The Elizabethan bible versions at the background of the traditionalist theory of translation

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THE ELIZABETHAN BIBLE VERSIONS AT THE BACKGROUND

OF THE TRADITIONALIST THEORY OF TRANSLATION

V. O. Patsan (Archbishop Eulogius of Novomoskovsk)

Oles Honchar Dnipropetrovsk National University

Визначено епістемологічні передумови сприйняття англомовних викладів Священного Писання доби Єлизавети І як перехідних ланок на шляху від Біблії У. Тіндейла - першого англійського перекладу Богодухновенної Книги з мов оригінального тексту - до авторизованої версії короля Джеймса, визнаної вершиною перекладацької майстерності в історії євангелізації Англії. Недооцінка Женевської Біблії і Єпископської Біблії і як віх у долученні англійців до Слова Божого, і як літературних досягнень англійського Відродження пов'язується із виключенням із їх «поля огляду», оформленого сучасною гуманітарно-науковою рефлексією, і ренесансно-гуманістичних інспірацій єлизаветинців - перекладачів Священного Писання, і відкритих ними горизонтів сприйняття традиціоналістської теорії перекладу. Значущість граничного комунікативного досвіду, втіленого в єлизаветинських англомовних викладах Богодухновенної Книги, для міжособистісних відносин людини і Творця, розкривається на основі виявлення тієї діалогічної співвіднесеності критеріїв змістової і формальної відповідності перекладу, що встановлюється перекладачами доби Єлизавети І, націленими на “передання Слова Божого людськими мовами” (Ю. Найда), і спрямовує їх на відкриття, на злеті Ренесансу в Англії, способів забезпечення особистого доступу до Одкровення, які уможливили оформлення духовного виміру особистісного самовизначення в англомовному культурному контексті.

Ключові слова: Абсолютна Особистість Бога, Надприродне Одкровення, людська особа, Біблійна топологія особистісного буття, традиціоналістські моделі перекладу, перекладацька реконструкція, Відродження.

Определены эпистемологические предпосылки восприятия англоязычных изложений Священного Писания эпохи Елизаветы І как переходных этапов на пути от Библии У. Тиндейла - первого английского перевода Богодухновенной Книги с языков оригінального текста - до авторизированной версии короля Джеймса, признанной вершиной переводческого мастерства в истории евангелизации Англии. Недооценка Женевской Библии и Епископской Библии и как вех приобщения англичан к Слову Божьему, и как литературных достижений английского Возрождения связывается с исключением из их «поля обзора», оформленного современной гуманитарнонаучной рефлексией, и ренессансно-гуманистических инспираций елизаветинцев - переводчиков Священного Писания, и открытых ими горизонтов восприятия традиционалистской теории перевода. Значимость предельного комуникативного опыта, воплощенного в елизаветинских англоязычных изложениях Богодухновенной

Книги, для межличностных отношений человека и Творца, раскрывается на основе выявления той диалогической соотнесенности критериев семантического и формального соответствия перевода, которая устанавливается переводчиками эпохи Елизаветы І, нацеленными на «передачу Слова Божьего человеческими языками» (Ю. Найда), и направляет их на открытие, на взлете Ренессанса в Англии, способов обеспечения личного доступа к Откровению, сделавших возможным оформление духовного измерения личностного самоопределения в англоязычном культурном контексте.

Ключевые слова: Абсолютная Личность Бога, Сверхприродное Откровение, человеческая личность, Библейская топология личностного бытия, традиционалистские модели перевода, переводческая реконструкция, Возрождение.

elizabethan translators scripture

Realizing the translation as a means of disseminating the Word of God, the English men of letters of the late sixteenth century confirming the literary dominant of the Renaissance ideal of “uomo complete” did not restrict themselves in “moral improvement” of readers, approved by traditionalism as the aim of poesy, to the original figurative expression of the universal truth opening by the natural Revelation given in the created world. In the age of Elizabeth I this creative initiative was reflected in its concordance with the kernel strain of the Reformation in England revealed as the new apprehension of the old need in the straight personal access of the Englishmen to the supernatural Revelation that might be ensured only by the rendering of the Scripture into their native tongue. At such a turn of the thought the Renaissance aspiration for individual revealing the humanity so productive for the Elisabethans rose to the transmission of “God's Word in human languages” (E. A. Nida).

By overcoming the restrictions of secularism their unprecedented creativity was directed towards the space of person's self-realization where the human personality could implement the image and likeness of God providing the neighbor's communication with Him. Using the literary skills formed in improving the vernacular languages according to the verbal models of classical poetics and rhetoric Elizabethan translators supporting the Reformation created two English versions of «God-breathed» (2 Timothy 3:І6; 2 Peter 1:21) Book, known as Geneva Bible (1560) and Bishops' Bible (і5б8).

Both versions of God Breathed Book appeared in the era of Elizabeth dialogically correlated “word-by-word” model of translation with its “sense-by-sense” matrix in the course of rendering into English the topoi олостасц and npooranov defining the personal being in the Greek original of the New Testament.

Reinforcing the rational aspect of perceiving the Biblical text all these means of providing the personal access to the living God's Word predicted the rationalistic restrictions of the scope of comprehending the supernatural Revelation and formed the premises for reducing the spiritual source of personality to the personalized ratio and supporting in such a way the scholastic double-truth theory realized nowadays as the source of “the immanent frame” of the secularized mind and revised in the post-secular space of the person's self-definition.

Keywords: Absolute Personality of God, Supernatural Revelation, human person, Bible topology of personal being, traditionalist models of translation, translative reconstruction.

The English renderings of the Bible performed in the era of Elizabeth I (1558- 1603) are considered to be the greatest milestones of “the golden age” in the history of England marked with the blossom of the national culture leading the Renaissance in that country to the apogee and followed by the core transformation of English mentality.

Depicting the cultural situation form in England in the last third of the sixteenth century A. N. Wilson, an English master-historian of nowadays, known by his formula of painting “a portrait of the age”, in his book “The Elizabethans” (2011) characterizes the reign of the Virgin Queen as «a time of exceptional creativity, wealth creation and political expansion... There was a Renaissance during this period in the world of words, which included the all-round hero and literary genius, Sir Philip Sidney, playwright-spy Christopher Marlowe and that myriad-minded man, William Shakespeare... this was the age when modern Britain was born, and established independence from mainland Europe... English was destined to become the language of the great globe itself...» [28, p. 7].

Designating the boarder between traditionalism and historicism in the national- cultural consciousness of Englishmen, the fascinating epoch became a period of establishing the dialogic structure of personal self-definition [2; 6; 15; 3; 1; 7; 8; 23] The point of view on Elizabethan versions as a prologue to the triumph of King Jame's translators is shared by the majority of modern scholars focused on the problems of perceiving the biblical texts in England. See, for example: Bruce F. F. History of the Bible in English / F. F. Bruce. - Oxford : Oxford University Press, 1978. - P. 92-108; Comfort Ph. W. Essential Guide to Bible Versions / Ph. W. Comfort. - Wheaton, Illinois : Tyndale House Publishers, 2000. - 320 p. - P. 146; Ewert D. From Ancient Tablets to Modern Translations: A General Introduction to The Bible / D. Ewert. - Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1983. - 284 p. - P. 203-204; Wegner P. D. The Journey from Texts to Translations: The Origin and Development of The Bible / P. D. Wegner. - Grand Rapids : Baker Academic, corrected printing, 2000. - 464 p. - P. 311.. It was inspired by the humanistic comprehension of the Christian anthropology and confirmed the priority of interpersonal communication in the self-fulfillment of the subject transformed by the post-Renaissance types of rationality into the problematic epicenter of the modern humanitarian reflection.

At the social-cultural background of Elizabethan England the assertion of the human dignity as a unity of “virtus atque doctrina” performed by the studia humanitatis in the European continent was extended beyond the secular dimension of the person's creativity set by the Roman Renaissance. In this field of view the creative activity of the human personality was emphasized as a way to imitate Creator by completing the individual manner, formed in the movement from the imitation of the canonical examples of “liberal arts” to the competition with them. And it should be taken into consideration that the Renaissance humanism as Pan-European intellectual movement asserted the human mind as a basis of personal creativity. The “ratio” was defined by the humanists as a gift of God that aimed at the fulfillment of the free self-definition of the created person at achieving the likeness of Creator predetermined by Him to form a core of the human personality. Perhaps, the most precise formulation of this idea belongs to Leone Battista Alberti:”...talent, ability to study, mind are divine attributes by which he [a man] can explore, distinguish and comprehend what should be avoided and what should be accepted to protect himself' [5, p. 235-236].

Following the way paved by the humanists of the continental Europe, the initiators of the late flowering of the English Renaissance perceived their insight of the dialogue, realized in its horizontal and vertical, empirical and transcendent orientations, as an authentic form of person's self-manifestation. But in clarifying the personal communicative positions distinguished as “the self' and “the other” appealing to God the Elizabethans actualized the creative intentions that exceeded the ethical-aesthetic criteria of human personality established by the founders of the Roman Renaissance in the process of secularization of anthropological concepts of the Catholic doctrine.

Confirming the literary dominant of the Renaissance ideal of “uomo complete” English men of letters of the late sixteenth century did not restrict themselves in “moral improvement” of readers, approved by traditionalism as the aim of poesy, to the original figurative expression of the universal truth opening by the natural Revelation given in the created world. In the age of Elizabeth I this creative initiative was reflected in its concordance with the kernel strain of the Reformation in England revealed as the new apprehension of the old need in the straight personal access of the Englishmen to the supernatural Revelation that might be ensured only by rendering the Scripture into their native tongue.

