20Then Saul and all the people who were with him rallied and went into the battle, and every sword was against the other, so that there was very great confusion.
The Hebrew and Greek that is transliterated as “Saul” in English is translated in Spanish Sign Language with the sign that depicts “sword in chest” (referring to 1 Samuel 31:4 and 1 Chronicles 10:4) and also “self-centered.” (Source: Steve Parkhurst)
In Gbaya, the notion of something that is messy or jumbled (including concepts like flattering lips, rash words, or doing many things at once) is emphasized with the ideophone ɗulugbuk.
Ideophones are a class of sound symbolic words expressing human sensation that are used as literary devices in many African languages. (Source: Philip Noss)
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of 1 Samuel 14:20:
Kupsabiny: “From there, Saul’s soldiers paraded/arranged themselves and then went to fight with the Philistines. They found the Philistines fighting themselves without knowing (what they were doing).” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Newari: “Then Saul and all his soldiers went to fight against the Philistines. but they saw The Philistines in confusion fighting by sword among themselves.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “Then Saul and his men assembled and went to fight. They saw the Filistinhon in confusion, killing-one-another with swords.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “Then Saul gathered his men and they went toward the battle. They found that the Philistia soldiers were so confused that they were striking each other with their swords.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
The people who were with him: see verses 2 and 17.
Rallied: the Hebrew is literally a passive form of the verb meaning “to cry out.” But in this context it refers to “being called together.” In languages that naturally use the passive form, translators may say “the army was assembled.” Where the passive is not an option, a possible model for translating this verb may be “[Saul] called his army together” (Contemporary English Version).
Behold: the focusing particle here highlights the unusual fact that the Philistines were killing each other.
Every man’s sword was against his fellow: that is, the Philistine soldiers were killing each other. See the similar expression in Judges 7.22. Klein captures the force of the interjection behold as follows: “Surprisingly, the sword of each man [of the Philistines] was turned against his companion—a very great confusion.” Contemporary English Version provides a simpler, common-language equivalent with “By this time the Philistines were so confused that they were killing each other.”
Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellington, John E. A Handbook on the First and Second Books of Samuel, Volume 1. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2001. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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