「성경전서 개역개정판」 아가 번역의 개정을 위한 주석적 제안

Abstract

The Hebrew text of the Song of Songs is in a very good condition presenting no serious text critical issues. However, the book contains some fifty hapax legomena along with very difficult words rarely attested in other books of the Hebrew Bible. In addition, the author of the book uses highly sophisticated poetic devices which can hardly be rendered into another language. Therefore, it would be a daunting task for any translator to render such a book as the Canticles into Korean. While working on a commentary on the Song of Songs, the present author has found that many verses in the translation of the book of the New Korean Revised Version are in need of emendation. Some verses in the current translation fail to reflect the original Hebrew's poetic styles or deliver the intended meaning of the original text. Other verses are to be revised for a better reading on text critical grounds. This study lists these problematic verses with the author's own translation and provides detailed explanations for such emendation. Admittedly, the New Korean Revised Version largely focused on updating old vocabularies in the original Korean Revised Version, thus failing to reflect many of the discoveries and development of recent biblical scholarship. Therefore, time is ripe to discuss the issue of revising or improving the New Korean Revised Version. It is hoped that this short essay will make contributions to this undertaking and that further studies will examine the translation issues of the individual books of the New Korean Revised Version.