complete verse (Deuteronomy 25:3)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Deuteronomy 25:3:

  • Kupsabiny: “The guilty person should not be beaten more than forty sticks/times/lashes. But if that guilty person is judged more than forty lashes, it makes the person become very ashamed.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “But he must not be whipped with more than forty lashes. If he is whipped more than that with, he will be disgraced before the people.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “But (it is) not more than 40 lashes, for if (it is) more than 40, he will-be-put-to-shame.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “It is permitted that he be struck as many as 40 times, but no more than that. If he is struck more than 40 times, he would be humiliated publicly.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Deuteronomy 25:3

Forty stripes may be given him: in no case could the judge order more than forty lashes to be given to the guilty person. In later times the maximum was reduced to thirty-nine lashes (see 2 Cor 11.24) to make sure that the limit in this law was not exceeded. Another way to express this is “They may not hit him more than forty times with the whip.”

Your brother: that is, your fellow-Israelite. Revised English Bible “your neighbor” is not correct in this context.

Degraded in your sight: the sense is that a fellow-Israelite should not be publicly humiliated or “made to lose face in front of the other Israelites.”

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 .