throw filth on you

The Hebrew that is translated as “I will throw filth on you” in English (referring to the treatment of a prostitute) is rendered in Medumba with the existing expression “throw filth (ashes) at one’s back.” (“This is the way in which ‘children’ — but there is of course no age limit! — are punished by parents for having violated the existing order or some particular — sexual or non-sexual — taboo. However, at the same time, the expression ‘throw ashes at one’s back’ has entered the language in a figurative way, having the extended meaning of ‘making someone ridiculous.’ In fact, both components of punishment and making ridiculous are present here.”)

Source: Jan de Waard in The Bible Translator 1971, p. 146ff.

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