The New Testament of our Lord Jesus Christ in the new Russian translation by K.P. Pobedonostsev

The first edition of the translation of the New Testament books prepared by K.P. Pobedonostsev, published in 1906, the second edition was published in the year of the translator’s death. Pobedonostsev called this work his “testament to the Russian reader.” According to Pobedonostsev, translating the Slavic speech of the Gospel into ordinary Russian means spoiling it, and “translating it by paraphrasing means disfiguring it with the danger of vulgarizing the pure and belittling the sublime.” Nevertheless, Pobedonostsev recognized the need to have a Russian translation of the Gospel. He considered his translation to be his first experience, which the translator himself recognized as imperfect, and the task before him as extremely difficult. Pobedonostsev strove not to change the turn and structure of the Slavic phrase without special need, bringing his translation closer to the Church Slavonic text. He attached great importance to the harmony of phrase heard in church. This harmony depends, among other things, on consonance in the juxtaposition of words. When changing the construction of a phrase, this harmony is often disrupted. The translation of the New Testament, carried out by Pobedonostsev, combines Russian and Church Slavonic vocabulary as much as possible. Pobedonostsev assessed the Synodal translation of the New Testament negatively, which prompted him to undertake a new translation. The so-called Synodal translation of the New Testament was carried out from the Greek text. Currently, this is the only translation of the New Testament into Russian recognized in church practice (published in the early 1860s). In the preface to the publication, Pobedonostsev explains the principles that guided him when working on the language of his translation. The text of the Acts and the Apostolic Epistles underwent the least amount of linguistic processing. In the preface, Pobedonostsev gives examples of the corrections he made to the New Testament text. For example, he replaces the phrase “mocked by the Magi” with the Church Slavonic “mocked by the Magi”, “forgiveness of sins” with “forgiveness of sins”, “loud voice” with “great voice”. It took Pobedonostsev two years to translate the New Testament. Back in 1892, Chief Prosecutor of the Holy Synod K.P. Pobedonostsev turned to the rectors of theological academies with a request to provide an analysis of the inaccuracies of the Slavic and Russian translations of the New Testament. The rector of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, Bishop Anthony of Vyborg (Vadkovsky), entrusted this task to N.N. Glubokovsky. Subsequently, the manuscript of Glubokovsky K.P. Pobedonostsev used it when compiling his own translation of the New Testament. Konstantin Petrovich Pobedonostsev (1827–1907) - Russian statesman, lawyer, chief prosecutor of the Synod. The son of a professor at Moscow University. Graduated from the School of Law. Served as an official in the departments of the Senate. In 1860–1865 Professor of the Department of Civil Law at Moscow University. Since 1868, senator, since 1872, member of the State Council, in 1880–1905. - Chief Prosecutor of the Synod. He taught law to the great princes, including the future emperors Alexander III and Nicholas II, on whom he had great influence. Author of the Manifesto of April 29, 1881 on strengthening the autocracy. The mastermind of extreme reaction. Opponent of Western European culture and bourgeois forms of social life. As chief prosecutor of the Synod, he persecuted schismatics and sectarians, oppressed the zemstvo school and established the church school. After the publication of the Manifesto on October 17, 1905, he retired. Orthodox people are familiar with the Apostolic Epistles and the Book of Acts mainly from church readings. But these readings, arranged in the service according to the beginnings, are presented in the form of excerpts from the entire text, and in many cases are little understood without connection with the remaining parts of the whole message. Reading the messages at home, which is not accessible to everyone, is difficult for many, due to the fact that the speech, arranged in individual verses, is a literal translation from the Greek composition and is located in long phrases and periods that are unusual for the Russian composition, therefore it is difficult to understand: the reader has to, moving from one verse to another, look for the mutual connection between them and think about the idea that connects the totality phrases. Moreover, the reader often encounters words and terms that are difficult for him to understand. The present translation of the messages aims to present them in a presentation that eliminates, if possible, these difficulties, and to facilitate the pious reader’s understanding of the sacred text in home reading. Attentive readers will judge to what extent this first experiment satisfies its purpose. Experience to improve the translation into Russian of the holy books of the New Testament Our Church Slavonic language is the great treasure of our spirit, the precious source and inspirer of our native speech. Its strength, expressiveness, depth of thought reflected in it, the harmony of its consonances and the structure of the entire speech - create its inimitable beauty. And in this language, its inspired creators, themselves raised on the beauty and power of Hellenic speech, gave us the books of the Holy Scriptures, gave us the Holy Gospel. And every word of this book, read day after day in church, is familiar, familiar, understandable to every Russian person raised in the church. The language of the Holy Gospel is filled with such lofty simplicity, and every word in it, and every speech in its entirety is filled with such sacred meaning and such sacred memory, that, it would seem, there is no need to translate it into our everyday speech, into the language in which we speak, in which the books of our so-called literature are written. To translate the Slavic speech of the Gospel