The terms dynamic equivalence and formal equivalence, coined by
Eugene Nida
Eugene A. Nida (November 11, 1914 – August 25, 2011) was an American linguist who developed the dynamic-equivalence Bible-translation theory and one of the founders of the modern discipline of translation studies.
Life
Eugene Albert Ni ...
, are associated with two dissimilar
translation
Translation is the communication of the Meaning (linguistic), meaning of a #Source and target languages, source-language text by means of an Dynamic and formal equivalence, equivalent #Source and target languages, target-language text. The ...
approaches that are employed to achieve different levels of literalness between the
source and target text, as evidenced in
biblical translation.
The two have been understood basically, with dynamic equivalence as
sense-for-sense translation (translating the meanings of
phrase
In syntax and grammar, a phrase is a group of words or singular word acting as a grammatical unit. For instance, the English expression "the very happy squirrel" is a noun phrase which contains the adjective phrase "very happy". Phrases can con ...
s or whole sentences) with
readability
Readability is the ease with which a reader can understand a written text. In natural language, the readability of text depends on its content (the complexity of its vocabulary and syntax) and its presentation (such as typographic aspects t ...
in mind, and with formal equivalence as
word-for-word translation (translating the meanings of words and phrases in a more literal way), keeping literal
fidelity
Fidelity is the quality of faithfulness or loyalty. Its original meaning regarded duty in a broader sense than the related concept of ''fealty''. Both derive from the Latin word ''fidēlis'', meaning "faithful or loyal". In the City of London ...
.
Approaches to translation
''Formal equivalence approach'' tends to emphasize fidelity to the lexical details and grammatical structure of the original language, whereas dynamic equivalence tends to employ a more natural rendering but with less literal accuracy.
According to
Eugene Nida
Eugene A. Nida (November 11, 1914 – August 25, 2011) was an American linguist who developed the dynamic-equivalence Bible-translation theory and one of the founders of the modern discipline of translation studies.
Life
Eugene Albert Ni ...
, ''dynamic equivalence'', the term as he originally coined, is the "quality of a translation in which the message of the original text has been so transported into the receptor language that the ''response'' of the ''receptor'' is essentially like that of the original receptors." The desire is that the reader of both languages would understand the meanings of the text in a similar fashion.
In later years, Nida distanced himself from the term "dynamic equivalence" and preferred the term "functional equivalence". What the term "functional equivalence" suggests is not just that the equivalence is between the function of the source text in the source culture and the function of the
target text (translation) in the target culture, but that "function" can be thought of as a property of the text. It is possible to associate functional equivalence with ''how people interact in cultures''.
Theory and practice
Because the ''functional equivalence'' approach eschews strict adherence to the grammatical structure of the original text in favor of a more natural rendering in the target language, it is sometimes used when the readability of the translation is more important than the preservation of the original grammatical structure.
''Formal equivalence'' is often more goal than reality, if only because one language may contain a word for a concept which has no direct equivalent in another language. In such cases, a more dynamic translation may be used or a
neologism
A neologism Greek νέο- ''néo''(="new") and λόγος /''lógos'' meaning "speech, utterance"] is a relatively recent or isolated term, word, or phrase that may be in the process of entering common use, but that has not been fully accepted int ...
may be created in the target language to represent the concept (sometimes by borrowing a word from the source language).
The more the source language differs from the target language, the more difficult it may be to understand a literal translation without modifying or rearranging the words in the target language. On the other hand, formal equivalence can allow readers familiar with the source language to analyze how meaning was expressed in the original text, preserving untranslated
idiom
An idiom is a phrase or expression that typically presents a figurative, non-literal meaning attached to the phrase; but some phrases become figurative idioms while retaining the literal meaning of the phrase. Categorized as formulaic language, ...
s,
rhetoric
Rhetoric () is the art of persuasion, which along with grammar and logic (or dialectic), is one of the three ancient arts of discourse. Rhetoric aims to study the techniques writers or speakers utilize to inform, persuade, or motivate par ...
al devices (such as
chiastic structure
Chiastic structure, or chiastic pattern, is a literary technique in narrative motifs and other textual passages. An example of chiastic structure would be two ideas, A and B, together with variants A' and B', being presented as A,B,B',A'. Chia ...
s in the
Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;["Tanach"](_blank)
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. Hebrew: ''Tān ...
