ALL of the fast days in Judaism demand introspection and repentance. Certain fast days also demand mourning; for example, the tenth of the Hebrew month of Teves, observed this coming Sunday. Teves 10 marks a season, not just a day. Teves 8 is the anniversary of the first translation of the Hebrew Bible, the Septuagint, into Greek.
Why is this a source of mourning? What is wrong with translating the Bible? Even people fluent in Biblical Hebrew seem to gain from translations. We might say, especially people fluent in Hebrew benefit from translations because Hebrew is multi-layered. One word can denote many things. Translation is a prism, illuminating the translators choice of the right meaning from a pool of possible meanings.
Not to mention, translation is an art form. Lost in translation is a truism; it is very difficult to transpose the precise meaning and tone of one language into another. Done right, translation is an intellectual delight. So why is the Septuagint an occasion for national mourning?
WE begin by observing an oddity in the Artscroll translation of the Hebrew Bible, a widely used English translation today. In rare instances, it does not translate. For example, Leviticus 12 and 13 mention disfigurations on the skin, one of which, in Hebrew, is the baheres. Here is the Artscroll translation: baheres. The translator figuratively throws up his hands and says: I cannot translate this!
The point is deeper than the possible lack of a suitable English word for a technical term, or the possible loss of a precise tradition as to what baheres denotes. The refusal to translate is a symbol of the profound gap between the Biblical text, in Hebrew, and other languages a fissure found in contexts broader than technical terms.
For example, many regard Leviticus animal sacrifices as opaque. A specific sin requires an individualized expiation; a specific animal sacrifice is tailored to the task. Taken on this mechanical level, the sacrificial system is accessible, but on a deeper level translation fails us. It cannot convey the Levitical message that animal sacrifices bring the Divine presence more intensely than any other ritual.
Exile the dispersal of the Jews after the destruction of the ancient temple in Jerusalem is more than geographical. It is profoundly and spiritually alienating; it is the loss of the Divine presence, once induced by the sacrificial system. No person has experienced this system in almost 2,000 years. Its spiritual dynamics defy spiritual intuition. If this is true even for those who know Leviticus in the original Hebrew, how much more so for those whose only access to the Bible is a mediated, translated Hebrew. Translation is more than getting the words right; it is getting the meaning right.
This is what the ancient prophet who fixed the fast of Teves 10 feared: Translation eviscerates Biblical meaning. Any rendering of the Bible into another language cannot capture the spiritual dynamics within the text. This is why the anniversary of the first translation of the Hebrew Bible is an occasion for mourning.
THE problem is deeper still. Much of Leviticus is spiritually inaccessible, but we know that we dont know. We dont grasp the spiritual power of animal sacrifices. Admission of ignorance is an advantage. Far more problematic and beguiling are Biblical passages that seem to shimmer in their transparency. Here, paradoxically, the argument against translation is strongest. Resplendent, communicative passages, seemingly reaching over the arc of the millennia, are actually the best evidence against translation.
For example: two verses in this weeks Torah portion.
Josephs brothers return to Canaan after Joseph has revealed himself to them. All is peaceful between the brothers who, 22 years earlier, hated Joseph so much so that they sold him down to Egypt, deceiving their father by telling him that an animal had devoured Joseph. Now, Jacobs sons must break the news to Jacob that his son Joseph is alive.
And they told him, Joseph is still alive, also that he is ruler over all the land of Egypt; but his heart went cold, for he did not believe them. However, when they related to him all the words that Joseph had spoken to them, and he saw the wagons that Joseph had sent to transport him, then the spirit of their father Jacob was revived (Gen. 45:26-27).
What revived Jacob? What transpired between the brothers first report of Josephs survival, which Jacob did not believe, and the end of the passage, after which Jacob exclaims, My son Joseph lives! I shall go and see him before I die (45:28).
Rashi, citing a midrash, observes that the key was the wagons. The Hebrew word for wagons also means calves and may refer to the calf with the broken neck (an expiation for the citizens of a city outside of which an unknown corpse is found; Deut. 21:1-9.) Rashi says that the reference to wagons, specifically to Joseph having sent them, was a secret sign, a code word, by which Joseph established the veracity of his brothers report of his survival.
The calf with the broken neck was the last Torah topic that Jacob and Joseph studied together before Josephs disappearance. Only Joseph and Jacob knew this. Joseph encoded it in the verses reference to wagons to confirm his existence for Jacob.
This provides the explanation we need: First, Jacob naturally disbelieves his sons report of Josephs survival, since his sons lacked credibility, having previously reported Josephs death. Then, Jacob sees the wagons and a hidden message that only Joseph could have sent. Jacob knows that Joseph lives; Jacob revives.
With help from Rashi and the midrash, a Biblical exchange seems perfectly clear.
IT is not. Indeed, it is the most inaccessible of all types of Biblical verses. Just when a shimmering Biblical text makes us think we have penetrated it, we need to be most cautious. Knowledge of Hebrew and Biblical commentary can fool us into believing that Biblical verses may stand on their own. With animal sacrifices, at least we know we dont know. Here, in the Joseph story, we think we know. The ancient prophets fear reaches its apex: Biblical verses, even if grasped in Hebrew and layered by sophisticated commentary, do not convey the Bibles meaning. For that, we need a story, a metaphor a deeper translation.
Here is a story that finally unveils the mask overlaying our seemingly clear Biblical text:
Just after the Holocaust, the Klausenberger Rebbe learned of a young student who had lost his family and faith in the concentration camps. Before the camps, he had been an observant Jew and a budding Talmudic scholar. Now, he was unobservant and angry.
The boy was brought to the rebbe. The rebbe was gentle. He tried to coax the boy into conversation. The boy would not give the rebbe the satisfaction of acknowledging that he had once loved the Torah. The rebbe gently asked more questions. The boy resisted; he had no interest in religious life, not after all he had gone through. The tension mounted.
Finally, the boy could no longer take the rebbe, and blurted out: They killed the best of us! The finest are gone forever.
The rebbe paused. He looked right at the boy and said: How right you are. They took the best of us. My wife. My 11 children. They took the best of us and (the rebbe pointed to himself) look who they left over.
The rebbe burst out sobbing. So did the boy.
Not another word was spoken.
They wept in each others arms.
Gradually, the boy returned to the life he lived before the war.*
THE exchange between Jacob and his sons first led Jacob to disbelief. Then, after a profound, secret message, Jacob reacquired belief in Josephs existence and revived.
Dry bones, these.
They need flesh.
They need meaning.
They need translation the type of translation that transcends the mere rendering of Hebrew words into another language.
They proceed with the gloss that illuminates the reference to wagons as a code, a secret message. Even on this level, though even in an apparently clear, glossed narrative the Hebrew Bible remains a closed book that translation cannot penetrate. Needed is translation on an entirely different level: a story of a rebbe and a young survivor whose experiences led him, like Jacob, to disbelief.
Through a deep translation of a secret message (the reference to the last Torah topic that father and son studied), we understand why Jacob revives. The rebbes understanding that faith may be a recovery of shared feelings allows us to penetrate Jacobs feelings of holiness via his joint Torah study with his son.
To understand the Bibles secret message through a gloss on wagons is to acquire but a preliminary translation, setting us up for the deeper one, provided for these verses by an angry boys encounter with an empathetic rebbe.
THE required intimacy with the Hebrew, and the additional, necessary stories and metaphors that elucidate the text, are stopped up, blocked, by the mere rendering of the Hebrew words into another language.
For that stoppage, the prophet prescribed a day of mourning.
For that blockage, the prophet said: Fast on Teves 10.
To overcome the stoppage, we must know that there is no short cut to the penetration of the Hebrew Bible.
There is no escaping the study of the Hebrew language.
There is no access to the levels of meaning inherent in and springing from the Hebrew text via any translation, no matter how accurate, artistic, delightful or elegant.
*This is condensed from Echoes of the Maggid by Paysach J. Krohn (Mesorah, 1999), pp. 272-274.
