THE NEW WESTERN ARRARNTA BIBLE
The Western Arrarnta (Arrarnta Tjorritja) Bible which is being launched today
(21/9/97), stands at the end of a long line of translation effort. One of the
principal aims of the missionaries who first came to Hermannsburg, was to learn
the local language, so that they could translate the Scriptures and present the
Christian message in the people's own language.
The first missionaries arrived at what came to be called
Hermannsburg (Ntaria) in 1877. The vigour with which they applied themselves to
language learning can be gleaned from the fact that their first publication in the
Arrarnta language, entitled GALTJINTANA - PEPA Kristianirberaka Mbontala,
appeared in 1891, having been printed in Hannover, Germany. The book comprised 24 Old Testament stories, 9 Psalms, 48 New Testament stories, 53 Hymns,
22 Occasional prayers and Luther's Small Catechism.
The difficulties they had with the translation of Biblical concepts like holy,
Lord, Kingdom of God, blessed etc., can be gauged from the fact that they used
Latin equivalents. While the translations as such left a great deal to be desired,
one can but admire their effort and tenacity.
The Rev. Carl Strehlow who arrived at Hermannsburg in 1894, and died in
1922, was a prolific translator. He revised and greatly expanded the GALTJINTANA
- PEPA of the first missionaries. He added more Bible stories and Hymns. He also
translated the Communion Liturgy, and prayers for each day of the week. He
called his book the GALTJINDINJAMEA - PEPA Aranda-Wolambarinjaka, and this
appeared 10 years after his arrival at Hermannsburg. A second edition of this book
was published 1924, after his death, by Auricht's Printing Office in Tanunda, S.A.
This book remained in use for many years.
While Bible stories from the Scriptures had been in use for some time, Rev.
C. Strehlow was the first to actually translate the New Testament. Although the
whole New Testament was never published, the British and Foreign Bible Society in
Australia did publish the Gospel of Luke in 1925, and then the 4 Gospels in 1928.
These editions were printed in Great Britain.
Looking at these early Scripture translations, it is clear that these men were
still struggling to learn the grammar of the language.
The next major translation of the Scriptures was undertaken by T.G.H.
Strehlow, the son of Rev. Carl Strehlow. The fact that he had been exposed to the
language as a child, and had learnt to speak it as a child, is very evident in the
translation of the New Testament which he made, and which was subsequently
published in 1956 by the British and Foreign Bible Society in Australia, and printed
by Griffin Press in Adelaide.
A feature of TGH Strehlow's translation was his use of diacritics i.e., various
symbols such as dots and dashes under letters to indicate their correct
pronunciation.
Two other features of this translation need to be noted, for they ultimately
created the need for the new translation which is being launched today.
Firstly, TGH Strehlow hoped that his translation would help to preserve the
richness of the Arrarnta language, and to that end he incorporated many words and
synonyms which at that time were only know to the old people. They told him that
they would teach these words to the younger generation, but this does not appear
to have eventuated, as many of these words are now not known, and have not
been known for some time.
Secondly, when TGH Strehlow was translating, it was still held that
translations of the Scriptures had to be word equivalent. The net effect of this
principle was to force the Arrarnta language into an alien mould - a Greek/English
mould. Where Greek used a concept, the Arrarnta had to be turned into a concept,
even when the language did not naturally use concepts. Where Greek used long
sentences with many relative clauses, the Arrarnta translation used long sentences
with relative clauses, even when it was not natural for the language to use this
form.
The end result was that TGH Strehlow's translation of the New Testament
became more and more unintelligible, as people lost more of their vocabulary, and
didn't have the skills to decipher the meaning behind very complicated grammatical
constructions which were foreign to the language.
In more recent years there has been a dramatic change in the theory and
practice of translating. While the former method was word equivalent, the current
method is functional equivalent or meaning based, with the meaning being
expressed in the idiom of the language into which the translation is being made.
For example, the Hebrew of the Old Testament, speaks of the richness and fertility
of the Promised Land in terms of a land flowing with milk and honey. The word
equivalent method of translating would mean finding words for land, flowing, milk
and honey. It would not necessarily ask whether this way of translating conveyed
the same thought as the words had in Hebrew. It was enough to translate the
words, word for word, as far as this was possible.
The meaning equivalent way of translating begins by asking: What is the text
saying about the land, when it says it is flowing with milk and honey? Then it
would ask: Would translating it word for word convey the same meaning in Arrarnta
as in Hebrew? If not, how should it be translated in Arrarnta, in order to get
across the meaning of the Hebrew? Incidentally, if one were to translate it word
for word, not only would one not convey what the Hebrew words are saying, but
one would convey something the text never intended saying. In Arrarnta the word
for milk and breast are identical, so you can work out for yourself the pictures a
land flowing in milk and honey would conjure up in the minds of Arrarnta readers
and hearers!!
