With with beginning, as for God the sky and the land were drawn up. And there to be a land which does not have form, vacate? And tjncbre that was in opposition of the channel. And mind of God wateren moved by opposition. And being expressed before the God, as follows it left the light/write there where is: And a little it exists.

This is the opening to the King James Bible, but with a twist; we’ve had it translated out of English and back, a couple of times, by an online automated translator.

Now go back to the King James:

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void.

Any better?

Though automated translation has improved considerably in recent years, you can see that most professional (human) translators aren’t quaking in their boots just yet.

The answer to the question, “Why does translation matter?” is easily illustrated by this example. There’s all the difference in the world between one version (of the Bible, say), and another. Even a translation that is strictly “accurate” will reflect certain decisions and styles and understandings of the translator.

This is why a computer without its own style, and unable to understand or make intelligent decisions, will always find it hard to compete with a group of clever and well-read and well-educated 17th-century clerics with a flair for beautifully turned language.

Let’s look at that first sentence again:

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

Seems simple enough, doesn’t it? But…

• Why “In the beginning” rather than “At the start”, or “To begin with”, or “On day one”? Or how about “For starters…”?
  
  
• God – or The Lord? (And it’s God rather than “a god”, presumably?)
  
  
• Created – because he’s the “Creator” – but it could be “made”, or “constructed”, or “built”. Or how about “conceived”? Would that suggest that God was perhaps female? (Which is something we’ll have to worry about when we get to our first pronoun…)
  
  
• The heaven – or “the heavens”, perhaps, or “the sky”? And why not “Heaven”? People talk about dying and going to Heaven, not to the heaven. And “Earth”, or “the earth”?

It may seem that this is splitting hairs – why does it matter?

Well, compare these openings:

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. (King James)

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was barren, with no form of life; it was under a roaring ocean covered with darkness. But the spirit of God was moving over the water. (The Contemporary English Version)

First this: God created the Heavens and Earth – all you see, all you don’t see. Earth was a soup of nothingness, a bottomless emptiness, and inky blackness. God’s spirit brooded like a bird above the watery abyss. (The Message)

Each translation creates a quite different atmosphere: some are more accessible, some more grand; some sound great to read aloud; some are freer than others about how much they change the original or add to it.

One last interesting thing to note:

This is an obvious thing to mention, but… When you start a sentence with “And”, it suggests that you are adding something to the previous sentence; when you start a sentence with “But”, it suggests that the new sentence is somehow in conflict with the previous one, is contradicts or modifies what it means or implies. Notice, then, in the first two versions:

… And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

… But the Spirit of God was moving over the water.

Only a little word, but it changes how the sentence fits into the passage completely.

It was dark and God was there.

It was dark but God was there.

Which sounds right to you?

P.S. Translations of The Bible have always played an important part in the history of translation in general, incidentally - many of the milestones in translation history (in terms of politics and in terms of the way translation is perceived as an art) have related to Bible translations. It's no wonder that the patron saint of translators is St Jerome, the man behind the most famous translation of the Bible into Latin.