Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 37:7:
Kupsabiny: “That prevents people from working so that people can see his power/strength.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Newari: “So that all the men that He created may know His work, He stops all the work of men.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “so-that the people can-rest from their work and can-meditate on what God does.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “What supports the pillars on which the earth rests? When the stars that shine early in the morning sang together, and someone put in place the stone that causes the earth to stay in its place, and all the angels shouted joyfully when they saw that happening, who laid that cornerstone? Did you?” (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 the latter two 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. ).
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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 shows different degree of politeness is through the usage of an honorific construction where the morpheme rare (られ) is 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, fūjikome-rare-ru (封じ込められる) or “seal off” is used.
He seals up the hand of every man: verse 7 is interpreted and translated in various ways. Revised Standard Version gives a literal translation whose probable meaning is that God prevents people from working, by causing it to rain and snow. Agricultural work in the fields is interrupted by the weather. Good News Translation makes this clear by avoiding the figurative language. New English Bible has “He shuts every man fast indoors.” This involves making a change in the Hebrew word for hand, and taking the word translated seals up to mean “close up,” as it is used in Jeremiah 32.11 and Daniel 12.4.
That all men may know his work is literally “that all men of his work may know.” The traditional Hebrew text uses a form that means “men of his work,” that is, men whom he has made. Some scholars believe the last letter of the Hebrew for “men” was lost when the text was copied because it is the same as the first letter of the next word. In that case the text would say “that all men may know of his work.” The Revised Standard Version footnote gives the first meaning as representing the Hebrew text. The Revised Standard Version text follows the opinion of the scholars so as to represent the second meaning, to which Good News Translation agrees. The wording all men (Good News Translation “them”) has an added advantage in that it permits the parallelism of every man in line a and all men in line b. New English Bible follows an interpretation of the verb translated know to mean “rest,” as in 20.20 “his greed knew no rest.” And so New English Bible translates “and all men whom he has made must stand idle.” Another possibility is “that every person may rest from his work.” This suggestion provides an excellent parallel with line a, provided that line a is understood to mean “He brings the work of people to a stop” because of the rain and snow in verse 6. The Good News Translation translation may be followed; however, the preferred rendering is “He brings all the work people do to a stop so that all may rest from their work.”
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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