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The Translatability of Scripture

I recently watched an online lecture at Wheaton College by Lamin Sanneh on the Translatability of Scripture. This is a fascinating topic. He himself is from an Islamic background. His brother told him not to become a Christian, because, if he did, he would be limited to one wife! Islam is based on the idea of supersessionism - the idea that one religion replaces another, so the newest monotheistic religion is best. In addition, he points out that Islam uses Arabic, the language of Muhammad, whereas Christianity does not use Aramaic, the language of Jesus the Messiah. Pickthall, in his introduction to his, 'The meaning of the Glorious Quran', which is in English, says that the Quran cannot be translated, it has to be read in Arabic. Wherever Muslims go, they begin Quranic schools to teach young boys (mainly) Arabic, so they can memorise the Quran. Whether or not they understand what they are reciting from memory is, in some parts of the world at least, a moot point.

In contrast, Christians are quite happy to translate the Bible into whatever language that needs it, anywhere in the world. Not only this, Sanneh points out that wherever the church has grown, it is because of the existence of the Bible in local languages. No one in their right mind would suggest that everyone has to learn Hebrew and Greek, the languages in which the Bible was written. (Some might suggest people learn English, but that is based on a few trips they have made on their holidays, where, 'Everyone spoke English to me,' Open square brackets, in my hotel, close square brackets. This goes along with Sanneh's idea, which he says tongue-in-cheek, that we [Westerners] have the Bible; everyone else in the world has translations.) 

The very fact that the New Testament (NT) was written in Greek is a case in point. There are arguments to say that Jesus knew some Greek, but no concrete evidence in the NT manuscripts themselves. Instead, he is quoted as using Aramaic or Hebrew (they are sometimes hard to distinguish from each other). The Hebrew Bible is also mainly quoted and alluded to via its Greek translation in the NT. This is because it is the message that is important, not the language it is written in. The Bible, just like Jesus, is incarnate in the languages in which it is written, according to Andrew Walls. The whole idea of the incarnation is, of course, anathema to Muslims. Apparently Luther, who translated the Bible into German, talked about the audacity of the incarnation.

Another point Sanneh makes is that Christianity has never used force to get people to convert. During the Crusades there was a misguided attempt to conquer Jerusalem and Bethlehem (the approximate equivalents of Meccah and Medina), but this failed. Instead, wherever the gospel has successfully spread, it has done so underground, by word of mouth, and with great joy. Salvation is not a token of Caesar's favour, Sanneh says, it is a free gift. Examples in his book* of where this has happened include Ethiopia (via Amharic) and Russia (in Church Slavonic).

One interesting challenge Sanneh brought in his lecture, was that mediation is needed between frontier Christians and those in the secular West. The former believe that the Bible is a religious canon, the latter, that it is just another book.


The online lecture, to save you hunting for it.

*Sanneh's book (I recommend for further study) is:

Sanneh, Lamin O. 2009. Translating the Message: The Missionary Impact on Culture. 2. ed., rev. Expanded. American Society of Missiology Series 42. Orbis Books. Read chapter 8 first.


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