Jer 25:9 – TIPs

tribe

The Greek and Hebrew that is translated as “tribe” in English when referring to the “12 tribes of Israel” is translated in some East African languages, including Taita and Pökoot, with the equivalent of “clan” instead.

Aloo Mojola explains (in The Bible Translator 1989, p. 208ff. ) (click or tap here to see the rest of this insight):

“A number of Bible translation teams in East Africa have been baffled and intrigued by the use of the term ‘tribe’ in the English translations of the Bible. The usage employed in these translations does not reflect any of the popular meanings associated with the term ‘tribe’ in present-day English. Neither does it reflect popular conceptions of the meaning of this term in East Africa or in other parts of Africa and elsewhere. This raises the question: is the term tribe the best translation of the Hebrew terms shebeth and matteh or the Greek term phyle? What is a tribe anyway? Are the twelve tribes of Israel tribes in the sense this term is currently understood? How can this term be translated in East African languages?

“It is easy to see that there is no consistent definition of the term tribe which applies exclusively and consistently to the communities to which it is currently applied. Why, for example, are the Somali or the Baganda called a tribe, but not the Irish or the Italians? Why do the Yoruba or Hausa qualify, but not the Portuguese or the Russians? Why the Bakongo and the Oromo, but not the Germans or the Scots? Why the Eritreans, but not the French or Dutch-speaking Belgians? Why the Zulu or the Xhosa, but not the South African Boers (Afrikaners) or the South African English? The reason for the current prejudices, it would seem, has nothing to do with language, physical type, common territory, common cultural values, type of political and social organization or even population size. Ingrained prejudices and preconceived ideas about so-called “primitive” peoples have everything to do with it.

“The term ‘tribe’ is used to refer to a universal and world-wide phenomenon of ethnic identification which may draw on any of the following bases: identification in terms of one’s first or dominant language of communication (linguistic), in terms of one’s place of origin (regional), in terms of one’s presumed racial, biological or genetic type (racial), or in terms of one’s ideological or political commitments (ideological), and so on. Communities may choose one or more of these bases as criteria for membership. Any of these may change over time. Moreover forms of ethnic identification are dynamic or in a state of flux, changing in response to new environments and circumstances. Essentially forms of ethnic association reflect a people’s struggle for survival through adaptation to changing times. This is inextricably intertwined with the production and distribution of vital resources, goods and services as well as the distribution of power, class and status in society.

“At the base of any ethnic group is the nuclear family which expands to include the extended family. The extended family consists of more than two families related vertically and horizontally: parents and their offspring, cousins, uncles, aunts, nephews, and others, extending to more than two generations. A lineage is usually a larger group than an extended family. It includes a number of such families who trace descent through the male or female line to a common ancestor. A clan may be equivalent to or larger than a lineage. Where it is larger than a lineage, it brings together several lineages which may or may not know the precise nature of their relationships, but which nevertheless claim descent from a common ancestor. A clan is best thought of as a kind of sub-ethnic unit whose members have some unifying symbol such as totem, label, or myth. In most cases the clan is used to determine correct marriage lines, but this is not universally so. Above the clan is the ethnic group, usually referred to inconsistently as the tribe. Members of an ethnic group share feelings of belonging to a common group. The basis of ethnic identity is not always derived from a common descent, real or fictional; it may draw on any of the bases mentioned above.

“The Israelites identified themselves as one people sharing a common descent, a common religious and cultural heritage, a common language and history. There is no doubt that they constitute what would nowadays be called an ethnic group, or by some people a tribe. The twelve subunits of the Israelite ethnic group or tribe, (Hebrew shebeth or matteh, or Greek phyle) are clearly equivalent to clans. In fact this is what seems to make sense to most African Bible translators in the light of their understanding of these terms and the biblical account. Referring to a shebeth as a tribe or an ethnic group and to Israel as a collection of twelve tribes creates unnecessary confusion. Translating each of the terms shebeth, matteh, and phyle as clan seems to solve this problem and to be consistent with current usage in African languages.”

family / clan / house

The Hebrew terms that are translated as “family” or “clan” or “house” or similar in English are all translated in Kwere as ng’holo or “clan.” (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)

In the English translation by Goldingay (2018) it is translated as “kin-group.”

says the LORD / says the Lord GOD

The English that is translated as “says the Lord” or “says the Lord God” is translated in some influential French translations as oracle de Yahvé (La Bible de Jérusalem) oracle du Seigneur (Traduction œcuménique de la Bible), and oracle de l’Éternel (Nouvelle Version Segond Révisée 1978) or “oracle (authoritative statement) of YHWH (or: the Lord).”

