Aari: “the day our Savior comes” (in Rom 13:11) (source: Loren Bliese)
in Mairasi its is translated as “life fruit” or “life fruit all mashed out.” Lloyd Peckham explains: “In secret stories, not knowable to women nor children, there was a magical fruit of life. If referred to vaguely, without specifying the specific ‘fruit,’ it can be an expression for eternity.” And for “all masked out” he explains: “Bark cloth required pounding. It got longer and wider as it got pounded. Similarly, life gets pounded or mashed to lengthen it into infinity. Tubers also get mashed into the standard way of serving the staple food, like the fufu of Uganda, or like poi of Hawaii. It spreads out into infinity.” (See also eternity / forever)
In Lisu a poetic construct is used for this term. Arrington (2020, p. 58f.) explains: “A four-word couplet uses Lisu poetic forms to bridge the abstract concrete divide, an essential divide to cross if Christian theology is to be understood by those with oral thought patterns. Each couplet uses three concrete nouns or verbs to express an abstract term. An example of this is the word for salvation, a quite abstract term essential to understanding Christian theology. To coin this new word, the missionary translators used a four-word couplet: ℲO., CYU. W: CYU (person … save … person … save). In this particular case, the word for person was not the ordinary word (ʁ) but rather the combination of ℲO., and W: used in oral poetry. The word for ‘save’ also had to be coined; in this case, it was borrowed from Chinese [from jiù / 救]. These aspects of Lisu poetry, originally based on animism, likely would have been lost as Lisu society encountered communism and modernization. Yet they are now codified in the Lisu Bible as well as the hymnbook.”
In the Contemporary Chichewa translation (2002/2016) it is translated with chipulumutso which is used to refer to an act of helping someone who is in problems but cannot help him/herself come out of the problems because of weakness. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
The Greek, Latin and Hebrew that is translated in English as “painful” or “sorrow” is translated in Huba as “cut the insides.” David Frank explains: “Huba has just one expression that covers both ‘angry’ and ‘sad.’ They don’t make a distinction in their language. I suppose you could say that the term they use means more generically, ‘strong emotional reaction.’ (Source: David Frank in this blog post )
In Noongar it is translated as koort-warra or “heart bad.” (Source: Bardip Ruth-Ang 2020)
In Enlhet it is translated as “going aside of the innermost.” “Innermost” or valhoc is a term that is frequently used in Enlhet to describe a large variety of emotions or states of mind (for other examples see here). (Source: Jacob Loewen in The Bible Translator 1969, p. 24ff. )
The Greek and Hebrew that is often translated as “repent” or “repentance” is (back-) translated in various ways (click or tap here to see the rest of this insight):
Embu: “change heart” (“2 Cor. 7:10 says ‘For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation and brings no regret, but worldly grief produces death.’ In ordinary speech the terms ‘repent’ and ‘regret’ are used interchangeably in Embu, so that this verse comes out as: ‘godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation and brings no repentance,’ which is contradictory. The problem was solved by using ‘changing heart’ in the first, and ‘sadness’ in the second.”) (source: Jan Sterk)
Muna: dofetompa’ao dhosa bhe dodoli ne Lahata’ala: “radically-end sin and to turn to God” (source: René van den Berg)
Bacama: por-njiya: “fetch sand” (“Before the coming of Christianity 100 years ago, when the elders went to pray to the gods, they would take sand and throw it over each shoulder and down their backs while confessing their sins. Covering themselves with sand was a ritual to show that they were sorry for what they had done wrong, sort of like covering oneself with sackcloth and ashes. Now idol worship for the most part is abandoned in Bacama culture, but the Christian church has retained the phrase por-njiya to mean ‘repent, doing something to show sorrow for one’s sins’” — source: David Frank in this blog post .)
“In Tzotzil two reflexive verbs to communicate the biblical concept of repentance are used. Xca’i jba means to know or to reflect inwardly on one’s self. This self inquiry or self examination is similar to the attitude of the prodigal son where Luke 15:17 records that ‘he came to his senses.’ Broke, starving, and slopping hogs, the prodigal admitted to himself that he was in the wrong place. The second reflexive verb ‘jsutes jba’ means turning away from what one is and turning to something else. In a sense, it is deciding against one’s self and toward someone else. It is similar to the attitude of the prodigal son when he said, ‘I will get up and go to my father’ (v. 18).” (source: Aeilts, p. 118)
Enlhet “exchange innermosts.” “Innermost” or valhoc is a term that is frequently used in Enlhet to describe a large variety of emotions or states of mind (for other examples see here). (Source: Jacob Loewen in The Bible Translator 1969, p. 24ff. )
Merina Malagasy: fifonana, deriving from mifona “meaning ‘to completely uproot so that something new can grow’ (a term also used for the loss of a baby tooth) (source: Brigitte Rabarijaona)
Following are a number of back-translations of 2 Corinthians 7:10:
Uma: “For as for sadness of heart that follows God’s will, that sadness leads us to repent from our evil behavior, with the result that God lifts us from the punishment of our sins. And that sadness we don’t feel sorry about. But as for the sadness of heart that is common among people who don’t know God, that sadness doesn’t lead us to repent from our evil behavior, with the result that we get death that separates us from God.” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
Yakan: “Because if the sadness of people is from God, that can be the reason for his regretting his sin and changing his liver. And this is no longer bad because the outcome of it is he will live forever. But the sadness of people who do not follow God does not cause them to change their liver and it will yet bring them to death.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “For the sorrow that God uses, it can be the thing that which changes the mind of a person so that he might be freed from punishment. And it’s not right that we should regret that godly sorrow. However, the sorrow of people who do not follow God, it does not cause people to change their minds, and because of this they cannot be given life forever.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “Because the sorrow that pleases God, it results in a person’s repenting of his sins so that he will be saved. No one feels-regret because of that. But worldly sorrow, it results in punishment that is forever.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Tagbanwa: “Because grief that is in accordance with God’s will, (it) leads people to repent and drop their sin, the outcome being salvation that is not (later) regretted. But that grief that this world gives, (it) just causes stubbornness (lit. hardens the head) therefore, the outcome is death which is punishment without end.” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
Tenango Otomi: “Because concerning the person whose heart hurts because of how he walked, he then turns his heart and separates from the evil in which he walked. And this is what God looks well upon and then he saves the person’s soul. But concerning the person who really does not want to believe in God, even though his heart is sad, yet his soul will not be saved.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)
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 to do this is through the usage (or a lack) of an honorific prefix as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. When the referent is God, the “divine” honorific prefix mi- (御 or み) can be used, as in mi-kokoro (みこころ) or “will (of God)” in the referenced verses. Two verses (Ezra 10:11 and Ephesians 1:9) use mi-mune (みむね) with the same honorific prefix and meaning.
Paul uses three “event” nouns followed by an adjective in the first half of this verse: grief, repentance, salvation, and no regret. Most likely the Corinthians are the ones who experienced grief, who repented, who will be saved, and who had no regrets. But it is also possible to understand that Paul was the one who had no regrets, that is, “For the sadness that God causes you brings about a change in your hearts that leads to your salvation, and I do not regret that.” See verse 8: “I do not regret it (though I did regret it).”
New Century Version translates this verse, not as a particular reference to the Corinthians, but as a general statement regarding repentance: “Being sorry in the way God wants makes a person change his heart and life. This leads to salvation, and we cannot be sorry for that….” The pronoun “we” in New Century Version includes Paul along with all Christians.
In many languages it will be necessary to make explicit the agents of these “event” nouns and the adjective. The context favors understanding the reference to be to the Corinthians specifically and not to Christians in general. And the structure of the sentence in Greek favors having the same agent, that is, the Corinthians rather than Paul, as the one having no regret.
Produces: twice in this verse and once in the next verse, Paul uses verbs translated as produces in Revised Standard Version. The sense of these verbs is “to bring about,” “to give rise to,” or “to create.” The two Greek verbs come from the same stem and are synonyms here.
On the meaning of repentance see comments on 7.9, where the same Greek word is translated as “repenting” in Revised Standard Version.
Worldly grief is contrasted with godly grief. Worldly here means “merely human” (Good News Translation). Some possible models for these two expressions may be “when God makes you feel sorry … when this world makes you feel sorry” (Contemporary English Version); “distress, accepted as God means it to be accepted … distress, regarded from the world’s point of view” (Barclay).
Salvation and death: on the term salvation see 1.6 and 6.2, where the same term is used. It is possible that salvation here refers to the spiritual well-being of the church community at Corinth as in 1.6. More likely, however, Paul is thinking here of the future salvation of individual Christians. Since death stands in contrast to salvation in this verse, death is not primarily physical death but rather spiritual death.
Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellingworth, Paul. A Handbook on Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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