burnt-offering

The Hebrew olah (עֹלָה) originally means “that which goes up (in smoke).” English Bibles often translates it as “burnt-offering” or “whole burnt-offering,” focusing on the aspect of the complete burning of the offering.

The Greek Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate Bibles translate it as holokautōma / holocautōsis (ὁλοκαύτωμα / ὁλοκαύτωσις) and holocaustum, respectively, meaning “wholly burnt.” While a form of this term is widely used in many Romance languages (Spanish: holocaustos, French: holocaustes, Italian: olocausti, Portuguese: holocaustos) and originally also in the Catholic tradition of English Bible translations, it is largely not used in English anymore today (the preface of the revised edition of the Catholic New American Bible of 2011: “There have been changes in vocabulary; for example, the term ‘holocaust’ is now normally reserved for the sacrilegious attempt to destroy the Jewish people by the Third Reich.”)

Since translation into Georgian was traditionally done on the basis of the Greek Septuagint, a transliteration of holokautōma was used as well, which was changed to a translation with the meaning of “burnt offering” when the Old Testament was retranslated in the 1980’s on the basis of the Hebrew text.

In the Koongo (Ki-manianga) translation by the Alliance Biblique de la R.D. Congo (publ. in 2015) olah is translated as “kill and offer sacrifice” (source: Anicet Bassilua) and in Elhomwe as “fire offering.” (Source: project-specific translation notes in Paratext)

The English translation of Everett Fox uses offering-up (similarly, the German translation by Buber-Rosenzweig has Darhöhung and the French translation by Chouraqui montée).

See also offering (qorban).

sacrifice

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.'”

take pleasure / desire (Japanese honorifics)

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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 to do this is through the usage (or a lack) of an honorific prefix as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017.

The Greek and Hebrew that is translated as “take pleasure” or “desire” in English is translated in the Shinkaiyaku Bible as o-yorokobi (お喜び), combining “rejoice” (yorokobi) with the respectful prefix o-. (Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

sin

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)

In Warao it is translated as “bad obojona.” Obojona is a term that “includes the concepts of consciousness, will, attitude, attention and a few other miscellaneous notions.” (Source: Henry Osborn in The Bible Translator 1969, p. 74ff. ). See other occurrences of Obojona in the Warao New Testament.

Martin Ehrensvärd, one of the translators for the Danish Bibelen 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. )

See also sinner.

complete verse (Hebrews 10:8)

Following are a number of back-translations of Hebrews 10:8:

  • Uma: “First Kristus says like this: God does not request worship-gifts and offerings and he does not like worship-gifts that are burned or livestock that is slaughtered to pay-for sin–yet all those worship-gifts are offered following the Law of the Lord that was written by Musa.” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
  • Yakan: “This is what he first said, he said, ‘You do not want and you are not pleased with sacrifices and gifts of the people or with whole animals burnt and sacrifices to take away sin.’ He said this even though those things/doings were commanded in the law.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “He first said that God does not want the offerings and sacrifices which were burned, and the blood of animals which are meant to take away sin. And He said this even though this is commanded in the Law.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “Let’s think-about the meaning of what Cristo said that I have-just-written. The first-thing he said is, God doesn’t desire the various-kinds of offerings that have been offered to him. That’s not what makes-him-happy. He said that, even though all these offerings, they are according to what the law commanded.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Tagbanwa: “Well, there is a point to these words of his. Firstly, he said that God is not pleased with what they are giving and the animals that (they) are burning, which are-a-means-of-asking for forgiveness for sin, even though that is what is contained in the laws.” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Tenango Otomi: “The first things Christ said to God was that he said he knows that God does not look well upon the animals which people kill to make sacrifices for clearing people’s sins. Neither the animals people kill to burn the flesh upon the altar does God look well upon. Even though it is written in the law concerning all this that the people do, yet God doesn’t look well upon it.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)
  • Chichewa: “Therefore he first said, ‘Sacrifices or offerings, whole burnt sacrifices, or sacrifices offered for sins, you did not desire and you were not pleased with them.’ These things are those the Law[s] said that they must be offered.” (Interconfessional translation, publ. 1999) (Source: Wendland 1998, p. 100)

law

The Greek that is translated in English as “Law” or “law” is translated in Mairasi as oro nasinggiei or “prohibited things” (source: Enggavoter 2004) and in Noongar with a capitalized form of the term for “words” (Warrinya) (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang).

In Yucateco the phrase that is used for “law” is “ordered-word” (for “commandment,” it is “spoken-word”) (source: Nida 1947, p. 198) and in Central Tarahumara it is “writing-command.” (wsource: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.)

See also teaching / law (of God) (Japanese honorifics).

addressing God

Translators of different languages have found different ways with what kind of formality God is addressed. The first example is from a language where God is always addressed distinctly formal whereas the second is one where the opposite choice was made.

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Like many languages (but unlike Greek or Hebrew or English), Tuvan uses a formal vs. informal 2nd person pronoun (a familiar vs. a respectful “you”). Unlike other languages that have this feature, however, the translators of the Tuvan Bible have attempted to be very consistent in using the different forms of address in every case a 2nd person pronoun has to be used in the translation of the biblical text.

As Voinov shows in Pronominal Theology in Translating the Gospels (in: The Bible Translator 2002, p. 210ff. ), the choice to use either of the pronouns many times involved theological judgment. While the formal pronoun can signal personal distance or a social/power distance between the speaker and addressee, the informal pronoun can indicate familiarity or social/power equality between speaker and addressee.

In these verses, in which humans address God, the informal, familiar pronoun is used that communicates closeness.

Voinov notes that “in the Tuvan Bible, God is only addressed with the informal pronoun. No exceptions. An interesting thing about this is that I’ve heard new Tuvan believers praying with the formal form to God until they are corrected by other Christians who tell them that God is close to us so we should address him with the informal pronoun. As a result, the informal pronoun is the only one that is used in praying to God among the Tuvan church.”

In Gbaya, “a superior, whether father, uncle, or older brother, mother, aunt, or older sister, president, governor, or chief, is never addressed in the singular unless the speaker intends a deliberate insult. When addressing the superior face to face, the second person plural pronoun ɛ́nɛ́ or ‘you (pl.)’ is used, similar to the French usage of vous.

Accordingly, the translators of the current version of the Gbaya Bible chose to use the plural ɛ́nɛ́ to address God. There are a few exceptions. In Psalms 86:8, 97:9, and 138:1, God is addressed alongside other “gods,” and here the third person pronoun o is used to avoid confusion about who is being addressed. In several New Testament passages (Matthew 21:23, 26:68, 27:40, Mark 11:28, Luke 20:2, 23:37, as well as in Jesus’ interaction with Pilate and Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman at the well) the less courteous form for Jesus is used to indicate ignorance of his position or mocking (source Philip Noss).

In Dutch and Western Frisian translations, however, God is always addressed with the formal pronoun.

See also female second person singular pronoun in Psalms.

Translation commentary on Hebrews 10:8 – 10:10

By making a few verbal changes in the quotation from Psalm 40, Hebrews has emphasized the contrast between the end of the old order and the basis of the new. The quotation is now repeated in a rather different form, but with no major change of meaning. First or “above” (Revised Standard Version) may mean “earlier in what I am writing,” or more probably, “earlier in the quotation,” in contrast with Then, verse 9.

In view of the way in which the direct quotations are introduced in verses 5 and 7, it may be good in verse 8 to render First he said as “First Christ said.” It may be necessary to introduce God as the person to whom the statement is made, since only in this way is the referent of the pronoun You made clear.

The rendering of the direct quotation in verse 8 depends largely on the way in which similar expressions are rendered in verses 5 and 6.

He said this even though all these sacrifices are offered according to the Law is an aside, or parenthetic expression, as Revised Standard Version shows by using parentheses. Nowhere else does Hebrews speak so positively about the Law of Moses, and the meaning here may be only “these sacrifices belong to the old order, governed by the Law.” Since the Greek participle, literally “saying,” is translated He said, it would be possible to put are offered into the past tense also. A better solution is Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch‘s “although all these sacrifices are prescribed (or, laid down) in the Law” or Barclay‘s “and these are the offerings which the law prescribes” (similarly Translator’s New Testament).

Some languages do not use a concessive clause introduced by a conjunction such as “though” or even though. However, it is always possible to express a concession by introducing a conjunction such as “nevertheless”; for example, “All these sacrifices were made as the Law said they should be made, but nevertheless he said this.”

As in verse 7, it may be necessary to alter the position of O God or to incorporate it as an indirect object of the verb said; for example, “Then he said to God, ‘I am here to do your will.’ ”

Translations are usually longer than the texts they translate. This passage is so compressed in the Greek that translations may need to be much longer if they are to bring out the full meaning.

