For the verses that say “Keep listening, but do not comprehend; keep looking, but do not understand. Make the mind of this people dull, and stop their ears, and shut their eyes, so that they may not look with their eyes, and listen with their ears, and comprehend with their minds, and turn and be healed.” or similar, see Matthew 13:14 and Matthew 13:15 et al.
Note that this quote in the New Testament is not taken from the Hebrew Bible but from the Greek Septuagint (LXX) which translates to English as “Go, and say to this people: ‘You will listen by listening, but you will not understand, and looking you will look, but you will not perceive.’ For this people’s heart has grown fat, and with their ears they have heard heavily, and they have shut their eyes so that they might not see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn — and I would heal them.'” (Translation by NETS — for the Greek version see the title’s tooltip)
Following are a number of back-translations of Acts 28:26:
Uma: “Like this its sound: The Lord God says: ‘Go, say to those Yahudi people: They do hear, but they never know the meaning. They do see, but it’s like they never really see.” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
Yakan: “‘Go to this tribe and say to them: You are always just listening but you do not understand. You are always just looking but you do not see.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “Because he said, ‘Go to these people and say to them that they listen very carefully, but they cannot understand. They look very carefully but they cannot see.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “‘You (sing.) go tell those people: Even-though you listen-and-listen, you will not understand, and even-though you look-and-look-closely, you will also not recognize. That is what you (sing.) are to tell them,” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Tagbanwa: “‘Say to these people, ‘Even though you keep on listening, you really won’t be able to understand. And even though you stare and stare, you won’t be able to recognize what you are looking at.'” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
God transcends gender, but most languages are limited to grammatical gender expressed in pronouns. In the case of English, this is traditionally confined to “he” (or in the forms “his,” “him,” and “himself”), “she” (and “her,” “hers,” and “herself”), and “it” (and “its” and “itself”).
Modern Mandarin Chinese, however, offers another possibility. Here, the third-person singular pronoun is always pronounced the same (tā), but it is written differently according to its gender (他 is “he,” 她 is “she,” and 它/牠 is “it” and their respective derivative forms). In each of these characters, the first (or upper) part defines the gender (man, woman, or thing/animal), while the second element gives the clue to its pronunciation.
In 1930, after a full century with dozens of Chinese translations, Bible translator Wang Yuande (王元德) coined a new “godly” pronoun: 祂. Chinese readers immediately knew how to pronounce it: tā. But they also recognized that the first part of that character, signifying something spiritual, clarified that each person of the Trinity has no gender aside from being God.
While the most important Protestant and Catholic Chinese versions respectively have opted not to use 祂, some Bible translations do and it is widely used in hymnals and other Christian materials. Among the translations that use 祂 to refer to “God” were early versions of Lü Zhenzhong’s (呂振中) version (New Testament: 1946, complete Bible: 1970). R.P. Kramers (in The Bible Translator 1956, p. 152ff. ) explains why later versions of Lü’s translation did not continue with this practice: “This new way of writing ‘He,’ however, has created a minor problem of its own: must this polite form be used whenever Jesus is referred to? Lü follows the rule that, wherever Jesus is referred to as a human being, the normal ta (他) is written; where he is referred to as divine, especially after the ascension, the reverential ta (祂) is used.”
In that system one kind of pronoun is used for humans (male and female alike) and one for natural elements, non-liquid masses, and some spiritual entities (one other is used for large animals and another one for miscellaneous items). While in these languages the pronoun for spiritual entities used to be employed when referring to God, this has changed into the use of the human pronoun.
Lynell Zogbo (in The Bible Translator 1989, p. 401ff. ) explains in the following way: “From informal discussions with young Christians especially, it would appear that, at least for some people, the experience and/or concepts of Christianity are affecting the choice of pronoun for God. Some people explain that God is no longer ‘far away,’ but is somehow tangible and personal. For these speakers God has shifted over into the human category.”
In Kouya, God (the Father) and Jesus are referred to with the human pronoun ɔ, whereas the Holy Spirit is referred to with a non-human pronoun. (Northern Grebo and Western Krahn make a similar distinction.)
Eddie Arthur, a former Kouya Bible translation consultant, says the following: “We tried to insist that this shouldn’t happen, but the Kouya team members were insistent that the human pronoun for the Spirit would not work.”
In Burmese, the pronoun ko taw (ကိုယ်တော်) is used either as 2nd person (you) or 3rd person (he, him, his) reference. “This term clearly has its root in the religious language in Burmese. No ordinary persons are addressed or known by this pronoun because it is reserved for Buddhist monks, famous religious teachers, and in the case of Christianity, the Trinity.” (Source: Gam Seng Shae in <em>The Bible Translator 2002, p. 202ff. )
In Thai, the pronoun phra`ong (พระองค์) is used, a gender-neutral pronoun which must refer to a previously introduced royal or divine being. Similarly, in Northern Khmer, which is spoken in Thailand, “an honorific divine pronoun” is used for the pronoun referring to the persons of the Trinity (source: David Thomas in The Bible Translator 1993, p. 445 ). In Urak Lawoi’, another language spoken in Thailand, the translation often uses tuhat (ตูฮัด) — “God” — ”as a divine pronoun where Thai has phra’ong even though it’s actually a noun.” (Source for Thai and Urak Lawoi’: Stephen Pattemore)
The English “Contemporary Torah” addresses the question of God and gendered pronouns by mostly avoiding pronouns in the first five books of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (unless God is referred to as “lord,” “father,” “king,” or “warrior”). It does that by either using passive constructs (“He gave us” vs. “we were given”), by using the adjective “divine” or by using “God” rather than a pronoun.
