Chinese Translation Of The Bible Under The Theory Of Manipulation

The Holy Bible ("the Bible") is the classic of the Christianity and it has a profound and far-reaching influence on the western civilization and the world's civilization. Thomas Cahill, an American cultural historian, pointed out that the Bible is "the cornerstone of western civilization". And to study the Bible is to study the western culture; to study the translation of the Bible is to study the translation of the western literature.Since the time when the Bible was introduced into China, it has been translated for over 1300 years. And the Chinese translation activities of the Bible started in Tang Dynasty, developed in Ming and Qing dynasties, flourished in late Qing dynasty and early Republic China and continued to this very day and has never be neglected. CUV and TCV were respectively completed in 1919 and 1979 and they are the two of the most popular versions. CUV and TCV were translated by different translators in different times, so the two had different styles. What qualities do the two versions have? What kind of factors have affected on these two versions in the translating process? What features does the Chinese translation of the Bible embody today? What is the tendency of the Chinese translation of the Bible? These questions will be discussed in this paper.Firstly, the paper briefly introduces the Bible and the study at home and abroad and analyzes the historical background, translators, readers and translation principles of CUV and TCV. And this part made a basis for the flowing parts.Secondly, the paper introduces the theory of manipulation and the anti-manipulation factors and analyzes these two factors'influence on the two versions by comparing the two versions. According to the analyses, it is understood that CUV is manipulated by the three factors:ideology, poetics and patronage and TCV is manipulated by the translators'ambition and consciousness of the readership.Thirdly, the paper illustrates that TCV is more literary than CUV by analyzing the texts of the two versions.Lastly, the paper concludes that CUV is more religious; however, under the influence of the anti-manipulation factors, CUV embodies the literariness to some degree. And TCV is more literary than CUV. The Chinese translation of the Bible is moving from religion to literature. The author of the paper hopes that this paper will provide help for the Bible translators as a reference and more and more good Chinese versions will come out as the development of the theories and practices of the Chinese translation of the Bible.