Noah was found perfect and righteous: When the Lord observed how corrupt the world was (Gen 6.11), he found Noah to be righteous (Gen 6.9). “Was” in Good News Translation is equivalent to was found. Another possible model for this line is “Noah perfectly obeyed [or, was completely loyal to] the Lord.”

In the time of wrath he was taken in exchange: In the time of wrath refers to the flood, when God, angry at human sin, inflicted punishment; so this phrase may be rendered “When the Lord became angry and sent the flood to destroy the world.” He was taken in exchange is literally “he became an exchange.” It is difficult to make sense from this, but a look at the Hebrew shows that the Greek translator simply misunderstood the sense of a Hebrew verb. The Hebrew (followed by Good News Translation and now by New Revised Standard Version) reads “in the time of destruction he was the one who continued.” This surely means that at the time of the flood, he continued the human race. This is the meaning of “he gave the human race a new start” in Good News Translation. This expression works well in English, but a translator could follow Shekan’s rendering, which is “[he] kept the [human] race alive.” We recommend following the Hebrew here. An alternative model for this whole line is “He kept the human race alive when the Lord became angry and sent a flood to destroy the world.”

Therefore a remnant was left to the earth when the flood came: Therefore is rendered “Because of him” in Good News Translation. We could also say “This is why.” A remnant was left to the earth is translated by Good News Translation as “there were people left on earth.” Good News Translation shifts the focus from when the flood came to “when the flood was over,” but this says the same thing as Revised Standard Version, and is a slight improvement.

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Sirach. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2008. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.