Passover

The Hebrew and Greek pesach/pascha that is typically translated in English as “Passover” (see below) is translated in a variety of descriptive ways of various aspects of the Jewish festival. (Click or tap here to see the rest of this insight):

  • Ojitlán Chinantec: “the feast of the passing by of God’s angel”
  • Lalana Chinantec: “the day would come which is called Passover, when the Israel people remember how they went out of the land of Egypt”
  • Huehuetla Tepehua: “the celebration when they ate their sheep”
  • Umiray Dumaget Agta: “the celebration of the day of their being brought out of bondage”
    (source for this and above: M. Larson / B. Moore in Notes on Translation February 1970, p. 1-125.)
  • Obolo: ijọk Iraraka — “Festival of Passing” (source: Enene Enene)
  • Guhu-Samane: “special day of sparing” (source: Ernest Richert in The Bible Translator 1965, p. 198ff. )
  • Yakan: “The festival of the Isra’il tribe which they call For-Remembering” (source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Wolof: “Festival of the day of Salvation” (“the term ‘pass over’ brings up the image of a person’s crossing over a chasm after death”) (source: Marilyn Escher)
  • Bura-Pabir: vir kucelir fəlɓəla kəi — “time-of happiness-of jumping-over house”
  • Berom: Nzem Gyilsit Nelɔ — “Festival-of jumping-of houses”
  • Nigerian Fulfulde: Humto Ƴaɓɓitaaki / Humto Sakkinki — “Festival-of passing-over”
  • Hausa: Bikin Ƙetarewa — “Festival-of going-over” (source for this and three above: Andy Warren-Rothlin)
  • Jula: “Feast of end of slavery” (source: Fritz Goerling)
  • Bafanji: laiŋzieʼ — “pass-jump over” (source: Cameron Hamm)
  • Tiéyaxo Bozo / Jenaama Bozo: “Salvation/Rescue (religious) feast” (source: Marko Hakkola)
  • Sabaot: Saakweetaab Keeytaayeet — “Festival of Passing-by” (source: Iver Larsen)
  • Language spoken in India and Bangladesh: “Festival of avoidance”
  • Vlax Romani: o ghes o baro le Nakhimasko — “the Day of the Passing”
  • Saint Lucian Creole: Fèt Délivwans — “Feast of Deliverance” (source: David Frank)
  • Finnish: pääsiäinen (“The term is very probably coined during the NT translation process around 1520-1530. It is connected to a multivalent verb päästä and as such refers either to the Exodus (päästä meaning “to get away [from Egypt]”) or to the end of the Lent [päästä referring to get relieved from the limitations in diet]. The later explanation being far more probable than the first.”)
  • Northern Sami: beas’sážat (“Coined following the model in Finnish. The Sami verb is beassat and behaves partly like the Finnish one. Many Christian key terms are either borrowed from Finnish or coined following the Finnish example.”)
  • Estonian: ülestõusmispüha — “holiday/Sunday of the resurrection” — or lihavõttepüha — “holiday/Sunday of returning of meat”
  • Karelian: äijüpäivü — “the great day” (“Here one can hear the influence of the Eastern Christianity, but not directly Russian as language, because the Russian term is Пасха/Pasha or Воскресение Христово/Voskresenie Hristovo, ‘[the day of] the resurrection of Christ,’ but the week before Easter is called as the great week.”) (Source for this and three above: Seppo Sipilä)
  • Russian (for Russian speaking Muslims): праздник Освобождения/prazdnik Osvobozhdeniya — “Festival of-liberation” (source: Andy Warren-Rothlin)
  • Kono: laaŋumɛ̃ɛ̃ or “skip over the person” (provisional term). Alesha Hagemeyer explains in this blog post that laaŋumɛ̃ɛ̃ is a play on the term laaɲámɛ̃ɛ̃ or “to skip over the water” which is traditionally used for the sacrifice of a sheep or a goat after the death of a family member. That term literally means “to skip over the water” so that “their loved one will pass over the water and enter the presence of God”
  • Chagatai (a precursor language of both Uzbek and Uighur): faṭīr, derived from the Arabic word fiṭr for the holiday celebrated by Muslims after fasting in Ramadan (ʿĪd al-Fiṭr / عيد الفطر) (source: F. Erbay and F.N. Küçükballı in Acta Theologica 2025 45/2, p. 133ff. )
  • Low German: Osterfest “Easter” (translation by Johannes Jessen, publ. 1933, republ. 2006)
  • Spanish Sign Language: pass through + miracle (source: John Elwode in The Bible Translator 2008, p. 78ff. )


    “Passover” in Spanish Sign Language, source: Sociedad Bíblica de España

  • English: Passover (term coined by William Tyndale that both replicates the sound of the Hebrew original pesah — פסח as well as part of the meaning: “passing over” the houses of the Israelites in Egypt) — oddly, the English Authorized Version (King James Version) translates the occurrence in Acts 12:4 as Easter

Many Romance languages follow the tradition from Latin that has one term for both “Easter” and “Passover” (pascha). Portuguese uses Páscoa for both, Italian uses Pascha, and French has Pâque for “Passover” and the identically pronounced Pâques for “Easter.”

