On the Perils of Good Translation (2)

A couple of years ago I wrote about the danger of good translations, which lull the reader into an unquestioning sense of security with regards to the original text. The translator was R. Shmuel ibn Tibbon, and the text was the Rambam's Guide for the Perplexed. The error there was not insignificant, and the moral of the story was כבדהו וחשדהו, or as we say in English, "trust, but verify".

In this part of the series, the protagonist (or villain, depending on your point of view) is again ibn Tibbon, and the text the very same. As in the previous case, there is no real error here and the crack is even harder to find; also as in the previous case, the lesson is that the greatest authors and texts are far too dense for any mortal to translate without significant losses of fidelity.

The relevant passage is in the Guide, 1:61:

כל שמותיו ית' הנמצאים בספרים כולם נגזרים מן הפעולות - וזה מה שאין העלם בו - אלא שם אחד והוא 'יוד הא ואו הא' שהוא שם מיוחד לו ית' ולזה נקרא 'שם מפורש' - ענינו שהוא יורה על עצמו ית' הוראה מבוארת אין השתתפות בה. אמנם שאר שמותיו הנכבדים מורים בשיתוף להיותם נגזרים מפעולות ימצא כמותם לנו כמו שבארנו.

All of God's names found in [our] books are derived from actions--that is well-known--besides for one: the four-letter name "Yud He Vav He", which is the name of God that is unique (Heb. meyuchad) to Him, and for that reason is called the shem hameforash, the meaning of which is that it denotes God's essence clearly in such a way as does not involve any homonymy. However, the rest of His honorable names refer [to Him] through homonymy, as they are derived from actions of a kind that are common to us, as we explained.

So far, so good. Kind of. If we try to follow the argument here, we find ourselves getting stuck on one transition. How exactly does the uniqueness of the name lead to the Hebrew shem hameforash, which means not "unique" but "made clear, explicit"? The reader is inclined, at this point, to let this slide, as the rest of the paragraph makes sense, more or less, and this is a pretty minor point.

Or is it?

A look at the Arabic tells us that the term ibn Tibbon is translating here is אסם מרתג'ל. The verb מרתג'ל (here, a present participle) is not very common, and a consultation of Lane's dictionary reveals two possible meanings: 1) extemporize, improvise, or 2) be alone, independent of others, not sharing or participating in something with others. The first meaning is not relevant here, and ibn Tibbon clearly wants to render the word using the second meaning. The Hebrew meyuchad, used here for that purpose, should not be read as "unique" in the sense of "especially for" or "particular to" but in the sense of "separate".

This, the Rambam understands, is the more significant meaning of the Hebrew word meforash. While it appears to be the passive of the present participle mefaresh, derived from the root p.r.sh in the verb form pi`el and meaning "to say explicitly", it is actually connected to the words parush and mufrash, which are derived from the same root but come from different verb forms, and mean "separate, separated off". With this in mind, the rest of this passage and the entire chapter in the Guide now read quite naturally, as well. The Rambam insists that this name "refers to God's essence in such a way as does not involve any homonymy", or, quite literally, "sharing".

Indeed, the Rambam is merely following and unpacking a passage that appears in both Sifri and Sotah, which he quotes later in this chapter. There, the tradition understands that the priestly blessing must employ the shem hameforash. How, asks the tradition, do we know this? Because the verse commanding the priests to bless the people says that they shall "place My name upon the Children of Israel", and "My name" indicates the name which is "meyuchad for Me". Without the Rambam's gloss of meforash as a "separate name" this passage is inexplicable--what does uniqueness (meyuchad) have to do with explicitness or clarity (meforash)? With his gloss it reads quite naturally; in fact, the passage becomes a significant insight into the history of the names. In the Rambam's reading, the Talmud (and Sifri) is itself offering a gloss of the term meforash, which already existed and denoted the tetragrammaton. The primary, straightforward meaning of the term meforash is "explicit", a reference to the pronunciation of the tetragrammaton as written as opposed to the more common substitution of adon-ai. The Talmud, however, is not against reading the term midrashically as connected to the words parush/mufrash. How, asks the Talmud, do we know to use the tetragrammaton here? Because meforash is to be midrashically read as though it were parush/mufrash, i.e. meyuchad. As he does throughout the Guide, the Rambam picks up on the theological significance of this seemingly minor midrashic twist and devotes this chapter to its explication.

Has the Rambam then abandoned the simple meaning of the Hebrew meforash in favor of the Talmud's midrashic understanding? Looking closely again at his wording, we see that he has not. The action of this name is שהוא יורה על עצמו ית' הוראה מבוארת אין השתתפות בה, "it denotes God's essence clearly in such a way as does not involve any homonymy". In light of the above, we can clearly discern both the simple meaning of meforash--"it denotes God's essence clearly"--and the Maimonidean/Talmudic reading of meforash--"in such a way as does not involve any homonymy"--standing side by side. The run-on fashion in which the Rambam blends the two suggests that he saw them as two sides of the same coin, one explaining the other: the name is only "clear" in the sense that it does not involve homonymy (as the Rambam often points out, this is the most one can say in a positive statement about God, Whose essence remains unknowable), and it does not involve homonymy because it must be "clear". As we have seen, the Hebrew מפורש plays with both senses. So does the Arabic adjective בין, which the Rambam uses for "clear": its sense of "clear" derives from its initial sense of "distinct, separate", and thus it alludes to both ideas.

Just as in the first part of the series, ibn Tibbon is not really wrong. The Mishnaic Hebrew word meyuchad can mean "separate, alone", as in the prohibition of yichud, or seclusion of a man and woman who are not husband and wife. Indeed, ibn Tibbon is merely following the Rambam himself! Seeing that the Rambam quotes the passage from Sotah, in which meforash is equated with meyuchad, ibn Tibbon can think of no better word by which to render the Arabic מרתג'ל! But because the word is multivalent, and is much more commonly understood as "designated for" in the Talmudic corpus, the Hebrew reader can only discern ibn Tibbon's intent after some struggle, a struggle in which the Arabic reader would not have had to engage. It is ibn Tibbon's very sharpness that ends up unintentionally obscuring the meaning of the passage.

In the next part of the series, we will discuss a related twist that left another translator of the Rambam with broken ankles.