not resistant / falling into destruction

In Gbaya, the notion of something not being resistant or falling into destruction in the referenced verses is emphasized with mbulɛɛ, an ideophone used to designate something that is not resistant, that is falling into ruin, or someone who lives in poverty.

Ideophones are a class of sound symbolic words expressing human sensation that are used as literary devices in many African languages. (Source: Philip Noss)

See also complete verse (Wisdom 1:11).

worship

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The Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek terms that are often translated as “worship” (also, “kneel down” or “bow down”) are likewise translated in other languages in certain categories, including those based on physical activity, those which incorporate some element of “speaking” or “declaring,” and those which specify some type of mental activity.

Following is a list of (back-) translations (click or tap for details):

  • Javanese: “prostrate oneself before”
  • Malay: “kneel and bow the head”
  • Kaqchikel: “kneel before”
  • Loma (Liberia): “drop oneself beneath God’s foot”
  • Tepeuxila Cuicatec: “wag the tail before God” (using a verb which with an animal subject means “to wag the tail,” but with a human subject)
  • Tzotzil: “join to”
  • Kpelle: “raise up a blessing to God”
  • Kekchí: “praise as your God”
  • Cashibo-Cacataibo: “say one is important”
  • San Blas Kuna: “think of God with the heart”
  • Rincón Zapotec: “have one’s heart go out to God”
  • Tabasco Chontal: “holy-remember” (source of this and all above: Bratcher / Nida)
  • Bariai: “lift up God’s name” (source: Bariai Back Translation)
  • Q’anjob’al: “humble oneself before” (source: Newberry and Kittie Cox in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 91ff. )
  • Alur: rwo: “complete submission, adoration, consecration” (source: F. G. Lasse in The Bible Translator 1956, p. 22ff. )
  • Obolo: itọtọbọ ebum: “express reverence and devotion” (source: Enene Enene)
  • Ngäbere: “cut oneself down before” (“This figure of speech comes from the picture of towering mahoganies in the forest which, under the woodman’s ax, quiver, waver, and then in solemn, thunderous crashing bury their lofty heads in the upstretched arms of the surrounding forest. This is the experience of every true worshiper who sees ‘the Lord, high and lifted up.’ Our own unworthiness brings us low. As the Valientes say, ‘we cut ourselves down before’ His presence. Our heads, which have been carried high in self-confidence, sink lower and lower in worship.)
  • Tzeltal: “end oneself before God.” (“Only by coming to the end of oneself can one truly worship. The animist worships his deities in the hope of receiving corresponding benefits, and some pagans in Christendom think that church attendance is a guarantee of success in this life and good luck in the future. But God has never set a price on worship except the price that we must pay, namely, ‘coming to the end of ourselves.'”) (Source of this and the one above: Nida 1952, p. 163)
  • Folopa: “die under God” (“an idiom that roughly back-translates “dying under God” which means lifting up his name and praising him and to acknowledge by everything one does and thanks that God is superior.”) (Source: Anderson / Moore, p. 202)
  • Chokwe: kuivayila — “rub something on” (“When anyone goes into the presence of a king or other superior, according to native law and custom the inferior gets down on the ground, takes a little earth in the fingers of his right hand, rubs it on his own body, and then claps his hands in homage and the greeting of friendship. It is a token of veneration, of homage, of extreme gratitude for some favor received. It is also a recognition of kingship, lordship, and a prostrating of oneself in its presence. Yet it simply is the applicative form of ‘to rub something on oneself’, this form of the verb giving the value of ‘because of.’ Thus in God’s presence as king and Lord we metaphorically rub dirt on ourselves, thus acknowledging Him for what He really is and what He has done for us.”) (Source: D. B. Long in The Bible Translator 1952, p. 87ff. )
  • In the German New Testament translation Fridolin Stier (1989) it is consistently translated as “bow (to someone) deeply” (tief verneigen)

In Luang it is translated with different shades of meaning:

Source: Kathy Taber in Notes on Translation 1/1999, p. 9-16.

complete verse (Jeremiah 8:2)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Jeremiah 8:2:

  • Kupsabiny: “Those bones will be spread out in the sun, moon and all the stars that those people loved to serve so as to ask advice and they worshipped (them). Never shall those bones be gathered or buried but left to be lying all over.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “Then these will-be-scattered in the land, before the sun, moon, and stars which they loved, served, followed, asked/consulted, and worshipped. Their bones will- not -be-gathered and buried again, instead be-scattered in the ground as-if-like dung.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “They will take out their bones from their graves and dishonor them by scattering them on the ground under the sun and the moon and the stars—
    those are the gods which my people loved and served and worshiped.
    No one will gather up their bones and bury them again;
    they will remain scattered on the ground like dung.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Jeremiah 8:2

Not only will the bones of these people be removed from their burial places, but they will be spread before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven. Thus the judgment to be brought upon them is in keeping with the nature of their sins, and it reflects Jeremiah’s sarcasm. During their lifetime the people had bowed in worship before the sun, moon, and stars, and so after death their bones will be spread out before these objects of their worship.

As in verse 1, many translators will continue in the active instead of passive voice: “And they [the enemies] will spread those bones out so they are exposed to the sun and moon and all the stars.”

All the host of heaven refers to the stars. It is often helpful to make this clear in the translation, since otherwise readers will think it refers to heavenly beings such as angels.

In the clauses which they have loved and served, which they have gone after, and which they have sought and worshiped, the pronoun they refers to the people of Judah whose bones are now being dug up. In they shall not be gathered or buried; they shall be as dung on the surface of the ground, the pronoun refers to the bones.

The four verbs (served … gone after … sought and worshiped) cover basically the same area of meaning, though it is possible to make some distinctions: “… the gods whom they loved and worshiped, to whom they brought sacrifices, from whom they sought instruction and according to which they governed their lives” (Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch). In Good News Translation the four verbs appear as three: “… served, and which they have consulted and worshiped.”

Jeremiah’s final blow of sarcasm comes in the last statement of this verse: the sun, moon, and stars cannot protect their worshipers, who will end up as dung on the surface of the ground.

Good News Translation has restructured the verse creatively. Another possibility is:

• Those enemies will spread those bones out on the ground like so much dung [or, manure]. Thus the people’s bones will be exposed to the very things they used to love and worship, and which they pursued with so much fervor: the sun, the moon, and all the stars.

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Jeremiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2003. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .