Posted on 08/10/2009 8:49:37 AM PDT by Zionist Conspirator
Jews believe that — unlike the Christian Bible, which has been translated from Hebrew and Greek into thousands of languages — the Torah is a near-verbatim copy of G-d's word.
Bloomenstiel is a "sofer," or expert in the age-old art of transcribing Hebrew calligraphy, a job Jews believe began with Moses, the first scribe to reduce G-d's laws to writing.
Since then, on parchment and using bird feathers for pens, holy men have been copying the document by hand. An elaborate system of editing and proofreading is designed to make sure the Torah is pristine.
(Excerpt) Read more at jewishworldreview.com ...
Ping.
Is this some new form of PC?
http://judaism.about.com/od/reformjudaismfaq/f/god_spelling.htm
Among some traditional Jews, speaking even the word "Ad*nai" is avoided outside of worship or study. This "stand-in" for God's name is itself replaced by "Ha-Shem" ("The Name"). The practice also has been extended to other Hebrew words associated with God. For example, the Hebrew word "El*him," which means "God" (the title, not God's name), is pronounced "Elokim" outside of prayer and study. ....Personally, I agree with Rabbi Soloveitchik that it is pointless as this is not Hebrew.
In recent years, some Jews have carried the practice even further by abstaining from writing the English word "God" and substituting the spelling, "G-d" or "Gd."
http://www.jewfaq.org/name.htm
... Judaism does not prohibit writing the Name of God per se; it prohibits only erasing or defacing a Name of God. However, observant Jews avoid writing any Name of God casually because of the risk that the written Name might later be defaced, obliterated or destroyed accidentally or by one who does not know better.
The commandment not to erase or deface the name of God comes from Deut. 12:3. In that passage, the people are commanded that when they take over the promised land, they should destroy all things related to the idolatrous religions of that region, and should utterly destroy the names of the local deities. Immediately afterwards, we are commanded not to do the same to our God. From this, the rabbis inferred that we are commanded not to destroy any holy thing, and not to erase or deface a Name of God.
It is worth noting that this prohibition against erasing or defacing Names of God applies only to Names that are written in some kind of permanent form, and recent rabbinical decisions have held that writing on a computer is not a permanent form, thus it is not a violation to type God’s Name into a computer and then backspace over it or cut and paste it, or copy and delete files with God’s Name in them.
However, once you print the document out, it becomes a permanent form. That is why observant Jews avoid writing a Name of God on web sites like this one or in newsgroup messages: because there is a risk that someone else will print it out and deface it.
Normally, we avoid writing the Name by substituting letters or syllables, for example, writing “G-d” instead of “God.” In addition, the number 15, which would ordinarily be written in Hebrew as Yod-Hei (10-5), is normally written as Teit-Vav (9-6), because Yod-Hei is a Name...
Welcome back, mencken!
Let’s accept your premise that translations are not “canonical”. Even so, are translations made by Jews, such as the Septuagint, at all useful in uncovering the sense of the Hebrew? In other words, isn’t it a fragment of evidence that Jewish scholars picked X foreign word and not Y in translation?
I am assuming the traditional account of the Septuagint’s authorship by Jewish scholars, which knowing you, is probably not a good assumption. But if you don’t like that particular example just address it in the theoretical. :)
Just breezing by during a road trip. Blessings for your Noahide efforts!
None of the original Septuagint, which was a coerced translation of only the Five Books of Moses by 70 rabbis, has survived.
What is the Septuagint we have now then? And what evidence do you have for saying the extant version is not the original?
I don't get it...The fella copying the scroll speaks English...What's to prevent him from translating correctly into English what he is reading and writing in Hebrew???
Why not learn Hebrew and read the original? It's not that difficult. If it had been, I couldn't have done it. I couldn't even learn Greek! (Granted, Greek is harder.)
Anyway, there is a Midrash that Moses wrote the Torah in "seventy languages" (referring to the number of primary non-Jewish nations), and non-Jews may study the Torah in their own language. In fact, they may study a traditional rabbinic Biblical commentary that gives the peshat (plain sense).
But you must remember that the Torah and Na"KH weren't given to the world as a whole but to Israel. The appropriation of Israel's Holy Books by chr*stianity because they are now "universal" is a chr*stian distortion.
I am assuming the traditional account of the Septuagint’s authorship by Jewish scholars, which knowing you, is probably not a good assumption. But if you don’t like that particular example just address it in the theoretical. :)
One of the disasters mourned on the fast day of `Asarah BeTevet is the translation of the Jewish Scriptures into another language, opening the way for their appropriation and misuse by other religions. Yeah, this seems to somewhat contradict the "seventy languages" thing, but . . .
Um, to clarify, it’s the translation of the Septuagint that is mourned on `Asarah BeTevet!
You obviously don't, and to tell the truth I don't get your question. Exactly what are you asking?
The person described by the article is a sofer, a Jewish Scribe. He is not translating at all. He is hand copying a Torah Scroll (in the original Hebrew text, all consonants and no vowels or punctuation) in accordance with the innumerable laws and regulations (handed down since the days of Moses) so that when he is finished he will have written a kosher Torah Scroll that is an exact replica of the one written by Moses and, before that, the First Great Torah Scroll written by G-d. It is only these kosher hand-written scrolls that are used for Torah readings in synagogue services.
A little cocky aren't ya???