) and
diction
Diction ( la, dictionem (nom. ), "a saying, expression, word"), in its original meaning, is a writer's or speaker's distinctive vocabulary choices and style of expression in a poem or story.Crannell (1997) ''Glossary'', p. 406 In its common meanin ...
in order to preserve original information and highlight finer shades of meaning.
Overlooked semantic differences between alleged equivalents in the source and target languages
According to
Ghil'ad Zuckermann
Ghil'ad Zuckermann ( he, גלעד צוקרמן, ; ) is an Israeli-born language revivalist and linguist who works in contact linguistics, lexicology and the study of language, culture and identity. Zuckermann is Professor of Linguistics and Ch ...
, a major problem lies in the fact that there are completely overlooked semantic differences between a lexical item in the source language and its alleged equivalent in the target language.
Zuckermann provides the example of the lexical item for "angels" in three different languages:
English (''angels''),
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
(''malāʾika'') and
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
(, ''malakhím''). These three terms are used to translate each other interchangeably, as if they meant exactly the same thing. As Zuckermann puts it, "for the non-sophisticated layman, an angel is an angel is angel."
[ However, employing natural semantic metalanguage to discover in depth the exact, complex meaning of each of the three lexical items, Zuckermann points out numerous differences that were identified by Sandy Habib, as following:][
::''Angels'' and ''malāʾika'' seem to be perceived as being in the place to which good people go after they die. ''Malakhím'', on the other hand, seem to be perceived as being in a place that includes the place to which good people go after they die. ''Angels'' seem to be perceived as living in a hierarchical world; thus some ''angels'' appear to be higher in status than other ''angels''. On the other hand, no linguistic evidence has been found in the corpus that demonstrates that Muslim Arabs view some of ''malāʾika'' as being superior to other beings of their kind. Some Islamic religious sources do speak of hierarchy among ''malāʾika'', but, as no evidence has been found in the corpus to support this idea, it can be concluded that this idea might not be known to ordinary Muslim Arabs. The same holds for ''malakhím''. The Hebrew Corpus shows eleven occurrences of the expressions ''malákh rashí'' (lit. ‘a chief malákh’). In seven of these contexts, the expression is used as an attempt to translate the English word archangel or the Romanian word ''Arhanghelul''. In three other contexts, it is used to talk about one of the three ''angels'' that appeared to Abraham before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah; in these contexts, the ''malákh rashí'' is identified as God. In the eleventh context, the expression is used to talk about the devil in Islam. As a result, it can be concluded that no conclusive linguistic evidence has been found in the corpus to support the idea that native Hebrew speakers believe that some ''malakhím'' are higher in status than other ''malakhím''.][
::''Angels'' and ''malakhím'' appear to be perceived as being immortal. Their immortality stems from the notion that they are spirits, and spirits do not die. On the other hand, Arabic ''malāʾika''’s (im)mortality does not seem to be clear, as there was no evidence found in the corpus that shows whether Muslim Arabs think that these beings die or not.][
::The three non-human beings also differ in their visual representation/appearance. Native English speakers and native Hebrew speakers seem to have the idea that ''angels'' and ''malakhím'', respectively, are incorporeal, but notwithstanding, they depict them in a certain way. Muslim Arabs, on the other hand, are not allowed to produce drawings, paintings, or statues of ''malāʾika'', or even imagine what they might look like. Whereas an ''angel'' or ''malákh'' can be imagined as having two wings, Arabic ''malāk'' can have (and not ‘can be imagined to have’) two or more wings. Native English speakers depict an ''angel''’s wings as white bird-like wings, while Muslim Arabs and native Hebrew speakers can tell nothing about the colour or appearance of the wings of a ''malāk'' or ''malákh'', respectively. ''Angels'' are depicted as having halos above their heads or light radiating from their bodies, and ''malāʾika'' are believed to have been created from light. ''Malakhím'', on the other hand, do not seem to be imagined with halos or light.][
::More differences emerge when examining the relationship between the three non-human beings and people. Unlike ''angels'', who seem to be perceived as doing only good things to people, ''malāʾika'' and ''malakhím'' seem to be perceived as beings who are capable of doing good, as well as bad things to people. Also, unlike Muslim Arabs, native English speakers and native Hebrew speakers do not have the notion that ''angels'' or ''malakhím'', respectively, play any role in tormenting people after their death.][
]
Bible translation
Translators of the Bible have taken various approaches in rendering it into English, ranging from an extreme use of formal equivalence, to extreme use of dynamic equivalence.