At such a turn of the thought the Renaissance aspiration for individual revealing the humanity so productive for the Elisabethans rose to “the transmission of God's Word in human languages” (E. A. Nida). By overcoming the restrictions of secularism in this way their unprecedented creativity was directed towards the space of person's selfrealization where the human personality could implement the image and likeness of God providing the neighbor's communication with Him. Using the literary skills formed in improving the vernacular languages according to the verbal models of classical poetics and rhetoric Elizabethan translators supporting the Reformation created two English versions of God Breathed Book, included in the history of rendering It into English as the Geneva Bible (1560) and the Bishops' Bible (1568).

In spite of the contradictory estimations proclaimed in the reign of Elizabeth I and expressing the diverse tendencies of the formation of Anglicanism these literary works should be recognized both important milestones in the evangelization of England and significant achievements of the Renaissance literature of that country. But in the modern scientific picture of the history of English Scripture translations the Geneva Bible and the Bishops' Bible are represented as the reductions of W. Tindale's Bible which marked the beginning of a new era in England as the first rendering of God's Breathed Book from the original languages (Hebrew for the Old Testament and Greek for the New Testament) into English. Accordingly the historical mission of Elizabethans in providing the access of Englishmen to the Biblical text was reduced to paving the way for King James authorized version that was generally recognized “the clearest, most fluent translation, with poetic rhythm and dignity based on the watershed of ... previous translations of Scripture [18, p. 146; 11; 12; 13; 26]” The point of view on Elizabethan versions as a prologue to the triumph of King Jame's translators is shared by the majority of modern scholars focused on the problems of perceiving the biblical texts in England. See, for example: Bruce F. F. History of the Bible in English / F. F. Bruce. - Oxford : Oxford University Press, 1978. - P. 92-108; Comfort Ph. W. Essential Guide to Bible Versions / Ph. W. Comfort. - Wheaton, Illinois : Tyndale House Publishers, 2000. - 320 p. - P. 146; Ewert D. From Ancient Tablets to Modern Translations: A General Introduction to The Bible / D. Ewert. - Grand Rapids : Zondervan, 1983. - 284 p. - P. 203-204; Wegner P. D. The Journey from Texts to Translations: The Origin and Development of The Bible / P. D. Wegner. - Grand Rapids : Baker Academic, corrected printing, 2000. - 464 p. - P. 311..

Springing forth from the soil broken by W. F. Moulton in his famous work “The History of The English Bible” (1878) [20] and consolidated by the authoritative authors of “The Cambridge History of The Bible” (1975-1980) [17], such vision of renderings of the Scripture made during the reign of Elizabeth I was formed in the studies of F. F. Bruce (“History of the Bible in English”,1978) [11], J. Brawn (“A Short History of Our

English Bible”, 2003) [11] Ph. W. Comfort (“Essential Guide to Bible Versions”, 2000) [12], D. Ewert (“From Ancient Tablets to Modern Translations: A General Introduction to The Bible”,1983) [13], J. C. Greider (“The English Bible Translations and History”, 2007) [11], B. M. Metzger (“The Bible in Translation: Ancient and English Versions”, 2012) [19], I. M. Price [24], D. V. Wallace (“The History of the English Bible”, 2009) [27], P. D. Wegner (“The Journey from Texts to Translations: The Origin and Development of The Bible”, 2000) [26] and others.

Predetermined by excluding from the field of view both the Renaissance-Humanistic inspirations of the Scripture translators of the era of Elizabeth I and the horizons of perceiving the traditionalist theoretical matrix of translation established by the Elizabethan translators of the Scripture and predetermined the models of rendering the Bible substantiated in their creative activity the statement of the transitional character of their works factually denies their original impact in the communion of English-speaking people with the living Word of God. Thus to reveal the significance of the Elizabeth versions of God's Breathed Book for realizing the interpersonal relationship of man and Creator the study should focus on defining the ways of providing the personal access to the Revelation in these English renderings of the Bible, taking into consideration the horizons of perceiving the traditionalist theory of translation opened by the Elizabethan men of letters.

The activity of Elizabethan Bible translators was inspired by two main branches of the literary reflection of traditionalism focused on rendering creative works from one language to another. There were commentary of translating the Scripture initiated by Hellenistic judaism and reception of the ancient Greek literature by Romans.

