formal 2nd person plural pronoun (Japanese)

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 formal plural suffix to the second person pronoun (“you” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. In these verses, anata-gata (あなたがた) is used, combining the second person pronoun anata and the plural suffix -gata to create a formal plural pronoun (“you” [plural] in English).

(Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

Translation commentary on Acts 3:22

Verse 22 is an amplification of verse 21b, namely, the statement by … his holy prophets. In this instance there is no causal relation as might be suggested by the word for. Rather, it may be necessary to indicate that the contents of verse 22 simply represent a specific instance of what has already been said. This can be effectively indicated by English “for,” but a conjunction of cause would not do this in certain other languages. A closer equivalent in such languages would be “for example, it was Moses who said.”

In some languages the so-called possessive your related to the phrase the Lord your God must be shifted from God to Lord, that is to say, “God your Lord.” This is because people are regarded as related to Lord but they certainly are not thought of as in any possessive relationship to God. Even with Lord the possessive pronoun represents a semantic goal, for the Lord is “the one who commands the people.”

“Like me” (Good News Translation just as he sent me) may in this present passage be taken to refer either to the fact that God will send a prophet in the same way that he sent Moses, or to the fact that the one whom he sends will be a prophet just like Moses was a prophet. The Good News Translation follows the first of these possibilities and gives the second as an alternative rendering.

The last clause of verse 22a who will be of your own people must in some languages be a separate sentence, since it should be attributive to prophet and not to the intervening phrase just as he sent me.

The phrase of your own people should refer to the “nation” and not merely to some family or clan. This means that the final clause of verse 22a might read “he will be one of your nation” or “he will be one of you,” though in this instance the pronoun “you” must refer to the totality of the people and not to the specific group gathered to hear Peter.

You must listen to involves more than merely hearing. The implication is “you must obey” or “pay attention to all that he tells you,” implying conformance in behavior.

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Acts of the Apostles. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1972. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .

SIL Translator’s Notes on Acts 3:22

3:22a–23b

For…: The Greek has two conjunctions, one here and one at the beginning of 3:23a. The usual meanings of these two conjunctions when the one follows the other are “on one hand” and “on the other hand.” They introduce contrast between the two parts. Here, Moses warned people to obey the later prophet (whom Peter implied here was the Christ, that is, Jesus), but God will destroy those who do not obey.

3:22a–b tell more about the Christ. So the Berean Standard Bible and some other English versions use the word For here. Other English versions do not translate the Greek conjunctions and allow the context to indicate the connection between the clauses. Consider what would be the most natural way in your language to indicate the connections between the clauses here.

3:22a

The quote in 3:22a–23b is from parts of Deuteronomy 18:15–19. You may want to include this information in a footnote or a cross-reference in your translation.

Moses said: The Jews considered Moses to have been a great prophet. In Deuteronomy he told the people that God would raise up a prophet like him so that the people could hear from God after he died. Like many Jews of his time, Peter considered Moses’ words to be referring to the Messiah/Christ whom God would send.

In some languages a literal translation would refer to someone other than the Christ. If that is true in your language, you may want to explain in your translation that Moses was speaking of the Christ. Your translation should not use the title “Christ” in Moses’ words. For example:

Moses said ⌊this about him⌋

Moses: The Jewish people considered Moses to be their greatest prophet (Deuteronomy 34:10). He was also one of their greatest leaders. In some languages people do not know who Moses was. If that is true in your language, you may want to explain it in a footnote in your translation. Here is an example footnote:

Moses was the greatest prophet of the Jews (Deuteronomy 34:10). His story is told in the Old Testament books of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

The Lord your God: Some languages cannot use the pronoun your with the word God. If that is true in your language, indicate that meaning naturally in your language. For example:

The Lord God, the one you ⌊worship/serve/obey,⌋

will raise up for you a prophet: The phrase raise up refers to God causing the Christ to be a prophet and begin his ministry. Here are some other ways to translate these words:

will give you a prophet (New Century Version)
-or-
will choose one of your own people to be a prophet (Contemporary English Version)
-or-
will send you a prophet (Good News Translation)

for you: The Berean Standard Bible adds the phrase for you.

3:22b

like me: Moses was someone through whom the people of Israel heard from God. In that way he was a prophet who told the people what God said to him. Here he spoke about someone who would do the same thing later. Here are some other ways to translate this phrase:

like me ⌊in authority⌋
-or-
as I ⌊was over God’s people⌋
-or-
God will send you a prophet, just as he sent me (Good News Translation)
-or-
God will choose one of your own people to be a prophet, just as he chose me (Contemporary English Version)

from among your brothers: This phrase indicates that God would cause one of the Jewish people to be the prophet. See the Contemporary English Version example above.

3:22c

You must listen to Him in everything He tells you: The Greek is literally “you will listen to whatever he tells you.” But 3:23a–b indicates that some people may not listen. So the Berean Standard Bible and many English versions translate this clause as a command.

This clause indicates that they must accept everything that the prophet would tell them and they must also obey everything he would command them to do. Here are some other ways to translate this clause:

Listen carefully to everything he tells you (New Living Translation (2004))
-or-
You are to obey everything that he tells you to do (Good News Translation)

© 2001, 2021 by SIL International®
Made available under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License (CC BY-SA) creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0.
All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
BSB is produced in cooperation with Bible Hub, Discovery Bible, OpenBible.com, and the Berean Bible Translation Committee.