposed here, there is no question of mistranslation in the sense defined above, but there are certainly ethical and political problems: is the evangelical goal a worthy one , and whose interest does it serve?


*TRANSLATING INSTITUTIONS AND 'IDIOMATIC' TRANSLATION*


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## steadfast7 (Oct 1, 2009)

armourbearer said:


> I would find it surprising if a person, who believes the Bible is the Word of God, suggested that the message of the Bible should be altered to suit the capacity of those who are yet to learn and understand it.



You bring up a good point. I have found that their approach casts serious problems on plenary verbal inspiration. I think they have more of a neo-orthodox belief in scripture perhaps. They believe that the message or teaching is certainly intact, and that the message is the word of God. I am convinced that newly evangelized cultures must eventually learn the original languages, but that can only happen when their language is equipped to do so, and for some it will be harder than others, and perhaps not very effective at all. Remember, again, that some languages out there are very different from western ones; formal equivalency is simply not possible in Chinese, for example, which is a pictorial, symbolic language, with no tenses.

My main point is that I understand their desire to produce something understandable in their heart language, rather than something foreign that butchers their language and conventions.

I think we should be open to listen to Nida although his theology may be deficient. Far from being simply a philosophical theorist, he was an experienced language learner and speaker and translator. His expertise as a practitioner is not a thing to be lightly dismissed.


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## rbcbob (Oct 1, 2009)

Dennis said


> I think we should be open to listen to Nida although his theology may be deficient. Far from being simply a philosophical theorist, he was an experienced language learner and speaker and translator. His expertise as a practitioner is not a thing to be lightly dismissed.



Nida has compromised his task at the outset.
Luther said:



> If I have made some mistakes in it (although I am not aware of any, and would most certainly be unwilling to deliberately mistranslate a single letter) I will not allow the papists to be my judges.
> I have always tried to translate in a pure and clear German. *It has often happened that for three or four weeks we have searched and inquired about a single word*, and sometimes we have not found it even then. In translating the book of Job, Master Philip, Aurogallus (6) and I have taken such pains that we have sometimes scarcely translated three lines in four days. ... Rather, with my helpers I have been very careful to see that where everything depends upon a single passage, *I have kept to the original quite literally and have not departed lightly from it*. For instance, in John 6 Christ says: "Him has God the Father versiegelt [sealed]." It would have been better German to say "Him has God the Father gezeichent [signified]" or even "He it is whom God the Father meinet [means]." *But I preferred to do violence to the German language rather than to depart from the word.*


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## steadfast7 (Oct 1, 2009)

It was right of Luther to translate a word literally where the equivalent existed in German, but this is not the case in many languages. Most western languages are quite complex with a vast vocubulary that expresses abstract nouns without much problem. Some exposure with African or Asian languages would make this evident.

even in our English bibles, we still do not know the definition of many words especially in Hebrew, but the translator must make an informed guess and provide an English word.

Arguably, only native speakers of Koine and ancient Hebrew would have the clearest sense of God's word, but such people no longer exist. Even the finest Greek and Hebrew scholars are second language learners at best. We live with some ambiguity and imperfection this side of heaven, seeing through a glass darkly, as it were.


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## Brian Withnell (Oct 2, 2009)

armourbearer said:


> For those interested in the philosophy of translation, I believe the following brief post by Paul Helm will prove very helpful in clearing away alot of the fog involved in modern discussions.
> 
> Helm's Deep: Dynamic Equivalence - Is there such a thing?
> 
> I consider his view of the possibility of cognitive equivalence to be a welcome remedy to the relativism which has prevailed in recent decades.



Hmmm. It was interesting to read, but what about languages which even transliteration is not possible (ones in which the sounds do not exist)? It would seem that it would be impossible to translate the Bible into a written language that is not at all phonic (ideograms). If the direct words are not there, and the language is not phonic, then it would seem that there would need to be what he calls cognitive equivalence, if by it he means translation of the thought. He did not explain what he meant by cognitive equivalence very well, and so I'm not sure what he meant.


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## MW (Oct 2, 2009)

Brian Withnell said:


> He did not explain what he meant by cognitive equivalence very well, and so I'm not sure what he meant.



Helm writes, "And what I claim is that there is no such thing as ‘dynamic equivalence’ achievable other than cognitive equivalence, and certainly it is not achievable through paraphrase, however ingenious and skilled the paraphraser may be. Why? Because the response of the reader is via his or her beliefs about what they read, what they take what they read to mean. The impact on the human mind of single words, phrases, and complete sentences, is obviously not physically mechanical, but it comes through the meaning or the perceived meaning, of the words. And so we should stick to the original words, translating or transliterating them as best we can."

In essence he is saying that words mean things; that the words of the Bible contain meaning and convey meaning; and it is impossible to contain and convey meaning in a translation by duplicating the content without also duplicating the words. Dynamic equivalence fails because it does not accommodate the fact that meaning is connected to words through the cognitive process. It fails to duplicate the content of the Bible because it omits that which is significant about the content of the Bible, namely, its words. Through cognitive equivalence the words as symbols of meaning can be sufficiently contained and conveyed in a translation.


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## ewenlin (Oct 2, 2009)

steadfast7 said:


> Translation teams need to make a judgment call. Either they present a bible that has 20-30% unintelligible words, or they try their best to contextualize the bible into terms that make sense to the locals.



Are you assuming the non-presence of a missionary among the locals?

I would suppose that a good missionary would be able to adhere to strict literalism and yet convey gospel and doctrinal truth across accurately to a point where the locals can read it for themselves. Takes time certainly, but I wouldn't have it any other way. (Although I'm not a missionary)

Maybe those in the missions field can share. Does having a loose contextualized translation help?


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## steadfast7 (Oct 3, 2009)

Hello Ewen,

are you from Singapore? You will probably understand more than most of us the difficulty, if not impossibility of strict literalism from Biblical to asian languages. For one thing Chinese does not have grammar in the same way English does. There is no way of conveying the perfect tense or middle voice in the text of the Chinese bible. This must be explained externally through teaching. While it would be great to have a trained biblical teacher in every mission setting, this is not always the case. Translators do believe in the perspicuity of the Bible in other languages as well!

Literalism assumes that there are one-to-one equivalents for words and grammar in languages, but this is not the case. Contextualization is necessary because it is incumbent on the translator to actually use the language correctly when translating. For example, from what I understand, John 21:15, "ἀγαπᾷς με πλέον τούτων" (literally, "you love me more than these?" "these" is ambiguous, so the english is able to capture it. In Korean, there is no ambiguous word for "these". the Korean bible, therefore, needs to interpret what it was referring to and put it into the text (I think they chose to interpret as "these disciples"). The point is even if you are seeking to convey words, ultimately, the translator HAS to convey meaning, and it HAS to be intelligible and within the conventions of their language. The moment translation is happening in any situation, we seek meaning - this is what dynamic equivalence essentially is.

Even when we read the Greek text, we need to contextualize the words into our vocabulary, our grammar, our idioms. We do this unconsciously, but we are doing it. This is because we are not native speakers of Koine, the language does not come naturally to us without having to interpret.

I appreciate Paul Helm's contribution in philosophy, but to really understand linguistics, he needs to spend some time slogging through a non-western language. I'm praying for more learned practitioners to come to the mission field.

cheers.


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