St. Jerome’s Approach to Word-for-Word and Sense-for-Sense Translation1

St. jerome's major contribution to the field of translation is his introduction of the terms word-for-word and sense-for-sense. these two terms were later to be adopted by many translators, opening the heated debates in the coming centuries. though the terms dated back to cicero and horace, st. jerome is still credited for kindling the argument. the purpose of this paper is to examine how st. jerome, through his letter to pammachius (letter 57) entitled “on the best method of translation, approached the word-for-word and sense-for-sense translation, what difficulties the translators face when translating, and how aimed at reinforcing the reasons behind his new latin translation of the old and new testaments: the vulgate.