Timothy Lloyd Wilt (in The Bible Translator 1999, p. 301ff. ) describes the Hebrew ne’um (adonay) YHWH (quoting S. Meier, 1992) as “a highly marked expression (…) Hebrew does not characteristically repunctuate quoted discourse with reminders of the quote’s source, making this particle’s function quite distinctive and certainly unique in its frequency and distribution.”

The French translations above are emulating this with their distinct wording containing the French oracle.

Similarly, the French translation by Chouraqui uses harangue de or “harangue (or: ‘sermon’) of YHWH” and the English translation by Fox uses Utterance of YHWH. Both of these translations are Jewish translations that attempt to emulate the Hebraic nature of the original text. (Source: Drew Maust) Likewise, the translation by Goldingay (2018) has Yahweh’s declaration, typically set in parentheses: (Yahweh’s declaration).

The translation into Kera marks this by using the equivalent of “the words of me, YHWH” (source: Jackie Hainaut) and a language in West Africa, belonging to the Mande language family, uses a honorific form of “say,” that is only used for speech from God or his prophets. Both of these languages are spoken in francophone Africa.

servant / slave

While the Greek term doulos in the New Testament and ‘ebed in the Old Testament refer to slightly different concepts (unlike in New Testament Judea in Old Testament Israel and Judah, Hebrew servants/slaves were required to be released after six years of labor and, regardless of when they started their servitude, all Hebrew servants were to be automatically freed during the year of Jubilee), translation issues are somewhat similar.

Joel Baden (2025, p. 65ff.) says this about the Hebrew term used in the Old Testament / Hebrew Bible:

“The English words ‘servant’ and ‘slave’ have decidedly different connotations. ‘Servant’ has the sense of ‘employee.’ ‘Slave,’ by contrast, carries with it the ideas of an owned and controlled body, of violence and dishonor. The connotation of ‘servant’ can verge on the positive; ‘slave’ is predominantly negative. How a reader of the Bible understands the identity of a character or the relationship between one character and another or the world of ancient Israel depends significantly on whether the word ‘servant’ or ‘slave’ is used. In Hebrew, however, there is but one word underlying every occurrence of ‘servant’ and ‘slave’ in our modern translations. The distinction between the two exists only on the level of interpretation.

“It is not a matter of mere nomenclature. Take the story of Genesis 24, in which Abraham sends his servant off to find a wife for Isaac. The servant — though the main character of the passage — has no name and is identified only by his title, which he even uses to introduce himself: ‘I am Abraham’s servant,’ he says (Genesis 24:34, Jewish Publication Society). This is often read as a warm story about a devoted servant — usually imagined to be relatively old — who carries out the elderly patriarch’s final wishes. How does it change, how do we reimagine it, when we read all thirteen mentions of Abraham’s servant as, in fact, Abraham’s slave? We know Abraham has slaves: His ‘servant’ even says so in this very chapter in the very next verse: ‘The Lord has greatly blessed my master, and he has become rich: he has given him sheep and cattle, silver and gold, male and female slaves, camels and asses’ (24:35, JPS). Yet generations of translators, interpreters, and readers have failed to connect the slaves (the property with which God has blessed Abraham) and the servant — the slave who is the protagonist of this same story.

“When slaves are turned into servants, the Bible itself is changed. Our revulsion at the institution of slavery is kept at a distance from the biblical text that stands as our religious heritage. The Bible is protected, albeit from itself. Slavery is minimized, or worse: The King James Version, notably, does not translate ‘ebed as ‘slave’ a single time. The result? Some KJV readers have denied that there is any slavery in the Bible whatsoever. Yet the word ‘ebed appears around 800 times in the Bible. That’s 800 moments when a slave, and the existence of slavery in ancient Israel and the biblical text, has been erased.

“The social role that we associate with the term ‘servant’ didn’t exist in ancient Israel. Slaves, however, did. Israel knew what it was to be a slave, and Israel knew, too, what it was to own a slave. And thus Israel uses the language and metaphor of slavery again and again to express the basic notions of obedience, of power disparity, of bodily control and the absence of agency. Samuel says to Yahweh upon being called, ‘Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening’ (1 Samuel 3:9, JPS). ‘Let my lord go ahead of his servant,’ Jacob says to Esau in Genesis 33:14 (JPS). Rendered as ‘servant’ in every translation, this is a sort of formally obsequious, self-abnegating speech. While literal slavery is not at stake in these sorts of expressions, the metaphorical reference to the relative status of slave and master is lost when it is translated as ‘servant.’