So what you are saying is God preserved His word in an all but dead language and the few people that do read the language aren't capable of translating it of that language...
In that case, we don't know if there were 10 Commandments or 24...Or none at all...And we don't know what they are if they do exist...
This is why the Hebrew Bible can never be adequately translated into any other language and why no other religion can possibly interpret it correctly.
So maybe God then did not create the heavens and earth...Would seem like God would have taught his chosen people a language like English instead of Hebrew so we could all learn what God had to say...
Yeah, this seems to somewhat contradict the "seventy languages" thing, but . . .
Well, if there weren't a bit of contradiction, it wouldn't be the work of Jewish scholars! ;)
Could we say rather that the Torah was given to the world through Israel?
(1) Christianity is a heresy and invalid.
(2) The Torah should not have been translated because it enabled the heresy of Christianity.
(3) The Torah is only for the Jews, who are the only Chosen People of God.
ZC, you are welcome to correct me.
I still don't understand what iscool is talking about. He simply isn't making any sense to me. And for admitting that I don't understand he calls me "cocky?"
G-d wrote the Torah in Hebrew, the Holy Language. The Holy Letters of the 'Alef-Bet were the first things created, and they formed the "building blocks" of all the created worlds. The entire human race spoke Hebrew until the haflagah (dispersal) at the Tower of Babel. The Torah could not have been written in any other language.
If you think the Torah's only message is the one that comes through in a translation, you are very, very mistaken. This is part of it, true. But the Hebrew letters have numerical value that don't come through in a translation. There are acrostics and codes hidden at equidistant letter spaces, and these cannot be translated. The names of the letter have meaning. The sizes and shapes of the letters have meaning (that's why it takes so long to write a Torah scroll correctly). Everything must be just right, and none of these things come across in a translation. Even the spaces between the letters have meaning! Sorta makes your Thomas Nelson printed King James "bible" seem inadequate, doesn't it?
And iscool, the Torah, and in fact none of the Bible, was given to you. It was given to Israel. It is their heritage. They are the only ones who may delve into its deep secrets, and they are certainly the only ones who can interpret it correctly. And yes, the chr*stian claim that the "old testament" is now the common property of the entire human race, which has somehow taken Israel's place, is (pardon the non-kosher expression) "hogwash."
Thanks for your help, PapaBear, and my apologies for perhaps embarrassing you. I know you don't agree with me, but I appreciate the fact that you can understand my position even if you don't agree with it.
You have a fundamental misunderstanding of ZC's position about the relationship between Jews and the rest of the world.
It is perhaps clarified by these passages from Isaiah chapter 60:
10 "Foreigners will rebuild your walls,And Chapter 61:
and their kings will serve you.
Though in anger I struck you,
in favor I will show you compassion.11 Your gates will always stand open,
they will never be shut, day or night,
so that men may bring you the wealth of the nations—
their kings led in triumphal procession.12 For the nation or kingdom that will not serve you will perish;
it will be utterly ruined.13 "The glory of Lebanon will come to you,
the pine, the fir and the cypress together,
to adorn the place of my sanctuary;
and I will glorify the place of my feet.14 The sons of your oppressors will come bowing before you;
all who despise you will bow down at your feet
and will call you the City of the LORD,
Zion of the Holy One of Israel.15 "Although you have been forsaken and hated,
with no one traveling through,
I will make you the everlasting pride
and the joy of all generations.16 You will drink the milk of nations
and be nursed at royal breasts.
Then you will know that I, the LORD, am your Savior,
your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob.17 Instead of bronze I will bring you gold,
and silver in place of iron.
Instead of wood I will bring you bronze,
and iron in place of stones.
I will make peace your governor
and righteousness your ruler.18 No longer will violence be heard in your land,
nor ruin or destruction within your borders,
but you will call your walls Salvation
and your gates Praise.19 The sun will no more be your light by day,
nor will the brightness of the moon shine on you,
for the LORD will be your everlasting light,
and your God will be your glory.20 Your sun will never set again,
and your moon will wane no more;
the LORD will be your everlasting light,
and your days of sorrow will end.21 Then will all your people be righteous
and they will possess the land forever.
They are the shoot I have planted,
the work of my hands,
for the display of my splendor.22 The least of you will become a thousand,
the smallest a mighty nation.
I am the LORD;
in its time I will do this swiftly."
5 Aliens will shepherd your flocks;
foreigners will work your fields and vineyards.6 And you will be called priests of the LORD,
you will be named ministers of our God.
You will feed on the wealth of nations,
and in their riches you will boast.7 Instead of their shame
my people will receive a double portion,
and instead of disgrace
they will rejoice in their inheritance;
and so they will inherit a double portion in their land,
and everlasting joy will be theirs.8 "For I, the LORD, love justice;
I hate robbery and iniquity.
In my faithfulness I will reward them
and make an everlasting covenant with them.9 Their descendants will be known among the nations
and their offspring among the peoples.
All who see them will acknowledge
that they are a people the LORD has blessed."10 I delight greatly in the LORD;
my soul rejoices in my God.
For he has clothed me with garments of salvation
and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness,
as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest,
and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.11 For as the soil makes the sprout come up
and a garden causes seeds to grow,
so the Sovereign LORD will make righteousness and praise
spring up before all nations.
You really believe this? NO other religion? What religion are you talking about?
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