Bible Translation Done to Update the Language of the Bible

Bible translation that is done because of language change is seen mainly in cases where there are existing translations in the language. One reason for such later translations is the need to update the language of the Bible. Languages change over time. New words get created from existing words or get borrowed from other languages. Existing words take up new shades of meaning or shed some shades of meaning. At times, a word with positive connotations becomes associated with negative ones. In other instances, some words become archaic and new words are used to replace them. Thus, the meanings of some words in a given Bible translation might not remain the same after some decades or centuries. These semantic changes then make it necessary to have new translations that would use current words that pass across the intended meanings. A case in point is the King James Bible published in 1611, whose language has undergone many changes.

Comfort (2000: 108) observes that many statements in the KJB “no longer make any sense – or, worse still, communicate the wrong idea to modern readers”. He illustrates this with the use of “gay” in James 2: 3:

And ye have respect to him that weareth the gay clothing, and say unto him, Sit thou here in a good place; and say to the poor, Stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool.

To the modern reader, the word “gay” connotes homosexuality. According to the Oxford English Dictionary,

Gay meaning ‘homosexual’ became established in the 1960s as the term preferred by homosexual men to describe themselves. It is now the standard accepted term throughout the English-speaking world. As a result, the centuries-old other senses of gay meaning either ‘carefree’ or ‘bright and showy’ have more or less dropped out of natural use. The word gay cannot be readily used today in these older senses without arousing a sense of double entendre, despite concerted attempts by some to keep them alive. Gay in its

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modern sense typically refers to men (lesbian being the standard term for homosexual women) but in some contexts it can be used of both men and women.

Thus, recent translations like the New King James Bible (NKJB, 1982) replace “gay” with

“fine” in James 2: 3:

and you pay attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and say to him,

“You sit here in a good place,” and say to the poor man, “You stand there,” or,

“Sit here at my footstool”.

In addition to the changes in the meanings of words, the excerpt from the KJB also shows some archaic forms that are no longer in use. These forms are replaced with modern forms in the NKJB, e.g. “ye” -> “you”, “weareth” -> “wearing”, “thou” -> “you”. So, some Bible translations are done in order to update the language of the Bible, to make it reflect the current usage.

In relation to the Igbo translations, the period from 1913 when the Union Igbo Bible, the first complete translation in Igbo, was published and the late 1960s when new translations were started was too short for any remarkable change to have taken place such that would necessitate a new Bible translation. Thus, as demonstrated in Chapters 4 and 5, many of the lexical choices of the translations done during the missionary period (1840-1913) were retained in the translations by native Igbo agents (published between 1966 and 2007).

That notwithstanding, findings in Chapter 6 reveal instances of lexical and semantic differentiation in later translations where earlier translations did not make such differentiation. Such changes may be seen as corrective, i.e., the later translations corrected perceived errors in the earlier translations. Interestingly, the lexical and semantic differentiation also contributes in expanding the lexicon of the language.

Furthermore, according to Comfort (2008: 108), some verses of the KJB “exhibit dated, male-oriented language”. 1 Corinthians 14: 20 is illustrative of such male-oriented language:

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Brethren, be not children in understanding: howbeit in malice be ye children, but in understanding be men.

In this passage, “men” is used to represent both men and women. Commenting on this generic use of “men” to represent both men and women, Comfort (2000: 108-109) submits that

[m]odern readers, accustomed to male-female equality, would take exceptions to this rendering. And well they should. According to the Greek, Paul was encouraging his readers to be ‘mature’: it has nothing to do with maleness or manliness.

Such male-oriented language may have been the norm in the English of the 15^th century AD, but it is no longer so in modern times. Thus, some modern Bible translations into English, use gender neutral terms in this Bible verse to reflect the current norm. For example, in place of “men” in 1 Corinthians 14: 20, the New Living Translation (NLT) uses “mature”

while the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) uses “adults”.

Incidentally, Igbo does not have this problem of gender mis-representation, for it is not the norm to represent both genders with one gender. Rather, each gender is represented distinctly, and in situation where both genders are referred to, a gender inclusive expression is used. For example, the UIB uses ndị tozuru okè “fully grown people” or

“adults” in the 1 Corinthians 14: 20 text. Other IBTs use different gender inclusive terms.

Secondly, the practice in English of using the third person singular pronouns “he” and “his”

in a generic sense for both male and female referents is also not seen in Igbo, because Igbo pronouns are gender neutral, i.e., Igbo personal pronouns do not make any gender distinction. The Igbo third person pronouns ya and Ọ could be represented in English as

“he”, “she” or “it”.

However, there were other aspects of change in the Igbo language that necessitated the subsequent translations of the Bible in Igbo, e.g., changes in orthography and in the standard dialect of Igbo. As noted in Chapter 3, Igbo was an oral language and the first CMS missionaries that translated portions of the Bible into Igbo used different writing systems.

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With the introduction of the Lepsius orthography in 1855, revised in 1863, the missionaries adopted this orthography for all their translations. However, the colonial government introduced the “African orthography” in 1927, which the CMS rejected. The Catholic church embraced this new orthography and thus ensued the orthography controversy in Igbo. The UIB was translated in the Lepsius orthography. After the orthography controversy was settled and a standard orthography developed for Igbo, the need arose to have the Bible in the standard orthography. A similar incident is seen as regards the dialect of the Bible. The UIB was translated into an artificial dialect of Igbo, created by combining features of five different Igbo dialects. The development of an accepted standard dialect of Igbo after independence in 1960 also warranted that the UIB be revised to reflect this new standard dialect. The ILB and the IRE both acknowledge that they were made to update the language of the UIB to reflect current usage. However, the ICB and the INWT are silent on the existence of any earlier translation of the Bible in Igbo, a step I attribute to the ideologies of the denominations that did the translations.