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You're welcome. You might refresh your screen, as I have just made a couple of minor edits.
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• Liddell and Scott's Abridged Greek-English Lexicon. This is the classic Greek lexicon that I used in a 1967 course on Attic Greek and to which I have repeatedly turned during the ensuing decades.
• Liddell and Scott's unabridged Greek-English Lexicon. This is, to the best of my knowledge, the definitive Greek-English lexicon. It is difficult to use on a regular basis, because it is extremely large and heavy. If one had an old-fashioned bookstand on which to place it (which I don't have), it would be ideal. When one wants a fuller treatment of a particular word than what is available in the abridged version, this tome is indispensable. Among other things, it contains many examples of how each significant word was used by ancient Greek authors.
• Herbert Weir Smyth, Greek Grammar. A classic and indispensable reference.
• Donald J. Mastronarde, Introduction to Attic Greek. Although I misplaced the text I used for my 1967 course on Attic Greek, I later purchased this book and studied the entirety of it in my spare time over a period of several months during the 1990s. It is quite useful for learning Greek vocabulary and grammar.
• Peter Jones, Learn Ancient Greek. I have not studied this book in any depth, but it looks like it could be useful.
• Clyde Pharr and John Wright, Homeric Greek: A Book for Beginners. I read part of this book during the 1990s. It is quite interesting. If one only had the time, it would be fascinating to acquire expertise in both Homeric and classical Greek and see how the language evolved.
The following two items involve the Greek New Testament. They accordingly are outside the scope of this group except insofar as the New Testament addresses ethical issues.
• Arthur L. Farstad et al. (eds.), The NKJV Greek-English Interlinear New Testament. This work presents the New King James Version (based on what this edition calls the "Majority Text" of the manuscripts) in marginal columns. The Majority Text Greek is then set forth with a word-for-word English translation and an idiomatic English translation. Footnotes set forth alternative readings of other manuscript texts as well as discussions of the meanings of particular Greek words.
• Wesley J. Perschbacher, Refresh Your Greek: Practical Helps for Reading the New Testament. This book sets forth the Greek text of the Aland edition of the Greek New Testament. This version is somewhat different from the Majority Text used for the New King James Version. The Greek is set forth on each page with footnotes translating each significant word. Separate sections include a "Basic Vocabulary List," a "Summary of Basic Greek Grammar and Syntax," and other materials.
Alan, a 'broad' question here.How would you describe the value of classical education down throughout the centuries of western civilization? That is to say, the teaching of Latin and Greek to youngsters, for example. Familiarity with classic Greek & Roman literature. If you were to place yourself back in any previous century (700s, 1300s, 1800s) would you be in favor of it as a boon to education? Both on the individual level and on the societal level, would you say it was advantageous or no? Can you point out places where it hindered rather than helped, (again) either the person or his nation? Was it ever 'useless' or a 'waste of time'?
I think you can sense my opinion from the way I have phrased my question, but I would still like to hear any pros/cons you can array.
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How would you describe the value of classical education down throughout the centuries of western civilization?"
That is a broad question. People like some of the leading US Founders (Jefferson, for example, who was quite fluent in classical Greek and Latin and had read the ancient authors in their original languages) clearly benefited from the broad humanistic sweep of a classical education. But many modern thinkers considered the medieval and early modern version of such education to be stifling rather than liberating. If memory serves, Francis Bacon, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and many other leading lights of modern philosophy did not like the version of classical education that was the standard fare at places like Oxford and Cambridge until more recent times. See generally William T. Costello, The Scholastic Curriculum at Early Seventeenth-Century Cambridge (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1958), which I cited in The First American Founder: Roger Williams and Freedom of Conscience (Philosophia, 2015), 391n28, with regard to Roger Williams's education at Cambridge. (Costello's book, long out of print, appears not to be available online, but I borrowed a copy through Interlibrary Loan; reprints of unknown quality to me are available on Amazon.) Williams, a radical Protestant, also did not like the scholastic cast of his Cambridge education, though it is clear that he learned much from it. The teaching of modern science was lacking at such traditional institutions until recently. I've only scratched the surface of trying to answer your question. Actually, I was more on top of this issue a couple of years ago and have now forgotten much of what I read about it at that time and even where I read it. Perhaps other group members may be able to contribute something along this line, including a correction of my foregoing statements to the extent, if any, that they are inaccurate.