The translator also has to choose between different ways of making explicit what is implicit in the text. The main problems may be listed as follows, using Revised Standard Version as a basis. The first two questions must be studied together: (a) Who “abolishes the first in order to establish the second”? And (b) what is “that will”? There are two possibilities:

(a) “he abolishes…”
(i) God abolishes: Good News Translation, Bible en français courant
(ii) Christ abolishes: Revised Standard Version, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, Phillips, Jerusalem Bible (?), Barclay (?).
(b) “that will”
(i) God’s will (in general): Bijbel in Gewone Taal, Knox (?), New English Bible
(ii) Christ’s act of obedient sacrifices: Good News Translation, Bible en français courant, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, Translator’s New Testament

Many translations irresponsibly leave the reader to choose; those translations are not mentioned in this summary. If necessary, an alternative translation may be added in a footnote.

(a) There are two arguments in favor of choice (i), Good News Translation God does away…. First, if “Christ” is the grammatical subject, the conclusion “the body of Jesus Christ” is a little awkward. Second, it is usually God rather than Christ who is said to establish or change the Law, priesthood, and forms of worship. On the other hand, in favor of choice (ii) is the fact that “Christ” has been the subject of all the main verbs since verse 5. Most translations therefore imply or state that “Christ” is the subject here also.

(b) “That will” is literally “by which will,” referring back to “thy will” (Revised Standard Version) in verse 9. “Thy will” there means “God’s will.” The question arises whether the “will” that people should be purified from sin is (i) God’s will or (ii) the specific act by which Christ offered himself in sacrifice, in response to what God wanted him to do. Choice (ii) fits in more clearly with the context, and choice (i) could have been more naturally expressed in Greek in other ways.

On this basis other questions are more easily settled. (c) Does away with means “abolishes” a “law,” rather than having the general meaning “destroys.” (d) “The first” (Revised Standard Version) means the old animal sacrifices mentioned in verses 5-6, and “the second” (Revised Standard Version) is Christ’s willing obedience to God (verse 7), expressed in the sacrifice of his death. (e) In we are all purified or “made holy,” we includes all Christians. The Greek for been purified in verse 2 is different from the word used here, and so is the Greek for make perfect in verse 1, but the meaning is very similar. Alternatively purified may mean “set apart to belong to God in a special way.” Translator’s New Testament combines the two: “we are cleansed and set apart for his service.” Barclay emphasizes that for the writer, the purpose of holiness is to make possible a real meeting with God in worship: “we have been made fit to enter God’s presence.” Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch (see below) emphasizes the inner purpose of worship as the removal of guilt, as in verses 17-18.

Even though the Greek text of verse 9b says only “he does away with the first in order to establish the second,” it is important to make clear what are the first and the second, and this is precisely what Good News Translation has attempted to do. But does away with should not be understood in the sense of “destroying” or “throwing away.” A more satisfactory rendering may be “declares that all the old sacrifices no longer have any power,” “causes all the old sacrifices to no longer have power,” or “… no longer be able to accomplish anything.” The rendering of puts the sacrifice of Christ in their place must be translated in such a way as to complement the first part of verse 9b. If the first part of 9b is translated “God takes away the power of all the old sacrifices,” one may translate the second part of 9b as “and he causes the sacrifice of Christ to have power.”

As in other contexts, we are all purified from sin may be best expressed negatively: “we no longer have sin” or “… have guilt.”

The offering … of his own body is the same as the sacrifice of himself in 9.26; compare 9.12. No contrast is implied between body, the keyword of verse 5, and “soul” or “spirit.” Offering, as in verse 8, is used in the sense of a “sacrifice.” The expression of means in the phrase by the offering that he made may be rendered in some languages as cause; for example, “because of the offering he made” or “because of the way he offered.”

In order to avoid the implication that his own body was something external to Christ himself, it may be best to translate by the offering that he made of his own body as “by the way in which he offered himself.”

Once and for all, in the Greek as in Good News Translation, comes at the end of the sentence, and is thus even more emphatic than usual. The tense of the verb indicates a past action, the effects of which continue into the present. Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch and some commentators understand the sentence to mean “we have been purified once for all,” but Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch first edition’s very clear translation is more probable: “Once for all, he offered himself.”

Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch sums up many of the choices recommended above: “In this way Christ puts an end to the old sacrifices and puts his own (sacrifice) in their place. Thus he did what God wanted of him. Once for all, he offered himself (emphasized). By this, we have been freed from all guilt.”

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 .