Danny Renner
1 Samuel 17:43-49

King James Version

[43] And the
Philistine said unto David, Am I a dog, that thou comest to me with staves? And
the Philistine cursed David by his gods.

[44] And the
Philistine said to David, Come to me, and I will give thy flesh unto the fowls
of the air, and to the beasts of the field.

[45] Then
said David to the Philistine, Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a spear,
and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God
of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied.

[46] This
day will the LORD deliver thee into mine hand; and I will smite thee, and take
thine head from thee; and I will give the carcases of the host of the
Philistines this day unto the fowls of the air, and to the wild beasts of the
earth; that all the earth may know that there is a God in Israel.

[47] And all
this assembly shall know that the LORD saveth not with sword and spear: for the
battle is the LORD's, and he will give you into our hands.

[48] And it
came to pass, when the Philistine arose, and came and drew nigh to meet David,
that David hasted, and ran toward the army to meet the Philistine.

[49] And
David put his hand in his bag, and took thence a stone, and slang it, and smote
the Philistine in his forehead, that the stone sunk into his forehead; and he
fell upon his face to the earth.

 

Translation

[43] And the
Philistine said to David, “Am I a dog, that thou comest to me with a staff?”
And the Philistine cursed David by his gods. (DRB)

[44] And the
Philistine said to David, “Come to me, and I will give thy flesh unto the fowls
of the air, and to the beasts of the field.” (KJV)

[45] Then
said David to the Philistine, “Thou comest to me with a sword, and with a
spear, and with a shield: but I come to thee in the name of the LORD of hosts,
the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou hast defied. (KJV)

[46] And the
Lord shall give thee in mine hand, and I shall slay thee, and I shall take
thine head from thee; and today I shall give the dead bodies of the tents of
Philistines to the fowls of heaven, and to the beasts of the earth; that all
the earth know, that the Lord God is in Israel, (WYC)

[47] And all
this church shall know, that the Lord saveth not with sword and spear: for it
is his battle, and he will deliver you into our hands.” (DRB)

[48]
And when the Philistine arose to come and draw near unto David, David hasted
and ran to fight against the Philistine. (GEN)

[49]
And David put his hand in his bag, and he took out a stone, and he casted it
with his sling, and led about, and smote the Philistine in the forehead; and
the stone was fastened in his forehead, and he felled down into his face on the
earth. (WYC)

    

          The norms that are
often considered when translating Biblical texts into a different language can
be blurred, but the Roman Catholic Church has taken steps in an attempt to
provide more clarity into the matter over the years.  Many church councils, made up of Cardinals
and Bishops, have met over the years to discuss the boundaries, and one such
council, The National Conference of Catholic Bishops, released a letter stating
how they would evaluate Biblical translations. 
In their release they stated, among other criteria, that the two main principles
for judging the translations would be “the principle of fidelity to the word of
God and the principle of respect for the nature of the liturgical assembly”
(National Conference).  I understood this
to mean that the importance of the translation lay in keeping the original word
of God, while there was a lot of flexibility in making the language easier to
understand.

     While doing my translation, I wanted to
use older versions of the Bible with more accurate translations, and only
change wordings if they would make no sense to a modern day reader.  I chose verses from four different versions
of the Bible, picking the ones that were easiest to understand. Meanwhile, I
was also trying to keep the rhythm of the Bible, even as I was drawing from
different translations.

     Verse 43 in the King James Version
references the word ‘stave’, which I translated to mean ‘staff’, although it
could also be translated to mean ‘sticks’ (Oxford).  I chose not to use ‘stave’ because it is not
a common word today, and it seemed more likely that David would be carrying a
staff, as opposed to a bundle of sticks. 
Similarly in verse 49, some versions of the Bible claim that David “put
his hand in his scrip,” whereas I translated the word ‘scrip’ to mean ‘bag’
(Oxford).

     In verse 45, David claims, “I come to thee
in the name of the LORD of hosts, the God of the armies of Israel, whom thou
hast defied,” although some translations state, “which thou hast defied.” I
believe that ‘whom’ references God, whereas ‘which’ alludes to God’s earthly
armies, essentially pitting Goliath, the Philistine, against God himself, and
giving the statement more spiritual perspective.  Likewise, some versions of the Bible use
‘assembly’ in verse 47, while some use ‘church’. I chose the latter to strengthen
the spiritual context. Generally, when choosing verses to include in my
translation, I was more inclined to choose a verse referencing the religious
aspect of the story, rather than list physical events and leave the reader to
guess at the spiritual aspects to be gleaned.  

     Overall, when choosing a verse from a
Bible translation, I kept it whole, except for ‘church’ and ‘bag’, in verses 47
and 49.  I wanted to keep the messages of
the verses intact and felt that combining verses would either lead to confusion
or misconstrued information.  The Bible
translations I used were centuries apart (1380-1752), but used very similar in
language, so I was not overly concerned with including translations from
multiple sources.

 

WorksCited:

Douay-Rheims
Bible (DRB). http://drbo.org/. Web.17 Feb. 2015

King James
Version (KJV). quod.lib.umich.edu. Web.17 Feb. 2015

Wycliffe
Bible (WYC). biblegateway.com. Web.17 Feb. 2015

Geneva Bible
(GEN).  genevabible.org. Web.17 Feb. 2015

Oxford English
Dictionary. Web. 17 Feb. 2015. <http://www.oed.com>.

National Conference of Catholic Bishops.
Translations of Scriptural Texts

  

Proposed. 1997. Pastoral Letters of the United States Catholic Bishops:

 

1989-1997. Comp. Hugh Joseph Nolan. Ed. Patrick W. Carey. N.p.: USCCB

   

Publishing, 1998. 207-14. Google Books. Web. 17 Feb. 2015.  https://books.google.com/books?id=5k5RFxDisLMC&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false

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