See also Locke's Some Thoughts Concerning Education, which I believe departed from the existing scholastic model, and Rousseau's Emile, which definitely did. I read the entirety of Emile for a graduate course in 1968 and have not read it since. I have only read small portions of Locke's work on education. You may have read one or both of these works.
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I responded before I saw your amended post. Personally, I wish I had learned Greek and Latin when I was young (I took one quarter of Attic Greek in college and studied it again on my own during the 1990s). I had an opportunity to take Latin in high school but opted for German instead, not knowing then how valuable knowledge of Latin could have been to me in later years. Although these "dead" languages are no longer fashionable, I would give a great deal to be able to read the classical Greek and Latin authors in their original languages, as was the routine intellectual equipment of well-educated gentlemen and scholars until, perhaps, the twentieth century. Of course, such knowledge is not all that "useful," and I would not, in any event, have liked the mandatory scholastic disputations on such subjects as how many angels can sit on the head of a pin. Still and all, some very great thinkers had this kind of education and benefited from it, even if some later complained about it.
It's not entirely clear to me which "side" you are on regarding this issue. I would appreciate your further elaboration on this question.
Thank ye. This is a promising start. When I cast my own mind over the question, innumerable authors, poets, and thinkers come to my mind. There's many more I could not begin to name; which I'm trying to get at. You're assisting. Certainly men like Goethe, Racine, Liebniz, Spinoza, Newton, Copernicus, and Voltaire all had Latin, I'd reckon. The Legal profession; the men in the Royal Academies, the medical profession...Now, this:
Alan wrote: " If memory serves, Francis Bacon, Thomas Hobbes, John Locke, and many other leading lights of modern philosophy did not like the version of classical education that was the standard fare at places like Oxford and Cambridge ..."
Though they disliked it, were they actually the products of such education?
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For the most part, yes.
The US Founders made frequent references to classical Greek and Latin authors, and many of them had read these authors in their original languages. See, for example, the debates over the US Constitution, where, among other things, the authors of anonymous publications used pseudonyms from the ancient past ("Publius," for example, for The Federalist, and "Brutus" for one of the most famous Antifederalist tracts). If one considers these Founders to be of superior intellect, knowledge, and wisdom (disregarding, for the moment, their faults, such as slavery), this may be due in no small part to their classical educations. It just now comes to my mind that the postpresidential correspondence between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson was full of such classical allusions. It's quite astonishing how much they knew.
Fascinating indeed. Where did many of the founders attend school? England, or the colonies?Would you say that these men didn't simply learn the languages, but perforce also became immersed in the classical culture as well? Can one study classical languages but remain immune to lessons of these lost cultures? Can one come away with just language skill but no boon to critical thinking? These are matters of education, (and my curiosity is vaguely-worded and fuzzily-aimed) but I'd still like to hear your opinion.
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The following are excerpts from Wikipedia:
John Adams
[John] Adams, as the eldest child, was under a mandate from his parents to obtain a formal education. This began at age six at a Dame school for boys and girls, which was conducted at a teacher's home and centered upon The New England Primer. Shortly thereafter, Adams attended Braintree Latin School under Joseph Cleverly, where studies included Latin, rhetoric, logic, and arithmetic. Adams' reflections on early education were in the negative mostly, including incidents of truancy, a dislike for his master, and a desire to become a farmer. All questions on the matter ended when his father commanded that he remain in school saying, "You shall comply with my desires." Deacon Adams also retained a new school master named Joseph Marsh, and his son responded positively.
. . . .
At age sixteen, Adams entered Harvard College in 1751. He took all his courses under the tutorship of Joseph Mayhew who administered his entrance exam.[9][10] He did not share his father's expectation that he become a minister. After graduating in 1755 with an A.B. degree, he taught school for a few years in Worcester, Massachusetts while pondering his permanent vocation. In the next four years, he discerned a passion for prestige, saying that he craved "Honour or Reputation" and "more defference from [his] fellows" and, at age twenty-one, he was determined to become "a great Man".[7] He decided to become a lawyer to further those ends, writing his father that he found among lawyers "noble and gallant achievements" but, among the clergy, the "pretended sanctity of some absolute dunces." Doctrinally, he later became a Unitarian, and dropped belief in predestination, eternal damnation, the divinity of Christ, and most other Calvinist beliefs of his Puritan ancestors. Nevertheless, his remnant Puritanism frequently prompted reservations about his hunger for fame, which he once referred to as mere "trumpery", and he questioned his not properly attending to the "happiness of [his] fellow men."[7]
. . . .
