The Art of Bible Translation

An award-winning biblical translator reflects on the art of capturing the literary power of the Bible in EnglishIn this brief book award-winning biblical translator and acclaimed literary critic Robert Alter offers a personal and passionate account of what he learned about the art of Bible translation over the two decades he spent completing his own English version of the Hebrew Bible.Alter?s literary training gave him the advantage of seeing that a translation of the Bible can convey the text?s meaning only by trying to capture the powerful and subtle literary style of the biblical Hebrew something the modern English versions don?t do justice to. The Bible?s style Alter writes ?is not some sort of aesthetic embellishment of the ?message? of Scripture but the vital medium through which the biblical vision of God human nature history politics society and moral value is conveyed.? And as the translators of the King James Version knew the authority of the Bible is inseparable from its lit