Re-translating the Bible

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Rich McQuillen
Posts: 9
Joined: Sat Apr 13, 2019 10:01 am

Re-translating the Bible

Post by Rich McQuillen »

Hi guys,
My Hebrew is terrible. I look at the letters, and some of them look the same. It's honestly hard for me to transcribe. One of my goals of joining this forum is to improve both identifying letters on sight, and also learning some Hebrew.

That being said, I have a buddy of mine who has created a proto-semitic dictionary by comparing modern Ethiopian to an Egyptian Dictionary. If the words match, then the modern word must be an ancient word.

Next, he used this proto-semitic dictionary to re-translate Genesis and Exodus. Some of these renderings are very different from the standard translations. And for names, he's deriving Etymologies and losing names entirely. I don't have the expertise to evaluate these alternate renderings.

I have his permission to share parts of these alternate renderings here. I can see that the level of difference is too high to say that his re-translation is reliable (so it's not reliable). But, this is still using a semitic language to re-examine the bible, so "some" of these re-translated words may have some merit and value to this forum.

I look forward to seeing the thoughts of others, once I begin sharing a sentence here and there, in response to existing topics..
Thanks,
Rich
kwrandolph
Posts: 1531
Joined: Sun Sep 29, 2013 12:51 am

Re: Re-translating the Bible

Post by kwrandolph »

Rich McQuillen wrote:Hi guys,
My Hebrew is terrible. I look at the letters, and some of them look the same. It's honestly hard for me to transcribe. One of my goals of joining this forum is to improve both identifying letters on sight, and also learning some Hebrew.
That’s what most of us are here for. Even those of us who have studied long and hard, still can learn. Further we can still make mistakes (and feel stupid when those are elementary mistakes).

Or take me for example—I have dyslexia, I can’t tell how many times I looked up non-existent words, or worse, existent but the wrong words, while trying to learn Hebrew. If I can learn a bit of Hebrew, so can you.
Rich McQuillen wrote: That being said, I have a buddy of mine who has created a proto-semitic dictionary by comparing modern Ethiopian to an Egyptian Dictionary. If the words match, then the modern word must be an ancient word.

Next, he used this proto-semitic dictionary to re-translate Genesis and Exodus. Some of these renderings are very different from the standard translations. And for names, he's deriving Etymologies and losing names entirely. I don't have the expertise to evaluate these alternate renderings.

I have his permission to share parts of these alternate renderings here.
It would be best if he were to sign up to this forum himself and be ready to defend his translations himself. Be forewarned, there are some world-class scholars with PhDs on this forum. Your buddy will have to be ready for some high level research.
Rich McQuillen wrote: I can see that the level of difference is too high to say that his re-translation is reliable (so it's not reliable).
That’s exactly why your buddy should sign up onto this forum, rather than have you in the middle going back and forth.
Rich McQuillen wrote: But, this is still using a semitic language to re-examine the bible, so "some" of these re-translated words may have some merit and value to this forum.
That depends, and a lot of t hat has to do with his attitude. There are a couple of people who regularly post in this forum whose messages I don’t even read, let alone respond to them They’re not here to learn, rather here to push their pet theories.
Rich McQuillen wrote: I look forward to seeing the thoughts of others, once I begin sharing a sentence here and there, in response to existing topics..
Thanks,
Rich
Welcome to the journey. Learning Hebrew then reading Tanakh can be a real rewarding trip.

Karl W. Randolph.
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