complete verse (Ezekiel 22:10)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Ezekiel 22:10:

  • Kupsabiny: “Some are sleeping the wives of their fathers. Others dishonor women who are in the month sleeping with (them).” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “There are also who have-sex with the wife of their father or [they] rape a woman who is having-a-monthly-period.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “There are men who have sex with their father’s wives , and men who have sex with women during their monthly menstrual periods.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

2nd person pronoun with low register (Japanese)

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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 second person pronoun (“you” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. The most commonly used anata (あなた) is typically used when the speaker is humbly addressing another person.

In these verses, however, omae (おまえ) is used, a cruder second person pronoun, that Jesus for instance chooses when chiding his disciples. (Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

See also first person pronoun with low register and third person pronoun with low register.

Translation commentary on Ezekiel 22:10

In you men uncover their fathers’ nakedness: To uncover someone’s nakedness usually means to have sexual intercourse with the person (compare 16.36), but here their fathers’ nakedness is generally taken to mean “their father’s wife” (Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version) to avoid the implication of homosexuality. Although this phrase may refer to their own mother, it probably refers either to a stepmother or another wife of their father. In a footnote New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh suggests that it may refer to a former wife of their father. Translators should not try to make it explicit in their translation which of these is meant. This clause may be rendered simply “Your men have sex with their fathers’ wives.”

In you they humble women who are unclean in their impurity: Women who are unclean in their impurity are women who are considered ritually unclean because they are having their monthly menstrual period (see 18.6). Because it was against the Law to have sex during this time, men who made women do so were guilty of a crime almost as bad as rape. This expression may be translated “women who are impure because of their monthly period.” For their impurity, referring to their menstruation, translators may use a local euphemism, as long as the meaning is clear. The verb humble focuses on the humiliation the women suffered (compare “violate” in New Revised Standard Version and New International Version), but the Hebrew verb here focuses on the abusive action of the men, so Good News Translation, Jerusalem Bible, and New Jerusalem Bible are better with “force,” and so is New American Bible with “coerce.” A helpful model for this clause is “Your men force women who are impure because of their monthly period to break the law by having sex with them.” The text continues to emphasize that this takes place in you, that is, in the city itself.

Quoted with permission from Gross, Carl & Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Ezekiel. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2016. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .