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Comment by latch | Hacker News Reader

Another good example of this is the [English] bible. In the original Greek translation, "almah" was translated to 'young women' in most places, except two where it's translated to virginity. You also have the Latin influence that turned "fruit" into "apple"

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I do not believe you know what you are talking about.

What version -- English or otherwise -- translates the Hebrew word for 'fruit' into 'apple'?

It's translated generically as "fruit" in all English versions that I know of. Likewise, it's translated as a generic fruit in the Vulgate (Latin - 'fructus') and Septuagint (Greek - 'karpos').

As far as 'almah' is concerned, the word is generally used in the OT to represent a young unmarried woman. It is presumed that such a woman would be a virgin (shocking, I know.) The context of its use in Isaiah 7:14 is that of virginity, the Jews who translated the Hebrew passage into Greek (200 years before Christ) used the Greek term for virgin, and Matthew's Greek quote of the verse in the context of Mary's pregnancy also uses the Greek term for virgin. Quibbling over the word 'almah' is strange in light of the fact that Luke explicitly states Mary had never had sex (see Luke 1:34) and that, while espoused to Joseph, she had yet to do the deed. (Matt 1:18).

This is why I'm fascinated with different translations and take the time to read my favorite passages in every translation I come across. The new meaning revealed is awesome.

One of my favorite editions is "The Word: The Bible from 26 Translations", which has different translations of each verse printed together. It's a huge book, and I can only imagine how much work went into it. The credits are two pages long.

I'm just curious about the physical book there - how do you fit 26 Bible translations in one book?

I don't have it with me at the moment, but it's small print on large sheets, and 2500 or 3500 pages, IIRC.

I just found the first English translation of the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Old Testament which pre-dates the Masoretic Text) translated by Charles Thomson. It's quite lovely. A good one to add to your collection.

Volume 1: https://archive.org/details/oldcovenantcommo01thom/page/n5/m... Volume 2: https://archive.org/details/oldcovenantcommo02thom/page/n3/m...

I'll also point you to Brenton's translation of the Septuagint, which is also a good addition if you don't already have it. This particular version has the original Greek and the English translation in parallel:

https://archive.org/details/septuagintversio1879bren/page/4/...

Have any translations of the Bible actually called the forbidden fruit an apple? I thought the association with apples was an invention of artists who might have been punning on the Latin words for evil and apple, but I haven't heard of any Bible that actually translates it to apple.

It is literally "the fruit of the forbidden tree" in original Hebrew.

Yes I know, I'm asking if any translated bible ever called it an apple. I don't think that happened. Artists chose to depict it as an apple, but that isn't an idea given to them by a mistranslated bible.

I believe it was Milton who gave us "apple" in Paradise Lost.

Worth mentioning that apple used to signify any sort of fruit

I have checked right now the Latin Vulgate,

https://www.vatican.va/archive/bible/nova_vulgata/documents/...

and it uses only the word "fructu", i.e. fruit, presumably translating "carpo" from Greek. There is no other more specific word.

James Tabor released a translation of Genesis that has me very interested because he states that he stays as true to the original Hebrew meaning as possible and it reads completely differently than everything I've ever known.

that's interesting. any suggestions for books, blogs etc about specifically such aspects of the bible?

i read the ot in german standard translation coined by luther and a modern (but conservative) translation of the nt by kammermayer.

my disappointing take away was how dull and boring the bible is. i didn't find much inspiration in it. and i am spiritually inclined with an open mind towards christian mysticism.

but of course the bible as we know it is a disfigured and violated excerpt of a larger partly secret canon. so to understand it better precisely stuff like apple/fruit or girl/virgin are relevant and also make it more interesting.

I really like the /r/AcademicBiblical/ community on Reddit for these kinds of things. I'm also much more into the spiritual and mystical aspects of Christianity, which, IMO, were either obfuscated or intentionally removed. Couple this with the wide range of translations and you get a boring result.

The orthodox and coptic churches are much more mystical than the catholic church, and much much more than protestant denominations. Reading about the early Irish church is interesting, since it was very influential in the middle ages with many of the most famous saints, and it was a very mystical and ascetic branch of the faith.

I can't say about German bibles, but the Norton Critical Edition KJV is great for literary study of the bible in English. It's hard to beat the KJV in terms of poetic quality (not to mention its massive influence on the development of the language itself), but even simple archaisms like separate second-person singular and plural pronouns preserve meaning lacking in more modern English translations. This edition has copious notes providing deep textual analysis. It's definitely a very slow read.

Any recommendations on Christian (or not) mysticism? That's not something I've ever delved into at all.

> Any recommendations on Christian (or not) mysticism? That's not something I've ever delved into at all.

Read about hesychasm, read about orthodox monks living in deserts, read about Mount Athos.

> Any recommendations on Christian (or not) mysticism? That's not something I've ever delved into at all.

The Philokalia is worth checking out.

Check out The Symbolic World channel on youtube.

I would check out Jonathan Pageau's channel called The Symbolic World on youtube. This will bring a whole new light to what you are reading.

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