Adams followed the usual course of reading the law in order obtain his license to practice. In 1756, he became an apprentice in the office of John Putnam, a leading lawyer in Worcester.[7] In 1758, he earned an A.M. from Harvard,[11] and was also that year admitted to the bar, having completed his studies under Putnam.[12] From an early age, he developed the habit of writing descriptions of events and impressions of men which are scattered through his diary, which included his report of the 1761 argument of James Otis, Jr. in the Massachusetts Superior Court as to the legality of Writs of Assistance. Otis's argument inspired Adams to the cause of the American colonies.[12]
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was born on April 13, 1743 (April 2, 1743 OS), at the family home in Shadwell in the Colony of Virginia, the third of ten children.[1] He was of English and possibly Welsh descent and was born a British subject.[2] His father Peter Jefferson was a planter and surveyor who died when Jefferson was fourteen; his mother was Jane Randolph.[a] Peter Jefferson moved his family to Tuckahoe Plantation in 1745 upon the death of a friend who had named him guardian of his children. The Jeffersons returned to Shadwell in 1752, where Peter died in 1757; his estate was divided between his sons Thomas and Randolph.[4] Thomas inherited approximately 5,000 acres (2,000 ha; 7.8 sq mi) of land, including Monticello. He assumed full authority over his property at age 21.[5]
Education
Wren Building (rear), College of William & Mary where Jefferson studied
Jefferson began his childhood education beside the Randolph children with tutors at Tuckahoe.[6] In 1752, he began attending a local school run by a Scottish Presbyterian minister. At age nine, he started studying the natural world as well as three languages: Latin, Greek, and French. By this time he also learned to ride horses. He was taught from 1758 to 1760 by Reverend James Maury near Gordonsville, Virginia, where he studied history, science, and the classics while boarding with Maury's family.[7]
Jefferson entered the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, at age 16 and studied mathematics, metaphysics, and philosophy under Professor William Small. Small introduced him to the British Empiricists including John Locke, Francis Bacon, and Isaac Newton. Jefferson improved his French and Greek and his skill at the violin. He graduated two years after starting in 1762. He read the law under Professor George Wythe's tutelage to obtain his law license, while working as a law clerk in Wythe's office.[8] He also read a wide variety of English classics and political works.[9]
Jefferson treasured his books. In 1770, his Shadwell home was destroyed by fire, including a library of 200 volumes inherited from his father.[10] Nevertheless, he had replenished his library with 1,250 titles by 1773, and his collection grew to almost 6,500 volumes in 1814.[11] The British burned the Library of Congress that year, and he sold more than 6,000 books to the Library for $23,950. He had intended to pay off some of his large debt, but he resumed collecting for his personal library, writing to John Adams, "I cannot live without books".[12]
. . . .
Jefferson was admitted to the Virginia bar in 1767 and then lived with his mother at Shadwell.
James Madison
From age 11 to 16, young "Jemmy" Madison was sent to study under Donald Robertson, an instructor at the Innes Plantation in King and Queen County, Virginia, in the Tidewater region. Robertson was a Scottish teacher who tutored a number of prominent plantation families in the South. From Robertson, Madison learned mathematics, geography, and modern and classical languages—he became especially proficient in Latin. He attributed his instinct for learning "largely to that man [Robertson]."[8][9]
At age 16, he returned to Montpelier, where he began a two-year course of study under the Reverend Thomas Martin in preparation for college. Unlike most college-bound Virginians of his day, Madison eschewed the College of William and Mary, where the lowland Williamsburg climate—more susceptible to infectious disease—might have strained his delicate health. Instead, in 1769, he enrolled at the College of New Jersey, now Princeton University, where he became roommates and close friends with poet Philip Freneau. Madison proposed in vain to Freneau's sister Mary.[10]
. . . .
Through diligence and long hours of study that may have compromised his health,[11]Madison graduated in 1771. His studies included Latin, Greek, science, geography, mathematics, rhetoric, and philosophy. Great emphasis was placed on speech and debate also; Madison helped found the American Whig Society, in direct competition to fellow student Aaron Burr's Cliosophic Society. After graduation, Madison remained at Princeton to study Hebrew and political philosophy under the university president, John Witherspoon, before returning to Montpelier in the spring of 1772. He became quite fluent in Hebrew. Madison studied law from his interest in public policy rather than the intent to practice law.[12]
Alexander Hamilton
[Hamilton was born and spent his early years in the Caribbean islands.]
The Church of England denied membership to Alexander and James Hamilton, Jr.—and education in the church school—because their parents were not legally married. They received "individual tutoring"[3]:17 and classes in a private school led by a Jewishheadmistress.[14] Alexander supplemented his education with a family library of 34 books.[3]:34
In October 1772, he arrived on the mainland and began learning fundamental subjects missing from his education. He attended the Elizabethtown Academy, a grammar school in Elizabethtown, New Jersey. In 1773, he studied with Francis Barber at Elizabethtown in preparation for college work. He came under the influence of William Livingston, a leading intellectual and revolutionary, with whom he lived for a time at his Liberty Hall.[15] Hamilton entered The King's College in New York City (now Columbia University) in the autumn of 1773 "as a private student", and officially matriculated in May 1774.[16] His friend Robert Troup spoke glowingly of Hamilton's ability to clearly and concisely explain the rights and reasons that the patriots had in their case against the British, in what is credited as his first public appearance on July 6, 1774 at the liberty pole at King's College.[17] Hamilton, Troup, and four other undergraduates formed an unnamed literary society that is regarded as a precursor of the Philolexian Society.
George Washington
The death of his father prevented Washington from an education at England's Appleby School such as his older brothers had received. He achieved the equivalent of an elementary school education from a variety of tutors, as well as from a school run by an Anglican clergyman in or near Fredericksburg.[17][18] There was talk of securing an appointment for him in the Royal Navy when he was 15, but it was dropped when his widowed mother objected.
[AEJ: Washington always felt insecure and inferior to the Founders who were much better educated and well-read than he. However, his writings show that he did absorb a lot of knowledge and information from associating with those who were better educated, and he may also have done a fair amount of reading on his own during those rare periods when he was not otherwise preoccupied with public affairs.]
AEJ Note:
Each of the foregoing supplemented their formal schooling with extensive and intensive reading throughout their lifetimes.
Needless to say, I don't have time or space to provide such details regarding the other Founders. Some of the wealthier Founders went (either before or after the Revolutionary War) to England, where they studied at the Inns of Court to become lawyers. I don't recall off the top of my head whether any of them went to Oxford, Cambridge, etc.
With regard to the question in the last paragraph of your preceding post, the foregoing US Founders certainly did absorb a great deal of wisdom from their reading. I think that this was also true of those who had been raised in English grammar schools and universities. As you say, I don't know how they could have studied the great Greek and Latin classics without acquiring some of the wisdom therein.
I have owned for more than a decade the following books, which, unfortunately, I have not found time to read:
Carl J. Richard, The Founders and the Classics: Greece, Rome, and the American Enlightenment (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1994). (I've read only the "Introduction.")
Caroline Winterer, The Culture of Classicism: Ancient Greece and Rome in American Intellectual Life, 1780-1910 (Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002).
Those were the days, eh? I have always said that I should have been born in the eighteenth century. But then there were the negatives, of which slavery was the most disturbing. John Adams never owned a slave. I'm not sure about Alexander Hamilton. Washington, Jefferson, and Madison, of course, inherited slaves along with their fathers' plantations.
Bravo. Yes, 1700s for you...the 1800s I think, would have been a comfortable era for myself. Just think of the great things that were done in both those eras. Imagine being with Lewis & Clark, or with Jean Lafitte, for example. Imagine being well-read in those timeperiods; the influence one might have wielded...
"The translator is the invisible presence in the equation between writer and foreign reader. In translating (trans-relating) a text from one language to another, they serve as a supreme amanuensis who bridges language and brings writers and foreign readers together."I was looking for an article on the art of translation by my very favorite translator of sacred Chinese and Sanskrit Buddhist texts, Bill Porter, aka Red Pine, but all I could find was an article about him from back in 2002. The article tells all about Bill, who lives near me in Port Townsend, WA and who has given many book readings in Seattle and its environs from and about his translations and travel books. But the article does focus on his views and approach to translation.
Here are some of his words on translation from this article:
“When I was translating Cold Mountain, I definitely didn’t have my own voice,” he says. “With Stonehouse it was somewhere in between. I think I didn’t really discover my translation voice until I did Bodhidharma, which gave me a chance to find the rhythms of my language.
