complete verse (Deuteronomy 21:22)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Deuteronomy 21:22:

  • Kupsabiny: “If a person has done a sin for which he must be condemned to death and then he is killed and fixed on a tree/wood,” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “If some man has to be killed because of sin he has committed, and you kill him, and his corpse is hung on a pole,” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “‘If a man was-punished of death because of the crime that he did, and his corpse was-hang on a tree,” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “‘If someone is executed for having committed a crime for which he deserves to die, and you hang his corpse on a post,” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Deuteronomy 21:22

It will be helpful as at the beginning of other sections to begin with “Moses said to the people of Israel” or something similar.

A crime punishable by death: in today’s English jargon this is styled “a capital offense” (New Jerusalem Bible, New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh, Revised English Bible).

He is put to death: the text does not say how. Presumably it is by stoning. In languages that do not use the passive voice, we may translate “they [people not named] put him to death.” However, in some languages the passive may be avoided through the use of a verb similar to “suffer”; for example, “If a man suffers death for….” It is possible to avoid the repetition in the Hebrew of this first sentence, with something like “If they have put to death [or, executed] a man who has committed a crime” (see Good News Translation).

Hang him on a tree: this can mean that he is hung by his neck to a tree. The Hebrew word may mean either “tree” or “wood” (that is, a stake, or a pole); see Josh 8.29; 10.26-27; 2 Sam 4.12. Probably impalement is meant; the dead body was fixed to a stake, or pole, driven into the ground. Good News Translation here is quite unsatisfactory.

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Deuteronomy. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2000. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .