<aside> 💡 This is a hands on activity to help teams think through what it means for a translation to be both trustworthy and trusted. It asks the team to consider translations they know that have these qualities or have had problems because they are missing them.
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Just because something is trusted does not mean it is worthy of trust. Only God is worthy or deserving of trust. Humans, with their changing thoughts and hearts, are often not worthy of trust. Something like a bridge may be very secure and worthy of trust but if people are afraid and do not walk on it, they do not trust it. These are the concepts we are going to talk about as related to Bible translation. Study the image below carefully:
The vertical Trustworthy/Not Trustworthy line is measurable. Checks can be done to determine if a translation is accurate & clear and, therefore, trustworthy. The horizontal Trusted/Not Trusted line is difficult to measure because this line represents how people feel or perceive a translation.
Quadrant 1: A translation may be accurate and trustworthy, but people do not trust it because they do not know who translated it; they were not involved in the translation; the person who translated it does not have a good reputation; or because of many other reasons. A translation that is Trustworthy but Not Trusted is a clear, accurate translation, but for one of the reasons listed above or for any other reason such as not knowing the translation exists, people do not use it.
Quadrant 2: A translation that is Not Trustworthy & Not Trusted is a bad translation, and everyone knows it is bad. It is sad that the resources were wasted to print and distribute a bad translation, but at least people know it and are not deceived by the bad translation.
Quadrant 3: A translation that is Trusted but Not Trustworthy is the worst kind of translation. It is not accurate and/or not understandable, but people do not know this reality. They think it is correct and that they understand what it is saying, but it is not true. This is the kind of translation that often leads to false teaching.
Quadrant 4: A translation that is Trustworthy and Trusted is the best translation and what every translation team should seek to accomplish. To accomplish a Trustworthy and Trusted translation, translators will learn how to do a long series of checks at every stage of the translation process to ensure the translation is accurate and trustworthy. Many of those checks will be done by pastors and church leaders, so the church can be confident in the translation and trust it completely.
<aside> 💡 Think about translations you know. Do you know any translations that fall into the other quadrants? Map them onto the graph. Why are they either not trustworthy or not trusted?
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