Lost in Translation
Martin
Luther once said the following:
"The
Hebrew language is the best language of all, with the richest vocabulary... If
I were younger I would want to learn this language, because no one can really
understand the Scriptures without it. For although the New
Testament is written in Greek, it is full of Hebraisms and Hebrew expressions.
It has therefore been aptly said that the Hebrews
drink from the spring, the Greeks from the stream that flows from it, and the Latins from a downstream puddle."
In
this rare, remarkable and uncharacteristic moment of lucidity; Martin Luther
revealed a great deal to the Christian world. Would that they have taken heed,
or at least notice.
Not
only was Luther being generous of spirit enough to admit that only those fluent
in Hebrew, that is the Jews, could understand the depths of Torah; he was
saying that the German translation of "the Bible" that he himself
produced could be nothing more than a torpid cesspool, if Latin was "a
downstream puddle". Most remarkable of all, it is not only inferable, but
necessarily true from Martin Luther's statement, that he admitted that he did
not understand the Bible that he translated into vernacular German.
Whether
or not Luther was aware of the alpha-numerical properties of Hebrew, which
provide the layers and lattices of meaning, as well as alternative readings of
the Text that are inaccessible to all but the adept and which render Hebrew
wholly untranslatable is not inferable from the passage above. If he was aware
of the alpha-numerical nature of Hebrew, he preferred not to share this
information with his flock.
Because
it is true that the Torah is wholly untranslatable, all hermeneutics and
exegesis based on a "Bible" in translation must be delusion based on
initial gross, often intentional, misunderstanding. It is most likely that any
translations based on translations (translations of "the Bible" from
Greek or Latin) will go yet further afield and one
will be led into the sphere of hallucination based on delusion. Any conclusions
drawn from hermeneutics and exegesis based on the Greek translation will be
without foundation, while conclusions drawn from hermeneutics and exegesis
based on translations of translations cannot but be insanity.
Woe
to the followers of a religion who based their thought, their emotions, their
intellectual work, their "spirituality" on gross misunderstanding!
How much wasted effort, indeed, how much pain could have been averted had the
Christian world heeded, or at least noted, Martin Luther's admission.
Christianity
was, and remains, the most sophisticated system of mind and emotions control
ever devised. I believe the leaders of the various denominations in the
uppermost echelons of power and influence were, and are, very much aware of
what Luther knew and chose to lead the Christians into demensions
[sic] of "Bible" interpretation that constituted a delusional state
of mind. The emotions generated by those delusional ideas must be considered
extreme emotional disturbances. Christian history and how Christians typically
related to the rest of humanity bear out these sad, but ineluctable,
conclusions.
It
is said that the mind sciences are a recent discipline and systematic mind
control a modern undertaking. I differ from that opinion. It seems to me that
pagan practices were nothing but mind and emotions control, often by trauma.
These are age-old practices and Christianity has seen to it that they have not
been lost in the mists of time, but only hidden behind filmy veils and symbols
of sufficient abstraction that they are not immediately recognizable.
Would
that the Christian world had taken heed, or at least notice, of Luther's
message in the passage above. It was probably the most important message he
delivered to the Christian world in his lifetime.
Doreen
Ellen Bell-Dotan,