Why We Do What We Do.

Sango language learning is fun.

I have never learned an African language before and there are little things in the language that are much different than Latin based languages like French or English.

One of the most interesting little features of Sango to me so far is the “heart” phrases.  It seems that any description of any emotion is embedded in a phrase saying something like “My heart is happy” Be ti mbi anzere” or as we say in English “I am happy”.  Although it is technically possible to say “I am happy” (Mbi yeke anzere) it is just not the way people say it.  You say “My heart is happy.” Your heart is always this or that depending on your present emotional state.  You get the point.

 

So, today I was looking up a word in our little Sango/English/French dictionary and I came upon the word for fire (wa).  It had a subentry under the verb saying that “be it lo za wa” literally translated “[his] heart shines/burns like a fire” which means in English “He is furious”.  “My heart is burning” in Sango means “I am red-faced furious.”  So, I immediately stored that somewhere in the recesses of the (ever filling) foreign language section of my grey matter to later retrieve when needed. 

 

But I immediately thought of the passage in Luke 24 when after Jesus appeared to two of his disciples on their way to Emmaus after His resurrection.  Those disciples were sad and discouraged thinking that Jesus was the Messiah and would triumphantly set up his kingdom in Jerusalem and reign.  But they were very disappointed when Jesus was crucified.  Jesus began explaining to them from the Old Testament no doubt that the triumphant Son/King/Messiah of Psalm 2 would also be the suffering Servant of Isaiah 53 whose body would not see corruption and be raised from the dead.  At this time they did not recognize Jesus but at the end of their day Jesus sat down at with them broke bread and gave thanks.  At that very moment they finally realized that it was Jesus and then Jesus disappeared. 

After these incredible events the two disciples said to themselves, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” That is to say in Greek our hearts were happy.  A burning heart in Greek means a happy heart, a burning heart in Sango…well….

 

I immediately laughed and thought, I wonder how the older Bible translation of Sango translated this verse.  Hopefully, they didn’t do a literal/word-for-word translation of that passage!

You see, although there are more than 62 languages here, Sango is a trade language and was the first language in CAR to have the Bible translated in it.  There are two translations of Sango here in CAR.  One is the old version that doesn’t have the best reputation (at least among certain folk) for being a quality translation.  However, it has been around for a long time and churches here seem to exalt this translation in the same way like some people exalt the KJV in the states.  In the sort of way that is like, “It doesn’t matter if I don’t understand a lot of the old language or phrases in my King James, it is the way God has preserved his word in English and I’m going to read it whether or not I need a dictionary to understand basic words in the text.” CAVEAT:  Of course, the KJV was done very well, and I know that many people who hold an “only KJV” view have much more sophisticated arguments than that.  But, of course, I have met many people whose KJV arguments are basically summed up in the previous quote. END OF CAVEAT

 

And there is a new translation in modern Sango where the translators where trained in exegesis and translation principles by (ahem ahem) a Wycliffe translation consultant (the very one who actually will be my mentor who I will be apprenticed under when he arrives from Switzerland next month.)

 

I compared the two translations of Luke 24:32 that says “Didn’t our hearts burn within us when he explained the scriptures?” and the two translations were very different.

 

The Old translated “Word-for-Word”

Lo yeke fa na ani tene ti Mbeti ti Nzapa. Be ti ani ayeke tonga na wa pepe?

[Literally translated]  [when] he showed to us the Scriptures, Weren’t our hearts like a fire?  (but the word translated to the English ‘our’ is also archaic and is only used in churchy language. The word that means ‘our’ or ‘we’ is ‘e’ in modern Sango)

[A good English translation]  “Weren’t we furious when He was explaining the Scriptures to us?”

 

The New translated “Meaning-for-Meaning”

Lo yeke fa nga na e nda ti tene ti Mbeti ti Nzapa so, Be ti e anzere fade mingi pepe?

[Literally translated] [when] he showed us the meaning of the Scriptures. Weren’t our hearts very happy?

[A good English translation]  “Weren’t we glad when He was explaining the Scriptures to us?”

 

So,  the old translation communicates something very different than the new translation.  By the way, the new got the original meaning from the Greek right, the old got it wrong.

With laughter and sadness I’m imagining 50 years of pastors trying to explain why these disciples were angry when Jesus was explaining the Scriptures to them in their sermons on this text.  Can you imagine how they would apply those verses to the congregations everyday lives?

 

Anyways, this is why we are here.  We are here to train mother tongue translators how to first correctly understand the meaning of the Biblical text (exegesis) so that they can translate the meaning from the original languages in a way that has the same meaning in their language (translation principles).

 

What a great and wonderful thing when the Bible is translated well, and what a sad and sometimes confusing, and sometimes dangerous thing it is when it is done wrong. 

Lord help us all in this glad and sober work.