; Predominant use of formal equivalence
*Douay–Rheims Bible
The Douay–Rheims Bible (, ), also known as the Douay–Rheims Version, Rheims–Douai Bible or Douai Bible, and abbreviated as D–R, DRB, and DRV, is a translation of the Bible from the Latin Vulgate into English made by member ...
(1610)
*King James Bible
The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version, is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and published in 1611, by sponsorship of K ...
(1611)
*Young's Literal Translation
Young's Literal Translation (YLT) is a translation of the Bible into English, published in 1862. The translation was made by Robert Young, compiler of '' Young's Analytical Concordance to the Bible'' and ''Concise Critical Comments on the New Tes ...
(1862)
*Revised Version
The Revised Version (RV) or English Revised Version (ERV) of the Bible is a late 19th-century British revision of the King James Version. It was the first and remains the only officially authorised and recognised revision of the King James Versio ...
(1885)
*American Standard Version
The American Standard Version (ASV), officially Revised Version, Standard American Edition, is a Bible translation into English that was completed in 1901 with the publication of the revision of the Old Testament. The revised New Testament had ...
(1901)
* Concordant Version (1926)
*Revised Standard Version
The Revised Standard Version (RSV) is an English translation of the Bible published in 1952 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. This translation itself is a revision of the Amer ...
(1952)
*Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition
The Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition (RSVCE) is an English translation of the Bible first published in 1966. In 1965, the Catholic Biblical Association adapted, under the editorship of Bernard Orchard OSB and Reginald C. Fuller, the Re ...
(1966)
*New American Standard Bible
The New American Standard Bible (NASB) is an English translation of the Bible. Published by the Lockman Foundation, the complete NASB was released in 1971. The NASB relies on recently published critical editions of the original Hebrew and Gr ...
(1971)
* New King James Version (1982)
* Green's Literal Translation (1985)
* New Jewish Publication Society Tanakh (1985)
*New Revised Standard Version
The New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) is an Bible translations into English, English translation of the Bible published in 1989 by the National Council of Churches. (1989)
* Orthodox Study Bible (1993)
* Third Millennium Bible (1998)
* Recovery Version (1999)
*World English Bible
The World English Bible (WEB) is an English translation of the Bible freely shared online. The translation work began in 1994 and was deemed complete in 2020. Created by volunteers with oversight by Michael Paul Johnson, the WEB is an updated ...
(2000)
*English Standard Version
The English Standard Version (ESV) is an English translation of the Bible. Published in 2001 by Crossway, the ESV was "created by a team of more than 100 leading evangelical scholars and pastors." The ESV relies on recently published critic ...
(2001)
* Revised Standard Version Second Catholic Edition (Ignatius Bible) (2006)
*Lexham English Bible
The Lexham English Bible (LEB) is an online Bible released by Logos Bible Software. The New Testament was published in October 2010 and has an audio narration spoken by Marv Allen. It lists as General Editor W. Hall Harris, III. The Old Testamen ...
