The Greek that is translated as “sacrifice” in English is translated in Huba as hatǝmachi or “shoot misfortune.”
David Frank (in this blog post ) explains: “How is it that ‘shoot misfortune’ comes to mean sacrifice, I wanted to know? Here is the story: It is a traditional term. Whenever there were persistent problems such as a drought, or a rash of sickness or death, the king (or his religious advisor) would set aside a day and call on everyone to prepare food, such as the traditional mash made from sorghum, or perhaps even goat. The food had to be put together outside. The king or his religious advisor would give an address stating what the problem was and what they were doing about it. Then an elder representing the people would take a handful of that food and throw it, probably repeating that action several times, until it was considered to be enough to atone for all the misfortune they had been having. With this action he was ‘shooting (or casting off) misfortune’ to restore well-being to his people. As he threw the food, he would say that this is to remove the misfortune that had fallen on his people, and everybody would respond by saying aɗǝmja, ‘let it be so.’ People could eat some of this food, but they could not bring the food into their houses, because that would mean that they were bringing misfortune into their house. There is still a minority of people in this linguistic and cultural group that practices the traditional religion, but the shooting of misfortune is no longer practiced, and the term ‘shoot misfortune’ is used now in Bible translation to refer to offering a sacrifice. Aɗǝmja is how they translate ‘amen.'”
The Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek that is typically translated in English as “serve,” “minister,” “walk with,” or “service” is translated in Igede as myị ẹrụ or “agree with message (of the one you’re serving).” (source: Andy Warren-Rothlin)
The Hebrew and Greek that is typically translated as “sin” in English has a wide variety of translations.
The Greek ἁμαρτάνω (hamartanō) carries the original verbatim meaning of “miss the mark.” Likewise, many translations contain the “connotation of moral responsibility.” Loma has (for certain types of sin) “leaving the road” (which “implies a definite standard, the transgression of which is sin”) or Navajo uses “that which is off to the side.” (Source: Bratcher / Nida). In Toraja-Sa’dan the translation is kasalan, which originally meant “transgression of a religious or moral rule” and has shifted its meaning in the context of the Bible to “transgression of God’s commandments.” (Source: H. van der Veen in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 21ff. ).
In Shipibo-Conibo the term is hocha. Nida (1952, p. 149) tells the story of its choosing: “In some instances a native expression for sin includes many connotations, and its full meaning must be completely understood before one ever attempts to use it. This was true, for example, of the term hocha first proposed by Shipibo-Conibo natives as an equivalent for ‘sin.’ The term seemed quite all right until one day the translator heard a girl say after having broken a little pottery jar that she was guilty of ‘hocha.’ Breaking such a little jar scarcely seemed to be sin. However, the Shipibos insisted that hocha was really sin, and they explained more fully the meaning of the word. It could be used of breaking a jar, but only if the jar belonged to someone else. Hocha was nothing more nor less than destroying the possessions of another, but the meaning did not stop with purely material possessions. In their belief God owns the world and all that is in it. Anyone who destroys the work and plan of God is guilty of hocha. Hence the murderer is of all men most guilty of hocha, for he has destroyed God’s most important possession in the world, namely, man. Any destructive and malevolent spirit is hocha, for it is antagonistic and harmful to God’s creation. Rather than being a feeble word for some accidental event, this word for sin turned out to be exceedingly rich in meaning and laid a foundation for the full presentation of the redemptive act of God.”
In Kaingang, the translation is “break God’s word” and in Sandawe the original meaning of the Greek term (see above) is perfectly reflected with “miss the mark.” (Source: Ursula Wiesemann in Holzhausen / Riderer 2010, p. 36ff., 43)
Martin Ehrensvärd, one of the translators for the DanishBibelen 2020, comments on the translation of this term: “We would explain terms, such that e.g. sin often became ‘doing what God does not want’ or ‘breaking God’s law’, ‘letting God down’, ‘disrespecting God’, ‘doing evil’, ‘acting stupidly’, ‘becoming guilty’. Now why couldn’t we just use the word sin? Well, sin in contemporary Danish, outside of the church, is mostly used about things such as delicious but unhealthy foods. Exquisite cakes and chocolates are what a sin is today.” (Source: Ehrensvärd in HIPHIL Novum 8/2023, p. 81ff. )
Following are a number of back-translations of Hebrews 10:11:
Uma: “All the priests of the Yahudi religion, every day they stand doing their work, and many times they offer worship-gifts that are always the same–yet those worship-gifts of theirs can never wipe-away their sins.” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
Yakan: “The Yahudi priests are there in the prayer-house/temple every day doing what they have been given to do and they often repeat their sacrifices. But these their sacrifices cannot remove sin.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “And in that old way of worshipping, the Jewish priests, every day they were in the church standing at work because they were carrying out their work in sacrificing. And these sacrifices that they made, they could not at all take away the sins of people.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “The priests of the Jews, they stand daily doing their work. Daily they twice offer the same kinds of offerings. But those offerings of theirs have absolutely no ability to remove sins.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Tagbanwa: “In that former way/trail of worshipping, the priests were there standing for they were doing their job/responsibility. Really day-after-day that’s what they were doing, sacrificing animals which were-a-means-of-asking for forgiveness for sin. But well, the truth is, those sacrifices were certainly not the means-of-erasing sin.” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
Tenango Otomi: “But the priests of the Jews day after day continue to kill animals, making sacrifice to God. Yet these sacrifices made for the people can never clear sins.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)
Some manuscripts have “High Priest,” but “priest” was more likely to be changed by copyists into “High Priest” (5.1 and 8.3) than the opposite. For this and other reasons the UBS Greek text has “priest.”
Jewish is implied; see comments on 8.4 and 10.1. This verse adds little to previous statements. Every Jewish priest may be rendered as “Every priest who is a Jew.” But this misses the point that in this context Jewish refers more to the religious system than to an individual as such. Therefore Every Jewish priest may be better rendered in some languages as “Every priest of the Jewish religion” or “Every priest who performs … on behalf of the Jews.”
Performs his services every day may be rendered as “does his work as priest every day.” See 7.27.
Offers the same sacrifices many times: the Greek term for many times is also used in 6.7 and 9.25. In translation it may be necessary to render the same sacrifices as “the same type of sacrifices,” to make it clear that the identical animals are not offered many times.
Take away translates a different verb from those used in verses 4 and 8, but the meaning is practically the same.
Quoted with permission from Ellingworth, Paul and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Letter of the Hebrews. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1983. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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