This morning I had occasion to use a biblical quote. I chose Proverbs 3.3. In the King James Version it goes like this:
“Let not mercy and truth forsake thee . . . “
But I picked up my JPS Tanakh, since it also has the Hebrew original, and read this:
“Let fidelity and steadfastness not leave you . . . “
So I checked the Hebrew:
חֶסֶד וֶאֱמֶת אַל-יַעַזְבֻךָ
It clearly says, “chesed v’emet,” which means “mercy and truth.” I’ve known these Hebrew words for more than fifty years. Why are they now being changed to “fidelity and steadfastness?” When I studied Kabbalah, some fifty years ago, I learned that “Chesed,” the fourth of the ten sephiroth, means “Mercy.” I started to do a little digging.
I found that this change doesn’t only affect Proverbs, but also the Psalms, and in fact the whole Tanakh (what is called the “Old Testament” in Christianity). I’ve previously written about this problem in the Psalms: see my Facebook Note “The Book of Psalms and its Various Translations,” published July 6 2011 (and republished in this blog on 19 April 2017). Psalm 136 uses the word “chesed” twenty-six times. In every case, it was translated as “ELEOS,” “mercy” in the Septuagint (LXX), made by Jewish scholars in Alexandria in about 200 BCE; in the Vulgate (St. Jerome, ca. 400 CE) as “misericordia,” “mercy;” and in the King James Version (1608 CE) as “mercy.” But now my JPS Tanakh gives it as “steadfastness” and has also changed “truth” to “fidelity.” The Revised Standard Version gives us “loyalty and faithfulness;” NIV: "love and faithfulness;" The Jerusalem Bible (Koren Publishers): "loyal love and truth;" NASB (1971): "kindness and truth;" Robert Alter's new translation (2018): "kindness and truth." What’s wrong with “mercy and truth?”
So I dug a little further, this time in my dictionaries. My dictionary of classical Greek (we don’t have the Hebrew text on which the Septuagint was based) defines “ELEOS” as “pity, mercy.” My dictionary of New Testament Greek defines it as “compassion, mercy.” My Hebrew dictionary (which largely reflects modern usage) gives “grace, favor: righteousness; charity.” In modern Hebrew it is frequently used to mean “charity.” All of this is also consonant with “mercy.” So, if the cream of Jewish scholarship in Alexandria, ca. 200 BCE, took “chesed” to mean “mercy” rather than “steadfastness” and “emet” to mean “truth,” rather than “fidelity,” who are we to change these translations? Is it required by any findings of modern scholarship? I don’t think so.
What is really happening here? At first I thought it was a conspiracy to mistranslate, and in some cases there may be an element of that. But lately I'm becoming more aware of other possibilities.For example: Robert Alter is an honest and honorable man, and he would not intentionally mislead us. And yet, he has "kindness" where the ancients translated "mercy." But "chesed" is often used in Modern Hebrew to mean "charity," which is a form of kindness. Perhaps Alter is being influenced by Modern Hebrew, which didn't exist when the Book of Proverbs was written. Semantic drift over time is clearly at work here. Robert Alter had the benefit of the NASB (completed in 1971), which may also have been influenced by Modern Hebrew, but is considered to be the most literal of contemporary translations (it underwent a revision, though, in 1995, which made it somewhat less literal). The fact is that the meanings of words are fluid over time. This means that the best translator for an ancient text is likely to be an ancient translator.
What is really happening here? At first I thought it was a conspiracy to mistranslate, and in some cases there may be an element of that. But lately I'm becoming more aware of other possibilities.For example: Robert Alter is an honest and honorable man, and he would not intentionally mislead us. And yet, he has "kindness" where the ancients translated "mercy." But "chesed" is often used in Modern Hebrew to mean "charity," which is a form of kindness. Perhaps Alter is being influenced by Modern Hebrew, which didn't exist when the Book of Proverbs was written. Semantic drift over time is clearly at work here. Robert Alter had the benefit of the NASB (completed in 1971), which may also have been influenced by Modern Hebrew, but is considered to be the most literal of contemporary translations (it underwent a revision, though, in 1995, which made it somewhat less literal). The fact is that the meanings of words are fluid over time. This means that the best translator for an ancient text is likely to be an ancient translator.
Here is just one more example, another quote I had occasion to use the other day, Isaiah 59.8:
“. . . they have made their roads crooked, no one who goes in them knows peace.” (Vulgate, KJV, et al are similar.) But my JPS Tanakh says, “They make their courses crooked, no one who walks in them cares for integrity.” I submit that the latter is willful, tendentious mistranslation. the Hebrew clearly says “will not know peace.” I don’t see how it could be any clearer. I know what “shalom” means, and so do you. The Hebrew word for “integrity” is not “shalom,” it’s “shlemut.” They are related words, to be sure, and “shalem” does mean “whole.” But the pointing has been available since about 600 CE and the word was already understood correctly in 200 BCE and 400 CE. Why should we make a ridiculous stretch and try to change it now? It is interesting, though, that in this case and in the previous one, the JPS Tanakh is out in left field, against all the others. I believe that the Jerusalem Bible (Koren Oublishers, Jerusalem, my edition is 1997) is far superior to the JPS publication.
I submit that some of these are cases of willful, tendentious mistranslation. I believe that this is a trend in modern biblical translations. I believe that this scriptural spinning is done to assuage modern consciences and to avoid offending those in power. If you’d like to see more evidence of this, please refer to my earlier Note, referenced above. God help us if we are in a world where mercy, truth, and peace are out of favor.