(2011)
*Modern English Version
The Modern English Version (MEV) is an English translation of the Bible begun in 2005 and completed in 2014. The work was edited by James F. Linzey, and is an update of the King James Version (KJV), re-translated from the Masoretic Text and th ...
(2014)
*Tree of Life Version The Tree of Life Version of the Holy Scriptures (TLV), first published in 2014, is a Messianic Jewish translation of the Hebrew Bible (or TA-NA-KH) and the New Testament (or New Covenant) sponsored by the Messianic Jewish Family Bible Society and T ...
(2014)
* English Standard Version Catholic Edition (2018)
* Literal Standard Version (2020)
; Moderate use of both formal and dynamic equivalence (optimal equivalence)
* The Holy Bible: Knox Version (1955)
* New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (1961, revised 1984, 2013)
* Confraternity Bible (1969)
* Modern Language Bible (1969)
*New American Bible
The New American Bible (NAB) is an English translation of the Bible first published in 1970. The 1986 Revised NAB is the basis of the revised Lectionary, and it is the only translation approved for use at Mass in the Latin-rite Catholic dioces ...
(1970, revised 1986 & 1991)
*Holman Christian Standard Bible
The Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB) is a modern English Bible translation from Holman Bible Publishers. The New Testament was published in 1999, followed by the full Bible in March 2004.
Beginnings
The roots of the HCSB can be traced t ...
called "optimal equivalence" (2004)
* New Community Bible (2008)
*Common English Bible
The Common English Bible (CEB) is an English translation of the Bible whose language is intended to be at a comfortable reading level for the majority of English readers. The translation was begun in late 2008 and was finished in 2011. It include ...
(2011)
*New American Bible Revised Edition
The New American Bible Revised Edition (NABRE) is an English-language Catholic translation of the Bible, the first major update in 20 years to the New American Bible (NAB), which was translated by members of the Catholic Biblical Association an ...
(2011)
*Christian Standard Bible
The Christian Standard Bible (CSB) is a modern English Bible translation of the Christian Bible. Work on the translation was completed in June 2016, with the first full edition released in March 2017. The translation was updated in February 202 ...
(2017)
* Evangelical Heritage Version (2019)
* New Catholic Bible / New Catholic VersionNew Catholic Bible
/ref> (St. Joseph New Catholic Bible) (2019)
*Revised New Jerusalem Bible
The ''Revised New Jerusalem Bible'' (RNJB) is an English translation of the Catholic Bible translated by the Benedictine scholar Henry Wansbrough as an update and successor to the 1966 '' Jerusalem Bible'' and the 1985 ''New Jerusalem Bible ...
(2019)
; Extensive use of dynamic equivalence or paraphrase or both
* Amplified Bible (1965)
*Jerusalem Bible
''The Jerusalem Bible'' (JB or TJB) is an English translation of the Bible published in 1966 by Darton, Longman & Todd. As a Catholic Bible, it includes 73 books: the 39 books shared with the Hebrew Bible, along with the seven deuterocanonical ...
(1966)
* New Life Version (1969)
*New English Bible
The New English Bible (NEB) is an English translation of the Bible. The New Testament was published in 1961 and the Old Testament (with the Apocrypha) was published on 16 March 1970. In 1989, it was significantly revised and republished as the R ...
(1970)
* Good News Bible (formerly "Today's English Version") (1976)
*New International Version
The New International Version (NIV) is an English translation of the Bible first published in 1978 by Biblica (formerly the International Bible Society). The ''NIV'' was created as a modern translation, by Bible scholars using the earliest a ...
(1978)
*New Jerusalem Bible
''The New Jerusalem Bible'' (NJB) is an English-language translation of the Bible published in 1985 by Darton, Longman and Todd and Les Editions du Cerf, edited by Benedictine biblical scholar Henry Wansbrough, and approved for use in study and ...
