Judaism, part II
For the sacred text selection, I have selected the flood story from the Bible. As mentioned in an earlier announcement, I changed the text selection from the story of Joseph to the flood story. And while there is a disaster in the story, this particular one highlights the idea of a covenant between God and his people, in this case and chronologically, at this time, the Jewish people. Later, when Christianity develops, Christians will adopt what becomes the Old Testament from the Bible, and then, Christians will have the New Testament as part of their sacred text.
I need to briefly discuss translation---this is important as it controversial and debatable. However, it is important for you to know. Translation in general is a difficult thing the more complex and more important the text is. Basically, when translating from one language from anther, inevitably, something is lost. In languages there are phrases, expressions, cultural constructs that are not always able to be best explained or have an exact cross over meaning from one language to another. Even within the same language there can be some differences.
Take for example: Yesterday, I put petrol in my lorrie. That makes no sense in the Unites States, but in the UK it does make sense. Yesterday, I put gas in my truck. Does that sound better? And then even within regions there are complications. While you may know how to make groceries and walk across the neutral ground without issues, will a person from Florida or California understand what you are talking about? While these are “fun” examples, consider what that could mean when translating a sacred text into one or multiple languages---what is lost? What is gained? We are left to the interpretation of the translator. Will the person provide a very literal (and possibly dry) translation or a liberal translation (taking liberties here and there). Will it be required for the person to learn or memorize a language for the specific purpose of only knowing that sacred text in its original language? The Bible is even more complicated as it is written in a few languages and dialects: Hebrew, Aramaic, another dialect of Aramaic, and Ancient (Biblical) Greek. Translations also change over time--- Here is the beginning of Noah and Flood from the King James Bible—compare to the NIV version below. Notice the change in styles for the different respective audiences.
The King James Bible (1611)
6:9These are the generations of Noah: Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations, and Noah walked with God. 6:10And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth. 6:11The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. 6:12And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth. 6:13And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth. 6:14Make thee an ark of gopher wood; rooms shalt thou make in the ark, and shalt pitch it within and without with pitch. 6:15And this is the fashion which thou shalt make it of: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits. 6:16A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third storiesshalt thou make it.
Genesis 6:9-9:17 New International Version (NIV)
Noah and the Flood
9 This is the account of Noah and his family.
Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God. 10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth.
11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. 14 So make yourself an ark of cypress[aLinks to an external site.] wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out. 15 This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high.[bLinks to an external site.] 16 Make a roof for it, leaving below the roof an opening one cubit[cLinks to an external site.] high all around.[dLinks to an external site.] Put a door in the side of the ark and make lower, middle and upper decks. 17 I am going to bring floodwaters on the earth to destroy all life under the heavens, every creature that has the breath of life in it. Everything on earth will perish. 18 But I will establish my covenant with you, and you will enter the ark—you and your sons and your wife and your sons’ wives with you. 19 You are to bring into the ark two of all living creatures, male and female, to keep them alive with you. 20 Two of every kind of bird, of every kind of animal and of every kind of creature that moves along the ground will come to you to be kept alive. 21 You are to take every kind of food that is to be eaten and store it away as food for you and for them.”
22 Noah did everything just as God commanded him.
7 The Lord then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family,because I have found you righteous in this generation. 2 Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate, 3 and also seven pairs of every kind of bird, male and female, to keep their various kinds alive throughout the earth. 4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights, and I will wipe from the face of the earth every living creature I have made.”
5 And Noah did all that the Lord commanded him.
6 Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters came on the earth. 7 And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. 8 Pairs of clean and unclean animals, of birds and of all creatures that move along the ground, 9 male and female, came to Noah and entered the ark, as God had commanded Noah. 10 And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth.
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, on the seventeenth day of the second month—on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened. 12 And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.
13 On that very day Noah and his sons, Shem, Ham and Japheth, together with his wife and the wives of his three sons, entered the ark. 14 They had with them every wild animal according to its kind, all livestock according to their kinds, every creature that moves along the ground according to its kind and every bird according to its kind, everything with wings. 15 Pairs of all creatures that have the breath of life in them came to Noah and entered the ark. 16 The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the Lord shut him in.