The starting point from which the theoretical thought began to focus attention on the role and status of translation for the Romans was the creative activity of Cicero and Horace. Their views on translation were to have great influence on successive generations of translators, and both discuss translation within the wider context of the two main functions of the poet: the universal human duty of acquiring and disseminating wisdom and the special art of making and shaping a poem. The significance of translation in Roman literature has often been used to accuse the Romans of being unable to create imaginative literature in their own right, at least until the first century BC. Stress has been laid on the creative imagination of the Greeks as opposed to the more practical Roman mind, and the Roman exaltation of their Greek models has been seen as evidence of their lack of originality. But the implied value judgement in such a generalization is quite wrong. The Romans perceived themselves as a continuation of their Greek models and Roman literary critics discussed Greek texts without seeing the language of those texts as being in any way an inhibiting factor. The Roman literary system sets up a hierarchy of texts and authors that overrides linguistic boundaries and that system in turn reflects the Roman ideal of the hierarchical yet caring central state based on the true law of Reason. Cicero points out that mind dominates the body as a king rules over his subjects or a father controls his children, but warns that where Reason dominates as a master ruling his slaves, «it keeps them down and crushes them» [9]. With translation, the ideal source language (hereinafter - SL) text is there to be imitated and not to be crushed by the too rigid application of Reason. Cicero nicely expresses this distinction: «If I render word for word, the result will sound uncouth, and if compelled by necessity I alter any thing in the order or wording, I shall seem to have departed from the function of a translator» [9]. Both Horace and Cicero, in their remarks on translation, make an important distinction between word for word translation and sense for sense (or figure for figure) translation. The underlying principle of enriching their native language and literature through translation leads to a stress on the aesthetic criteria of the target language (hereinafter - TL) product rather than on more rigid notions of «fidelity». Horace, in his «Art of Poetry», warns against overcautious imitation of the source model: «A theme that is familiar can be made your own property so long as you do not waste your time on a hackneyed treatment; nor should you try to render your original word for word like a slavish translator, or in imitating another writer plunge yourself into difficulties from which shame, or the rules you have laid down for yourself, prevent you from extricating yourself» [9].

Since the process of the enrichment of the literary system is an integral part of the Roman concept of translation, it is not surprising to find a concern with the question of language enrichment also. So prevalent was the habit of borrowing or coining words, that Horace, whilst advising the would-be writer to avoid the pitfalls that be set «the slavish translator», also advised the sparing use of new words. He compared the process of the addition of new words and the decline of other words to the changing of the leaves in spring and autumn, seeing this process of enrichment through translation as both natural and desirable, provided the writer exercised moderation. The art of the translator, for Horace and Cicero, then, consisted in judicious interpretation of the SL text so as to produce a TL version based on the principle non verbum de verbo, sed sensum exprimere de sensu (of expressing not word for word, but sense for sense), and his responsibility was to the TL readers. But there is also an additional dimension to the Roman concept of enrichment through translation, i.e., the preeminence of Greek as the language of culture and the ability of educated Romans to read texts in the SL. When these factors are taken into account, then the position both of translator and reader alters. The Roman reader was generally able to consider the translation as a metatext in relation to the original. The translated text was read through the source text, in contrast to the way in which a monolingual reader can only approach the SL text through the TL version. For the Roman translators, the task of transferring a text from language to language could be perceived as an exercise in comparative stylistics, since they were freed from the exigencies of having to «make known» either the form or the content per se, and consequently did not need to subordinate themselves to the frame of the original. The good translator, therefore, presupposed the reader's acquaintance with the SL text and was bound by that knowledge, for any assessment of his skill as translator would be based on the creative use he was able to make of his model. Longinus, in his «Essay On the Sublime», cites «imitation and emulation of the great historians and poets of the past» as one of the paths towards the sublime and translation is one aspect of imitation in the Roman concept of literary production [9]. The Roman translation may therefore be perceived as unique in that it arises from a vision of literary production that follows an established canon of excellence across linguistic boundaries. Moreover, it should not be forgotten that with the extension of the Roman Empire, bilingualism and trilingualism became increasingly commonplace, and the gulf between oral and literary Latin widened. The apparent licence of the Roman translators, much quoted in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, must therefore be seen in the context of the overall system in which that approach to translation was applied.

With the spread of Christianity, translation came to acquire another role, that of disseminating the Word of God. A religion as text-based as Christianity presented the translator with a mission that encompassed both aesthetic and evangelistic criteria. The history of Bible translation is accordingly a history of western culture in microcosm. The translations of the New Testament were made very early, and St Jerome's famous contentious version that was to have such influence on succeeding generations of translators was commissioned by Pope Damasus in 384 AD. Following Cicero, St Jerome declared he had translated sense for sense rather than word for word, but the problem of the fine line between what constituted stylistic licence and what constituted heretical interpretation was to remain a major stumbling block for centuries.

The Bible translation remained a key issue well into the seventeenth century, and the problems intensified with the growth of concepts of national cultures and with the coming of the Reformation. The translation came to be used as a weapon in both dogmatic and political conflicts as nation states began to emerge and the centralization of the church started to weaken, evidenced in linguistic terms by the decline of Latin as a universal language. The first translation of the complete Bible into English was the Wycliffe Bible produced between 1380 and 1384, which marked the start of a great flowering of English Bible translations linked to changing attitudes to the role of the written text in the church, that formed part of the developing Reformation. John Wycliffe (c. 1330-1384), the noted Oxford theologian, put forward the theory of «dominion by grace» according to which man was immediately responsible to God and God's law (by which Wycliffe intended not canon law but the guidance of the Bible). Since Wycliffe's theory meant that the Bible was applicable to all human life it followed that each man should be granted access to that crucial text in a language that he could understand, i.e., in the vernacular. Wycliffe's views, which attracted a circle of followers, were attacked as heretical and he and his group were denounced as «Lollards», but the work he began continued to flourish after his death and his disciple John Purvey revised the first edition some time before 1408 (the first dated manuscript). The second Wycliffe Bible contains a general Prologue, composed between 1395-1396 and the fifteenth chapter of the Prologue describes the four stages of the translation process: (1) a collaborative effort of collecting old Bibles and glosses and establishing an authentic Latin source text; (2) a comparison of the versions; (3) counseling «with old grammarians and old divines» about hard words and complex meanings; and (4) translating as clearly as possible the sentence»(i. e., meaning), with the translation corrected by a group of collaborators. Since the political function of the translation was to make the complete text of the Bible accessible, this led to a definite stance on priorities by the translator: Purvey's Preface states clearly that the translator shall translate «after the sentence» (meaning) and not only after the words, «so that the sentence be as open [plain] or opener, in English as in Latin and go not far from the letter» [22]. What is aimed at is an intelligible, idiomatic version: a text that could be utilized by the layman.

The extent of its importance may be measured by the fact that the bulk of the 150 copies of Purvey's revised Bible were written even after the prohibition, on pain of excommunication, of translations circulated without the approval of diocesan or provincial councils in July 1408. Knyghton the Chronicler's lament that “the Gospel pearl is cast abroad, and trodden under feet of swine» was certainly contradicted by the wide spread interest in the Wycliffe versions. In the sixteenth century the history of Bible translation acquired new dimensions with the advent of printing.

After the Wycliffe versions, the next great English translation was William Tyndale's (1494-1536) New Testament printed in 1525. Tyndale's proclaimed intention in translating was also to offer as clear a version as possible to the layman, and by the time he was burned at the stake in 1536 he had translated the New Testament from the Greek and parts of the Old Testament from the Hebrew.

The sixteenth century saw the translation of the Bible into a large number of European languages, in both Protestant and Roman Catholic versions. In 1482, the Hebrew Pentateuch had been printed at Bologna and the complete Hebrew Bible appeared in 1488, while Erasmus, the Dutch Humanist, published the first Greek New Testament in Baslein1516. This version was to serve as the basis for Martin Luther's 1522 German version. The translations of the New Testament appeared in Danish in 1529 and again in 1550, in Swedish in 1526-1541, and the Czech Bible appeared between 1579-1593. Translations and revised versions of existing translations continued to appear in English, Dutch, German and French.

Erasmus perhaps summed up the evangelizing spirit of Bible translating when he declared: «I would desire that all women should reade the gospell and Paules episteles and I wold to God they were translated in to the tonges of all men so that they might not only be read and knowne of the scotes and yrishmen, but also of the Turkes and the Sarracenes...I wold to God the plowman wold singe a texte of the scripture at his plow-beme. And that the wever at his lowme with this wold drive away the tediousnes of tyme. I wold the wayfaringeman with this pastyme wold expelle the weriness of his iomey. And to be shorte I wold that all the communication of the christen shuld be of the scripture for in a manner such are we oure selves as our daylye tales are» [9].

William Tyndale, echoing Erasmus, attacked the hypocrisy of church authorities who forbade the lay people to read the Bible in their native tongue for the good of their souls, but nevertheless accepted the use of the vernacular for «histories and fables of love and wantoness and of ribaudry as filthy as heart can think, to corrupt the minds of youth» [9].

The history of Bible translation in the sixteenth century is intimately tied up with the rise of Protestantism in Europe. The public burning of Tyndale's New Testament in 1526 was followed in quick succession by the appearance of Coverdale's Bible in 1535, the Great Bible in 1539 and the Geneva Bible in 1560. Coverdale's Bible was also banned but the tide of Bible translation could not be stemmed, and each successive version drew on the work of previous translators, borrowing, amending, revising and correcting.

