Translation, version and memories

I never asked if I was born when the moon was brightest. Or if it was raining when I was born to be stamped the innocent sinner. But August in Tamenglong, where I was born, received heavy rainfall and hail that melt to lose its whiteness. If my grandparents happen to be one of those Israelites during the Biblical time, with their bloody hands, it would have justified the belief that I was a sinner when I was born. Otherwise not. But my father would not be free from sin when I was born. That, then, would be enough to make me a sinner. As I grew up, not in Monday school, but Sunday school, I was injected the sinner’s doses in beautiful dramatic lessons. That was further substantiated by the doomed warning that I would be in hell if I remain to be what I was when I was born. That not only scared me but also disturbed me a lot when I was a kid. I did never overdose for the simple reason that it could not be. Even if one could, the beautiful game is that one would not see the Kingdom come by being good. I was given the right dose that becomes a strict affair in the family too. But my innocence never asked or questioned. My conscience did not. My reason did not. Everything was accepted with without. Without questioning. Without reasoning. However, to not question or reason would be to fulfill Marx’s explanation of religion as the opium of the masses.

I remember it gnaws more conservatively where I was born. Translation in search of the truth would take many decades more out there as the first one was accepted as something that had the touch of the hand of God. Or that holy breathe. Even the mistaken punctuation becomes holy and untouchable. As if romancing the saying that the sweetest is with the first bite. That not only had a degenerating impact on their literature, songs, but also on their mindset. Meager would be more polite to speak about the absence. There is, no doubt, the abundant error, and unclear texts, though translated. Even then, His love still has salvation for us. But the need for translation would, even if it were realized, would have to negotiate the terrain of numb and paralysed conservativeness, if not the sink of doctrinal fundamentalism. It was not strange when L Keivom, translator of Delhi Edition Bible, found himself standing alone, though not lonely, when he pursued the calling for translation.

Last week, HSA Delhi and Sekibusuok editorial board organized a seminar on Translation, Literature and Vision at Jawaharlal Nehru University. That was an almost, if not it, Marx superstructure topic, when our people are struggling for unbuttered bread. It led one into serious thinking, questioning and introspection. What interest me were the strong foreign cultural memories that are embedded firmly in our belief system, which has already become a part and parcel of our culture and value system. It has actually become our worship system. There are many questions. Can a globalize religion do without a tribal culture? Is it necessary for a globalize religion to inherit and survive on a tribal cultural memories? Does faith have to thrive and live on a worldly culture?

Do we need to decolonize our religious mindset? Too many things are embraced blindly without any question. We allow distortions of history. I don’t really know, but I haven’t seen any dry aged skull in any Hmar or Mizo villages. I have seen them adorning the houses in several Naga villages. But the despised history, which is ours, has it that our forefathers were headhunters in the days clogged with incurable darkness. Does that mean there are skeletons in our closet? Otherwise, our celebrated dances portrays volumes about overflowing love, courting, and all those sophisticated moves any Romeo or Juliet of the time would have exhibit to win their preyed heart and soul. The question again is how did we translate those oral history, which we still have traces of them in our inherited cultural memories, to our understanding of our past. For us culture transmits or imparts our historical reality through the oral ancestors that are reflected in our songs and dances. The rest is composed to invade and win the land and its people that Columbus has long discovered. But our version of history that is winning hearts beyond borders, which has us as headhunter is very recent. Another question is, are we telling this history because it is too convenient?

If the Lamb of God was translated as the pig of God in Papua New Guinea, something must have been done with us too. If not, it won’t be right. If not, it won’t be true. If not we may even have to. There is valid reason in Martin Luther’s saying that literal Latin is a great obstacle to speaking good German. It certainly would do worse for us. In Papua New Guinea any pig is holier than ten lamb or goat. Maybe hundred. There is a reason to speak in the language of one’s history, culture and value system if we desire to deliver understanding and acceptance. Like turning the water into wine. There is a need for it so that the message of salvation is delivered. Imagine failing to sow the seed of salvation to a ‘dark’ and ‘dim’ continent merely because of the choice of lamb over pig. Culture should act as the filter to our understanding, which was rightly practiced in Papua New Guinea. One desireable evidence where the Son of Man could win, but not Columbus. It would be an unrecoverable loss to sacrifice one’s identity, history and culture to the embedded seduction of an imagined superior and glorious culture in the name of salvation. L Keivom also acknowledged that Hmar is no inferior to English or Hebrew. Cultures that are foreign slipped in the guises of the words and songs of salvation. It is no surprise today when we quest for white, shining and glittering Christmas with cakes, Santa Claus and jingle bells. But Oh! We also have children running around with sophisticated toy guns in combat dresses for Christmas. Besides, we have every sort of cult group multiplying. Some of them have even gained popular acceptance. Sub-culture and call it sub-history also grows along them. Sometimes I wonder if they are also the sons and daughters of the failed translation. Once bitten twice shy. Unknowingly, we treated them as sacred, sanctified, sacrosanct and untouchable. I wonder if this cheap version is due to our failed translation. Or due to weak memories of our history and culture. Or due to the weakness of our history and culture.Or merely because of the supposed holy man whom Martin Luther called “incurable fellows.”