“Hope is sometimes one of the most difficult terms to translate in the entire Bible. It is not because people do not hope for things, but so often they speak of hoping as simply ‘waiting.’ In fact, even in Spanish, the word esperar means both ‘to wait’ and ‘to hope.’ However, in many instances the purely neutral term meaning ‘to wait’ may be modified in such a way that people will understand something more of its significance. For example, in Tepeuxila Cuicatec hope is called ‘wait-desire.’ Hope is thus a blend of two activities: waiting and desiring. This is substantially the type of expectancy of which hope consists.

In Yucateco the dependence of hope is described by the phrase ‘on what it hangs.’ ‘Our hope in God’ means that ‘we hang onto God.’ The object of hope is the support of one’s expectant waiting. In Ngäbere the phrase “resting the mind” is used. This “implies waiting and confidence, and what is a better definition of hope than ‘confident waiting’.” (Source for this and above: Nida 1952, p. 20, 133)

Other languages translate as follows:

• Mairasi: “vision resting place” (source: Enggavoter 2004)
• Enlhet: “waitings of (our) 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. )
• Kwang: “one’s future is restored to one’s soul like a fresh, cool breeze on a hot day.” (Source: Mark Vanderkooi right here )
• Noongar: koort-kwidiny or “heart waiting” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang)
• Anjam: “looking through the horizon” (source: Albert Hoffmann in his memoirs from 1948, quoted in Holzhausen / Riderer 2010, p. 7)
• Ron: kintiɓwi or “put lip” (source: Andy Warren-Rothlin)
• Highland Totonac “wait with expectation” (to offset it from the every-day meaning of hope or wait — source: Hermann Aschmann in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 171ff. ).
• Alekano: “wait not hearing two ears” (meaning to “wait without being double-minded” — source: Ellis Deibler in Notes on Translation June 1986, p. 36ff.)
• Berom: “direct one’s liver toward”
• Mixtepec Mixtec: “wait and remain strong on the inside”
• Cerma: “swallow the spittle”
• Adyghe: “the heart expects something good”
• Keliko: “place one’s heart on the head”
• Berik: “wait persistently and hold on to God”
• Somrai: “hold the heart really tight” (source for this and six above: Wycliffe Germany )
• Marathi: aasha (आशा) with a stronger emphasis on desire
• Tamil: nampikkai (நம்பிக்கை) with a stronger emphasis on expectation (source for this and above: J.S.M. Hooper in The Bible Translator 1954, p. 2ff. )

In Mwera “hope” and “faith” are translated with the same word: ngulupai. (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)

C.M. Doke looks at a number of Bantu languages and their respective translations of “hope” with slightly varying connotations (in The Bible Translator 1954, p. 9ff. ):

• Xhosa and Zulu: themba “hope, expect,” also “have faith in, rely upon”
• Tswana: tsholofelo “hope, expect, look for confidently”
• Southern Sotho: tshepo “trust, rely on, believe in, have confidence in”
• Kuanyama: eteelelo “waiting for”
• Swahili: tumaini “confidence, trust, expectation, hope” (as a verb: “hope, trust, expect, be confident, be truthful, rely on”
• Luganda: okusuubira “hope, trust, expect” also “look forward to, rely upon, anticipate, reckon”
• Chichewa: chiyembekezo “wait for, wait, expect”
• Koongo: vuvu “hope, expectancy, expectation, anticipation”