It doesn’t seem to matter very much whether they adopt sense-for-sense or word-for-word theories of translation. Most translations of the Bible, when it comes to Revelation 1:8, 21:6 and 22:13, seem to stick to the Lord describing himself as “The Alpha and the Omega”.
There are two exceptions I know of: TEV and derivatives have “the first and the last” and The Message has “A to Z”. I find that latter slightly bizarre: on the one hand it goes for a literal rendering of τὸ ἄλφα καὶ τὸ ὦ, on the other it goes for a colloquial English term that means a directory or map and therefore rather misses the point.
The only French Bibles I’ve looked at are like the English tradition “Je suis l’Alpha et l’Oméga.” Presumably both our traditions follow the Vulgate, and help match the biblical text to a considerable amount of Christian artwork and iconography.
By contrast, from what I can see, the German tradition seems happy to follow Luther: “Ich bin das A und das O.” It is, I think, rather hard to see a case for doing anything else in strict translation terms. The logic of translating the first and last letters of the source language by the first and last letters of the target language seems to me to be a relatively obvious thing to do, even if one wants to footnote it.
Those acquainted with such things will know that Rev 21:1-7 is a reading regularly used at funerals. I rather assume that mourners are increasingly uncomprehending of Alpha and Omega. (And goodness knows what they make of the sea being no more!) But wouldn’t a simple alphabetical substitution make things a lot clearer?
“I am the A and the Z, the beginning and the end” (Rev 21:6)
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What! And miss the teaching opportunity to escape parochialism? Z is only the 7th letter. I note that Delitzch has ‘I am the alef and the tav’ in Hebrew. (But there is no O!)
Doug,
You say:
“The only French Bibles I’ve looked at are like the English tradition “Je suis l’Alpha et l’Oméga.” Presumably both our traditions follow the Vulgate, and help match the biblical text to a considerable amount of Christian artwork and iconography.”
That would seem to be a significant plus in favor of Alpha and Omega – per KJV, ESV, NRSV, REB, NIV, NJB, NAB, and NLT – and French Bibles, to which I would add Italian and Spanish Bibles.
In a sense, your proposal to go with “A to Z” is not only anti-traditional, but also anti-catholic.
John, aren’t you now arguing the exact opposite of what you argued for Gen 1:1 “When God began to create …”? If the tradition is a good guide to how the text should be translated here, then why not there?
Is John’s phrase a translation into Greek? Is it perhaps related to the idiomatic saying “from Aleph to Tav”? Or does it hearken in any way back to the word את (et)?
http://www.ancient-hebrew.org/0_logo.html
Er ….
Tempted to just leave it at that, but I’m not sure there’s any evidence for this “idiomatic saying” in the first century, nor why on earth anyone would want to link God to a lexical device for marking the direct object of a sentence.
Agreed. It’s conjecture and speculation, but possibility:
http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Alpha_and_Omega
Is it just me, or is that image quite phallic?
Kurk,
er . . . (and I will leave it at that).
Doug,
It is just you. Can’t a person stand erect without being compared to . . . Oh I get it.
You have hit on the strongest reason I know of for translating Genesis 1:1 in the familiar way in a Bible meant for the Church. Indeed, in a Church Bible, I would translate it familiarly as ESV, NIV, and NLT do. NRSV, in any case, is just weird, another strike against it.
But I would add a footnote to the effect that Gen 1:1 was understood as an independent clause by Judaism since the third century BCE (note the rendering of the LXX) and by Christianity from the beginning, but that the syntax of the whole and the analogy of parallel passages in the Bible (Gen 2:4b-7; 5:1) and beyond (Enuma Elish, the Atrahasis Epic) suggest instead that it is a subordinate clause, to be rendered, “When God began to create . . .” This is one of several instances in which the original meaning a scripture had is to be distinguished from the meaning it came to have in light of later events and/or doctrinal developments. For further discussion, see Appendix A, “creatio ex nihilo.” Another example: Isa 7:14 “Behold the virgin will conceive and bear a son” (see note there, and Appendix F).
Isa 7:14 is the key example of why NRSV, REB, and NJB are ridiculous as Church Bibles, whereas ESV, NIV, NLT, and NAB (the official Catholic version) get it right.
Two Study Bibles I own with a decent note on Isa 7:14 from a confessional point of view: The Catholic Study Bible (NAB) and the NLT Study Bible.
oh dear. sorry for that
(alright, I’ll just listen to you, Bob, and John H.)
For what it’s worth, the following seven Spanish language translations:
La Biblia de las Américas, Nueva Versión Internacional, Reina-Valera Antigua, 1960 and 1995, El Libro del Pueblo de Dios and La Biblia de las Américas each renders the three references as ‘Yo soy el Alfa y la Omega’.
When I was in Patmos, a hotelier who entertained us and, it being off-season, arranged a personal tour of the cave of the Apocalypse, insisted to me that God had only here ‘spoken in Greek’. In this passage, does God indeed make a Greek word play? Does this show that God can speak in any language and in any language also play – as if such play was from before the foundation of the world?
It always reminds me of the Auden Hymn to St Cecelia which I think he modeled partly on Proverbs 8:30
I cannot grow;
I have no shadow
To run away from,
I only play.
I cannot err;
There is no creature
Whom I belong to,
Whom I could wrong.
I am defeat
When it knows it
Can now do nothing
By suffering.
All you lived through,
Dancing because you
No longer need it
For any deed.
I shall never be Different. Love me.
If wisdom is at play before the foundations of the world – and perhaps I am guilty not so much of word play as too much free association, then how do we respond in all our translation seriousness?
“God had only here ’spoken in Greek’.” Bob, that’s rich!
You prompted me to look at how Willis Barnstone translates into Hebraic English, and he consistently renders the phrase τὸ ἄλφα καὶ τὸ ὦ as “Alpha and Omega.”
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