Bible in Africa Studies by Sidney K Berman
Bible in Africa Studies, 2021
Climate change and its global impact on all people, especially the marginalized communities, is w... more Climate change and its global impact on all people, especially the marginalized communities, is widely recognized as the biggest crisis of our time. It is a context that invites all subjects and disciplines to bring their resources in diagnosing the problem and seeking the healing of the Earth. The African continent, especially its women, constitute the subalterns of global climate crisis. Can they speak? If they speak, can they be heard? Both the Earth and the Africa have been identified with the adjective “Mother.” This gender identity tells tales in patriarchal and imperial worlds that use the female gender to signal legitimation of oppression and exploitation. In this volume, African women theologians and their female-identifying colleagues, struggle with reading and interpreting religious texts in the context of environmental crisis that are threatening life on Earth. The chapters interrogate how biblical texts and African cultural resources imagine the Earth and our relationship with the Earth: Do these texts offer readers windows of hope for re-imagining liberating relationship with the Earth? How do they intersect with gender, race, empire, ethnicity, sexuality among others? Beginning with Genesis, journeying through Exodus, Ruth, Ecclesiastes and the Gospel of John, the authors seek to read in solidarity with the Earth, for the healing of the whole Earth community.
BiAS 16, Bamberg: UBP 2014, Nov 2014
In 1857, Setswana language produced the first complete Bible in a Bantu language. The second Sets... more In 1857, Setswana language produced the first complete Bible in a Bantu language. The second Setswana Bible was published in 1908 – the third in 1970. In each case, different circumstances, factors or contextual frames of reference dictated the need for such a Bible version. The frames converged to cause differences between the meanings of the Setswana Bibles and their sources. This book demonstrates how specific socio-cultural, organisational, linguistic, textual and communicational frames probably influenced the outcome of each Bible. It subsequently presents a framework for analysing existing Bibles and for minimising the occurrence of shifts in prospective translations. The book of Ruth is used as an example while Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (BHS) is treated as an ideal source text.
Sidney Berman is a scholar of Biblical Studies with a specific focus on Old Testament interpretation. He has taught Old Testament studies, Biblical Hebrew and New Testament Greek at the University of Botswana. His research and publications are in contemporary biblical hermeneutics, exegesis, Old Testament studies and Setswana Bible.
Papers by Sidney K Berman
Bible in Africa studies, 2021
Routledge eBooks, Jan 26, 2024
Bible in Africa studies, 2021
Journal for Semitics, 2017
This article proposes that the starting point for the improvement of Bible translations in sub-Sa... more This article proposes that the starting point for the improvement of Bible translations in sub-Saharan Africa is the identification and analysis of translation shifts. Shifts are differences between the corresponding portions of a translation and the source text. The concept of shifts is motivated by the observation that differences between a Bible translation and its source text are inevitable. This article demonstrates that the demarcation and examination of a shift can greatly enlighten the hypothesis of circumstances that caused the shift. Consequently, the translator or reviewer can be alert to the influence of similar circumstances contemporarily and find possible ways to eliminate or modify the shift. The article uses the text of Ruth 4:13 from Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia. The three Setswana Bibles that are compared with Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia are the translations by Robert Moffat (1857), Alfred Wookey (1908) and Bible Society of South Africa (1970). After examinat...
HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies
Bible in Africa Studies, 2020
Bible in Africa Studies, 2021
Climate change and its global impact on all people, especially the marginalized communities, is w... more Climate change and its global impact on all people, especially the marginalized communities, is widely recognized as the biggest crisis of our time. It is a context that invites all subjects and disciplines to bring their resources in diagnosing the problem and seeking the healing of the Earth. The African continent, especially its women, constitute the subalterns of global climate crisis. Can they speak? If they speak, can they be heard? Both the Earth and the Africa have been identified with the adjective “Mother.” This gender identity tells tales in patriarchal and imperial worlds that use the female gender to signal legitimation of oppression and exploitation. In this volume, African women theologians and their female-identifying colleagues, struggle with reading and interpreting religious texts in the context of environmental crisis that are threatening life on Earth. The chapters interrogate how biblical texts and African cultural resources imagine the Earth and our relationsh...
This article analyses the dichotomy of greatness versus smallness in 2 Kgs 5. It argues that Naam... more This article analyses the dichotomy of greatness versus smallness in 2 Kgs 5. It argues that Naaman’s real disease was an unhealthy attitude towards greatness, and Elisha primarily cured it. From the discourse of the story, Aram’s and Naaman’s looting and oppression of the weaker nation and individuals is borne from this disease. The investigation of this article is also postcolonial, drawing parallels between attitudes and power imbalances in the narrative and those of colonial relationships. The above-named concepts are merged with the method of literary narrative criticism to trace the text’s reproof of imperialist ideology.
Studia Historiae Ecclesiasticae (SHE)
This study investigates how the contextual frames of reference (CFRs) of the three extant Setswan... more This study investigates how the contextual frames of reference (CFRs) of the three extant Setswana Bibles – Moffat, Wookey and BSSA (Bible Society of South Africa) – could have impacted on their renderings of the book of Ruth. The fact that the Bibles were translated within contexts that differed from those of the Hebrew source text (ST) of Ruth gives rise to the assumption that some of such contexts or frames could have had problematic influences on decision making during translation. Differing frames were assumed to have led to differences (i.e., translation shifts) between the translations and the Hebrew text. Such frames were hypothesised to have emanated from socio-cultural, textual, communication-situational and organisational circumstances pertaining to the making of the ST and the translations. Since contextual frames of various kinds presumably converged on the Setswana target texts (TTs), this study proposes an integrated multidisciplinary approach to frame analysis, namely, the cognitive CFR model. The framework, which is embedded in biblical interpretation, merges insights from other disciplines including translation studies, cognitive semantics and cultural studies. The translators’ decisions are evaluated using the heuristic perspective of “an exegetically justifiable rendering.” The study identified indeed countless shifts in the three Setswana translations which resulted from hypothetical socio-cultural, organisational, communicational and textual factors. Moffat’s shifts revealed a predomination of organisational CFRs throughout the book of Ruth. The organisational CFR also stood out occasionally for Wookey as well. BSSA did not show a predomination of any class of CFRs but manifested the least problematic CFRs. As far as the negative influences of CFRs were concerned, BSSA was the least affected, followed by Wookey and lastly Moffat. The study reveals that it could sometimes be simple, but other times also be difficult or impossible, depending on the pertinent CFR, to provide an exegetically justifiable rendering of an ST unit. Yet, it can be concluded from this study that an awareness of CFRs during translation or analysis of translations can contribute towards the improvement of existing translations or the reduction of problematic shifts in new Bible translation projects.
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Bible in Africa Studies by Sidney K Berman
Sidney Berman is a scholar of Biblical Studies with a specific focus on Old Testament interpretation. He has taught Old Testament studies, Biblical Hebrew and New Testament Greek at the University of Botswana. His research and publications are in contemporary biblical hermeneutics, exegesis, Old Testament studies and Setswana Bible.
Papers by Sidney K Berman
Sidney Berman is a scholar of Biblical Studies with a specific focus on Old Testament interpretation. He has taught Old Testament studies, Biblical Hebrew and New Testament Greek at the University of Botswana. His research and publications are in contemporary biblical hermeneutics, exegesis, Old Testament studies and Setswana Bible.