NWT translation of Daniel 1:2 and 607 (page 2)

onacruse

celebrated WT scholars

And who might those be?

Pray tell us.

belbab

Welcome back, Scholar,

Where ya bin?

They say death and taxes are constants.

Glad to see there is another one, namely.

Scholar.

I give you an "A" for your comment about the verse in Daniel.

belbab

Leolaia

"The actual time involved is not specified".

Indeed. There is no adverbial phrase to translate, no indication of a duration, which is what "in time" implies in English. The waw + imperfect here simply indicates, as you said, a narrative progression of events in a sequence of time. That's it. B comes after A. It has no implication of an duration (however unspecified) between the events (cf. Genesis 2:21, where the consecutive events occur in a single specified act of sleeping). Duration is not implicit in the semantics of the verb but determined pragmatically from the narrative itself (as it is in Genesis 4:1). So "in time" does not translate anything in the text. Now, since, it is pragmatically known that sieges can last week or months (if not longer on rare occasions), a loose non-literal translation or paraphrase may decide to add "in time" or some other expression to make the narrative sound better, but this is not translating anything from the text itself and I thought the NWT is supposed to be a "literal" translation. If the claim is that "in time" actually translates something from the text, then this is an overtranslation.

Narkissos

The pertinent phrase in Daniel 1:2 "In time" renders the literal Hebrew verb "And gave". This verb is the future/imperfect form yiten of the verb natan (give) and when combined with waw properly has the meaning 'and then' or 'in time'. This combination (waw + imperfect=yiqtol) is known as a wayyiqtol. The actual time involved is not specified but is determined by the context which in this case is the preceeding verse one indicating that the action was not immedciate but a succession of events

Hi scholar,

As I pointed out, the previous and following verbs are equally wayyiqtol. Why weren't they (and thousands of other wayyiqtol verbs in the Hebrew Bible) found worthy of the "pertinent phrase" "in time" (which is, btw, quite different semantically from "and then")?

See how the NWT renders the wayyiqtol:

In the third year of the kingship of Je·hoi´a·kim the king of Judah, Neb·u·chad·nez´zar the king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and proceeded to lay siege to it. 2 In time Jehovah gave into his hand Je·hoi´a·kim the king of Judah and a part of the utensils of the house of the [true] God, so that he brought them to the land of Shi´nar to the house of his god; and the utensils he brought to the treasure-house of his god.

Iow, the "mystery" in which FW Franz wrapped the Hebrew wayyiqtol served no other purpose than allowing him to bend the translation at his whim, for extra-textual (and in this particular case inter-textual) considerations as you pointed out.

scholar

Leolaia and Narkissos

Context is everything. I disagree with you that no element of duration is implied in verse 2 necessitating the rendering 'In time' as specified by the verb yiten, an imperfect form combined with waw. This form can be used to indicate succession such as 'in time' or 'and then' but the context such as verse 1 does indicate duration by the expression "and proceeded to lay seige to it". Hence, it may be the case that NWT as a literal transalation is simply recognizing the context and the precise verbal form is translating accurately the Hebrew.

Thus it is not 'over translating' but simply being the most accurate-brilliant translation ever made and we all can be so ever grateful to the Author of the Holy Scriptures and His Holy Spirit and the 'celebrated WT scholars for making this possible in this most important of times.

scholar JW

onacruse

celebrated WT scholars

You still haven't answered my question about just who these "celebrated WT scholars" might be.

Of course, credentials are one thing, but recognized secularly-published articles would be invaluable evidence of just how "celebrated" these people might be.

searcher

celebrated WT scholars

You will get no answer because there is no answer, it's just an element of humor injected into the post.

Narkissos

scholar,

I doubt you can fool anybody -- including yourself.

Strictly speaking, extra-textual or inter-textual considerations (such as, how long did Jehoiaqim actually reign or how long did he reign according to other texts) are the very opposite of context.

Btw, have you finally started learning Hebrew?

behemot

I asked the same question to Greg Stafford by posting it on his site's "Interactive Chat" (www.elihubooks.com) and here is his reply (posted at 2007-12-21 06:26:41, PST ):

Hello, Behemot:

The Hebrew waw is not only used as a conjunction but it also, when it precedes certain verbal forms, can have many other semantic

indications. In this case, it is combined with the future/imperfect form (YiTeN) of the verb NaTaN (“give”), and so the meaning of the preceding

waw as “in time” is quite possible. This combination (waw + imperfect [= yiqtol]) is known as a “wayyiqtol,” and when used it can indicate a

succession such as “and then,” or even “in time.” Of course, the actual “time” between successions is often not clearly indicated, but it can be

interpreted to some degree based on the events in the surrounding context. So you should look at the context of events and how they are

presented overall in relation to words used in order to determine whether or not the succession is immediate or if there is some time between

events that may be appropriately communicated in the translation.

Regards,

Greg

So, I wonder, did scholar find, copy and paste Greg's reply or ... ?

Behemot

jayhawk1

How's it going Scholar? I can't believe you still post here after being so thoroughly pounded by AlanF in the 607 debate last year.

NWT translation of Daniel 1:2 and 607

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