complete verse (Exodus 26:4)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Exodus 26:4:

  • Kupsabiny: “Someone wind the blue threads (in a loop), after that, someone stitch/sew those wound things (loops) on to the sides/ends of each of the two big cloths.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “On the edge of the joined panels make loops from blue cloth. Likewise on the second joint panels’ edge of the cloth also make the same loops from blue cloth.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “Then [you (sing.)] have-(someone)-make things-like-rings/loops from blue cloth-material on each edge/end of the two joint cloth-materials;” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Bariai: “And take blue pieces of cloth and then sew ring-handles, to be for the attaching of these two big cloths so that they go and join together. Sew these ring-handles so that they go onto these two big cloths at their edge on one side.” (Source: Bariai Back Translation)
  • Opo: “Flax cloth five which you will sew together, you shall sew thread be green/blue on its edge for inside of loops. you make it thus at edge of flax cloth five other.” (Source: Opo Back Translation)
  • English: “For each set, they must make loops of blue cloth and fasten them along the outer edge of the strip, at the end of each set.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Exod 26:4

And you shall make loops of blue uses the singular you. The word for blue is the same as in verse 1. (But see the discussion on this color at 25.4.) The material from which the loops are to be made is not specified, but the word for blue at times means “blue wool” (New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh). New American Bible has “yarn.” To be safe, Good News Translation and Contemporary English Version have “blue cloth,” and Translator’s Old Testament has “blue material.” The word for loops suggests a “U-shaped” doubling of the blue yarn with both ends of the “U” sewn to the edge of the linen curtain, leaving an opening just large enough for the gold clasps (verse 6) to pass through. In some languages it will be necessary to make the action of “sewing” explicit and say, for example, “Make loops out of blue cloth and sew them to the outside piece in each set,” or “Use blue cloth and make loops….” In some languages “loops” will be rendered as the equivalent of “ears” or some similar object.

On the edge of the outmost curtain in the first set means that these loops were sewn along the 28-cubit length of one of the two pieces made according to verse 3. The word for set is derived from the word meaning “to be coupled” (“joined”) in verse 3. It means “what has been joined.”

And likewise … repeats the same instructions for the other piece. Good News Translation says it all in fewer words: “Make loops of blue cloth on the edge of the outside piece in each set.” This was to prepare the two large pieces of linen cloth to be joined together along their looped edges. Each set was twenty by twenty-eight cubits, and they were to be joined to make one large piece twenty-eight by forty cubits.

Quoted with permission from Osborn, Noel D. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Exodus. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1999. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .