A Passion for the Impossible
I am slowly reading Miriam Huffman Rockness' amazing biography of Lilias Trotter. She and her colleagues were pioneer missionaries to Northern Africa in late Victorian and Edwardian England times. I am about two-thirds through.
I will quote a section from Ms. Trotter's diary about translation problems. It seems appropriate in light of middle Eastern persecutions.
There are side touches too that bring Him near-yesterday "Fear not little flock" came in the chapter that we were working on--& we were getting at the right word for "little flock"--"Would that expression--jelieb--I think it was--mean such a little flock that it would not be worth the shepherd's care?" asked M. Summers. "No, if it were a very little flock the shepherd care for it all the more," answered Hadj Brahaim--and up shot the echo in thanksgiving to the great Shepherd who has such a very little flock in these Moslem Lands--He "are for it all the more." (29 March 1908)
I will quote a section from Ms. Trotter's diary about translation problems. It seems appropriate in light of middle Eastern persecutions.
There are side touches too that bring Him near-yesterday "Fear not little flock" came in the chapter that we were working on--& we were getting at the right word for "little flock"--"Would that expression--jelieb--I think it was--mean such a little flock that it would not be worth the shepherd's care?" asked M. Summers. "No, if it were a very little flock the shepherd care for it all the more," answered Hadj Brahaim--and up shot the echo in thanksgiving to the great Shepherd who has such a very little flock in these Moslem Lands--He "are for it all the more." (29 March 1908)
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