“So, too, when those figures who are the ‘ebed to a king are referred to as ‘courtiers,’ ‘officials,’ ‘attendants,’ ‘soldiers,’ ‘subjects,’ ‘envoys,’ ‘ministers,’ or even sometimes simply ‘men,’ of the king. These are all translations of the same word, and the instinct to specify their distinctive roles in the royal court is understandable. Yet in doing so, translations obscure the actual language with the connotations that it presents: subordination, threat of violence to one’s person, absolute control over will and agency. And so, too, when it is not a human king but God to whom one is said to be ‘ebed. In the book of Joshua, God states, ‘My servant Moses is dead’ (1:2, JPS) — we are relatively comfortable with the idea of serving God but perhaps less so with the idea of being God’s slave. Yet the qualities of obedience, subservience, and loyalty — and the implicit threat of punishment for the lack thereof — are part of this picture as well. One might point to the way this language is picked up in the New Testament in the phrase ‘slave of Christ’ in 1 Corinthians 7:22.

“If ‘servants’ and ‘slaves’ are not understood to be equivalent — and in modern English it is safe to say that they are not — then every time that the word ‘ebed appears, a choice has to be made by the translator. The diminishment of the very word ‘slave’ in English translations of the Hebrew Bible results in the diminishment of the idea and reality of slavery in the Bible and in the world that produced it. Though there is no debate to be had about whether there was slavery in the Bible and in ancient Israel, a lay reader of the text in translation might well wonder.

“Our ears, and eyes, have become accustomed to seeing the word ‘servant’ in the Bible. ‘Slave’ often sounds wrong, inapt, almost harsh. Yet it is just this discomfort that signals how important the change is. Whenever we encounter the word ‘servant’ in our English translations, we should be obliged to ask why it says ‘servant’ and not ‘slave’ — and what difference it would make to our reading of the text as an individual, as a community, and as a culture if we were instead to read ‘slave.’”

Ruden (2021, p. lviii) says this about the Greek term in the New Testament:

“In Judea, servitude was sui generis and could be complicated, and accordingly the Greek vocabulary in scripture is varied. But there appears to be no basis for sugarcoating the word meaning a chattel slave in nearly all Greek literature, doulos. It is unlikely that the internationally oriented authors of the Gospels didn’t mean what their peers meant by the word — ‘slave.’ Also, the English word ‘servant’ is too vague for the array of servitors (including trusted house slaves and personal attendants), military and administrative subordinates, and ritual helpers the Greek of the Gospels distinguishes.”

Some English New Testament translations (Ruden 2021, Hart 2017, The Orthodox New Testament 2004) have consistently used slave for the Greek doulos but no Old Testament translation consistently translates ‘ebed with only one term.

In a number of leading German translations, including the Catholic Einheitsübersetzung (1980 / 2016) and the Protestant Elberfelder Bibel (1871 / 2006), BasisBibel (2021), as well as the translation by Luther (all editions) use the term Knecht throughout. Knecht is an old-fashioned term for a low-class, often agricultural servant with little or no social mobility, a position that is somewhat located between Diener (“servant”) and Sklave (“slave”). The only times these versions specifically don’t use Knecht is where slavery is specifically in the focus (such as Leviticus 25:44 or Philemon 1:16).

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)

complete verse (Jeremiah 25:9)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Jeremiah 25:9:

Kupsabiny: “I will incite all the communities in the North, together with my servant Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon. Those people will come to fight this land and its people together with all the neighboring communities. I am going to destroy these people completely and make (them) become a terrible thing which is despised and always mocked.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “I will-have- you (plur.) -attacked by the people in the north being-led by my servant King Nebuchadnezzar of Babilonia. They will-attack this land and all its residents, as-well-as all the nations around it. I will- completely -destroy you (plur.), and the people will- surely -be-astonished/stunned/[lit. not able to speak] of what happened to you (plur.) and they will-despise you (plur.). Yes, you (plur.) will- surely -be-destroyed forever/[lit. until whenever].” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “I will gather all the armies of the nations that will come from the northeast. I have appointed King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon to lead them. I have appointed him to do my work for me. I will bring those armies to attack this land and nearby countries. I will completely destroy them, and cause them to be places that people are horrified about, and that people will ridicule/act contemptuously toward, places that will be ruined forever.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

cardinal directions

The cardinal directions “east” and “west” are easy to translate into Maan here since the language uses “where the sun comes up” and “where the sun goes down.” For “north” the translator had “facing toward the sun rising to the left,” and for “south” she had “facing toward the sun rising to the right.” So the listener had to think hard before knowing what direction was in view when translating “to the north and south, to the east and west.” So, in case all four directions are mentioned, it was shortened by saying simply “all directions.” Manya uses a similar nomenclature for the cardinal directions. (Source: Don Slager)

Likewise, Yakan has “from the four corners of the earth” (source: Yakan back-translation) or Western Bukidnon Manobo “from the four directions here on the earth” (source: Western Bukidnon Manobo back-translation).

