On the historical epistemologies of Bible translating

The three great monotheisms—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—are all religions based on sacred texts. Of the three, only Christianity has accorded sacred status to translations of its foundational texts. Indeed, one might argue that Christianity has been based on such translations, creating and depending on a multiplicity of texts ostensibly conveying the same message. The result has been two millennia of institutional survival, alongside significant sectarian and social fragmentation. Over the centuries, translation has been associated not just with unity, dissemination, and salvation, but also with dissent and conflict. For each deep-held belief in a unitary message, one could probably find a historical dispute about different renditions; faith in the one message has been experienced through countless adaptations to circumstance. Judaism and Islam, on the other hand, have retained significant social and theological unity by according translation a secondary place, useful for teaching purposes but never replacing the sacred text itself. The way any translator comes to terms with the Christian Bible cannot escape that historical tradition. The Bible can be said to bring with it a complex epistemology