Bibles International New "Haitian Creole" translation

Differing Heritages
By Troy Manning

The year 2011 marks the 400th year anniversary of the King James Version. This English version of the Bible has literally shaped the thinking of multitudes of English-speaking believers around the world. My own mind has the indelible imprint of the KJV’s rendering of numerous passages in the Bible. Working with the Haitian Creole Old Testament translator, however, I’ve noticed that his thinking has been shaped by a different heritage. Pastor Daniel Telfort grew up in Haiti, so he was exposed to French translations of the Bible, primarily Louis Segond’s 1910 translation but also the Colombe 1978 revision of that text. Though Pastor Telfort attended seminary in the USA and was exposed to English versions of the Bible, the cumulative effect of many years in the French-speaking world is not easily diminished.
The difference of these influences between the translator and me became apparent numerous times during a recent workshop on the Haitian Creole Old Testament. Pastor Telfort and I met in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on May 30-June 17, and we checked Genesis 41-50 and Psalms 25-82.
One example of an English/French difference is in Psalm 65:1. The first line in the KJV says, “Praise waiteth for thee, O God, in Sion.” The Haitian Creole translation says, “O Bondye, silans se louwanj pou ou nan Siyon” (translated into English it would be: “O God, silence is praise for you in Zion”). When I checked the translator’s work in preparation for the workshop, I was at first startled by his rendering of this passage. But I quickly realized where he got this understanding of the passage when I checked Colombe’s translation of this text. That translation says, “Pour toi le silence est louange ô Dieu, dans Sion” (English translation: “For you silence is praise, O God, in Zion”). As I examined the Hebrew and then checked some commentaries, I realized that it was indeed a legitimate way to render the Hebrew clause. In fact, I found myself finding continual delight and fruitful meditation in this new perspective on the Hebrew.
Another example is the familiar statement that the Lord “daily loadeth us with benefits” in the KJV of Psalm 68:19. The English Standard Version says that the Lord “daily bears us up,” and the New American Standard Bible says that the Lord “bears our burden.” All of them reflect a positive understanding of the verb, though differing on which objects to supply after the verb (the Hebrew has no direct object after the verb). On the other hand, Segond’s version says, “Quand on nous accable, Dieu nous delivre” (English translation: “When we are overwhelmed, God delivers us”). Predictably, Pastor Telfort followed Segond’s text when he wrote, “Bondye se delivrans nou, lè y ap peze nou” (English translation: “God is our deliverance, when we are overwhelmed”). How could Segond and Pastor Telfort differ so greatly from the English versions in their understanding of the passage? Well, the Hebrew says, literally, “Blessed be the Lord who daily bears/loads for us, the God who is our salvation.” As you can see, the key Hebrew verb in question could be translated as “bears” or “loads.” It can refer either to the bearing up of a burden or the loading down of burdens upon someone/something. The KJV preferred the latter idea, though it transformed the burdens into blessings—the Lord loads us with benefits. Since the Haitian Creole translation will be used in the French-speaking world and since the French rendering of the passage may be familiar to the Haitians who know French, I decided we should stay close to Segond’s translation. As the translator explained, people might be upset if we altered the sense of the passage, especially when Segond’s rendering is fully justified in the Hebrew.
As you can see, knowing another modern language can actually help a person in his study of the Bible. A bilingual Bible student can be confronted by differing ways to render the Hebrew text, causing him to have to look further into the meaning of the passage. One must be careful, however, not to be misled by a surface knowledge of the other language. In Psalm 33:17, the French backtranslation of the Haitian Creole translation uses the word “prétends” in the clause, “An horse is a vain thing for safety” (KJV). If one doesn’t know French well, he might be tempted to think that the Haitian Creole translation says, “Do not pretend that a horse can save you.” Clearly, the verse is not saying anything about “pretending,” as in the English idea of a young boy pretending to be a cowboy, for example. Daniel explained that the French word “prétendre” has the idea of “intending to deceive.” In language study, the relationship between “pretend” and “prétendre” is called “false friends.” The French verb only seems to have the same meaning, thus giving the appearance of being your friend, but in reality, it is deceiving you.
A surface understanding of French, however, can help you appreciate how two expressions in that language sound similar: “descendants” (descendants) and “deux cent dents” (200 teeth). (Ask someone who speaks French to pronounce these two expressions for you.) The translator and I enjoyed a humorous reprieve as we remarked on this similarity when checking Genesis 46:6: “So they took their livestock and their goods, which they had acquired in the land of Canaan, and went to Egypt, Jacob and all his descendants with him” (NKJV). Jacob went to Egypt with his descendants, not his 200 teeth!
The three-week workshop had such “lighter” moments sprinkled throughout to keep us from being worn out by continual concentration on the text, but most of the time was spent in intense translation work. However, in spite of the daily grind of meticulous examination of the Hebrew, French, English, and sometimes, Greek, the Lord helped us to maintain a cooperative and friendly spirit toward one another, such that we got into a good rhythm and accomplished much. Both the translator and I are new at this work, so it was understandable that the first few workshops would proceed slowly. But now that we have a few years of experience, we are seeing the pace increase. We completed the checking of almost 70 chapters, when we normally checked only around 20-30 chapters in each previous workshop (though those workshops were usually 10-14 days).
We have the goal of finishing Psalms and Proverbs by the end of next year, so that we can print them with a revised edition of the New Testament. Before the past workshop I doubted whether we could achieve that goal. But after seeing how well things went, I am beginning to think that we might actually get quite close to fulfilling it. We would also like to complete the entire Bible by 2020. At our new pace we might actually finish early.
Please pray for the translator and me as we continue to work through the Old Testament. Life is quite unpredictable, especially in Haiti, so we cannot assume that our work will continue to proceed as it has gone during the first part of this year. But through the prayers of God’s people, the Lord can protect this project and enable us to finish in good time, so that the Haitians might finally have their first conservative translation of the entire Bible.