NETS and NRSV: Psalm 1

NETS

Happy is the man
who did not walk by the counsel of the impious,
and in the way of sinners did not stand,
and on the seat of pestiferous people did not sit down.
Rather, his will is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law he will meditate day and night.
And he will be like the tree
that was planted by the channels of waters,
which will yield its fruit in its season,
and its leaf will not fall off.
And in all that he does, he will prosper.

Not so the impious, not so!
Rather, they are like the dust that the
wind flings from off the land.
Therefore the impious will not rise up in judgment,
nor sinners in the council of the righteous,
because the Lord knows the way of the righteous,
and the way of the impious will perish.

NRSV

Happy are those
who do not follow the advice of the wicked,
or take the path that sinners tread,
or sit in the seat of scoffers;
but their delight is in the law of the Lord,
and on his law they meditate day and night.
They are like trees planted by streams of water,
which yield their fruit in its season,
and their leaves do not wither.
In all that they do, they prosper.

The wicked are not so,
but are like chaff that the wind drives away.
Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment,
nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous;
for the Lord watches over the way of the righteous,
but the way of the wicked will perish.

There has been some discussion by Kevin, Iyov, Stefan, and doubtless by others, on the recently published New English Translation of the Septuagint. One of threads is concerned with how closely the NETS follows the NRSV, the translation which it is designed to parallel.

I am sure you will immediately notice that the NETS is not a completely gender neutral translation. However, it is in principle, and in Genesis the word "humankind" is used for anthropos. But here the word is aner. Although there is strong case to be made for aner sometimes being translated as "person", the preference, in a translation of this sort, is to maintain concordance where it works. Pietersma writes,

Though I have eschewed any rigid policy of one-to-one Greek-English equation, a reasonable effort has been made to reproduce word echoes in the Greek, which may or may not reflect echoes in the Hebrew. In passing it deserves to be mentioned that this effort has not infrequently meant that the reading of the NRSV has been replaced by a synonym in NETS. Psalms: To the Reader

Other differences are the adherence to the Greek inverted word order and the grammtical endings such as plural "waters" in line 8.

On another note, Pietersma mentions a particular literary feature of the Greek Psalms which is the lyrical translation for ben adam in Psalm 49:3, where the translator writes, γηγενεις "earthborn".

I note with some chagrin that when Pietersma mentions his grad students, the names appear to be all male. In my year, his class was well balanced with men and women, but the women did not stay in that field of study, although not for lack of a love of language.

Update: I certainly had no intention of saying anything negative about either the NETS use of gender language or the fact that there are so few women involved in this project. I only spoke with regret that I had not pursued this area myself. When I ask why why more Christian women are not in active leadership in certain areas, I am speaking first to myself.