Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 36:27:
Kupsabiny: “It is God who makes water to rise (like a cloud) towards heaven/up/sky and then it becomes a cloud that gives rain.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Newari: “He draws water vapor from the earth, and causes rain to come from the clouds. ” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “God is the one-who-causes- the water -to-go-up from the ground and he then makes it into [nga] rain.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “He draws water up from the earth and puts it in clouds and causes it to become rain.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
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 tā (他) is written; where he is referred to as divine, especially after the ascension, the reverential tā (祂) is used.”
In that system, one kind of pronoun is used for humans (male and female alike) and others 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: “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 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 and Orthodox 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 or The Orthodox New Testament, but most translations do not. Two other languages where this is also done (in most Bible translations) are Twents as well as 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. ).
These two verses describe, first how rain is formed, and then how it comes down. Verse 27 is uncertain, and translations differ greatly in the way they handle it.
For he draws up the drops of water describes how God takes drops of water and causes them to go up to where he is thought to be. Some scholars make a change in the word water to get “from the sea.” This, however, is unnecessary. Good News Translation‘s translation “takes water from the earth” is not a change in the text but an attempt to say from where God takes the drops of water. The implication may be that God gets the water from the earth according to the description in Genesis 2.6, “a mist went up from the earth.” It is sufficient to say “He (God) draws up to himself, lifts up, drops of water,” or as Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch says, “He draws drops of water up to heaven.”
He distils his mist in rain is literally “they distil,” as the Revised Standard Version footnote says. He refers to God, but the Hebrew “they” refers to the drops of water in the previous line. Thus “He draws the water drops that distil rain from the flood,” and in verse 28a “that trickle from the clouds.” Distils translates a transitive verb meaning “to filter, refine,” and is used in 28.1 referring to refining gold. Many translations, including Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation, change to the singular subject, referring to God. Pope argues that his mist refers to the reservoir of underground water in Genesis 2.6, and translates “flood.” Since it is God who is being praised for his ways in nature, it is probably best to make God the subject, as in Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation, and translate “and God turns the drops of water into rain.”
Which the skies pour down begins with a relative particle referring to the drops of rain in verse 27b. Skies translates “clouds.” Pour is plural in Hebrew and has “clouds” as its subject. The sense is “The clouds pour down the rain.” Good News Translation supplies God as the agent, “He lets the rain pour from the clouds,” which most likely expresses the poet’s thought.
And drop upon man abundantly: abundantly translates a word which most interpreters take to be an adjective rather than an adverb; they then translate, for example, “upon many men.” However, Pope argues that the expression is an alternative form of the word translated “showers” in Deuteronomy 32.2; and since the Hebrew ʾadam “man” is a variant form of the word ʾadamah meaning “earth,” he therefore translates “pour on the ground in showers.” This suits the context better than Good News Translation “in showers for all mankind.” However, it is not possible to eliminate the interpretation of Revised Standard Version or Good News Translation, and so a wide range of choice is given for translation. In some cases translators may have to follow the interpretation of a major language Bible, provided that translation contains one of the suitable choices. Verse 28 may also be rendered “He makes the clouds send down rain that showers the earth” or “He makes the clouds send down rain upon people everywhere.”
Quoted with permission from Reyburn, Wiliam. A Handbook on Job. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1992. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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