Translating the Bible: The Ethiopic Version of the Old Testament

Abstract

Translating Bible: Ethiopic Version of Old Testament, by Michael A. Knibb. Schweich Lectures for 1995. New York: Oxford University Press for British Academy, 2000. Pp. xii + 145. $45.00. In his Schweich Lectures, Michael Knibb returns to a theme broached some thirty years ago by Professor Ullendorff his magisterial Ethiopia and Bible, Schweich Lectures for 1967 (Oxford University Press, 1968). Ullendorff s first lecture, Translations, described status quaestionis of research into Ethiopic Bible at that time. But as Knibb notes, intervening decades have witnessed a tremendous advance this field. Although a complete critical is still lacking, a great number of editions of individual books have appeared, (Knibb himself has been actively involved this work, having edited with Ullendorff of 1 Enoch, and having prepared Ezekiel.) This justifies a revisiting of questions, which is precisely what Knibb skillfully undertakes. Knibb begins by returning to question of Vorlage of Ethiopic Bible. It is generally agreed that Ethiopic Bible, once translated, was subject to extensive revisions with result that scholars have long debated extent to which various other traditions (Hebrew, Greek, Syriac, Arabic, Coptic) are represented. Conventional wisdom holds that ca. fifth-sixth century, a translation was made from LXX, which was revised fourteenth century on basis of Syro-Arabic texts (the vulgar recension), and revised once more ca. fifteenth-sixteenth century on basis of Hebrew texts (the academic recension, pp. 2-3). Over last century and a half, however, this account has been regularly called into question. After summarizing these objections, Knibb responds to them, offering a finely nuanced defense of conventional wisdom (pp. 11-40). Noting that history of earliest translations is patchy and often ambiguous, Knibb insists that settling question of Vorlage can only be done on basis of internal evidence (p. 17). Knibb claims there are very strong reasons indeed for thinking that LXX was basis for this translation: The fact that Ethiopic version of Old follows Septuagint and its word order very closely and existence within Ethiopic of transliterations from Greek, and of mistakes that can only be explained terms of Greek, point conclusively to view that Ethiopic version was made primarily, if not necessarily exclusively, from a Greek text (p. 19). balance of book consists of Knibb's close comparison of Ethiopic and Greek texts. Here, he examines techniques used process of translation in order to form a considered view of character and accuracy of Ethiopic translation of Old Testament (p. 56). In his second lecture, Translation Techniques, Knibb makes seven observations about persistent features of Ethiopic. first is that Ethiopic translation is generally (often, slavishly) literal; Knibb then notes that this makes Ethiopic a literal translation of a literal translation-which may account for parallels between Ethiopic and Hebrew (p. 60). Knibb's second observation is that Ethiopic prefers verbal constructions to LXX's nominal constructions. He takes this as evidence for the instinctive adoption of what seemed normal (p. 65), since periphrastic substitution of clauses for participles, adjectives, and even nouns is a regular feature of Ge'ez (p. 63). Third, Knibb notes that Greek tense system is far more complex than Ethiopic, which means Ethiopic perfect forms often substitute for Greek aorist formsthough this is generally without cost to accuracy (pp. …