New English Bible - Background, Translation, Form, Considerations and Concerns, Summary
An English translation of the Bible from the original languages undertaken by an interdenominational committee of scholars under the auspices of the University Presses of Cambridge and Oxford since 1948. The first edition of the New Testament was completed in 1961, and the first complete Bible was produced in 1970. The goal was to present the text in good English literary idiom rather than in Biblical English, and to reflect the results of recent Biblical scholarship. It was substantially revised in 1989 under the title of the Revised English Bible.
| The New English Bible | |
|---|---|
| Full name: | The New English Bible |
| Abbreviation: | NEB |
| NT published: | 1961 |
| OT published: | 1970 |
| Complete Bible published: | 1970 |
| Publisher: | Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press |
| Copyright status: | The British and Foreign Bible Society |
| Genesis 1:1-3 | |
| In the beginning of creation, when God made heaven and earth, the earth was without form and void, with darkness over the face of the abyss, and a mighty wind that swept over the surface of the waters. | |
The New English Bible (NEB) was a fresh translation of the Bible into modern English directly from the original Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic texts (with some Latin in the Apocrypha);
Background
Near the time when the Copyright to the English Revised Version was due to expire (1935), the Oxford University Press and the Cambridge University Press, who were the current English Revised Version copyright holders, began investigations to determine whether a modern revision of the English Revised Version text was necessary. Hendry, along with the Presbytery of Stirling and Dunblane produced a notice, which was presented to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, indicating that the work of translating should be undertaken in order to produce a Bible with thoroughly "modern English."
Translation
In due time, three committees of translators and one committee of literary advisers were enlisted and charged with the task of producing the New English Bible.
For the New Testament the New English Bible Translators relied on a large body of texts including early Greek New Testament manuscripts, early translations rendered in other languages (those aside from Greek), and the quotations of early Christian writers and speakers. The text adhered to by the translators of the New English Bible can be found in The Greek New Testament, edited by R.
Form
The translators of the New English Bible chose to render their translation using a principle of translation called Dynamic equivalence (also referred to as Functional Equivalence or thought-for-thought translation).
This method of translation is in contrast to the traditional translations of the Authorized Version (King James Version), English Revised Version, American Standard Version, Revised Standard Version, and others, which place an emphasis on word-for-word correspondence between the source and target language. Dodd goes on to summarize the translation of the New English Bible as "...free, it may be, rather than literal, but a faithful translation nevertheless, so far as we could compass it."
Due to these translation principles the New English Bible is necessarily more periphrastic at times in order to render the thoughts of the original author into modern English.
Considerations and Concerns
It is evident that the New English Bible was produced primarily by British and European Scholarship (for example, Whitsuntide is rendered in 1 Corinthians 16:8 rather than Pentecost). For this reason, passages found in the New English Bible could be understood by a large body of English speaking individuals.
In relation to the issue of Gender neutral language, or Gender-Accuracy, the New English Bible was not produced within any guidelines that specified such a need and chose rather to render pronouns (among other things) using the traditional literary method followed by many previous translations in which the generic use of "he" is both typical and assumed. However, using this literary method has become increasingly unpopular and a revision of the New English Bible, aptly titled the Revised English Bible, was undertaken. Among the goals for this revision were rendering the text of the New English Bible Gender-Accurate, as well as fixing errors of transposition and interpretation that many felt to be present in the text.
Summary
Due to its official status and scholarly translators, the New English Bible has been considered one of the more important translations of the Bible to be produced following the Second World War. Bruce, then Rylands Professor of Biblical Criticism and Exegesis in the University of Manchester, declared that "To the sponsors and translators of the New English Bible the English speaking world owes an immense debt. Eliot comments that the New English Bible "astonishes in its combination of the vulgar, the trivial and the pedantic."
Controversial Passages (and various complaints) of the New English Bible
In Psalms 22:16, the New English Bible renders the familiar passage "... In Genesis 1:1-2, the New English Bible renders the passage using “a mighty wind” rather than the familiar, and traditional, choice of “the Spirit of God”. In Isaiah 9:6, the New English Bible translators chose a rendering that is both interpretive and non-traditional. In Nahum 1:12-14, the New English Bible transposes two verses and renders the promise of God interpretively. In Acts 20:7, the New English Bible renders the traditional phrase “first day of the week” as “Saturday night”.Members of the Committees
Old Testament Committee
The Rev.
New Testament Committee
The Rev.
Literary Committee
Professor Sir Roger Mynors, Professor Basil Willey, Sir Arthur Norrington, Mrs. Anne Ridler, The Rev.
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