Introduction (4 min)

previous lesson: Keeping Track of Biblical Term Renderings 

next lesson: Seeing History and Comparing Versions

this lesson in video format:  Lesson 7 videos

Where Are We?

As a consultant for the King James Latin project, you receive their translation text. We will learn how Paratext can help you see what is going on with key terms even though you don't understand the language.

 

Why Is This Important?

You want to help the team to be consistent in their use of key terms so that they don't omit a key term in the translation by mistake. The biblical terms tool helps both translators and consultants to verify the consistency of the translations used for different terms and biblical concepts in the translated text.

 

What Are We Going to Do?

We're going to use the biblical terms tool to verify a variety of terms in the text. This tool will show all the verses that contain a specific key term or name. This will help you to see whether the team has been consistent in their usage of the term. If you find inconsistencies, you can indicate them to the team. After this lesson, you should also be able to teach the team how to save store the key terms in their language in Paratext to better help you next time.

We will also learn how to enter a word into the glossary

Lesson (20 min)

Associating a Biblical Terms List with a project

This can only be done by a project administrator.

For new projects and existing projects, the default Biblical Terms list is Major Biblical Terms. To associate a different Biblical Terms list with your project, do the following;

  • Click in the window of your project, to make it the active window.
  • From the Project menu, select Project Properties and Settings dialog, and click the Associations tab.
  • To the right of Biblical Terms List, click Choose…
  • From the list of Biblical Terms lists available, select the one that you wish to be associated with your project.
  • Click OK.
Biblical Terms Lists
  • Major Biblical Terms 
    A list of important Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic words. This is the only list with glosses available in languages other than English. For the New Testament, there are more than 1,500 terms and 200 additional senses of meaning for the terms. Terms are classified by category and semantic domain.
  • All Biblical Terms 
    A comprehensive list of every Greek, Hebrew, and Aramaic word that occurs 500 times or less. For the New Testament, there are more than 5000 words. The words in this list do not have senses, categories, or semantic domains.
  • NT Key Biblical Terms 
    A list of concepts in the New Testament that have particular theological importance for translators. There are more than 100 terms divided into about 800 senses. This is the list that came with Paratext 6. You must use this list if you have entered renderings in Paratext 6 and you wish to access them in Paratext 7.
 

Start the Biblical Terms Tool

  • Click in the PLKJV window, to make it the active window.
  • From the Tools menu, select Biblical Terms…
 

The tool window is divided into 2 panes:

 

Upper Pane

Displays a table with Biblical Terms, what category each term comes under, a major language gloss for the term, and the known renderings for the term (guessed by Paratext or approved by users) in the selected project.

  • A filled-in star in the “Star” column indicates that a term has been added to the Project Biblical Terms list.
  • The Counts column displays two numbers according to the current filter: the number of occurrences completed (approved, guessed, or denied) and the total number of references.
  • The Found column displays a tick when checking is finished for the term. The tick has a small x if any occurrences of the term have a denied rendering.

Lower Pane

The lower pane displays the verses where the selected term exists in the source language texts, showing how each verse has been translated.

  • A green tick indicates that a known rendering for the selected term has been found in the verse.
  • A red X indicates that the verse does not yet have a known rendering.
  • A green tick with a red X indicates that the verse was approved without an explicit rendering of the term (known in Paratext as a denied rendering).
 

Select a comparative text

  • Click the button Comparative Texts
    • Select the Hebrew/Greek source text (HEB/GRK) or an English gloss (e.g. ESV)
 

Setting the filter

Click the word Filter… in the toolbar.

  • You can filter by a Scripture range, or the current book, chapter, or verse.
  • You can filter by one or more categories. Each term in or from Major Biblical Terms is in one category.
  • You can filter by “Semantic domains” Each term in or from Major Biblical Terms is in one or more semantic domains.
  • Or you can use the search box to find a particular word.
  • Click OK.

Propose Equivalents

Having configured the biblical terms tool, you can have Paratext guess what the English renderings are by using statistical calculations. Afterwards the team can verify the choice and add words that the computer was not able to guess.

Edit Renderings

  • Double-click on the word
  • Use the edit renderings window to insert notes. Encourage teams to use this window to explain their choice of key terms when necessary.
  • Create an entry in the glossary (It's quite easy!)
 

Exercises (29 min)

Work in teams of two people

 

Guess the glosses for all the proper names in the Gospels

  • Activate the window for PLKJV
  • Open the Biblical Terms Tool
    • Tools | Biblical Terms
  • Verify that the PLKJV text is selected:

Pt74btproject

  • Select a comparative text
    • Click on the button Comparative Texts

Pt74btcompartexts

  • Select an English translation such as the New Revised Standard

Pt74btselecttexts

  • From the File menu, select Comparative Texts….
  • In the Select Texts window, double-click on any text listed on the left. The selected text gets added to the list on the right. You can move texts up or down this list using the up and down arrows. You can also remove a text from the list by double-clicking on it.
  • Click OK.

Set the Filter

  • Click the Filter… button
    • Filter by category
      • Select Names
      • Click OK twice to exit back to key terms.

Pt74 Filter By Names

  • Now we were ready to choose Guess Renderings from the Tools menu.
    • The words in red have not yet been confirmed
    • If you think that the computer has guessed correctly you may double-click on the red word to open the Edit Renderings window.
    • Click OK to accept the term.
 

Create an entry in the glossary

  • Find the word for Abraham in the Biblical terms
  • Double-click the name to open the Edit Rendering window
  • Click on the tab Glossary
  • Create a short definition for Abraham in the glossary (Extra credit if you can write it in King James Latin :-)
  • Click OK, then open the Glossary (Book GLO) to see your entry.
 

Guess the glosses for the key terms in the Gospels

Follow the same steps as in the first exercise, except that this time you need to select key terms instead of proper names