“Every project I’ve engaged in taught me an entirely different way of translation,” he says. I don’t view Chinese poetry today the way I did then. I use to count the words in my English lines and try to do my best to do the same thing they did in Chinese. I was also intrigued about things you can do in English that reflect the Chinese, not to make the English sound Chinese but to do things with it that to me at least seemed unique.
“I tried to do things that I saw happening in Chinese — the Chinese language is a very telegraphic, terse language — time is almost irrelevant, their subject is also dispensed with. A line can be very ambiguous. So I started to play with that in English and still make sense.
“Words carry a lot on their surface, but a lot is under the surface that we don’t see when we see the word — a lot comes from contextual familiarity.
People identify words with context. I was intrigued by the nature of Chinese poetry and its brevity — there were these flashes of meaning.
“What I do now is more of a performance,” he says. “Before, I was usually sort of reading the lines like an actor, but now I perform the book — what I do now is closer to dance. The words have to follow along my physical feel for the rhythm, the feeling of what’s happening in the Chinese poem. I don’t see the Chinese as the origin anymore. The Chinese was what the authors used to write down what they were feeling.
“I’ve gotten so used to the words I don’t have to think about them anymore. I’m more concerned with the spirit. I don’t think I have a philosophy of translation, but you have to be very open.
“You’re trying to get into the heart of another person. I’m fortunate I’ve found materials that present deep hearts. That’s the way I’ve responded with the passion I have. I’m fortunate to have run into the Buddha, Bodidharma, Cold Mountain, Stonehouse and the other Buddhist poets.”
Bill is still around. A terrific guy. If you haven't read anything of his, please do so. The 17th century was just as interesting in China as it was in the New World.
Not exactly about political philosophy, but about the basic problem of getting across the heart of a writer in an culture and language not our own. I thought it might be appropriate here.
Cheers,
Randal
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Very interesting. Thanks, Randal.
Look at this great publisher of political, political history, and ethics subject matter:https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books
Feliks, My 90-year old buddy Mel Leiman's book on the Economics of Racism was published by Haymarket! Cheers, Randal
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https://www.haymarketbooks.org/books"
Thanks, Feliks, for calling our attention to this resource, of which I was previously unaware.
"Trigger warning" for those who are politically right of center: a quick look at this site results in my tentative conclusion that it is substantially left of center. "Not that there's anything wrong with that," as Seinfeld would say. Please, however, refrain from "gnashing of teeth" à la Fox News and instigating congressional investigations over this.
Thanks Felix for the invaluable information. Already registered my e-mail in the newsletter.
Say!Any good resources for latin you all might recommend? Any kind of handy resource or reference for the most common or most useful latin phrases?
Alan has already shared some from his career. Others to browse through?
Perhaps a simplistic question here: if so many of the great philosophers were both natively born and wrote their tracts in German, what does this do to their interpretation of the Greco-Roman classics? If we struggle so much over the language issues of Kant, how can we determine what he is actually saying, when we array his thought back toward what (we believe) Plato and Aristotle said? I suppose I am asking: if much of western philosophy hinges on questions of logic--and the great tradition of Germany thinkers, in interpreting this logic is mangled by the translation of their German letters and German idiom--how then, do we know where we stand at all??
Feliks,I believe Kant was the 'watershed,' so to speak. He certainly did not believe his philosophy was determined by the language it was written in, and he generally provides Latin versions of all his key terms.
It was Hegel who regarded the German language as especially philosophical, but even he did not go as far in this regard as some later German philosophers.
It was Nietzsche, of course, who was radical enough to suggest that certain metaphysical 'axioms' (e.g., a active subject, "I think, therefore..") are mere grammatical prejudices. Anyway, he is also rather sharp on how certain German 'virtues' were actually vices in the realm of metaphysics.
Incidentally, Walter Kaufmann liked to run down the Nietzsche translators of the early 20th C.- and specifically regarding Thomas Common's Thus Spake Zarathustra he may have been right- but I have found that many- or at least some- of the early translators were arguably as good as or better than Kaufmann.
