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Semantic shift

If everyone speaks English, why do we need this Oroko Bible translation? Consider this:

The back-translator was going over some text when one of the Baptist pastors (seminary trained) happened by and was interested to hear the story of Cain and Abel. In Oroko, Cain says to Abel, 'let's go out to the [word for farm in "the bush" (read: jungle)]'.

"No," says the pastor, "you've got the wrong word there. It should be [word for soccer pitch]. You know, the field."

This particular misunderstanding has no major theological import, but you can imagine if an educated person could make such a mistake as this, what those with a less masterful grasp of English would make of the NIV, to say nothing of the King James Version, which many of them use.

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