It would not perhaps be too gross a generalization to suggest that the aims of the sixteenth-century Bible translators may be collocated in three categories: (1) To clarify errors arising from previous versions, due to inadequate SL manuscriptsor to linguistic incompetence. (2) To produce an accessible and aesthetically satisfying vernacular style. (3) To clarify points of dogma and reduce the extent to which the scriptures were interpreted and represented to the laypeople as a metatext. In his Circular Letter on Translation of 1530 Martin Luther lays such emphasis on the significance of(2) that he uses the verbs ubersetzen (to translate) and verdeutschen (to Germanize) almost indiscriminately. And Luther also stresses the importance of the relationship between style and meaning: «Grammar is necessary for declension, conjugation and construction of sentences, but in speech the meaning and subject matter must be considered, not the grammar, for the grammar shall not rule over the meaning» [9]. The Renaissance Bible translators perceived both fluidity and intelligibility in the TL text as important criteria, but were equally concerned with the transmission of a literally accurate message. In an age when the choice of a pronoun could mean the difference between life or condemnation to death as a heretic, precision was of central importance. Yet because Bible translation was an integral part of the upward shift in the status of the vernacular, the question of style was also vital. Luther advised the translators to use a vernacular proverb or expression if it fitted in with the New Testament, in other words to add to the wealth of imagery in the SL text by drawing on the vernacular tradition too. And since the Bible is in itself a text that each individual reader must reinterpret in the reading, each successive translation attempts to allay doubts in the wording and offer readers a text in which they may put their trust. In the Preface to the King James Bible of 1611, entitled The Translators to the Reader, the question is asked «is the kingdom of God words or syllables?» The task of the translator went beyond the linguistic, and became evangelistic in its own right, for the (often anonymous) translator of the Bible in the sixteenth century was a radical leader in the struggle to further man's spiritual progress. The collaborative aspect of Bible translation represented yet an other significant aspect of that struggle.

Following the invention of printing techniques in the fifteenth century, the role of translation underwent significant changes, not least due to the great increase in the volume of translations undertaken. At the same time, serious attempts to formulate a theory of translation were also made. The function of translation, together with the function of learning itself changed. For as the great voyages of discovery opened up a world outside Europe, increasingly sophisticated clocks and instruments for measuring time and space developed and these, together with the theory of the Copernican universe, affected concepts of culture and society and radically altered perspectives. One of the first writers to formulate a theory of translation was the French humanist

Etienne Dolet (1509-1546) who was tried and executed for heresy after «mistranslating» one of Plato's dialogues in such a way as to imply disbelief in immortality. In 1540 Dolet published a short outline of translation principles, entitled «La maniere de bien traduire d'une langue en aultre» («How to Translate Well from one Language into Another») and established five principles for the translator: (1) The translator must fully understand the sense and meaning of the original author, although he is at liberty to clarify obscurities. (2) The translator should have a perfect knowledge of both SL and TL. (3) The translator should avoid word-for-word renderings. (4) The translator should use forms of speech in common use. (5) The translator should choose and order words appropriately to produce the correct tone. Dolet's principles, ranked as they are in a precise order, stress the importance of understanding the SL text as a primary requisite. The translator is far more than a competent linguist, and translation involves both a scholarly and sensitive appraisal of the SL text and an awareness of the place the translation is intended to occupy in the TL system. Dolet's views were reiterated by George Chapman (1559-1634), the great translator of Homer. In his dedication of the Seven Books 1598) Chapman declares that the work of a skillful and worthy translator is to observe the sentences, figures and forms of speech proposed in his author, his true sense and height, and to adorn them with figures and forms of oration fitted to the original in the same tongue to which they are translated. He repeats his theory more fully in the Epistle to the Reader of his translation of The Iliad. In the Epistle Chapman states that a translator must: (1) avoid word for word renderings; (2) attempt to reach the «spirit» of the original; (3) avoid overloose translations, by basing the translation on a sound scholarly investigation of other versions and glosses. The Platonic doctrine of the divine inspiration of poetry clearly had repercussions for the translator, in that it was deemed possible for the «spirit» or «tone» of the original to be recreated in another cultural context. The translator, therefore, is seeking to bring about a «transmigration» of the original text, which he approaches on both a technical and metaphysical level, as a skilled equal with duties and responsibilities both to the original author and the audience.

