Many languages distinguish between inclusive and exclusive first-person plural pronouns (“we”). (Click or tap here to see more details)
The inclusive “we” specifically includes the addressee (“you and I and possibly others”), while the exclusive “we” specifically excludes the addressee (“he/she/they and I, but not you”). This grammatical distinction is called “clusivity.” While Semitic languages such as Hebrew or most Indo-European languages such as Greek or English do not make that distinction, translators of languages with that distinction have to make a choice every time they encounter “we” or a form thereof (in English: “we,” “our,” or “us”).
For this verse, the Jarai and the Adamawa Fulfulde translation both use the exclusive pronoun, excluding Abigail.
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of 1 Samuel 25:15:
Kupsabiny: “Those people were so good to us. While we were with them in the grazing land, they did not harass us and nothing was lost.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Newari: “They treated us very nicely and gave us no trouble at all. No matter where we went in the fields with them, none of our goods got lost.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “These people (were) very good to us (excl.); they do- not -harm us (excl.). And the whole time that we (excl.) (were) there in the field near them, nothing at-all went-missing from us (excl.).” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “All the time that we were in the fields close to them, those men of David were very kind to us. They did not harm us. They did not steal anything from us.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
Click or tap here to see the rest of this insight.
Like a number of other East Asian languages, Japanese uses a complex system of honorifics, i.e. a system where a number of different levels of politeness are expressed in language via words, word forms or grammatical constructs. These can range from addressing someone or referring to someone with contempt (very informal) to expressing the highest level of reference (as used in addressing or referring to God) or any number of levels in-between.
One way Japanese shows different degree of politeness is through the choice of a third person singular and plural pronoun (“he,” “she,” “it” and their various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. While it’s not uncommon to avoid pronouns altogether in Japanese, there are is a range of third person pronouns that can be used. In these verses a number of them are used that pay particularly much respect to the referred person (or, in fact, God, as in Exodus 15:2), including kono kata (この方), sono kata (その方), and ano kata (あの方), meaning “this person,” “that person,” and “that person over there.”
These young men, who were Nabal’s servants, confirm what David’s men had said in verse 7. See also verse 21.
We suffered no harm may be expressed with David’s men as subject of the sentence if it seems more natural to do so in the receptor language: “they did not harm us.” See verse 7.
We did not miss anything: or “they did not steal anything.” See the comments at verse 7.
Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation translate the Hebrew in the fields quite literally. As the next verse indicates, the idea here is that these men were exposed in the open, with no natural protection, when they were in the fields. New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh says “all the time that we went about with them while we were in the open.”
As long as we went with them: or “the whole time we were with them.”
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 .
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.