The Greek that is translated as “(out of their) surplus (or: abundance)” is translated into Tabasco Chontal as “they gave money which they didn’t need” and into Tzeltal as “the left-over money.”
Language-specific Insights
all she had to live on
The Greek that is often translated into English as “all she had to live on” is translated into “all she had; this was her food” into Tabasco Chontal or “all she was going to eat” into Copainalá Zoque).
dishonor God
The Greek in Romans 2:23 that is usually translated in English as “dishonor God” is translated in various ways:
- Yatzachi Zapotec: “defame God’s character”
- Chicahuaxtla Triqui: “have no reverence before God”
- Tabasco Chontal: “cause God to be hated”
- Sayula Popoluca: “put God in a bad light”
- Highland Totonac: “put God to shame”
- Tzeltal: “cause embarrassment to God”
- Isthmus Zapotec: “err against God”
- Central Tarahumara: “become an enemy of God” (source for all above: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.)
- Bariai: “your eyes mock God” (source: Bariai Back Translation)
- Kupsabiny: “insult God” (source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
- Mairasi: “oppose God” (Enggavoter 2004)
- Hiligaynon: “causing- God -to-be-ashamed” (source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
See also complete verse (Romans 2:23).
care for no man, defer to no one
The Greek that is translated into English as “care for no man” or “defer to no one” (in the sense of not seeking anyone’s favor) is translated in Tabasco Chontal as “you say the same thing to everyone” and in Shilluk as “you show the same respect to everyone.” In Shipibo-Conibo it is “in your mind no one is anything,” in Chol it is “your heart is equally straight in the presence of all men” and in Tzeltal “it does not matter who — all of us are equal as far as you are concerned.”
envy / envious
The Greek, Latin and Hebrew that is translated as “envy” or “envious” in most English translations is, according to Nida (1952, p. 134), translated into Tzeltal and Tabasco Chontal in the following manner:
“Envy is bred of covetousness and self-centeredness. The Tzeltals, who recognize a covetous man as having a ‘small heart,’ say that an envious person has ‘a greedy heart.’ ‘Small hearts’ and ‘greedy hearts’ go together, and the soul shrinks in direct proportion to its greediness. The envious person is never satisfied, for he can never keep step with his own insatiable ego.
“The Chontal Indians, living in the low, swampy delta land of Tabasco in southern Mexico, regard envy in a more subtle way. They say of the man who is envious of his neighbor, ‘He did not want to see his neighbor.’ This describes the end result of envy. People cannot bear to see others enjoying the privileges which they insist should be their own. The envious man has acquired such a self-directed stare that he cannot take his eyes off self to see another’s enjoyment.”
In Central Mazahua is is translated as “jealous of each other, their fellow people,” in Sayula Popoluca as “hate those who have something” (source: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.), in Matumbi as sukya, which means “envy” but also “hate” (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext), and in Kupsabiny as “blackstomached” (source: Kupsabiny Back Translation).
See also envy.
doubt
The Greek and Hebrew that is translated as “doubt” in English versions is translated with a term in Tzeltal that means “heart is gone.” (Nida 1952, p. 122)
In other languages it is represented by a variety of idiomatic renderings, and in the majority of instances the concept of duality is present, e.g. “to make his heart two” (Kekchí), “to be with two hearts” (Punu), “to have two hearts” (Maan), “to stand two” (Sierra de Juárez Zapotec), “to be two” or “to have two minds” (Navajo (Dinė)), “to think something else” (Tabasco Chontal), “to think two different things” (Shipibo-Conibo), “to have two thoughts” (Yaka and Huallaga Huánuco Quechua), or “two-things-soul” (Yucateco).
In some languages, however, doubt is expressed without reference to the concept of “two” or “otherness,” such as “to have whirling words in one’s heart” (Chol), “his thoughts are not on it” (Baoulé), “without thought in the heart” (Kako), or “to have a hard heart” (Piro). (Source: Bratcher / Nida, except for Yucateco: Nida 1947, p. 229, Kako: Reyburn 2002, p. 191, Huallaga Huánuco Quechua: Nida 1952, p. 123, and Maan: Don Slager)
In Elhomwe the same verb for “to doubt” and “to be amazed” is used, so often “to ask questions in heart” is used for “to doubt.” (Source: project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
In Chokwe “kwalajala is ‘to doubt.’ It is the repetitive of kuala, ‘to spread out in order, to lay (as a table), to make (as a bed),’ and is connected with kualula ‘to count.’ [It is therefore like] a person in doubt as one who can’t get a thing in proper order, who lays it out one way but goes back again and again and tries it other ways. It is connected with uncertainty, hesitation, lack of an orderly grasp of the ‘count’ of the subject.” (Source: D. B. Long in The Bible Translator 1952, p. 87ff. )
deny oneself
The Greek that is translated with “deny himself” or “deny oneself” is according to Bratcher / Nida “without doubt one of the most difficult expressions in all of Mark to translate adequately.” These are many of the (back-) translations:
- Tetelcingo Nahuatl: “not accept self”
- Amganad Ifugao and South Bolivian Quechua: “forget self”
- North Alaskan Inupiatun: “have no regard for oneself”
- Toraja-Sa’dan: “not bother oneself about oneself”
- Huautla Mazatec: “cover up oneself”
- San Miguel El Grande Mixtec: “not worship oneself”
- Tzeltal: “stop doing what one’s own heart wants”
- Yaka: “let go that which he wants to do oneself”
- Cashibo-Cacataibo: “say, I will not do just what I want to do”
- Tzotzil: “say, I do not serve for anything” (in the sense of having no personal value)
- Sapo: “not do what is passing through one’s mind”
- Central Mazahua: “not take constant thought for oneself”
- Tabasco Chontal: “quit what one wants”
- Highland Totonac: “undo one’s own way of thinking”
- Dan: “put one’s own things down”
- Kekchí: “despise oneself”
- Kituba: “refuse oneself”
- Javanese: “turn one’s back on oneself”
- Southern Bobo Madaré: “disobey oneself” (in the sense of denying one’s own wishes)
- Huastec: “leave oneself at the side”
- Chicahuaxtla Triqui: “leave one’s own way”
- Loma: “take one’s mind out of oneself completely”
- Panao Huánuco Quechua: “say, I do not live for myself”
- Mitla Zapotec: “say No to oneself” (source for this and all above: Bratcher / Nida)
- Copainalá Zoque: “forgetting self”
- Huallaga Huánuco Quechua: “declare, I do not live for myself” (source: Nida 1952, p. 154)
- Galela: “put self down” (source: Howard Shelden in Kroneman 2004, p. 501)
- Mairasi: “shuffle out of one’s vision (=forget) everything which is one’s own” (source: Enggavoter 2004)
- Q’anjob’al: “do not belong to oneself any longer” (source: Newberry and Kittie Cox in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 91ff. )
- Achi: “don’t do only what one wants to do”
- Chipaya: “leave one’s own way of living” (source for this and above: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
spices
The Greek that is translated as spices in English is translated in Tabasco Chontal as “medicine/spices which pertained to rubbing on the body” and in Seri as “a substance that smelled like perfume. It was for pouring on the dead, one to keep his body from stinking.” (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)