In languages in francophone and lusophone (Portuguese speaking) Africa, indigenous languages typically use the Romance word for “Easter” as a loanword and often transliterate pesach/pascha. In Kinyarwanda and Rundi Pasika is used, in Swahili and Congo Swahili Pasaka, and in Lingala Pasika. In some cases, the transliteration of “Passover” is derived from the European language, such as Umbundu’s Pascoa (from Portuguese) and Bulu’s Pak (from French). In languages that use Pak or similar for both “Passover” and “Easter” (such as Adioukrou), the identical spelling “serves to reinforce the idea that this is one celebration, not two distinct ones” (source: Hill 2006).

As John Ellingworth (in The Bible Translator 1980, p 445f. ) points out “in most contexts only the presence or absence of the definite article distinguishes them [in French la pâque for Passover and Pâques for Easter]. Since most African languages do not have definite articles, there remains no way to distinguish between the two terms where the general population has borrowed the word for Easter and the Bible translators have borrowed the word for Passover to use in their translation. Some even consider the references to [Passover] before the death of Christ as prophetic!”

See also this devotion on YouVersion .

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: Passover .

Jerusalem

The name that is transliterated as “Jerusalem” in English is signed in French Sign Language with a sign that depicts worshiping at the Western Wall in Jerusalem:


“Jerusalem” in French Sign Language (source: La Bible en langue des signes française )

While a similar sign is also used in British Sign Language, another, more neutral sign that combines the sign “J” and the signs for “place” is used as well. (Source: Anna Smith)


“Jerusalem” in British Sign Language (source: Christian BSL, used with permission)

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: Jerusalem .

complete verse (2 Chronicles 30:2)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of 2 Chronicles 30:2:

  • Kupsabiny: “The king had agreed with the leaders and all the people of Jerusalem that the Festival of Passover was to be celebrated in the second month.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “The king, his courtiers and the people of Jerusalem decided to celebrate the Passover festival in the 2nd month.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “King Hezekia and his officials had-decided, and all the community/people of Jerusalem, to celebrate the Feast of the Passing-by of the Angels on the second month.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “The king and his officials and all the other people who had gathered in Jerusalem wanted to celebrate the Passover Festival. But they were not able to celebrate it at the usual time, because many of the priests had still not performed the rituals to purify themselves; therefore they were not allowed to do serve in the festival. Also, everyone had still not come to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover. So they decided to celebrate it one month later than usual.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

king

Some languages do not have a concept of kingship and therefore no immediate equivalent for the Greek, Hebrew, Ge’ez, Aramaic, and Latin that is translated as “king” in English. Here are some (back-) translations:

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  • Piro: “a great one”
  • Highland Totonac: “the big boss”
  • Huichol: “the one who commanded” (source for this and above: Bratcher / Nida)
  • Ekari: “the one who holds the country” (source: Reiling / Swellengrebel)
  • Una: weik sienyi: “big headman” (source: Kroneman 2004, p. 407)
  • Pass Valley Yali: “Big Man” (source: Daud Soesilo)
  • Ninia Yali: “big brother with the uplifted name” (source: Daud Soesilio in Noss 2007, p. 175)
  • Nyamwezi: mutemi: generic word for ruler, by specifying the city or nation it becomes clear what kind of ruler (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
  • Ghomála’: Fo (“The word Fo refers to the paramount ruler in the kingdoms of West Cameroon. He holds administrative, political, and religious power over his own people, who are divided into two categories: princes (descendants of royalty) and servants (everyone else).” (Source: Michel Kenmogne in Theologizing in Context: An Example from the Study of a Ghomala’ Christian Hymn))

Faye Edgerton retells how the term in Navajo (Dinė) was determined:

“[This term was] easily expressed in the language of Biblical culture, which had kings and noblemen with their brilliant trappings and their position of honor and praise. But leadership among the Navajos is not accompanied by any such titles or distinctions of dress. Those most respected, especially in earlier days, were their headmen, who were the leaders in raids, and the shaman, who was able to serve the people by appealing for them to the gods, or by exorcising evil spirits. Neither of these made any outward show. Neither held his position by political intrigue or heredity. If the headman failed consistently in raids, he was superceded by a better warrior. If the shaman failed many times in his healing ceremonies, it was considered that he was making mistakes in the chants, or had lost favor with the gods, and another was sought. The term Navajos use for headman is derived from a verb meaning ‘to move the head from side to side as in making an oration.’ The headman must be a good orator, able to move the people to go to war, or to follow him in any important decision. This word is naat’áanii which now means ‘one who rules or bosses.’ It is employed now for a foreman or boss of any kind of labor, as well as for the chairman of the tribal council. So in order to show that the king is not just a common boss but the highest ruler, the word ‘aláahgo, which expresses the superlative degree, was put before naat’áanii, and so ‘aláahgo naat’áanii ‘anyone-more-than-being around-he-moves-his-head-the-one-who’ means ‘the highest ruler.’ Naat’áanii was used for governor as the context usually shows that the person was a ruler of a country or associated with kings.”