Kankanaey is “from the coming-out and the going-away of the sun and the north and the south” (source: Kankanaey back-translation), Northern Emberá “from where the sun comes up, from where it falls, from the looking [left] hand, from the real [right] hand” (source: Charles Mortensen), Amele “from the direction of the sun going up, from the direction of the sun going down, from the north and from the south” (source: John Roberts), Ejamat “look up to see the side where the sun comes from, and the side where it sets, and look on your right side, and on your left” (source: David Frank in this blog post ).

In Lamba, only umutulesuŵa, “where the sun rises” and imbonsi, “where the sun sets” were available as cardinal directions that were not tied to the local area of language speakers (“north” is kumausi — “to the Aushi country” — and “south” kumalenje — “to the Lenje country”). So “north” and “south” were introduced as loanwords, nofu and saufu respectively. The whole phrase is kunofu nakusaufu nakumutulesuŵa nakumbonsi. (Source C. M. Doke in The Bible Translator 1958, p. 57ff. )

“West” is translated in Tzeltal as “where the sun pours-out” and in Kele as “down-river” (source: Reiling / Swellengrebel).

In Morelos Nahuatl, “north” is translated as “from above” and “south” as “from below.” (Source: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)

In Matumbi cardinal directions are defined as in relation to another place. “East” for instance typically is “toward the beach” since the coast is in the eastern direction in Matumbi-speaking areas. “North” and “south” can be defined as above or below another place. (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)

The Hebrew text that gives instructions where to place items in the tabernacle with the help of cardinal directions (north and south) had to be approached in the Bambam translation specific to spacial concepts of that culture.

Phil Campbell explains: “There are no words in Bambam for north and south. In Exodus 26:35, God instructs that the table is to be placed on the north side and the lamp on the south side inside the tabernacle. The team wants to use right and left to tell where the lamp and table are located. In many languages we would say that the table is on the right and the lampstand is on the left based on the view of someone entering the tabernacle. However, that is not how Bambam people view it. They view the placement of things and rooms in a building according to the orientation of someone standing inside the building facing the front of the building. So that means the table is on the left side and the lampstand is on the right side.”

king

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Some languages do not have a concept of kingship and therefore no immediate equivalent for the Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic, and Latin that is translated as “king” in English. Here are some (back-) translations:

(Click or tap here to see details)

Piro: “a great one”
Highland Totonac: “the big boss”
Huichol: “the one who commanded” (source for this and above: Bratcher / Nida)
Ekari: “the one who holds the country” (source: Reiling / Swellengrebel)
Una: weik sienyi: “big headman” (source: Kroneman 2004, p. 407)
Pass Valley Yali: “Big Man” (source: Daud Soesilo)
Ninia Yali: “big brother with the uplifted name” (source: Daud Soesilio in Noss 2007, p. 175)
Nyamwezi: mutemi: generic word for ruler, by specifying the city or nation it becomes clear what kind of ruler (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
Ghomála’: Fo (“The word Fo refers to the paramount ruler in the kingdoms of West Cameroon. He holds administrative, political, and religious power over his own people, who are divided into two categories: princes (descendants of royalty) and servants (everyone else).” (Source: Michel Kenmogne in Theologizing in Context: An Example from the Study of a Ghomala’ Christian Hymn))

Faye Edgerton retells how the term in Navajo (Dinė) was determined:

“[This term was] easily expressed in the language of Biblical culture, which had kings and noblemen with their brilliant trappings and their position of honor and praise. But leadership among the Navajos is not accompanied by any such titles or distinctions of dress. Those most respected, especially in earlier days, were their headmen, who were the leaders in raids, and the shaman, who was able to serve the people by appealing for them to the gods, or by exorcising evil spirits. Neither of these made any outward show. Neither held his position by political intrigue or heredity. If the headman failed consistently in raids, he was superceded by a better warrior. If the shaman failed many times in his healing ceremonies, it was considered that he was making mistakes in the chants, or had lost favor with the gods, and another was sought. The term Navajos use for headman is derived from a verb meaning ‘to move the head from side to side as in making an oration.’ The headman must be a good orator, able to move the people to go to war, or to follow him in any important decision. This word is naat’áanii which now means ‘one who rules or bosses.’ It is employed now for a foreman or boss of any kind of labor, as well as for the chairman of the tribal council. So in order to show that the king is not just a common boss but the highest ruler, the word ‘aláahgo, which expresses the superlative degree, was put before naat’áanii, and so ‘aláahgo naat’áanii ‘anyone-more-than-being around-he-moves-his-head-the-one-who’ means ‘the highest ruler.’ Naat’áanii was used for governor as the context usually shows that the person was a ruler of a country or associated with kings.”

(Source: Faye Edgerton in The Bible Translator 1962, p. 25ff. )

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Verse: Jeremiah 25:9