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Work on the current translation began as a low priority back in 1985. By
low priority, I mean it was squeezed in when other work permitted. Only more
recently did it gain first priority, and other things were left undone when needed.
There are several aspects of this translation which I will now mention.
This is the first time that the Scriptures available to Arrarnta speakers have
not only contained the New Testament, but also extensive portions of the Old
Testament. Given the constraints of time, it was not possible to translate the
whole of the Old Testament. However, the pre-history stories of the Old
Testament, beginning with the stories of creation, and concluding with the
confusion of language, were translated. As was the whole history of Israel,
beginning with the call of Abram, and ending with the return of the Jews from their
captivity in Babylon. Except for the first 11 chapters of Genesis, none of these
stories had previously been translated or published.
Two objectives were uppermost in the minds of those who worked on the
translation. The first was to be faithful to the word God had spoken to us, and
which was recorded in Hebrew in the Old Testament, and in Greek in the New
Testament. And the second, to communicate this word in the Western Arrarnta
language and idiom, including the use of euphemisms when cultural custom
demanded this. Sometimes when the thoughts expressed were simple, or the text
was largely narrative, the task of translation too was relatively simple. At other
times not so. For example, take these words from Isaiah's vision in the temple:
Holy, holy, holy!
The Lord Almighty is holy!
His glory fills the earth. (GNB)
"His glory fills the earth." The Arrarnta have no word for glory. And how
can one speak of his glory filling the earth! The thought is difficult enough in
English. After tearing my hair out for some time, I remember ringing Dr. John
Kleinig, an Old Testament lecturer from Luther Seminary, for some advice. After a
great deal of discussion (good for Telstra's bottom line!), he asked whether the
Arrarnta had a word for a taboo place, or a place where objects of significance were
kept. I said yes. And he then said, why don't you turn Isaiah's thought around,
and say that the whole earth is God's taboo place, a place of significance because of
God's presence? And that is how we translated it:
"Alha ntjapara makamaka ekura nama."
I must admit the Arrarnta translation conveys Isaiah's meaning to me more
meaningfully than the English.
While I headed up the translation project, a word about those who
contributed their particular gifts to this translation. Pastor Hans Oberscheidt,
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former Pastor at Hermannsburg. Not only was he good at Greek, a stickler for the
truth, but also a good lateral thinker. Mr. Garry Stoll for whom Arrarnta was a
second language. He made useful comments on things like intelligibility, and
stopped us from slipping into theological jargon. The late Pastor Nahassen
Ungkwanaka who helped with some early theological formulations. Mr. John
Heffernann who alerted us to "English-isms" which had crept into Arrarnta
theological language, and into the language generally. Pastor Eli Rubuntja. Many
a time I asked him: "How do you say this?" Pastor Davey Ingkamala with his
theological insights, made valuable contributions to the way things were ultimately
said. Besides these, there were the candidates for ministry from Eastern Arrarnta
and Anmatjirra communities, whom Garry Stoll and I used to field test drafts of the
translation in the course of our teaching. Someone's name had to be mentioned
last, but he is by no means least, Dr. Carl Gross, the Bible Society in Australia's
translation consultant. His help in providing us with translation tools, and checking
our work and making useful suggestions, was greatly appreciated.
Finally a word on the spelling and orthography (way of writing the language),
that we used. With few exceptions, we used the spelling that TGH Strehlow had
used, because the Arrarnta people were used to it. However, we found it
necessary to replace his diacritics, i.e., dots to indicate retroflexed sounds, and
dashes to indicate dental sounds. Instead we adopted the method used by others.
Dental sounds were represented with the letter `h’ after the consonant(s) which is
modified. Retroflexed sounds were represented with the letter `r’ in front of
consonant(s) which is modified. The single `r’ was used to represent the
retroflexed ‘r’. The ‘rr’ was used to represent the rolled or trilled r. The `aa' was
used when it was critical to distinguish the long a from the short a and the word
was otherwise spelt the same way, e.g. kaarta (father) and karta (with) or mpaara
(maggot) and mpara (knee). Field testing showed that these changes caused no
problems for Arrarnta readers.
We take this opportunity to acknowledge the work of The Bible Society in
Australia, and thank them for publishing the Western Arrarnta Bible. Our prayer is
that this translation of God's Word may help Arrarnta speakers and hearers to more
clearly hear their Heavenly Father speak to them.
Paul Albrecht
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