17 For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth. 18 The waters rose and increased greatly on the earth, and the ark floated on the surface of the water. 19 They rose greatly on the earth, and all the high mountains under the entire heavens were covered.20 The waters rose and covered the mountains to a depth of more than fifteen cubits.[eLinks to an external site.][fLinks to an external site.] 21 Every living thing that moved on land perished—birds, livestock, wild animals, all the creatures that swarm over the earth, and all mankind. 22 Everything on dry land that had the breath of life in its nostrils died. 23 Every living thing on the face of the earth was wiped out; people and animals and the creatures that move along the ground and the birds were wiped from the earth. Only Noah was left, and those with him in the ark.
24 The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days.
8 But God remembered Noah and all the wild animals and the livestock that were with him in the ark, and he sent a wind over the earth, and the waters receded.2 Now the springs of the deep and the floodgates of the heavens had been closed, and the rain had stopped falling from the sky. 3 The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, 4 and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat. 5 The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.
6 After forty days Noah opened a window he had made in the ark 7 and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth.8 Then he sent out a dove to see if the water had receded from the surface of the ground. 9 But the dove could find nowhere to perch because there was water over all the surface of the earth; so it returned to Noah in the ark. He reached out his hand and took the dove and brought it back to himself in the ark. 10 He waited seven more days and again sent out the dove from the ark. 11 When the dove returned to him in the evening, there in its beak was a freshly plucked olive leaf! Then Noah knew that the water had receded from the earth. 12 He waited seven more days and sent the dove out again, but this time it did not return to him.
13 By the first day of the first month of Noah’s six hundred and first year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry. 14 By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the earth was completely dry.
15 Then God said to Noah, 16 “Come out of the ark, you and your wife and your sons and their wives. 17 Bring out every kind of living creature that is with you—the birds, the animals, and all the creatures that move along the ground—so they can multiply on the earth and be fruitful and increase in number on it.”
18 So Noah came out, together with his sons and his wife and his sons’ wives.19 All the animals and all the creatures that move along the ground and all the birds—everything that moves on land—came out of the ark, one kind after another.
20 Then Noah built an altar to the Lord and, taking some of all the clean animals and clean birds, he sacrificed burnt offerings on it. 21 The Lord smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of humans, even though[gLinks to an external site.] every inclination of the human heart is evil from childhood. And never again will I destroy all living creatures, as I have done.
22 “As long as the earth endures, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night will never cease.”
God’s Covenant With Noah
9 Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth. 2 The fear and dread of you will fall on all the beasts of the earth, and on all the birds in the sky, on every creature that moves along the ground, and on all the fish in the sea; they are given into your hands. 3 Everything that lives and moves about will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything.
4 “But you must not eat meat that has its lifeblood still in it. 5 And for your lifeblood I will surely demand an accounting. I will demand an accounting from every animal. And from each human being, too, I will demand an accounting for the life of another human being.
6 “Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind.
7 As for you, be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it.”
8 Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him: 9 “I now establish my covenant with you and with your descendants after you 10 and with every living creature that was with you—the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you—every living creature on earth. 11 I establish my covenantwith you: Never again will all life be destroyed by the waters of a flood; never again will there be a flood to destroy the earth.”
12 And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come: 13 I have set my rainbow in the clouds, and it will be the sign of the covenant between me and the earth. 14 Whenever I bring clouds over the earth and the rainbowappears in the clouds, 15 I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life. 16 Whenever the rainbow appears in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and all living creatures of every kind on the earth.”
17 So God said to Noah, “This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth.”
Footnotes:
- Genesis 6:14Links to an external site. The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.
- Genesis 6:15Links to an external site. That is, about 450 feet long, 75 feet wide and 45 feet high or about 135 meters long, 23 meters wide and 14 meters high
- Genesis 6:16Links to an external site. That is, about 18 inches or about 45 centimeters
- Genesis 6:16Links to an external site. The meaning of the Hebrew for this clause is uncertain.
- Genesis 7:20Links to an external site. That is, about 23 feet or about 6.8 meters
- Genesis 7:20Links to an external site. Or rose more than fifteen cubits, and the mountains were covered
- Genesis 8:21Links to an external site. Or humans, for
Post Questions:
From the notes, how important do you think translation is with sacred texts? Does it matter that a person must know the language or is it important to make sure more followers have translations so that they can understand the content? Do you see a way to find balance between strict knowledge of the original language and translations for followers?
In the above passage, what do you observe about reconciliation between God and man (Noah and his sons) in the creation of a covenant? How does this passage represent the idea of a covenant with the Jewish people as seen in their religious belief systems?