into this language means to spoil it; and to paraphrase it means to disfigure it with the danger of vulgarizing the pure and belittling the sublime. It was recognized, however, that it was necessary to have a Russian translation of the Gospel, and the first experiment was made, which, due to the difficulty of this matter, of course, could not be perfect. It is necessary to continue these experiments until we receive a translation in a language worthy of the Slavic original, in a language that would not disturb the ear of one familiar with the harmony of church reading. Significant success could be expected - and it was not in vain that they expected - from Zhukovsky’s translation. He was a connoisseur of Russian speech - not just the book, he understood with his mind and heart the beauty of the Slavic language and had the ability to sense and find the harmony of words. All these qualities were reflected in Zhukovsky’s translation. Now I consider it useful to offer a new experience in translating the Holy Gospel. I consider it useful to indicate some of the considerations that guided me. I think that one should not change, without special need, the turnover and construction of a Slavic phrase, but should, where possible, be applied to it. The harmony of a phrase, as we hear in church, means a lot: it depends on the consonance in the juxtaposition of words and especially in the final sound; By changing the design, we often violate this harmony, and to maintain it in any scripture, we must compose a phrase not only with our thoughts, but also with our ears. In many cases, it is in vain to avoid Slavic words and sayings in Russian translation, when they are used in a certain tone in Russian speech and are understandable to everyone. Why, for example, where it is used with full dignity in Slavic yes, put Russian because from colloquial speech (for example, John 1:8, 9:3, 10:17)? and where possible, more decently than because it is used in large quantities. Why eliminate what is familiar and understandable to everyone for the sake of it? Why replete the gospel speech taken from the Slavic with inharmonious and clumsy words? It is possible instead - with a change in the phrase - to put he, who, or to resort to the common that (John 9:8-24). And in John 17:6 it is very inconvenient to hear the words of which, and it seems more decent to leave them here, but in John 1:47 it is completely worthy to leave them there. John 5:45, 6:51. Why replace this everywhere with the colloquial this? Why replace the future everywhere with the future (hardly in meaning and the corresponding term), or the future with the coming? Here we have to distinguish which word is more decent in relation to the subject of speech. John 1:36–47. Why, where you can resort to a simple expression, put a bookish, artificial, not simple, but abstract word: has, have? In John 13:25 it seems more decent to leave the word persi. By replacing a word with another, current in conversation, we risk changing or weakening the meaning of the term used in the sacred text - for example, putting learned instead of understood, do instead of create, will receive instead of find, knew instead of knew, completely instead of fulfilled, takes instead of takes, you will see instead of behold, destroy instead of ruin, declare instead of confession, strange instead of cruel, friends instead of friends , servants instead of servants , announced instead of told . And in many cases there is no need for this replacement, from which the speech does not become any clearer, but only becomes vulgarized. Good wine is much more expressive and simpler than good wine; kept much more accurately than he saved in John 2:10. There is no need to replace the rope from the current speech with a rope. It is more appropriate to leave the word sign instead of miracle; but in other places the miracle is more decent in terms of the setting of speech. The word signified is hardly convenient to replace with the words put seal John 6:27; or John 12:33. There is no need to replace the word “appropriate” where it is more worthy. John 9:4. There is no reason to replace a student with a well and a ship with a boat; It’s even more decent to have a boat instead of a boat. The word without hesitation, which is used in our country in ordinary speech, has no reason to be replaced. John 10:24. From time immemorial it is as clear as from the beginning. Replacement of eyes with eyes is not appropriate everywhere. It is hardly convenient to replace the word wife with the word woman. Dragging a boat - in any case, it’s more worthy of the word dragging. In many cases it is more decent to leave the word verbs, just as it is more decent to ask than to ask. In the phrase: “How long will you bear our souls?” instead of earthly they use disturb, without replacing it with the cliched phrase: you keep in bewilderment. John 10:24. It is more appropriate to say that he will remember the Holy Spirit than remind him. Also John 14:26. Raising your eyes to grief - there is hardly any need to replace it with the words: raising your eyes to the sky. John 11:41. In some places, it seems, the words sy and paki can be left out. John 1:18, 2:13. In some places it seemed more convenient to leave Slavic phrases without replacement, understandable to everyone, when everyone is used to hearing them, and they are expressive, for example: per word (John 15:3); It’s better not to replace this with the phrase: through the word. It is also more decent to leave this out in many places. When considering where the word of the Slavic text should be left and where to replace it with a current word, it is necessary, I think, to distinguish between what is being discussed and whose words these are: Jesus Christ, the evangelist, or persons from the people. I think that it is better to leave some Greek words - familiar and sometimes dear to those who hear the Gospel - explaining them, if you like, by translation in a footnote. These are, for example: architricline, alector, lention (without transferring it through a towel). You might be interested in: