gentiles / nations

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The Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin that is often translated as “gentiles” (or “nations”) in English is often translated as a “local equivalent of ‘foreigners,'” such as “the people of other lands” (Guerrero Amuzgo), “people of other towns” (Tzeltal), “people of other languages” (San Miguel El Grande Mixtec), “strange peoples” (Navajo (Dinė)) (this and above, see Bratcher / Nida), “outsiders” (Ekari), “people of foreign lands” (Kannada), “non-Jews” (North Alaskan Inupiatun), “people being-in-darkness” (a figurative expression for people lacking cultural or religious insight) (Toraja-Sa’dan) (source for this and three above Reiling / Swellengrebel), “from different places all people” (Martu Wangka) (source: Carl Gross).

Tzeltal translates it as “people in all different towns,” Chicahuaxtla Triqui as “the people who live all over the world,” Highland Totonac as “all the outsider people,” Sayula Popoluca as “(people) in every land” (source: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.), Chichimeca-Jonaz as “foreign people who are not Jews,” Sierra de Juárez Zapotec as “people of other nations” (source of this and one above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.), Highland Totonac as “outsider people” (source: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.), Uma as “people who are not the descendants of Israel” (source: Uma Back Translation), “other ethnic groups” (source: Newari Back Translation), and Yakan as “the other tribes” (source: Yakan Back Translation).

In Chichewa, it is translated with mitundu or “races.” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)

See also nations.

sanctuary

The Hebrew, Greek and Latin that is translated as “sanctuary” in English is translated in the Contemporary Chichewa translation (2002/2016) with opatulika or “separated place.” This is understood in a religious setup as a place designated for worship. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)

Translation commentary on 1 Maccabees 6:18

Now the men in the citadel: Now is better rendered “Meanwhile” (Good News Bible, Contemporary English Version) or even “At the time that Antiochus died.” Some of the men in the citadel were Gentiles, but many were renegade Jews, Jews who did not obey the Law of Moses (see the comments on 1Macc 1.33-34). This becomes apparent in verse 21 when some of them escaped and went to King Antiochus to complain what their fellow countrymen, the Jews, had done to them. Good News Bible translates this phrase as “the enemies in the fort,” and Contemporary English Version has “some enemies were still in the Jerusalem fortress.”

Kept hemming Israel in around the sanctuary indicates that these men were apparently preventing the Jews from having free access to the Temple, not necessarily blockading the Temple. So we may translate “kept trying to prevent the Jews from entering the Temple.”

They were trying in every way to harm them and strengthen the Gentiles: They were always trying to hurt the Jewish cause and to support the Gentile cause. They did what they could to weaken the Jews over against the Syrians.

An alternative model for this verse is:

• Meanwhile [or, At the time that King Antiochus died] the enemies in the fort in Jerusalem kept trying to prevent the Jews from entering the Temple. They did everything they could to hurt them, and to help the Gentiles.

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on 1-2 Maccabees. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2011. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.