Hebrew translations

Question

I would like to know the correct Hebrew translation for the phrase, "Whoever saves one life saves the world entire." I saw two different translations in Hebrew, one in google translator, מי שמציל חיים אחד מציל את העולם כולו and the other in Schindler factory in Krakow in Poland, וכל המקיים נפש אחת כאילו קיים עולם מלא but when I try to translate the phrase Schindler factory it goes like this, "And everything that sustains a soul as if it were a complete world." Which two actually mean, "Whoever saves one life saves the world entire."? Is the google translator wrong or in Schindler's factory is it spelled wrong?

Answer 1

You have to realize that the quote in the Schindler factory is a poetic paraphrase of the original. All the words are there, and the concept is the same, but running it through a translator takes out some of the flowery prose and replaces it with more of a, well, sterile feel.

The original quote, as found in the oldest complete manuscript of the oldest Jewish law code, the Mishna Sanhedrin 4:1:

וכל המקיים נפש אחת מעלין עליו כ[א]ילו קיים עולם מלא

Putting this through Google Translate produces

And whoever maintains one soul ascends upon him as if there were a full world

So it's really all in the interpretation of the interpreter.

As an aside, the reason for the discrepancy between the Hebrew in the Schindler factory and the Hebrew of the Talmud is likely that the quote in the Schindler factory is a translation of the original movie quote into Hebrew for the sake of Israeli Jews who come through there, rather than an attempt to quote from the Talmud directly.