Translators Down Through the Ages

[Rippon2]

was it a "free" translation, as in more dynamic then literal?

Not 'free' but more in the functionally equivalent mode. Why don't you read Ernst Wendland's paper on the subject that John cited? If you did your own homework a lot more often you would not ask so many needless questions.

J.N. Darby had issues with Luther's translation. "Luther's is the most inaccurate I know." Darby translated the New Testament into many European languages. I don't necessarily think his opinion on this is that authoritative though.

 

[OnlyaSinner]

The translation Luther produced turned out to be one of the greatest in history. It changed and unified the German language so that everyone in Germany spoke the same German. There had been various translations of the Bible before Luther's, but they all faded away when his version appeared. To this day, the Luther Bible is still in print--an incredible accomplishment.

A fascinating read - thanks.
At present (meaning, when I studied German in the 1960s) there are two main dialects, hoch Deutsch, common in the south and the dialect generally taught in the US, and platte Deutsch, used in the north and with a slightly greater resemblance to Dutch. I've no idea whether the dialects came into use after Luther's translation or whether one of them was a holdover from earlier.

 

[John of Japan]

was it a "free" translation, as in more dynamic then literal?

Wendland's essay, cited above, makes a case for Luther's version as being done with dynamic/functional equivalence. However, his article does not mention reader response theory, so without doing my own study of the version, I disagree. (Not that Wendland is not a far better scholar than I. )

 

[John of Japan]

A fascinating read - thanks.
At present (meaning, when I studied German in the 1960s) there are two main dialects, hoch Deutsch, common in the south and the dialect generally taught in the US, and platte Deutsch, used in the north and with a slightly greater resemblance to Dutch. I've no idea whether the dialects came into use after Luther's translation or whether one of them was a holdover from earlier.

Good post. Thanks.

If I'm not mistaken, the Austrian version of German is somewhat different, so yes, there are dialects nowadays. I don't know about in Luther's time.

 

[Rippon2]

Wendland's essay, cited above, makes a case for Luther's version as being done with dynamic/functional equivalence. However, his article does not mention reader response theory, so without doing my own study of the version, I disagree. (Not that Wendland is not a far better scholar than I. )

In the six page introduction of the 2012 edition of the NLT there is no mention of 'reader's response.' And of course, the NLT is considered a mainly functionally equivalent translation.