desolate / destroy

In Gbaya, the notion of “(to make) desolate” or “to destroy” is emphasized with lɔkɔti-lɔkɔti, an ideophone used to describe complete destruction, devastation.

Ideophones are a class of sound symbolic words expressing human sensation that are used as literary devices in many African languages. (Source: Philip Noss)

See also other occurrences of lɔkɔti-lɔkɔti.

gentiles / nations

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The Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin that is often translated as “gentiles” (or “nations”) in English is often translated as a “local equivalent of ‘foreigners,'” such as “the people of other lands” (Guerrero Amuzgo), “people of other towns” (Tzeltal), “people of other languages” (San Miguel El Grande Mixtec), “strange peoples” (Navajo (Dinė) (this and above, see Bratcher / Nida), “outsiders” (Ekari), “people of foreign lands” (Kannada), “non-Jews” (North Alaskan Inupiatun), “people being-in-darkness” (a figurative expression for people lacking cultural or religious insight) (Toraja-Sa’dan) (source for this and three above Reiling / Swellengrebel), “from different places all people” (Martu Wangka) (source: Carl Gross).

Tzeltal translates it as “people in all different towns,” Chicahuaxtla Triqui as “the people who live all over the world,” Highland Totonac as “all the outsider people,” Sayula Popoluca as “(people) in every land” (source: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.), Chichimeca-Jonaz as “foreign people who are not Jews,” Sierra de Juárez Zapotec as “people of other nations” (source of this and one above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.), Highland Totonac as “outsider people” (source: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.), Uma as “people who are not the descendants of Israel” (source: Uma Back Translation), “other ethnic groups” (source: Newari Back Translation), and Yakan as “the other tribes” (source: Yakan Back Translation).

In Chichewa, it is translated with mitundu or “races.” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)

See also nations.

complete verse (Ezekiel 29:12)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Ezekiel 29:12:

  • Kupsabiny: “I shall make Egypt lose strength surpassing how other countries lost strength. Its cities will be in ruins for forty years and and/with other cities that were destroyed. I shall scatter its people to other countries and communities.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “I will-make Egipto the most-desolate of all the nations. For a period/[lit. inside] of 40 years, her towns will-become the-most-desolate of all the towns. And I will-scatter the Egiptohanon to different nations.’” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “Egypt will be barren/empty, and it will be surrounded by other desolate nations. The cities in Egypt will be empty and deserted for 40 years, surrounded by ruined cities in nearby nations. I will cause the people of Egypt to be scattered to countries far away.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

1st person pronoun referring to God (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 first person singular and plural pronoun (“I” and “we” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. The most commonly used watashi/watakushi (私) is typically used when the speaker is humble and asking for help. In these verses, where God / Jesus is referring to himself, watashi is also used but instead of the kanji writing system (私) the syllabary hiragana (わたし) is used to distinguish God from others.

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

See also pronoun for “God”.

Translation commentary on Ezekiel 29:12

The first half of this verse repeats and strengthens the ideas of the previous verses.

And I will make the land of Egypt a desolation in the midst of desolated countries: See verses 9-10. Many translations take this sentence as a superlative, saying that Egypt will be “the most desolate country in the world” (Good News Translation; similarly Revised English Bible, New Jerusalem Bible, New American Bible, New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh). Contemporary English Version says “the most barren place on earth,” International Children’s Bible has “the emptiest country of all,” and New International Reader’s Version translates “more empty than any other land.” However, it is also possible that this sentence is not saying Egypt will be more desolate than other countries or the most desolate of all. Instead, it may be saying Egypt will be desolate, just like other desolate countries, or just as desolate as others. This is the sense of the following renderings: “I will make the land of Egypt one of the desolate lands” (Moffatt), “I will make it one of the wastelands” (Christian Community Bible), and “I will make Egypt as desolate as any country could be” (Allen). Either interpretation is acceptable.

And her cities shall be a desolation forty years among cities that are laid waste: This sentence refers to the cities of Egypt in the same way as the previous sentence referred to the country as a whole. The Hebrew verb rendered laid waste implies that the cities are “in ruins” (Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version; see the comments on 12.20).

Models for the two ways of translating the first half of this verse are:

• I will destroy the land of Egypt so that it will be the most barren [or, emptiest] country of all, and the cities in Egypt will be in ruins for forty years. They will be more totally ruined than any other city.

• I will destroy the land of Egypt so that it will be as barren [or, empty] as any other country. And for forty years the cities in Egypt will be in ruins. They will be just like any other ruined city.

I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations, and disperse them among the countries: The Egyptians will suffer the same fate as the Israelites had suffered—God will send them into exile in other countries (see 12.15). The Hebrew verbs for scatter and disperse are synonyms, and some translations do not use both (so Contemporary English Version, New Living Translation, Bible en français courant, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch). Depending on the requirements of the language, this is acceptable. In many languages there is not really a distinction between nations and countries (see 11.16). Translators may render this whole sentence as “I will scatter them throughout all the different countries.”

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 .