Accuracy vs. Clarity in Bible Translation: The Case of Jeremiah 7:21-23

Which do you prefer: (1) a translation that makes sense on its own, without off-site explanation, or (2) a translation that is a head-scratcher until an explanation is given which clears things up, and even then leaves you wondering if you have it right?

Almost everyone I know, except J. K. Gayle whom I wish to congratulate for his well-earned doctorate, prefers, all others things being equal, a type (1) translation. Trouble is, all things are rarely equal. More often than usually imagined, a Bible translation that makes sense if read on the fly - that is, without background knowledge of the kind the source text's author could take for granted among the intended audience - is purchased at a formidable cost: non-equivalence to its source.

Jeremiah 7:21-23 may exemplify. Not too long ago, Ken Brown drew attention to this passage in a remarkable attempt at articulating a postmodern doctrine of Scripture.

The villain translations of this post are translations I cherish and use on a regular basis: NIV/TNIV and NLT1/NLT2. The translations that come out smelling, if not like a rose, at least not like a skunk, are NJPSV, RSV=ESV, NRSV, REB, NAB, and NJB. I cherish and use these translations on a regular basis.

Here is Jer 7:21-23

כֹּה אָמַר יְהוָה צְבָאוֹת אֱלֹהֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל

עֹלוֹתֵיכֶם סְפוּ עַל־זִבְחֵיכֶם

וְאִכְלוּ בָשָׂר

 

כִּי לֹא־דִבַּרְתִּי אֶת־אֲבוֹתֵיכֶם

וְלֹא צִוִּיתִים

בְּיוֹם הוֹצִיאִי אוֹתָם מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרָיִם

עַל־דִּבְרֵי עוֹלָה וָזָבַח

 

כִּי אִם־אֶת־הַדָּבָר הַזֶּה צִוִּיתִי אוֹתָם לֵאמֹר

 

שִׁמְעוּ בְקוֹלִי

וְהָיִיתִי לָכֶם לֵאלֹהִים

וְאַתֶּם תִּהְיוּ־לִי לְעָם

 

וַהֲלַכְתֶּם בְּכָל־הַדֶּרֶךְ אֲשֶׁר אֲצַוֶּה אֶתְכֶם

לְמַעַן יִיטַב לָכֶם

Here is my DE – not FE - translation:

יהוה of Armies, the God of Israel, has this to say:

Add your whole offerings to your other sacrifices:

eat the meat of them all!

 

When I instructed your forefathers

and made demands on them

on the day I brought them out of Egypt,

I said nothing about whole-offering or sacrifice;

 

I made this demand on them:

 

“Listen to my voice,

and I will be your God

and you will be my people.

 

Walk in all the ways I enjoin on you,

and it will go well for you.”

 

Rashi and Kimchi per Moshe Weinfeld in the article cited below understood the passage correctly to say God gave Israel foundational instruction - the Ten Words - as the basis of everything else, in which instruction about whole-offering and other sacrifice had no place, in accordance with a hierarchy of truth reflected in the order of the narrative:

Exodus 19:5=Jer 7:23: Listen to my voice

Exodus 20:1-17: the Ten Words

Exodus 20:22-26: instruction regarding altar and sacrifice

Weinfeld points out that Jeremiah belonged to a current which objected to attributing any instruction whatsoever about whole-offering and sacrifice to “the day,” broadly understood, in which God brought the Israelites out of Egypt. Thus, in the book of Deuteronomy, the Ten Words alone are reported to have been given at Sinai/Horeb (Deut 5). Subsidiary instruction is given a generation hence, in the plains of Moab (Deut 6-30). The legal corpus proper, including instruction about whole-offerings and sacrifice, is found at a significant remove from the Ten Words (Deut 5), in Deut 12-26.

The point is not substantially different from the one made already by the order of events in Exod 19-20 continued in the larger Ex-Lev-Num complex. But Deut makes the foundational nature of the Ten Words, without adherence to which obedience to additional instructions is ineffective, that much clearer by means of a 40 year separation between the giving of the Ten Words and the rest of God’s instructions.

Furthermore, as Jacob Milgrom points out, God’s ire as reported by Jeremiah in this passage may very well be directed against the people’s love affair with making individual voluntary whole offerings and other sacrifices (Lev 17:8; 22:17–25; Num 15:1-10). That would have been discerned as a response on the cheap to God’s abundant care. “Walk in all the ways I enjoin on you, and it will go well for you,” says Jeremiah’s God. Until you do, you might as well eat the meat of your whole offerings.

The thought of eating the meat of a whole-offering was horrifying. That’s what God is doing in this speech: horrifying his listeners. He asks them to do something they would never do, anymore than they would sleep with their daughters or fail to circumcise their sons.

In short and once again, Jer 7:21-23 say:

Add your whole-offerings to your other sacrifices:

eat the meat of them all!

 

When I instructed your forefathers

and made demands on them

on the day I brought them out of Egypt,

I said nothing about whole-offering or sacrifice;

 

I made this demand on them:

 

“Listen to my voice,

and I will be your God

and you will be my people.

 

Walk in all the ways I enjoin on you,

and it will go well for you.”

 

Here’s the problem. A straight-up translation of Jer 7:21-23 like the one just offered cannot be understood without the kind of background information just provided.

This is the first part of a two-part series. Go hereere for the second part.

Bibliography

Peter C. Craigie, Jeremiah 1-25 (WBC 26; Dallas: Word, 2002); William L. Holladay, Jeremiah 1: A Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah Chapters 1-25 (Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986); Jack R. Lundbom, Jeremiah 1-20 (AB 21A; New York: Doubleday, 1999); William McKane, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jeremiah (ICC; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1986); Jacob Milgrom, “Concerning Jeremiah’s Repudiation of Sacrifice,” ZAW 89 (1977) 273–75; Moshe Weinfeld, “Jeremiah and the Spiritual Metamorphosis of Israel,” ZAW 88 (1976) 17–56

Comments

[Ken Brown]

Interesting. I don't have access to Weinfeld's article at the moment, but as you describe it, I have to agree that this interpretation works a bit better than mine. Particularly interesting to me is Jeremiah's use of the covenant formula in 7:23, which seems to imply that Israel’s violation of the fundamental requirements of YHWH’s covenant (committing idolatry, murder, theft, adultery etc.; cf. 7:6, 9), is what renders their sacrifices valueless.

In any case, the contrast you higlight between Deuteronomy and Exodus-Leviticus-Numbers would actually seem to support the underlying point I was trying to draw from the passage, though by a rather different route.

[JohnFH]

Hi Ken,

That's a very good point you make about the covenant formula.

The histories of tradition and composition behind the texts we have in the Torah were undoubtedly complex and elude reconstruction in detail. The way I see it, both Ex-Lev-Num and Deut in their current forms, each in its own way, highlight the fundamental requirements of the covenant and identify them with the Ten Words (Ex 20; Deut 5).

I can't imagine the tradents of either complex disagreeing with the basic thrust of Isaiah 1:10-20; Hosea 6:6; or Jer 7:21-23.

However, I would guess that the tradents of Ex-Lev-Num would have been more at ease with the both/and language of, for example, Psalms 50 and 51, than the language of "relative negation" (see next post) of the prophetic invective of Isaiah, Amos, Hosea, and Jeremiah.