Ulan wrote: ↑Tue Jul 24, 2018 1:46 amWhy would this even matter? The original is online for everyone to peruse, and serious researchers read the Greek text in the original anyway. Using translations just brings new issues into the understanding, because you never know whether differences from other versions of the text are due to the underlying text or due to the translation. That's why translations are not used in serious comparisons.
Another issue which would accompany an English translation is what to do about the corrections in the manuscript itself. Sinaiticus famously contains several layers of corrections throughout the text. I once read what purported to be a faithful English translation of at least part of Sinaiticus, a part which included Acts 8.5, but it gave only the corrected form of that verse, with "Samaria" (in agreement with most/all other manuscripts), instead of the truly interesting original form of that verse in Sinaiticus, with "Caesarea." (I forget where I found this translation.) The only way to properly clue someone without knowledge of Greek into what is going on in the manuscript would seem to be, therefore, to include all the corrections in footnotes or some such. Such an endeavor would amount to producing in a scholarly manner a tome which no scholar would use, since of
course the Greek is what ought to be consulted.
Think of the problems using translations like the KJV causes. The English language has changed since that translation was done, which means modern people, even if they are native English speakers, tend to misunderstand the KJV text even though it is in English, because word meanings have shifted since. That's a problem that is completely independent from the additional issues of the underlying Greek and Latin texts and one of the reasons why the Bible is translated again and again.
I once encountered a tract by some KJV-Only person who thought that the "scrip" of Luke 22.36 meant "script," which the author interpreted as "scripture," thus advising missionaries always to carry a Bible with them. Tautological but true: if you are going to read the King James translation of the Bible, you ought to know King James English.