paralytic

The Greek that is translated as “paralytic” in English is translated by the Panjabi translation in Persian script with the common expression “one struck by paralysis.” (Source: Yousaf Sadiq in The Bible Translator 2021, p. 189ff.)

In Cherokee “paralysis” is translated as “loss of control” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 33).

possessed by a demon

The Greek that is translated as “possessed by a demon” in English is translated in Matumbi in two ways. Either as mundu mwene moka / “having a demon” or bandu babalobi moka / “being drunk with a demon.” (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)

In Cherokee it is translated as “to have something alive inside.” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 28)

See also demon.

meek, meekness

The Greek that is often translated as “meek” or “meekness” in English is translated in Malba Birifor as hɛlɛlɛ. David B. Woodford (in The Bible Translator 1962, p. 181 ) tells how that translation was uncovered: “Some words come by the accidents God provides. For a long while we had searched in vain for a word adequate to express ‘meekness.’ Then we gave up (temporarily), and took a walk outside for a break. The grain-stalks left after harvesting were beginning to sprout again, so I said [to the language assistant], ‘Look, they’re sprouting.’ ‘No,’ he said, ‘they’re hɛlɛlɛ.’ ‘What does that mean?’ ‘That is the word we use for new leaves when they are big enough and strong enough to bend and not to break. We use it for people too, who are so strong inside that they don’t need or want to fight you. But if a person is hard and brittle like a dead leaf it means that he is not really strong.’ And that is surely a better word for Bible meekness than anything we can say in English!”

In Cherokee it is translated as “have a heart” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 21).

See also gentleness.

Nephilim

The Hebrew that is translated as “Nephilim” or “giants” in English is translated in Cherokee with the mythological Cherokee figure Judacullah or tsuhlkala. “Judacullah (ᏧᏓᎦᎳ) [is] the giant who taught the Cherokees about hunting, farming, and medicine. Genesis 6:4 describes a time when ‘there were giants in the earth,’ [according to the King James Version] and ‘giants’ is translated as tsunihlkala or Judacullahs, plural! In Cherokee, tsuhlkala is a proper name, so the idea of many populating the land must have been quite striking and creates a uniquely Cherokee reading of this chapter. The use of both dakwa and junihlkala suggests a continuity between the biblical and the Cherokee human experience.” (Source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 47)

magi, wise men

The Greek magoi originally referred to Persian Zoroastrian “priests who were experts in astrology and in the interpretation of dreams. But the word may also be used in a derogatory sense of ‘magician’ or ‘charlatan,’ a meaning which it has in its only other New Testament occurrences outside Matthew’s nativity narrative (Acts 13:6,8). Matthew most likely has Babylonian astrologers in mind.” (Source: Newman / Stine; see also this interview .)

While most English translations either transliterate this as “magi” or translate it as “wise men,” most German versions (with the exceptions of Luther and Menge [publ. 1909]) use Sterndeuter, an old-fashioned term for astrologer. The Pfälzisch translation by Walter Sauer (publ. 2012) uses Sternegugger, also an old-fashioned term for astrologer with the verbatim meaning of “star watchers.” In Luxembourgish, it is translated as weis Astronomen or “wise astronomers.” (Source: Zetzsche)

In Kwakum it is translated as “guardians of religious rites who look up at the starts to see the things to come” or “guardians of religions rites.” (Source: Stacey Hare in this post )

In Cherokee it is translated as aniktani or “knowledgeable ones.” Aniktani (ᎠᏂᎫᏔᏂ) “appear in Cherokee oral history as a former priestly society.” (Source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 47)

See also complete verse (Matthew 2:1) and who know the laws.

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: The Magi .

covenant

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The Hebrew, Greek, Ge’ez, and Latin that are translated as “covenant” in English are translated in a variety of ways. Here are some (back-) translations:

  • Mossi: “helping promise”
  • Vai: “a thing-time-bind” (i.e. “an arrangement agreed upon for a period of time”)
  • Loma (Liberia): “agreement”
  • Northwestern Dinka: “agreement which is tied up” (i.e. “secure and binding”)
  • Chol: “a word which is left”
  • Huastec: “a broken-off word” (“based on the concept of ‘breaking off a word’ and leaving it with the person with whom an agreement has been reached”)
  • Tetelcingo Nahuatl: “a death command” (i.e. “a special term for testament”)
  • Piro: “a promised word”
  • Eastern Krahn: “a word between”
  • Yaka: “promise that brings together” (source for this and all above: Bratcher / Nida)
  • Eastern Highland Otomi: “fixing” (source: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
  • Nabak: alakŋaŋ or “tying the knot” (source: Fabian 2013, p. 156)
  • Kâte: ʒâʒâfic or “tie together” (source: Renck 1990, p. 108)
  • Nyamwezi: ilagano: “agreement, contract, covenant, promise” (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
  • Bariai: “true talk” (source: Bariai Back Translation)
  • Q’anjob’al: “put mouths equal” (representing agreement) (source: Newberry and Kittie Cox in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 91ff. )
  • Manikion, Indonesian: “God’s promise” (source: Daud Soesilo)
  • Natügu: nzesz’tikr drtwr: “oneness of mind” (source: Brenda Boerger in Beerle-Moor / Voinov, p. 164)
  • Tagalog: tipan: mutual promising on the part of two persons agreeing to do something (also has a romantic touch and denotes something secretive) (source: G. Henry Waterman in The Bible Translator 1960, p. 24ff. )
  • Tagbanwa: “initiated-agreement” (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Cherokee: “that which is told” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 16)
  • Guhu-Samane: “The concept [in Mark 14:24 and Matthew 16:28] is not easy, but the ritual freeing of a fruit and nut preserve does afford some reference. Thus, ‘As they were drinking he said to them, ‘On behalf of many this poro provision [poro is the traditional religion] of my blood is released.’ (…) God is here seen as the great benefactor and man the grateful recipient.” (Source: Ernest Richert in The Bible Translator, 1965, p. 81ff. )
  • Chichewa: pangano. This word can also be translated as a contract, agreement, or a treaty between two parties. In Chewa culture, two people or groups enter into an agreement to help each other in times of need. When entering into an agreement, parties look at the mutual benefits which will be gained. The agreement terms are mostly kept as a secret between the parties and the witnesses involved. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
Law (2013, p. 95) writes about how the Ancient Greek Septuagint‘s translation of the Hebrew berith was used by the New Testament writers as a bridge between the Old and New Testaments (click or tap here to read more):