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In the introduction to his translation of Plato's Republic, Joe Sachs, a long-time tutor in the Great Books curriculum at St. John's College in Annapolis, Maryland, discussed the similarities and differences between his translation of the Republic (2007) and that of Allan Bloom (1968, 1991), with additional remarks about the Latin translations of Aristotle by William of Moerbeke (whom Bloom acknowledged as a model):
"But why should the English-speaking world be subjected to yet another version of the Republic? Over the past forty years or so, I have read the dialogue all the way through in translation at least a dozen times. Whatever new translation I have read from time to time, I have always returned to that of Allan Bloom as by far the most accurate available. I have no serious complaints about Bloom’s translation, but the mere fact that it has held the field since 1968 is reason enough to try to discover whether a worthy alternative to it can be provided. I don’t seek to emulate Thrasymachus, who thinks an intelligent person would want to outdo any artful piece of work by someone else, but it is at least true that I don’t share Bloom’s preoccupations, and the different choices I have made may foster some new thought and discussion about an inexhaustible book. I depart a bit farther than Bloom does from the 19th century diction enshrined forever in such reference works as the lexicons of Liddell and Scott and the commentary of James Adam, without moving all the way into current colloquial speech. That sort of attempt to hit a moving target can never simply be a success. 'You’re a damned shyster,' Raymond Larson’s version of a remark at 340D, no more captures the exact tone and content of the original than 'Do you play the sycophant with me, my good sir?' would; it merely changes the manner of its obsolescence. Plato’s characters can be kept recognizably human and natural, speaking neither the English one might have heard in the rooms of an Oxbridge don in 1905, nor the sort one would find in barrooms, or chat rooms, in 2005.
"Like Bloom, I have tried to respect the text as written. I have no desire to revise the author’s style to suit my own tastes, as Cornford did in 1941, or to recast a recollected conversation into the format of dramatic imitation, as C. D. C. Reeve’s 2004 version does. . . . Clearly such choices by Plato are not thoughtless or incidental, but intrinsic parts of intelligent and artful work, and if any author’s judgment is worthy of respect, this author’s is. But the example Bloom cites as a model translator is not one I would care to imitate either. William of Moerbeke translated the works of Aristotle on the assumption that Greek of the 4th century BC was a coded form of his own 13th century AD Latin, and could be transposed into it by a simple one-to-one substitution of prefix for prefix, root for root, and ending for ending. If that assumption is false, and no word in any natural language has the same range of meaning as any one word in another, then that sort of literalism has to sacrifice accuracy much of the time. Bloom, of course, is never guilty of such a foolish consistency, but I am less likely than he to regard a Greek word as too important to be allowed to vary with its context. Plato’s Greek is conversational, and words that others have taken in fixed senses always have a certain fluidity in his dialogues, as Socrates leads those around him, and us, to see more and more in them. To sacrifice the way in which both Plato and Socrates shift various aspects of meaning to the foreground may produce a literal translation, but it cannot be considered accurate translation.
"One matter of fact that provides an occasion for a new round of translations of the Republic is the availability since 2003 of a newly edited version in the Oxford Classical Texts series. This is not a seismic shift, but it does produce a slight resettling of the ground beneath our feet. S. R. Slings has no major new discoveries to work from, but he reports consultation of an extensive array of evidence, including papyrus manuscripts and ancient translations into Middle Eastern languages. John Burnet’s Oxford text was kept in print for a century, but he and James Adam of Cambridge had many small disagreements based on their opinions of the relative trustworthiness of the various medieval manuscript traditions. I hereby declare that (with the two exceptions noted in 454B and 556E) I have trusted Slings’s scholarship to resolve all such discrepancies better than I could, but in fact most of the textual points in dispute are so small that they will be invisible to the reader within the inevitable differences among translations. To give one random example typical of many, at 370B where the text Bloom worked from has the word práxei, accented as a verb in the future, he translates it with the phrase 'for the accomplishment,' while the text I used has prâxin, accented as a noun in the accusative, which I translate 'in practice'; Reeve, basing his translation on the same text I used, leaves the word out of his English version altogether."
Joe Sachs, introduction to Republic, by Plato, trans. and ed. Joe Sachs (Newburyport, MA: Focus, 2007), 13-15.
I had a friend once who had taught himself Latin. Seneca was his favorite writer, and Allan Bloom was maybe second place (he also spoke highly of Of Time, Work, and Leisure).Anyway, he went to the library and found a medieval Latin translation of Plato's Meno. He thought a medieval Latin version, if he could read it, would be closer to the original than a modern English translation.
But he told me it was too literal. It treated Plato as a scientific text of which every word had to be placed in the same order in Latin as in Greek.