(1985)
*Easy-to-Read Version
The Holy Bible: Easy-to-Read Version (ERV) is an English translation of the Bible compiled by the World Bible Translation Center. It was originally published as the English Version for the Deaf (EVD) by BakerBooks.
History
Some Deaf readers stru ...
(1987)
*Christian Community Bible
The Christian Community Bible is a translation of the Christian Bible in the English language originally produced in the Philippines.
It is part of a family of translations in multiple languages intended to be more accessible to ordinary readers, ...
(1988)
* Revised English Bible (1989)
* God's Word Translation (1995)
*Contemporary English Version
The Contemporary English Version or CEV (also known as Bible for Today's Family) is a translation of the Bible into English,
published by the American Bible Society. An anglicized version was produced by the British and Foreign Bible Society, ...
(1995)
*New Living Translation
The New Living Translation (NLT) is an English translation of the Bible. The origin of the NLT came from a project aiming to revise ''The Living Bible'' (TLB). This effort eventually led to the creation of the NLT—a new translation separate ...
(1996)
* Complete Jewish Bible (1998)
*New International Reader's Version
The New International Reader's Version (NIrV) is an English translation of the Christian Bible. Translated by the International Bible Society (now Biblica) following a similar philosophy as the New International Version (NIV), but written in a ...
(1998)
*New English Translation
The New English Translation (NET Bible) is a free, "completely new" online English translation of the Bible, "with 60,932 translators' notes" sponsored by the Biblical Studies Foundation and published by Biblical Studies Press.
History and text ...
(2005)
* Today's New International Version (2005)
* CTS New Catholic Bible (2007)
;Extensive use of paraphrase
* The Living Bible (1971)
* The Street Bible (UK) (2003), as the word on the street (US) (2004)
*The Message Bible
''The Message: The Bible in Contemporary Language'' (MSG) is a paraphrase of the Bible. Authored by Eugene H. Peterson and published in segments from 1993 to 2002, the MSG falls on the extreme dynamic end of the dynamic and formal equivalence ...
(2002)
* The Voice (2012)
* EasyEnglish Bible (2018)
See also
* Bible concordance
A Bible concordance is a concordance, or verbal index, to the Bible. A simple form lists Biblical words alphabetically, with indications to enable the inquirer to find the passages of the Bible where the words occur.
Concordances may be for the ...
* Bible version debate
There have been various debates concerning the proper family of biblical manuscripts and translation techniques that should be used to translate the Bible into other languages. Biblical translation has been employed since the first translations we ...
* Exploratory data analysis
In statistics, exploratory data analysis (EDA) is an approach of analyzing data sets to summarize their main characteristics, often using statistical graphics and other data visualization methods. A statistical model can be used or not, but prim ...
* Lexical markup framework
Language resource management - Lexical markup framework (LMF; ISO 24613:2008), is the International Organization for Standardization ISO/TC37 standard for natural language processing (NLP) and machine-readable dictionary (MRD) lexicons.
The scop ...
* Natural semantic metalanguage
* Ted Woolsey
Ted Woolsey is an American video game translator and producer. He had the primary role in the North American production and localization of Square's role-playing video games released for the Super NES between 1991 and 1996. He is best known for ...
, known for his use of dynamic equivalence in translations of Japanese video games
* Textualism in jurisprudence
Jurisprudence, or legal theory, is the theoretical study of the propriety of law. Scholars of jurisprudence seek to explain the nature of law in its most general form and they also seek to achieve a deeper understanding of legal reasoning ...
:
** Original meaning (''cf.'' formal equivalence)
** Original intent (''cf.'' dynamic equivalence)
** Purposivism
The purposive approach (sometimes referred to as purposivism, purposive construction, purposive interpretation, or the modern principle in construction) is an approach to statutory and constitutional interpretation under which common law courts i ...
(also called purposive theory)
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dynamic and formal equivalence
Translation studies
Biblical criticism
Bible versions and translations