Edmond Cary, discussing Dolet in his study of the great French translators, stresses the importance of translation in the sixteenth century: “The translation battle raged throughout Dolet's age” [9]. The Reformation, after all, was primarily a dispute between translators. Translation became an affair of State and a matter of Religion. The Sorbonne and the king were equally concerned with it. Poets and prose writers debated the matter, Joachim du Bellay's «Defense et Illustration de la Langue francaise» is organized around problems relating to translation. In such an atmosphere, where a translator could be executed as a result of a particular rendering of a sentence or phrase in text, it is hardly surprising that battle lines were drawn with vehemence. The quality of aggressive assertiveness that can be discerned in Chapman's Epistle or Dolet's pamphlet can be seen through the work and statements of a number of translators of the time. One major characteristic of the period (reflected also in the number of translations of the Bible that updated the language of preceding versions without necessarily making major interpretative changes) is an affirmation of the present through the use of contemporary idiom and style. Matthiesson's study of Elizabethan translators gives a number of examples of the way in which the affirmation of the individual in his own time manifests itself. He notes, for example, the frequent replacement of indirect discourse by direct discourse in North's translation of Plutarch (1579), a device that adds immediacy and vitality to the text, and quotes examples of North's use of lively contemporary idiom. So in North's version it is said of Pompey that «he did lay all the irons in the fire he could, to bring it to pass that he might be chosen dictator» (V, p. 30-1) and of Anthony that he decided Caesar's body should «be honourably buried and not in hugger mugger» [9]. The updating of texts through translation by means either of additions, omissions or conscious alterations can be very clearly seen in the work of Philemon Holland (1552- 1637) the «translator general». In translating Livy he declared that his aim was to ensure that Livy should «deliver his mind in English, if not so eloquently by many degrees, yet as truly as in Latine, «and claimed that he used not «any affected phrase, but...a meane and popular style». It is his attempt at such a style that led to such alterations as the use of contemporary terminology for certain key Roman terms, so, for example patres et plebs becomes Lords or Nobles and Commons; comitium can be common hall, High court, Parliament; praetor becomes Lord Chief Justice or Lord Governour of the City. At other times, in his attempt to clarify obscure passages and references he inserts explanatory hrases or sentences and above all his confident nationalism shows through. In the Preface to the Reader of his translation of Pliny, Holland attacks those critics who protest at the vulgarization of Latin classics and comments that they «think not so honourably of their native country and mother tongue as they ought», claiming that if they did they would be eager to «triumph over the Romans in subduing their literature under the dent of the English pen» in revenge for the Roman conquest of Britain effected in earlier times by the sword. Translation in the Renaissance Europe came to play a role of central importance. At a time of explosive innovation, and amid a real threat of surfeit and disorder, translation absorbed, shaped, oriented the necessary raw material. It was, in a full sense of the term, the matiere premiere of the imagination. Moreover, it established a logic of relation between past and present, and between different tongues and traditions which were splitting apart under stress of nationalism and religious conflict. Translation was by no means a secondary activity, but a primary one, exerting a shaping force on the intellectual life of the age, and at times the figure of the translator appears almost as a revolutionary activist rather than the servant of an original author or text.

The Elizabethan Scripture translation known as the Geneva Bible was made by the Reformers who had to flee from England to Geneva after Mary Tudor's Accession to the English throne taken place in 1553 and giving the start of Catholic reaction in the country. One of these Genevan refugees, William Whittingham, completed his rendering of the New Testament in 1557 which was printed by Conrad Badius [22] in the same year. Two years later the group of Marian exiles including such Protestant scholars as Christopher Goodman, John Pullain, Thomas Sampson, Miles Coverdale and William Whittingham himself finished their version of the Old Testament.

Thus the early years of Elizabeth's reign were marked by the publication of the English Scripture translation performed in Geneva in 1560 and accepted as the “Bible for Puritans” in Elizabethan England. Produced originally in continental Europe and only in quarto size this rendering of the Scripture was shipped in the whole issue to the British Isles where it became known as the Geneva Bible.

In 1561 this version was printed in England; a patent of monopoly was given to James Bodleigh and in 1576 it was transferred to Christopher Barker, in whose family the right of printing this Scripture translation remained for upwards of a century [22]. According to the figures given by D. V. Wallace and E. H. Plumptre, the experts on the history of rendering the Bible into English, during the almost semi-centennial reign of Queen Elizabeth I nearly 100 [27] (not less than 80 [22]) editions of Genevan translators' work were published. Even such approximate rating data of Elizabethan publications of the Geneva version proves that it was the most popular rendering of the Scripture in England in the late sixteenth - early seventeenth centuries. This popularity is affirmed by the facts of common knowledge that (1) the Geneva Bible was the first English translation of God Breathed Book to be brought to America and (2) it was used by William Shakespeare.

The prevalence of this rendering of the Scripture in the age of Elizabeth I might be defined by the following factors:

- the size of its volume (a small quarto) was appropriate for every-day home usage;

- it was the first English version of the Bible “which laid aside the obsolescent black letter, and appeared in Roman type” in the majority of its editions; [22]

- this translation of the Scripture introduced the standard (generally accepted nowadays) division into verses following both the tradition of ancient origin revealed in Masoretic versions of the Old Testament and the innovation performed by the famous French printer and classical scholar of the sixteenth century Robert Estienne (known as Robertas Stephanus) in his fourth edition of the New Testament (in the Latin translation of Erasmus) made in 1551.

