The Greek that is translated as “give thanks” in English is Tzotzil as “saying to God: Because of you.” (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
The Greek that is translated as “get behind me, Satan” or similar in English is translated in Highland Oaxaca Chontal as “Go away! Your word is like the word of Satan” and in Tzotzil as “Get away from me, you who are acting like Satan.” (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
The Greek that is typically translated as “send (him) away empty-handed” in English is translated in Punu with the existing idiom “send (him) away holding his hands.” (Source: Nida 1952, p. 54)
In Western Highland Chatino it is translated as “(they) didn’t give him even one grape.” (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
The Greek in Mark 4:3 that is translated with “Listen!” or similar in English is translated in Tzotzil with the traditional story-beginning formula: “I tell you, hear how it is with a man.” (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
Elsa Tamez (in The Bible Translator 2008, p. 59ff. ) explains: “A literal translation of this verse: ‘Let anyone with ears to hear listen!’ (Luke 8:8) is not appropriate for the Deaf community; it is difficult to understand and it can easily be misunderstood. Deaf people have ‘ears to hear’ but they cannot hear.”
In Tzotzil it is translated as “You all who with one heart want to learn, think about what I said,” in San Mateo Del Mar Huave as “Every one of you have heard this story. Now put it in your hearts,” in Gwichʼin as “He that will hear me, let him pay attention to me” (source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.), and in the German New Testament translation by Berger / Nord (publ. 1999) as Denkt gut darüber nach or “Think about it carefully.”
In the German translation by Fridolin Stier (1989) it is translated as “Whoever has ears that are able to hear: listen.”
Willy Wiedmann rendered this phrase artistically in the following way:
In Seri “The woman just wanted to be sure John died” is added to the verse. Without it the head served on a tray implied cannibalism. (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
The Greek and Hebrew that is often translated into English as “(the two) shall become one flesh” is translated as “become just one” in Copainalá Zoque and San Mateo del Mar Huave or with existing idiomatic equivalents such as “become one blood” in Mitla Zapotec, “become the complement of each other’s spirit” in Tzeltal (source for this and above Bratcher / Nida), “become one body” in Uab Meto (source: P. Middelkoop in The Bible Translator 1952, p. 208ff. ), “tie with wife as one, so that they tie one insides” in Luang (source: Kathy and Mark Taber in Kroneman [2004], p. 539), or “become like one body-entity” (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation).
In Tataltepec Chatino it is translated as “the two shall accompany each other so that they no longer seem two but are like one person,” in Choapan Zapotec as “when the man and woman live together in front of God, it is as if just one person,” and in Mezquital Otomi as “they aren’t two, it is as though they are one.” (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
In the German New Testament translation by Berger / Nord (publ. 1999) it is translated with bilden eine neue Sippe or “form a new clan.” They explain (p. 417): “Usually ‘become one flesh.’ This is clearly not correct from a biological point of view. In the Old Testament, ‘flesh’ in such contexts means: ‘kinship, clan, family.’ So the idea is that the man gives up his clan and forms a new clan together with the married woman.”
