Since no two languages are identical, either in the meanings given to corresponding symbols or in the ways in which such symbols are arranged in phrases and sentences, it stands to reason that there can be no absolute correspondance between languages. Hence there can be no fully exact translations. In this article, the author first distinguished different types of translations and then focuses on two basic orientations in translating. Furthermore attention goes to the linguistic and cultural distance of the two codes involved and to formal and dynamic equivalence.