(Source: Faye Edgerton in The Bible Translator 1962, p. 25ff. )

See also king (Japanese honorifics).

Translation commentary on 2 Chronicles 30:1 - 30:3

Good News Translation combines the first three verses of this chapter, and Contemporary English Version joins verses 1-4 together. Bible en français courant and Parole de Vie go one step further by combining verses 1-5. All this is an indication that the structure of the Hebrew is not the natural order in some languages and may require modification of some sort in the receptor language. The key to the structural problem is that the information in verse 3 (or verses 3 and 4, according to some) is crucial to the understanding of verses 1 and 2. Therefore this information is shifted forward in Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version, Bible en français courant, and Parole de Vie. In fact, Good News Translation reverses the order with the information in verse 3 placed first and that in verse 1 placed last.

As will be noted below, verse 1 seems to be a general summary of what follows, so the invitation in verse 5 should not be understood as a second sending of invitations to come to Jerusalem. For this reason versions such as Contemporary English Version, Bible en français courant, and Parole de Vie express the meaning even more clearly than Good News Translation does. (See the Contemporary English Version model at the end of the discussion on 2Chr 30.5.)

Hezekiah sent to all Israel and Judah: The verb sent has no direct object in the Hebrew text. This verb may be translated “sent word” (New Revised Standard Version, Revised English Bible, Moffatt), “sent a message” (Contemporary English Version, New American Bible), or “sent messengers” (New Jerusalem Bible, La Bible du Semeur). In this context all Israel refers to the former northern kingdom.

And wrote letters also to Ephraim and Manasseh: Ephraim and Manasseh may be rendered “the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh” (Good News Translation, Parole de Vie) or “the people living in the territories of Ephraim and West Manasseh” (similarly Contemporary English Version).

That they should come to the house of the LORD at Jerusalem: New Living Translation says “He asked everyone to come to the Temple of the LORD at Jerusalem.”

To keep the passover to the LORD the God of Israel: The verb keep renders the Hebrew literally, but in this context it is better expressed in modern English as “celebrate” (Good News Translation, New Jerusalem Bible, New American Bible). Other possible verbs are “observe” and “commemorate.” The passover was one of three pilgrim festivals for which the people were to travel to the Temple in Jerusalem. It was the religious feast celebrating Israel’s deliverance from Egypt in the time of Moses. It was celebrated on the fourteenth day of the month of Nisan, the first month in the Hebrew calendar (see the comments on 1 Chr 12.15). It is described in Exo 12, and is also referred to in Num 9.1-14; Deut 16.1-8; and Josh 5.10-11. In some languages the passover is translated “the feast of deliverance [or, redemption/liberation/passing over].” To the LORD may be rendered “in honor of the LORD” (Good News Translation).

For the king and his princes and all the assembly in Jerusalem had taken counsel to keep the passover in the second month: King Hezekiah, his officials, and all the other people in Jerusalem made the decision to celebrate the Passover one month late. For princes see the comments on 1 Chr 19.3 and 2 Chr 12.5. The second month refers to the month called Ziv in the Hebrew calendar (see the comments on 2 Chr 3.2).

For they could not keep it in its time: NET Bible says “They were unable to observe it at the regular time,” and Parole de Vie has “the feast of the Passover could not be celebrated on the normal date.” Moffatt is more specific with “they could not hold it in the first month.” Another possible model is “for they could not observe the feast at the proper time.”

Because the priests had not sanctified themselves in sufficient number, nor had the people assembled in Jerusalem: Two reasons are given to explain why the Passover could not be celebrated at the proper time. First, there were not enough priests who were ritually clean to lead the festival. Second, not enough ordinary people had come together in the city of Jerusalem where the festival was to be celebrated. For sanctified themselves, see the comments on 1 Chr 15.12.

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellington, John E. A Handbook on 1-2 Chronicles, Volume 1. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2014. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .

SIL Translator’s Notes on 2 Chronicles 30:2

30:2a For the king and his officials and the whole assembly in Jerusalem

The king, his nobles and all the people who were gathered in Jerusalem
-or-
The messengers did this because⌋ King Hezekiah, his officers and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem

30:2b had decided to keep the Passover in the second month,

decided to celebrate the feast of Passover on the second month of the year.
-or-
had set the date for celebrating the Passover Feast. The celebration was to be in month two (2).

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