The point of using William of Moerbeke as a model, however, besides his strict literalism, is that Thomas Aquinas relied on W of M's translations in his commentaries on Aristotle, and Thomas Aquinas was the supreme interpreter of Aristotle, without knowing Greek.
There seems to me to be a very major problem as regards the ins and outs of translation which has not been addressed, a problem that grows in proportion as the text being translated rises in significance.The probelm I speak of has to do with what is commonly referred to as "accuracy." ALL such claims simply beg the question - accuracy to "what"?--the apparent or the hidden dimension, and language is a very tricky medium, indeed language goes to the core of what humans are (try expressing a decent thought without using any words.... uh huh?)
For me every translation is an interpretation and saying that the more accurate are better interpretations would, as I already mentioned, beg the question.
Can there be hope, then?
I would maintain that only those translators who are kindred spirits are able to adequately translate great philosophy, and they are few in number. The masses will continue to rely on accuracy,
as Kurt Vonnegut says: so it goes.
An instance from the New Testament: Jesus speaks to his mother before the transformation of water into wine: "Woman what have I to do with you." >> There's your literal translation that totally befuddles the entire scene.
A translation that dives down into the heart of the matter would be: "What is there that weaves betwixt you and me" -- which shows that Christ's first "miracle" relied upon a power existing betwixt Christ and his mother.....
at least so as I see it, not that you'll find any New Testaments that are so enlightened....and if that book has such flaws, well....so it goes....
pl.
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The problem is that the reader then has to trust the interpretation of the translator. The reader has to assume that the translator and the original author have a "mind meld" as it were. But different scholars have different interpretations of Plato, Aristotle, et al. What then? Who does the reader trust? The alternative is for the translator to translate the words and sentences as literally as is possible (consistent with English style and usage) with footnotes explaining alternative interpretations (where there are alternative translations/interpretations of the text). This is the procedure adopted by the Straussians. One example is the Bartlett/Collins translation of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics. I admit, however, that there may still remain some legitimate differences, not always reflected in the footnotes, about how the Greek words should be understood and translated. For example, the Sachs translation of the Nicomachean Ethics follows similar Straussian translation principles but still has a somewhat different approach in interpreting and translating the work. In addition to the present topic, such issues are discussed in the Ethical Philosophy of Aristotle, Plato, and Leo Strauss and the "Straussians" topics. See also my essay "Some Thoughts on Book 1 of Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics.
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See especially posts 1 and 23 of the present topic. Post 1 links my previous (as of 12/27/2016) discussions of translation matters. Although the search box (upper right of this page) does not seem to be retrieving all early posts, a search therein for "translation" identifies a number of recent posts on this issue, including some that disagree with me and agree, in general, with Phillip. In particular, Rodney has recently challenged my approach.
A "mind meld" is indeed what is needed - and the mind is spirit, which at its core is ONE > hence the idea of the Idea as capable of unification with Being - as per Plato's Parmenides or Plotinus' philosophy of union with the divine.....Otherwise, we become animals - relying on thought that has no divine origin and is determined, truth becomes relative, etc...
But, of course, such ideas are not particularly in vogue these days....
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I am neither a relativist nor a determinist, but I disagree with your position and could argue against it. That would, however, take me into matters of theology and personal revelation which, according to your own statement, underlie your position. As I have repeatedly stated, theological issues are beyond the scope of this Goodreads group. Accordingly, I will refrain from discussing them here, and I request that you also observe this rule.
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I have a free download on: Translating What's Written Between the Lines >> http://home.earthlink.net/~ushaphil/i... Although it deals with translating Kafka and the ideas of "over and under translation" - it appliles to any and all translations.... the other major issue is consciousness per se - assuming that it is not a constant, rather that consciousness itself is something that changes over time (and space - tribal, post-tribal, modern....).
I'd be glad to clear up any ?s if there are any.... note that the Bible is itself (& I'm meaning the New Testament) a prime candidate for faulty translations > if indeed it is an inspired text and deals as much with the spiritual as it does with the physical.... Who these days takes spiritual realities seriously?
p.
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In post 23, above, I discussed, inter alia, the question of the differences between the translations of Joe Sachs and Allan Bloom of Plato’s Republic. I have now, at long last, finished reading Sachs’s translation of the Republic and have compared his and Bloom’s translations here.