“Right from the start we witness the influence of the Septuagint on the earliest expressions of the Christian faith. In the New Testament, Jesus speaks of his blood being a kaine diatheke, a ‘new covenant.’ The covenant is elucidated in Hebrews 8:8-12 and other texts, but it was preserved in the words of Jesus with this language in Luke 22:20 when at the Last Supper Jesus said, ‘This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood.’ Jesus’s blood was to provide the grounds for the ‘new covenant,’ in contrast to the old one his disciples knew from the Jewish scriptures (e.g., Jeremiah 31:31-34). Thus, the earliest Christians accepted the Jewish Scriptures as prophecies about Jesus and in time began to call the collection the ‘Old Testament’ and the writings about Jesus and early Christianity the ‘New Testament,’ since ‘testament’ was another word for ‘covenant.’ The covenant promises of God (berith in Hebrew) were translated in the Septuagint with the word diatheke. In classical Greek diatheke had meant ‘last will, testament,’ but in the Septuagint it is the chosen equivalent for God’s covenant with his people. The author of Hebrews plays on the double meaning, and when Luke records Jesus’ announcement at the Last Supper that his blood was instituting a ‘new covenant,’ or a ‘new testament,’ he is using the language in an explicit contrast with the old covenant, found in the Jewish scriptures. Soon, the writings that would eventually be chosen to make up the texts about the life and teachings of Jesus and the earliest expression of the Christian faith would be called the New Testament. This very distinction between the Old and New Testaments is based on the Septuagint’s language.”

See also establish (covenant) and covenant (book).

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: Covenant in the Hebrew Bible .

desert / wilderness

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The Greek, Hebrew, Ge’ez, and Latin that is translated as “desert” or “wilderness” in English is translated in a number of ways:

  • Mairasi: “a place where noisiness is cut off (or: stops)” (source: Enggavoter 2004)
  • Muna: pandaso bhalano pr “big barren-field” (source: René van den Berg)
  • Wantoat: “cold windy place where no one lives” (source: John Beekman in Notes on Translation, March 1965, p. 2-20)
  • Balinese: “barren field” (source: J.L. Swellengrebel in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 75ff. )
  • Wantoat: “uninhabited place” (source: Holzhausen 1991, p. 38)
  • Umiray Dumaget Agta: “where no people dwell” (source: Larson 1998, p. 98)
  • Shipibo-Conibo: “where no house is” (source: James Lauriault in The Bible Translator 1951, p. 32ff. )
  • Amri Karbi: “waterless region/place” (source: Philippova 2021, p. 368)
  • Ocotlán Zapotec: “large empty place” (source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
  • Pa’o Karen: “jungle” (denoting a place without any towns, villages and tilled fields) (source: Gordon Luce in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 153f. )
  • Low German translation by Johannes Jessen, publ. 1933, republ. 2006: “steppe”
  • Yakan: “the lonely place” (source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “a land where no people lived” (source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “the place with no inhabitants” (source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Cherokee: inage or “far away downstream” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 16)
  • Matumbi uses various term: lubele (desert, sandy place without water) — used in John 11:54, lupu’ngu’ti (a place where no people live, can be a scrub land, a forest, or a savanna) — used in Mark 1:3 et al.), and mwitu (a forest, a place where wild animals live) — used in Mark 1:13 et al.) (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)
  • Chichewa Contemporary translation (2002/2016): chipululu: a place uninhabited by people with thick forest and bush (source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
  • Adioukrou: loj or “savannah” — “land that is not village, nor forest, nor field (source: Hill 2006)
  • Morelos Nahuatl: “where nobody lives”

    • Isthmus Mixe: “dry country” (source for this and one above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)

Note that in Luke 15:4, usually a term is used that denotes pastoral land, such as “eating/grazing-place,” in Tagbanwa (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation).

See also wilderness and desolate wilderness.

millstone

The Hebrew, Ge’ez and Greek that is translated as “millstone” in English is illustrated for use in Bible translations in East Africa by Pioneer Bible Translators like this:

Image owned by PBT and Jonathan McDaniel and licensed with the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

In the German translation by Fridolin Stier (1989) is it translated as “donkey millstone” (Eselsmühlstein) and in Cherokee as nvya or “rock” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 16).

See also a mill or an upper millstone.