אֲשֶׁ֤ר קְצִיר֨וֹ ׀ רָ֘עֵ֤ב יֹאכֵ֗ל וְאֶֽל־מִצִּנִּ֥ים יִקָּחֵ֑הוּ וְשָׁאַ֖ף צַמִּ֣ים חֵילָֽם׃
5The hungry eat their harvest,
and they take it even out of the thorns,
and the thirsty pant after their wealth.
The Hebrew and Greek that is translated as “thirst” or “thirsty” in English is translated in Kituba as “hungry for water” (source: Donald Deer in The Bible Translator 1973, p. 207ff. ) and in Mairasi as “water pain” (source: Enggavoter 2004).
See also thirst (figuratively).
The Swedish Bibel 2000 declared the 69 Old Testament verses referenced herein as “untranslatable.” Typically, other Bible translations translate those verses and mention in footnotes that the translation is uncertain or give alternate readings. Christer Åsberg, the Translation Secretary with the Swedish Bible Society at that time, explains why the Swedish Bible Society decided to not translate these verses at all (in The Bible Translator 2007, p. 1ff. ):
“In the new Swedish translation (SB) of 2000, [some verses are] not translated at all; [they are] indicated with three hyphens inside square brackets [- - -] [with a] reference to the appendix, where in the article ‘Text’ one will find a paragraph with roughly the following content:
In some cases the text is unintelligible and the variant readings differing to such an extent, that it is quite impossible to attain a reasonable certainty of what is meant, although some isolated word may occur, whose meaning it is possible to understand.
“If Bible translators find the Hebrew text untranslatable, what kind of text is it that they have produced in the translation into their own language? When a footnote says ‘The Hebrew is not understandable,’ what then is the printed text a translation of? And if the translators prefer to do without footnotes, are they then really released from the responsibility of informing their readers that the text they read is just mere guesswork?
“To leave a blank space in a Bible text seems to be an offensive act for many. (. . . ) To admit that a piece of Holy Scripture makes no sense at all may have been unimaginable in times past. In our enlightened era, an overprotective concern for the readers’ trust in the word of God is apparently a decisive factor when a translator tries to translate against all odds. The verdict ‘untranslatable’ is much more frequent in scholarly commentaries on different Bible books written by and for experts than in the translations or footnotes of the same books designed for common readers.
“Another reason (. . .) is a professional, and very human, reluctance to admit a failure. Also, many Bible translators lack translational experience of other literary genres and other classical texts where this kind of capitulation is a part of the daily run of things. They may have an innate or subconscious feeling that the Bible has unique qualities not only as a religious document but also as a linguistic and literary artifact. Completeness is felt to be proof of perfection. Some translators, and not so few of their clients, are unfamiliar with a scholarly approach to philological and exegetical matters. In some cases their background have made them immune to a kind of interpretative approximation common in older translations, confessional commentaries, and sermons. Therefore, their tolerance towards lexical, grammatical, and syntactical anomalies tends to be comparatively great.
“It is very hard to discern and to define the boundary between something that is extremely difficult and something that is quite impossible. I am convinced that all Bible translators in their heart of hearts will admit that there actually are some definitely untranslatable passages in the Bible, but are there a dozen of them or a score? Are there fifty or a hundred? Not even a group of recognized experts would probably pick out the same ten most obvious cases. (. . .)
“Conclusions:
With thanks to Mikael Winninge, Director of Translation, Swedish Bible Society
The Hebrew, Ge’ez, Latin, and Greek that is translated in English as “hungry” (or: “famished”) is translated in a number of ways:
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Job 5:5:
His harvest the hungry eat: in Hebrew this line begins with the pronoun “whose,” which refers back to the fool in verse 3. Good News Translation has “Hungry people will eat the fool’s crops.” The meaning is that the fool (and his sons in verse 4) is so helpless that the poor and hungry can help themselves to his crops. If verse 4 has been translated as a petition, verse 5 should be also, as New Jerusalem Bible “May the hungry devour his harvest.” Harvest must be expressed in some languages as, for example, “the food he grows” or “the plants he has hoed.”
The next two lines are difficult to interpret, and numerous changes in the text have been suggested. And he takes it even out of thorns: the Hebrew says literally “and to from thorns he takes it.” The word translated thorns is found only here and in Proverbs 22.5. Some interpreters simply delete the line, feeling it is too unclear to bother with, but such a decision should be avoided. Others have proposed changes in the text that permit “and their sheaf the poor take it,” or “all their substance he takes,” or “a strong man snatches it from baskets.” The latter refers to baskets of grain being taken to the threshing floor, which is the rendering followed in part by New English Bible, “The stronger man seizes it from the panniers,” meaning large baskets. Dhorme changes one consonant in the Hebrew word thorns and gets “and carry it away to hiding places.” Still others change thorns to “teeth,” with the meaning “from their mouths.” New Jerusalem Bible has “God snatches it from their mouths.” In spite of the variety of interpretations, New International Version, Traduction œcuménique de la Bible, Bible en français courant, Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, and Biblia Dios Habla Hoy translate similarly to Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation. The thought is “The hungry gather and eat the crops grown by the fool, even that part that grows among thorns” or “… even that part that is protected by thorns.”
And the thirsty pant after his wealth renders what is literally “and inhales the snare their wealth.” The word “snare” is found only here and in 18.9. In Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation thirsty translates the ancient versions. (See Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation footnotes.) This same text is followed by many other modern translations, although Hebrew Old Testament Text Project finds “snare” the more likely text. Most modern translations use some form of greed, envy, or thirst. New Jerusalem Bible takes verse 5b to be a continuation of the curse petition and says “May the thirsty swallow their wealth,” with a note saying the Hebrew is uncertain. Many languages express consuming, destruction, and spending with the verbs swallow or eat. Translators must make certain that the verb is used naturally with the subject. If the “thirsty” do not eat, it will be better to say, for example, “greedy people eat his wealth,” or as a curse, “may greedy people eat, take away, use up his wealth.”
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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