Vocabulary puzzler. Alan, you're savvy with Greek word forms. I just happened to notice that, 'author' is found in the root of the words, 'authoritarian' and 'authority'. Wondering what makes this so? Any idea?
Searching all the usual web resources, nothing turning up so far...
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I just happened to notice that, 'author' is found in the root of the words, 'authoritarian' and 'authority'. Wondering what makes thi..."
This would be a subject of philology, a field in which I am not an expert. If Nietzsche were still alive, you could ask him. He was, for a time, a professor of classical philology. As his writings (like them or not) attest, he certainly had a way with words.
This is what Merriam Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary Online says about the origin of the word “authority”:
Middle English authorite, alteration of autorite, auctorite, from Old French autorité, auctorité, from Latin auctoritat-, auctoritas, from auctor originator, author + -itat-, -itas -ityThat’s all I know about this question.
First Known Use: 13th century (sense 1a)
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Well, now you’ve triggered my curiosity. The classical Greek word for “authority” is exousia (ἐξουσία), which the Liddel and Scott Greek-English Lexicon defines as (1) “power or authority to do a thing,” (2) “abuse of authority, license, arrogance,” or (3) "office, magistracy . . . .” Exousia was used in one or more of these sense by Xenophon, Plato, Aristotle, and other classical writers. Accordingly, the English word “authority” appears to be of Latin rather than Greek origin. I've never studied Latin and know little about that language.
Some of the background of "Authority" may be the medieval habit of treating as valid information anything derived from ancient auctores (authors). In the often-useful The Discarded Image: An Introduction to Medieval and Renaissance Literature, C.S. Lewis pointed to the sixth-seventh century example of Isidore of Seville, a favorite encyclopedist of the Middle Ages. To quote Lewis, "When auctores come into play, Isidore makes no kind of differentiation between them. The Bible, Cicero, Horace, Ovid, Martial, Pliny, Juvenal, and Lucan (the latter chiefly on snakes) all have for him exactly the same sort of authority."(Lewis often emphasizes the "bookishness" of the real Middle Ages as it shows up in its literature.)
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Thanks, Ian, for this information.
The connection between Auctoritas and Auctor is a bit complicated. See, for example, the meanings in Classical and Medieval Latin:https://logeion.uchicago.edu/auctoritas
Try under "Lewis and Short" and "DMLBS" (Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources)
(Lewis and Short is the standard Latin-English dictionary, for those unfamiliar with the designation.)
and https://logeion.uchicago.edu/auctor
(same headings)
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https://logeion.uchicago.edu/auctoritas
Try under "Lewis and Shor..."
Thanks, again, for the expert information.
For the complicated history of Lewis and Short, and its faults and obsolescence, see Wikipedia, under “A Latin Dictionary,” with its cross-references.
Google "Greek words in Plato and Aristotle" and you will find several sites. You could, of course, change the Google search to other ancient Greek authors, e.g., Homer, the Greek dramatists, Herodotus, Thucydides, the Greek sophists and rhetoricians, and so forth.
The present post provides links to several comments about translations that I have earlier posted in various topics in this group.
In my discussions of this matter, I am referring to translations into English of texts originally written in other languages, mostly (but not exclusively) texts originally written in ancient Greek. Other posters are welcome to add their own information, including, if applicable, translations into languages other than English. Note that discussions of translations often occur in topics devoted to a particular philosopher or historian. Although I have attempted to reference all such existing posts, there may be similar future discussions in other topics, which may or may not end up being cross-referenced in the present topic.
The following are links to previous discussions of translations in other topics in this group:
• Post 16 (last four paragraphs) of the Leo Strauss and the Straussians topic (Straussian principles of translation).
• Post 38 of the Plato topic (section on "Straussian Translation Principles").
• Post 1 of the Ethical Philosophy of Aristotle topic in the "Ethics" folder (Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics and Eudemian Ethics).
• Posts 1-2 of the Aristotle topic in the "Political Philosophy" folder (Aristotle's Politics).
• Post 1 in the Thucydides topic (Thucydides).
• Post 1 in the Cicero topic (Cicero's Republic and Laws).
• Post 1 in the Spinoza topic (Spinoza's Theologico-Political Treatise).
• Post 5 in the Montesquieu topic (Montesquieu's Spirit of the Laws).
Several of the translations referenced in the above-listed posts discuss the meanings of key terms in the work being translated. Some of them also contain glossaries of such words.