Some Protestant English Bibles use a referential capitalized spelling when referring to the persons of the Trinity with “He,” “His,” “Him,” or “Himself.” This includes for instance the New American Standard Bible, but most translations, especially those published in the 21st century, do not. Two other languages where this is also done (in most Bible translations) are the closely related Indonesian and Malay. In both languages this follows the language usage according to the Qur’an, which in turn predicts that usage (see Soesilo in The Bible Translator 1991, p. 442ff. and The Bible Translator 1997, p. 433ff. ).
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 show different degree of politeness is through the usage of an honorific construction where the morphemes rare (られ) or are (され) are affixed on the verb as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. This is particularly done with verbs that have God as the agent to show a deep sense of reverence. Here, iw-are-ru (言われる) or “say” is used. (Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )
Isaiah is commissioned as Yahweh’s prophet with the words in verses 9-10. The LORD tells him that those who hear his message will not really listen to it or understand it. Verse 9 contains the two primary verbs hear and see. They reappear in the next verse with their meaning given more fully. The underlying purpose of the commands here has to be seen in light of the next verse (see the introductory comments there).
Verses 9-10 have two levels of quotation. The LORD speaks to Isaiah, but inside his speech he tells Isaiah what to say to the people (verse 9b). Some languages may prefer to have only one level here. Good News Translation provides a good model for this.
Go and say to this people: Isaiah expressed his willingness to be a divine messenger, and now he is accepted and simply told by Yahweh to Go and give the people a message. This people refers to the Israelites. It is the first time this kind of impersonal reference is made. Usually when Yahweh speaks about the people of Israel, he refers to them as “my people” (see 1.3; 3.12, 15; 5.13).
Hear and hear, but do not understand: This is the first of two emphatic parallel statements that make up Yahweh’s message. The prophet first has to call the people to listen to what he has to say. This line is literally “Listen to listen, but do not understand.” The grammatical construction of the first part gives emphasis to the verb hear. So Hear and hear may be rendered “Listen closely” or “Hear it again and again!” Many languages will require an object here, in which case a general object such as “my words” or “what I say” is best.
But do not understand is a negative command in Hebrew. It orders the people not to understand, which seems to contradict the purpose of speaking to them. However, the Hebrew imperative does have other functions than just giving orders. One function is to express sarcasm (see examples of this in 1 Kgs 2.22 and Amos 4.4). If it is used this way here, then this clause may be rendered “but don’t think you will understand it!” Another function of the imperative is to indicate some future event or situation (see 2 Kgs 19.29, where the imperatives have a future meaning: “… then in the third year sow, and reap, and plant vineyards, and eat their fruit”). This leads to the following rendering here: “but you will not understand!” This latter possibility is the probable sense of the command here and we recommend following it. The LORD is warning Isaiah that his preaching will have little effect. More than that, it will harden his listeners even more. Revised English Bible and Contemporary English Version adopt this understanding. Revised English Bible says “However hard you listen, you will never understand” (similarly New English Bible [New English Bible]), and Contemporary English Version has “You will listen and listen, but never understand.” So the prophet is told to call on the people to listen closely, but at the same time he is to tell them that they won’t comprehend the real meaning of his words. Bible en français courant plays on the difference between “listen” and “hear” to express this, saying “You may listen as much as you like, you will not hear.”
See and see, but do not perceive follows the same form in Hebrew as the previous line. Its meaning is similar as well. See seems to imply that, like other prophets, Isaiah will actually act out his message, thereby challenging his onlookers to give a response. On the other hand, there is also the possibility that see is used figuratively here with the sense of discover or understand. The people will not perceive (literally “not know”) or comprehend the full meaning of what they observe with their eyes. Like the verb hear, see may require an object in some languages. If so, translators should add an object that is parallel to the previous one, for example, “my deeds” or “what I do.” Bible en français courant has a line parallel to the first one: “You may observe as much as you like, you will not see.”
For the translation of this verse we suggest:
• Then Yahweh said to me: “Go and tell these people,
‘Listen closely [to what I say], but you will not understand;
look carefully [at what I do], but you will never comprehend.’
• Yahweh then said: “Go to these people and say,
‘Listen carefully [to my words] though you will never understand [them];
observe closely [my deeds] though you will never comprehend [them].’
Quoted with permission from Ogden, Graham S. and Sterk, Jan. A Handbook on Isaiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2011. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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