Quote:
Originally Posted by Drake
"Evangelical made a "compelling case" for there being "no male bias." Jane made a compelling case that there was male bias. Why don't we put the issue to the translators to verify the veracity of the translation? Why is that such a problem to you and your buddy?"
Ok, let's compare the two "compelling cases".
Jane alleges male bias in the KJV.
Evangelical compared several translations and the gender composition of those translators and showed clearly that the translations that had women were more aligned with KJV than others.
Jane has a hypothesis but no analysis. An opinion is not a compelling case.
If Jane, or you, want to refute his analysis you have the very same resources at your fingertips. He even provided the links he used. If you want to put it to translators then do it. That is part of your perogative in making your case.
It makes no difference to me personally whether you do or not.
Drake
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That's right.
Actually this male bias assumption is also found in Bushnell's "God's Word to women":
While in China as a medical missionary, Bushnell discovered that the Chinese Bible was
mistranslated to support cultural prejudice against the ministry of women. She
wondered whether the same male bias might prejudice English translations as well and
renewed her study of Hebrew and Greek.
So apparently because the Chinese biased their translation, she thinks the Egyptians, Greeks and English , Germans and everyone else did as well?
She does not really go into proving that this male-bias is a thing. It could equally be a result of her being affected by confirmation bias - seeing something there which is not really there because she is looking for it.
She see the male-bias in the verses she sees but does not see the times when the male translators translate verses
in favor of women. This indicates her own confirmation bias.
What is disturbing to me is that Bushnell puts forward a view that the translators were not overseen by the Spirit but their "unconscious self-interest":
It is well known that when a man gets lost on the prairie, he begins to go round in
a circle; it is suggested that one side (the right, generally), being stronger than the other,
he pulls unconsciously with greater strength upon the corresponding guiding rein of his
horse. Just so does the translator; he pulls unconsciously on the strong side of
preconception or self-interest. This may not be intended, but it is none the less inevitable
221 to the uninspired hand.
She clearly does not believe in God's guiding and preserving hand on the translators.
Bushnell's book contains the same unsupported presumptuous nonsense:
But it almost looks as though our English translators took no care, as to the
precise language here
If one wants to make a "compelling case" that male-bias exists because of a majority of males, then they should have some facts and figures to back it up. Jane's analysis is mostly on the text and meaning of the "lemon verses", not the driving idea about how those lemons came to be there in the first place. It's possible that this is found in Bushnell's book and Jane expects us to read that.
Jane does not have much analysis for the idea of male-bias influencing translations, but this "sets the scene" for the rest of the textual analysis which she does do fairly well.
Biblehub has 22 versions of the bible. ISV seems the most friendly towards Jane's view, but has a male-majority on the translation committee.
None of the others seem friendly, some are actually worse than the KJV and reinforce a patriarchal view despite having females on the committee.
Simply having a certain number of females on a committee does not seem to guarantee a female-friendly outcome. I would have thought that female members on a committee provide oversight and would have picked up the problem with Genesis 3:16 if there truly was a problem with it. Some of the female members of the CEB for example are professors in Hebrew and such and it would be well within their capabilities.
It would also depend upon whether the person who was responsible for translating Genesis was male or female and what their particular leanings were.
So I think to do a proper further analysis we have to find whether or not the female-translated versions of Genesis are matching the male-translated versions.
The first problem is to find female-translated versions of Genesis.
Another aspect to consider is that the all-male Greek Septuagint translation of the original Hebrew seems to favor Jane's view because it translates teshuqah as "turning", not desire. Again, I don't think there is much correlation between a translator's gender and their rendering of the verse.