These two verses are combined and radically restructured in Good News Translation. The information taken as parenthetical by Revised Standard Version is shifted forward and given greater prominence. This may also serve as a good model in many other languages.

The men of the land: this means the former inhabitants of the land of Canaan. Good News Translation simply uses the pronoun “They,” but it is probably wiser to make this more explicit. Some other alternatives are “the previous inhabitants” (New American Bible), “the local inhabitants” (Moffatt), and “the people who lived in the country before you” (New Jerusalem Bible).

Statutes and … ordinances: see verse 4.

Abominations: see verses 17 and 22.

The native or the stranger …: see 17.15. Compare also 16.29.

Quoted with permission from Péter-Contesse, René and Ellington, John. A Handbook on Leviticus. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1990. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .