09-17-2008, 11:25 PM
Shlama Akhi Thirdwoe,
Not a problem at all. These are great questions. Let's go one at a time:
What are the linguistic reasons that caused you to translate it tongues rather than languages?
AGR:
A personal choice really. LISHAN can be either. I think I leaned towards "tongues" because to my mind the passage was talking about spiritual understanding, prayer, and thoughtful interpretation. "language" just didn't seem to bring that over directly enough to my taste. "languages" were confused at the Tower of Babel by YHWH. Here, Rav Shaul is talking about the opposite YHWH-inspired speech that can edify, or at least the kind of speech that comes through spiritual process and focus. So "language" seemed too clinical and "tongue" more spiritually based.
Next:
And would the term "understanding" mean the same as "Mind".
AGR:
Technically yes--madeaa can mean "mind", but again the spiritual nature of the text caused me to go away from that. See, my problem there is Greek vs. Semitic thought process. In the mindset of the Greeks the "soul" is something separate from the body. It is something we have tucked away somewhere. We often talk--too much in my opinion--about "mind, body, spirit" as discrete categories.
But in the Torah, specifically Genesis 2:7, we are told the Ruach of YHWH breathed into Adam and he became a LIVING SOUL. So Adam does not HAVE a soul; rather he IS A SOUL. The term nefesh (Aram. naphsha) can also be translated as LIFE or even SELF. We are told, for example, that in Lev 17:11 the NEFESH is in the blood. If the NEFESH is in the blood, then the SOUL is mixed in with our physical reality in some way not totally clear but definitely evident.
Although, if I went with MIND here then it would imply from a Greek view that one's intellect rather than one's spirit was engaged in the prayer process, and the way that might be taken by others could extend into areas that I didn't want folks to go after reading Mari. This is what we call in the trade "connotation vs. denotation" or the difference between the technical/dictionary meaning of a word and the way it may be inferred away from that meaning.
It is no small thing to wrestle with. We could for example look at Y'shua's view of the Shema in places like Matti 22:37. He says, "Love YHWH with all your HEART (the seat of intelligence in the ancient world) all your SOUL (nefesh), all your MIGHT and all your MIND", but MIND is a different word, raiyana. So does that "love" of YHWH imply intellect, spirit or both? I took the Eastern view of this Eastern text that all these things were kind of bound up together; i.e. that within say the NEFESH were our emotions, memory, personality, etc; so it sort of starts with our intelligence (heart) but it goes through a kind a spiritual transit that plain old "mind" just didn't convey to me.
Such is more art than science I am afraid. There are other places where any of these choices could be the alternate choice without any problem whatsoever. It is more context and experience with the language filtered through one's own style, that dictates how it ultimately comes.
And finally:
Translating these passages the way you did here makes sense and is, I believe, the correct way to translate them.
AGR:
Thanks for that. Hope I didn't ramble too much.
Shlama w'burkate
Andrew Gabriel Roth
Not a problem at all. These are great questions. Let's go one at a time:
What are the linguistic reasons that caused you to translate it tongues rather than languages?
AGR:
A personal choice really. LISHAN can be either. I think I leaned towards "tongues" because to my mind the passage was talking about spiritual understanding, prayer, and thoughtful interpretation. "language" just didn't seem to bring that over directly enough to my taste. "languages" were confused at the Tower of Babel by YHWH. Here, Rav Shaul is talking about the opposite YHWH-inspired speech that can edify, or at least the kind of speech that comes through spiritual process and focus. So "language" seemed too clinical and "tongue" more spiritually based.
Next:
And would the term "understanding" mean the same as "Mind".
AGR:
Technically yes--madeaa can mean "mind", but again the spiritual nature of the text caused me to go away from that. See, my problem there is Greek vs. Semitic thought process. In the mindset of the Greeks the "soul" is something separate from the body. It is something we have tucked away somewhere. We often talk--too much in my opinion--about "mind, body, spirit" as discrete categories.
But in the Torah, specifically Genesis 2:7, we are told the Ruach of YHWH breathed into Adam and he became a LIVING SOUL. So Adam does not HAVE a soul; rather he IS A SOUL. The term nefesh (Aram. naphsha) can also be translated as LIFE or even SELF. We are told, for example, that in Lev 17:11 the NEFESH is in the blood. If the NEFESH is in the blood, then the SOUL is mixed in with our physical reality in some way not totally clear but definitely evident.
Although, if I went with MIND here then it would imply from a Greek view that one's intellect rather than one's spirit was engaged in the prayer process, and the way that might be taken by others could extend into areas that I didn't want folks to go after reading Mari. This is what we call in the trade "connotation vs. denotation" or the difference between the technical/dictionary meaning of a word and the way it may be inferred away from that meaning.
It is no small thing to wrestle with. We could for example look at Y'shua's view of the Shema in places like Matti 22:37. He says, "Love YHWH with all your HEART (the seat of intelligence in the ancient world) all your SOUL (nefesh), all your MIGHT and all your MIND", but MIND is a different word, raiyana. So does that "love" of YHWH imply intellect, spirit or both? I took the Eastern view of this Eastern text that all these things were kind of bound up together; i.e. that within say the NEFESH were our emotions, memory, personality, etc; so it sort of starts with our intelligence (heart) but it goes through a kind a spiritual transit that plain old "mind" just didn't convey to me.
Such is more art than science I am afraid. There are other places where any of these choices could be the alternate choice without any problem whatsoever. It is more context and experience with the language filtered through one's own style, that dictates how it ultimately comes.
And finally:
Translating these passages the way you did here makes sense and is, I believe, the correct way to translate them.
AGR:
Thanks for that. Hope I didn't ramble too much.
Shlama w'burkate
Andrew Gabriel Roth