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I mentioned that a Bible translator sometimes uses a phrase if there is no equivalent word or concept in the target language and culture. An example of this is the Japanese translation for the word "justify" (dikaioo in Greek, δικαιόω). In Japanese it has to be gi to mitomerareru (義と認められる), or...

Yep, it is a huge deal. So Japanese has multiple levels of politeness, and woe unto you if you get the level wrong. It was always fun to exchange names and/or business cards with Japanese men and watch their expression as they try to figure out where in society a missionary comes, above or below...

Some scholars look down on them, but I still like and consult the various "Word Study" sets of years ago: A. T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament (6 volumnes, excellent) Marvin Vincent, Word Studies in the NT (4 vol.) Henry Alford, Alford's Greek NT (4-5 volumes, depending on the...

This is correct. For example, Japanese uses the same word for both (daigaku, 大学), and there is no distinction in Japanese culture.

Japan is very similar to this in their giving and receiving. Their custom is called giri ninjo (義理, meaning "duty," plus 人情, empathy). When you are given something, you must give back. Because of this custom and other factors, evangelism is difficult in Japan. Nevertheless, over 33 years there...

Sorry I didn't see this until now. This is an excellent answer. Since Christ died to give us eternal life, it is incredibly rude to reject Him. And if you do except Him as Savior, it is necessary to give back to Christ your life! Those who believe but do not give their lives and everything they...

I would be amiss if I did not mention our own seminary MA in Bible translation. Check it out here: Baptist Theological Seminary - Doctrinal Precision. Revival Vision. Our degree could use improvement, but here are some distinctives: 1. We have experienced Bible translators as professors. 2. Our...

All true. Good missions strategy. They also ought to be taught ecclesiology, specifically church planting. We've just graduated one student from a limited access nation from our seminary, and he is heading back to his country to evangelize. We have several more in our college and seminary...

My whole point was that a college or university, Christian or secular, must know who they are trying to reach for students. And the key to that is the alumni. So when Tennessee Temple U. (TTU) decided to join the SBC (because they were shrinking), they abandoned their base of graduates, and that...

Often there is a failure of missionary strategy. However, I know of a Bible college in the Philippines which trains nationals from all around the Far East. I can get behind an effort like that, which does put the emphasis on the nationals. PTL, I know several of our students headed for Japan...

Bob Jones U. has a master's degree in Intercultural Studies (which used to be called simply "missions") that has a concentration in "Bible Translation and Linguistics": Intercultural Studies, MA | BJU Seminary. It looks like a pretty good program overall, but the actual courses on translation...

There are four Greek nouns for love. 1. Agape (ἀγάπη) is usually described as unconditional love, but it is more accurate to say it is love that occurs by a decision. God loved us while we were yet sinners, not from anything we are or have done. The verb cognate is agapao (ἀγαπάω), "I love."...

Quite different, and dark and powerful (getting deeper into the song), as you say, though perhaps a little aggressive for my taste in the second half. But good stuff. The lyrics are kind of dark to start with.

Nice guitar playing--somewhat different from Paul Simon's, so fun to hear for an old guitar player and S & G fan.

There are very few bachelor degrees out there for Bible translators. Tyndale has the only one I can find online, and it looks pretty good: Bible Translation | Undergraduate Studies - Tyndale University. Normally, Bible translation is a master's level degree. I know of a few of these.

Excellent post! It is impossible to do a good Bible translation without native speakers on the team, and preferable having the lead. A recent trend in the Bible translation world is for the Western experts to be translation consultants, training and being a help to the nationals. Here is one of...

I daresay very few of the scholars who translate the various English Bible versions have ever taken a single class in translation. However, there are a few training programs and degrees out there for missionary Bible translation. Do you know of any? Please share and critique. How good does the...

I believe you mean the historical grammatical method of interpretation. There is no translation method with the moniker "historical grammatical". Carry on. :)

My point was that everyone can learn the Greek alphabet, not that everyone must. And not everyone can learn Greek, due to character issues, dyslexia, whatever. I had one student who failed the class twice--couldn't learn it. But I had another student who failed once, but took it again and got...

Learning the Greek alphabet is not a "language skill." It is simple memorization. It is not hard to do. As I said in a previous post, every single Greek student I've ever had, even those who later failed the course, was able to learn the Greek alphabet easily within two days. With the documents...