But the acceptance of the Geneva Bible in the Elizabethan era had the limits determined by the confessional divergences between the translators involved in the work over it and their contemporaries concerned with the Reformation in England. As E.H. Plumptre underlines, this rendering of the Scripture “was accordingly the version specially adopted by the great Puritan party through the whole reign of Elizabeth, and far into that of James” [22]. The Puritan's character of the Bible translation made by the exiled English Reformers was revealed in the extensive margin notes which added about one third the length of the Scripture text itself (approximately 300 000 words). Inspired by John Calvin, the leader of the Swiss Reformation (and by coincidence William Whittingham's brother-in-law) these commentaries reflected the process of the authors' adoption of the Calvinistic ideas which reinforced the foundations of Puritanism. But the radical requirement for purifying the Church of England was not shared by all the Reformed Protestants of the Elizabethan age. Accordingly the metatext of the Geneva Bible formed by the translators became the main obstacle for its general recognition by the Englishmen in the late sixteenth - early seventeenth centuries. Moreover, as G. Kenyon points out in his analytical review of rendering the Scripture into English, this version “could hardly be expected to find favor, namely, among the leaders of the Church of England. Elizabeth herself was not too well disposed towards the Puritans, and the bishops in general belonged to the less extreme party in the church” [16, p. 441].

Thus, the archbishop of Canterbury, Matthew Parker, took on the task of coming up with an alternative to the Geneva Bible. He proposed to revive “the old project of a translation to be produced by the bishops” [16, p. 441]. E. H. Plumptre describes the process of its realization in such a way:” Great preparations were made...The bishops.., eight in number, together with some deans and professors, brought out the fruit of their labors in a magnificent folio” [22]. It appeared in 1568 and was called the Bishops' Bible. The second edition of this Scripture version was published in 1569 and included a considerable number of alterations which “were made, partly, it appears, as the result of the criticisms of Giles Laurence, professor of Greek at Oxford” [16, p. 442]. In 1572 the third (and the last) edition of the Bishops' Bible appeared, “of importance chiefly in the New Testament, and in some cases reverting to the first edition of 1568” [16, p. 442].

The Elizabethan Scripture translation performed by the Bishops was introduced in official use; according to the characteristic given by F. F. Bruce, one of the most respected biblical scholars of the twentieth century, during the reign of the Virgin Queen “the Bible of the liturgy would be the Bishops' Bible which was utilized in the Common Book of Prayer” [11, p. 92]. But this rendering of the Scripture could not attain the popularity and influence of the Geneva Bible. E. H. Plumptre has a reason to state:”Of all the English versions, the Bishops' Bible had probably the least success. It did not command the respect of scholars, and its size and cost were far from meeting the wants of the people. Its circulation appears to have been practically limited to the churches which were ordered to be supplied with it” [22].

Thus the intention “to have diversity of translations and readings” (Matthew Parker, the archbishop of Canterbury) did not express the motives of creative activity realized in renderings of the Scripture performed at the climax of the Renaissance in England. The coexistence of The Geneva Bible and the Bishops' Bible in “the golden age” of the national history denoted the tension between the groups of the English Protestants formed in that period. Characterizing the historical context of these versions

Jr. Brown reasonably sums up:”The low church Separatists championed the Geneva Bible. Conversely, the high church Anglicans promoted the Bishop's Bible” [10, p. 17].

Both versions of God Breathed Book appeared in the era of Elizabeth dialogically correlated “word-by-word” model of translation with its “sense-by-sense” matrix in the course of rendering into English the topoi пяоатаац and яроаюяюу defining the personal being in the Greek original of the New Testament.

Simultaneously The Geneva Bible and the Bishops' Bible differed in transforming the Scripture textual organization. The former of these versions didn't exhaust its innovation by introducing the first modern verse divisions, but included “the bracketed” commentaries forming the deliberate perception of the Biblical testimonies. The latter of Elizabethan translations of God Breathed Book was intended to unite two opposite principles of structuring the text: priority of edification presupposing the tendentiousness of interpreting the Scripture evidences and “diversity of translations and readings” demonstrated by combining the different versions of Psalms and attaching the initials of translators to the parts of the Bible rendering produced by them.

Reinforcing the rational aspect of perceiving the Biblical text all these means of providing the personal access to the living God's Word predicted the rationalistic restrictions of the scope of comprehending the supernatural Revelation and formed the premises for reducing the spiritual source of personality to the personalized ratio and supporting in such a way the scholastic double-truth theory realized nowadays as the source of “the immanent frame” [25] of the secularized mind and revised in the postsecular space.» [21] of the person's self-definition.

References

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2. Бахтин М. М. Творчество Франсуа Рабле и народная культура средневековья и Ренессанса / М. М. Бахтин. - М. : Эксмо, 2015. - 640 с.

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8. Тарасова А. А. Специфика диалога эпохи Возрождения / А. А. Тарасова // Исторические, философские, политические и юридические науки, культурология и искусствоведение. Вопросы теории и практики. - 2014. - № 10. - Ч. 2. - С. 181-185.

9. Bassnett S. Translation, History and Culture / S. Bassnett, A. Lefevere. - London : Pinter., 1990. - 254 p.

10. Brown Jr. A Short History of Our English Bible / J. Brown // WRS Journal. - 2003. - №10(2). - P. 17-26.