Translation commentary on Judith 10:17

Good News Translation does well to use this verse to end the preceding paragraph, rather than using it to open the following paragraph.

They chose from their number … they brought them …: Revised Standard Version‘s third person pronouns are not clear in this verse. They chose refers to the whole group of Assyrian soldiers whom the two women met in verse 11. But in they brought them, they refers to the 100-man escort, and them to the women. Revised Standard Version‘s problems with pronouns continue into the next verse. Good News Translation solves this neatly and efficiently. Good News Translation does not say, as the Greek does, that the escort actually took Judith to Holofernes, but this really does go without saying. Contemporary English Version eliminates the first pronoun by using a passive verb: “One hundred men were assigned to take Judith and her servant to the tent of Holofernes.” In languages that do not have the passive, we may say “The soldiers assigned one hundred from their group to take Judith….”

Quoted with permission from Bullard, Roger A. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Judith. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2001. For this and other handbooks for translators see here.