>At 11:10 AM 9/4/97 -0400, Nichael Cramer wrote:
>>McKay family wrote:
>
>>> 'Whoever has ears to hear, let THEM hear' etc. ... at
>>> > least [it's] proper English. [paraphrased Metzger]
>
>>The real problem, of course, is that there simply _isn't_ a way to say
this
>>in gramaical English.
>
>Or in typo-free English ;-> In Mark 4:23, the Greek reads EI TIS ECEI
WTA
>AKOUEIN AKOUETW. I don't see no "him" in the Greek - it is inserted as
part
>of the translation.
>
>How about this: "Let anyone who has ears to hear with listen."
>
Jonathan,
I see a few problems:
1-It weakens the text by changing a command to an exhortation. AKOUETW is
the imperative and has the force of a single command (the difference
between "Sit" and "Please be seated" in English). BTW, the "he" (or "she"
or "it") is implied in the fact that it's third person singular, and
English--unlike Greek and Latin--usually requires that the pronoun
subject of the sentence be expressed by a separate word.
2-It loses the wonderful verbal reinforcement that arises from the
similarity of AKOUEIN and AKOUETW.
3-The keen edge of the EI TIS doesn't come through as forcefully. Who, in
fact, doesn't have ears! Also, despite the fact that AKOUEIN is an
infinitive, the context seems to require translating it "for hearing"--as
though people need to be reminded why they have ears.
Though I've yet to reach even the "little Greek" level (an "in vitro"
Greek, perhaps?), I find myself attracted primarily to the literal
meaning of both the words and the tone they convey--though it's difficult
to be faithful to both when translating into English. (As others have
pointed out, the inclusive language problem is an English issue, not a
Greek issue; though as a professional editor I have no difficulty with
using a plural pronoun with an singular indeterminate subject.) My
approach would be to convey the text literally at first--including the
sarcasm and the command--then reformulate it into good English that
conveys the same complex meaning. A few possibilities:
"Hear, if you have ears for hearing!"
"Can you hear?" (if you couldn't, I wouldn't be talking to you) "Then
hear!"
"Do you have ears? Use them!"
For me, this is the real excitement of being able to read the text in its
original language. But I'm not a fan of the so-called dynamic
translation, since that just replaces what was said with what we'd say
now. Rather, we need both.
In translating this sentence, I suspect we should also take into
consideration the central role that "shema" plays throughout the Hebrew
Scripture, and the fact that the sentence reappears almost verbatim
(just the infinitive is missing) in Revelation: seven times--2:7, 11, 17,
29; 3:6, 12, 22--once to each of the seven churches. On this latter
point, Anne-Marit Enroth offers a thorough analysis in her "The Hearing
Formula in the Book of Revelation," <italic>New Testament
Studies,</italic> vol. 36, 1990, pp. 598-608.
Anthony Prete
212 Marne Avenue
Haddonfield NJ 08033-1444
609/428-1203
tonyp@waterw.com
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