God is asked here to Remember not the iniquities of our fathers but thy power and thy name. Compare Bar 2.32-33, where God predicts of the exiles that they will “remember the ways of their fathers,” as well as “my name.” Since 3.1-8 is a summary of the whole prayer in 2.11–3.8, it is hard not to see the use of the word remember as deliberate on the writer’s part; the prediction is being fulfilled in 3.5-7. But it may be a subtlety too difficult to preserve in translation (see the comments at 2.32-33). The meaning of this verse may be expressed in the following way:

• Stop dwelling on our ancestors’ sins and think about your own power and reputation.

But it must not sound impolite or demanding, of course. We might say, for example,

• Don’t keep thinking about our ancestors’ sins; this is a time to concentrate on your own power and reputation.

In this crisis is literally just “at this time.” Revised Standard Version is unusually bold in reading such strong meaning into so ordinary a phrase, but the people who prayed understood it in this way. Good News Translation captures that sense splendidly with “at a time like this,” which clearly suggests a crisis, but yet is almost a literal translation.

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on The Shorter Books of the Deuterocanon. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2006. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.