Language is a tricky thing. Spelling, grammar, syntax, conjugation, tense, person, etc etc etc. Mastering just one language is tricky enough, but trying to be fluent in two or more is a real accomplishment. I like to say that I know how to speak Spanish, but more accurately, the Spanish I learned in high school and have since retained is probably enough to get me through a vacation and shopping excursion in Mexico. I've tried to pick up Arabic, and from my several deployments to Iraq and Kuwait I've picked up enough to get a conversation going, but not nearly enough to carry it much further than pleasantries or commands in dangerous cases. I've not made much of a big effort to learn much Dari or Pushtu other than a few words here and there. I know I'm remiss, but with my limited brain capacity, I'm afraid I might push out some knowledge I seriously need in the future, like calculus and advanced chemistry...
I remember back in the late 90's boarding an Asiana Airlines 767 to fly back from Korea to the U.S. and one incident sticks out clearly in my mind. A large group of Sikhs boarded and decided that they all wanted to sit together instead of their assigned seat on their tickets. The demure Korean flight attendants were not able to convince the group of Sikhs that they needed to return to their assigned seats because they were blocking all the other passengers from boarding and taking their own seats. The plane's Captain was called back to handle the situation, and this is where it got interesting. The Sikhs were speaking English in a very heavy Pakistani accent and the Captain was speaking English in a very heavy Korean accent. The Sikh's group leader explained that he needed his people to sit together, and the Captain ordered the group to take their assigned seats or he would deplane them. It was a surreal experience as only the Americans appeared to understand what was going on because we were the only group that spoke English as a primary language. The other two groups both spoke English but couldn't understand each other at all.
Having used interpreters for both Middle Eastern languages and in working with the deaf, you realized that your message does not always get translated correctly 100% of the time. That's why they're called "interpreters". They use their best judgement to interpret their best guess from one language to another, where in some cases a word, concept, or idea has no real translation into another language or culture. As a simple test, try this for yourself sometime: Go to an online translation web site such as google or bablefish. Type in a complex sentence in one language then translate it several times in several languages from one to another. Then translate it back to English. Was it what you started with? Of course not, and that's my point.
Switching gears, if I can say anything about Muslims and their religion of Islam it would be that their holy book, the Koran/Quran is still in the same language of Arabic and unchanged since it was written in the early 7th century. Hebrews can say the same thing with their Torah and Talmud, but Christians worship from a book that has been translated, transcribed, and rewritten countless times over the past two millennia. Just like mutations in a genome line, the Bible has picked up plenty of errors over the many centuries since it was first cobbled together by the Nicene Conference between the second and fourth centuries CE. They picked and chose the books of the New Testament Bible they would keep and leave out in order to create Christianity's first holy book. Yes, it was a committee of men who decided what was to be included in the official Bible and what was to be left out. And how many versions of the Bible exist today? I'm not going to even try and list them, but sufficed to say that everyone with an agenda has written their own version complete with it's own slant. This is not to say that the translation of original Hebrew, Koine Greek, or Aramaic manuscripts to Latin, German and other languages and then to English was accurate at all either.
The Bible as we have it today is not the "Word of God"; it's the translations of the transcribing of people who I believe spoke for God and founded my religion long ago. The exact wording in the Bible is flawed and inaccurate, but the major concepts live on as the cornerstones of the faith. Some people who claim to speak for my savior, Jesus Christ, use literal English translations from the Bible as law that should be set in stone, while completely ignoring the true tenants and abstract concepts of the faith. A good Christian knows that in order to follow the Bible, they must interpret what they read and understand that the concepts and historical context are what is important and not the exact wording. Following exactly word for word to a book that is several thousands of years old is neither practical or feasible. And there's no Rosetta Stone to ensure you understand the human author's true intent unless you lived back then. From my perspective, for many of the overtly religious Christians, the Bible has lost all meaning.
More to follow.
I remember back in the late 90's boarding an Asiana Airlines 767 to fly back from Korea to the U.S. and one incident sticks out clearly in my mind. A large group of Sikhs boarded and decided that they all wanted to sit together instead of their assigned seat on their tickets. The demure Korean flight attendants were not able to convince the group of Sikhs that they needed to return to their assigned seats because they were blocking all the other passengers from boarding and taking their own seats. The plane's Captain was called back to handle the situation, and this is where it got interesting. The Sikhs were speaking English in a very heavy Pakistani accent and the Captain was speaking English in a very heavy Korean accent. The Sikh's group leader explained that he needed his people to sit together, and the Captain ordered the group to take their assigned seats or he would deplane them. It was a surreal experience as only the Americans appeared to understand what was going on because we were the only group that spoke English as a primary language. The other two groups both spoke English but couldn't understand each other at all.
Having used interpreters for both Middle Eastern languages and in working with the deaf, you realized that your message does not always get translated correctly 100% of the time. That's why they're called "interpreters". They use their best judgement to interpret their best guess from one language to another, where in some cases a word, concept, or idea has no real translation into another language or culture. As a simple test, try this for yourself sometime: Go to an online translation web site such as google or bablefish. Type in a complex sentence in one language then translate it several times in several languages from one to another. Then translate it back to English. Was it what you started with? Of course not, and that's my point.
Switching gears, if I can say anything about Muslims and their religion of Islam it would be that their holy book, the Koran/Quran is still in the same language of Arabic and unchanged since it was written in the early 7th century. Hebrews can say the same thing with their Torah and Talmud, but Christians worship from a book that has been translated, transcribed, and rewritten countless times over the past two millennia. Just like mutations in a genome line, the Bible has picked up plenty of errors over the many centuries since it was first cobbled together by the Nicene Conference between the second and fourth centuries CE. They picked and chose the books of the New Testament Bible they would keep and leave out in order to create Christianity's first holy book. Yes, it was a committee of men who decided what was to be included in the official Bible and what was to be left out. And how many versions of the Bible exist today? I'm not going to even try and list them, but sufficed to say that everyone with an agenda has written their own version complete with it's own slant. This is not to say that the translation of original Hebrew, Koine Greek, or Aramaic manuscripts to Latin, German and other languages and then to English was accurate at all either.
The Bible as we have it today is not the "Word of God"; it's the translations of the transcribing of people who I believe spoke for God and founded my religion long ago. The exact wording in the Bible is flawed and inaccurate, but the major concepts live on as the cornerstones of the faith. Some people who claim to speak for my savior, Jesus Christ, use literal English translations from the Bible as law that should be set in stone, while completely ignoring the true tenants and abstract concepts of the faith. A good Christian knows that in order to follow the Bible, they must interpret what they read and understand that the concepts and historical context are what is important and not the exact wording. Following exactly word for word to a book that is several thousands of years old is neither practical or feasible. And there's no Rosetta Stone to ensure you understand the human author's true intent unless you lived back then. From my perspective, for many of the overtly religious Christians, the Bible has lost all meaning.
More to follow.
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