mourn

The Hebrew, Latin, and Greek that is translated as “mourn” or similar in English is translated in Newari as “have one’s heart broken” or “have a bursting heart” (source: Newari Back Translation).

In Cherokee it is translated as “going around feeling badly” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 16).

many to lie unburied

In Gbaya, the notion of numerous (“many to lie unburied”) in 2 Maccabees 5:10 is emphasized with ŋgoɗoso, an ideophone that designates things that are numerous, in clusters, in bundles.

Ideophones are a class of sound symbolic words expressing human sensation that are used as literary devices in many African languages. (Source: Philip Noss)

Translation commentary on 2 Maccabees 5:10

He who had cast out many to lie unburied had no one to mourn for him: He who had cast out many to lie unburied means Jason left many corpses exposed and unburied. This implies that he was responsible for killing them. Good News Bible makes this clear. We suggest that translators follow its lead. The following model will be helpful for languages that do not have the passive voice: “Jason had killed many people and never buried their bodies. Now no one mourned his death.”

He had no funeral of any sort and no place in the tomb of his fathers: The tomb of his fathers refers to Jason’s family burial place, presumably in a cave, whether artificial or natural (see the comments on 1Macc 2.70). For this sentence Good News Bible has “He was not given a funeral or even buried with his ancestors,” which is good. Contemporary English Version is also helpful with “no one … gave him a funeral or made a place for his body in the family grave.” Other possible models are “There was no funeral for him, and he was not buried with his ancestors” and “No one gave him a funeral or gave him a place in the family grave.”

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.