4From the wilderness and the Lebanon as far as the great river, the River Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, to the Great Sea in the west shall be your territory.
Low German translation by Johannes Jessen, publ. 1933, republ. 2006: “steppe”
Yakan: “the lonely place” (source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “a land where no people lived” (source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “the place with no inhabitants” (source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Cherokee: inage or “far away downstream” (source: Bender / Belt 2025, p. 16)
Matumbi uses various term: lubele (desert, sandy place without water) — used in John 11:54, lupu’ngu’ti (a place where no people live, can be a scrub land, a forest, or a savanna) — used in Mark 1:3 et al.), and mwitu (a forest, a place where wild animals live) — used in Mark 1:13 et al.) (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)
Chichewa Contemporary translation (2002/2016): chipululu: a place uninhabited by people with thick forest and bush (source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
Adioukrou: loj or “savannah” — “land that is not village, nor forest, nor field (source: Hill 2006)
Isthmus Mixe: “dry country” (source for this and one above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
Note that in Luke 15:4, usually a term is used that denotes pastoral land, such as “eating/grazing-place,” in Tagbanwa (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation).
The Hebrew that is translated in English as “Great Sea” or similar is translated in Khoekhoe as “Mediterranean Sea.” (Source: project-specific notes in Paratext)
The various Greek, Aramaic, Ge’ez, and Latin and Hebrew terms that are translated as “sea,” “ocean,” or “lake” in English are all translated in Chichewa with one term: nyanja. Malawi, where Chichewa is spoken, has a lot of lakes but does not share a border with the ocean (source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation). Likewise, in Toposa all the different bodies of water are all called by one term as well: nya-name̥ (source: Schröder 2026, p. 101).
In Malagasy culture, the sea is perceived as sacred because it was a path taken by the ancestors. That is why the Malagasy word for the “sea” is ranomasina, which literally means “the sacred water.” The word masina actually has two different meanings: “salted” and “sacred/holy.” Salt is used for the conservation of some foods, such as meat or fish, that are to be set aside for later use. In this sense, the Malagasy phrase for “Holy Spirit” has the literal meaning of “Salted Spirit.” (Source: Brigitte Rabarijaona in The Bible Translator 2022, p. 103ff.)
“Sea” (or: “ocean”) is translated in Tepeuxila Cuicatec as “water land” and in Xicotepec De Juárez Totonac as “very big lake.” (Source: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
According to Anne Garber Kompaoré (in Le Sycomore 3/2009, p. 34ff. ), there are 4 ways to identify cardinal directions:
1. celestial bodies, especially the sun and certain stars
2. geographical landmarks, for example a mountain, sea, or river (depending on its position or the direction in which the water flows) etc.
3. climatic phenomena, such as the wind and the direction from which rain comes
4. bodily reference points, especially front, back, left, and right, in relation to celestial bodies or geographical landmarks
Following are examples of how these are practically implemented by various languages: (click or tap here to see the rest of this insight)
Celestial Bodies
East and west are often translated by the rising and the setting of the sun (note that the origin of English and other Indo-European languages is “dawn” for “east” and “evening” [i.e. sun-down] for “west”):
Maan: “where the sun comes up” and “where the sun goes down” (source: Don Slager)
Kankanaey: “from the coming-out of the sun “and “going-away of the sun” (source: Kankanaey back-translation)
Northern Emberá: “from where the sun comes up” and “from where the sun falls” (source: Charles Mortensen)
Ejamat “the side where the sun comes from” and “the side where it sets” (source: David Frank in this blog post )
Tzeltal: “where the sun pours-out” (west) (source: Reiling / Swellengrebel)
Northern Ngbandi: “the sun behind the chief’s house” (east — the chief lives traditionally at the eastern side of the village, therefore he does not get the sunlight into his eyes) and “under the sun” (west)
Northwestern Dinka: “earth behind” (east — the place behind the earth, i.e. the area where the sun rises)
Jula: “salt village” (north — because salt comes from the north, from the Sahara Desert) and “kola village” (south — since kola comes from the coastal region to the south) (source: Garber Kompaoré)
Matumbi: “toward the beach” (East) (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)
Acoli: “right” (of the local White Nile) (north) and “left” (of the White Nile) (south)
Zande: “interior (dry) land” (east); “place-inside-country” (north / south) — Zande, like a number of other languages, including Matengo and Hehe, traditionally only has three cardinal directions.
Belanda Bor: “lower place” (north) and “higher place” (south)
Turkana: “(up)stream” (north) and (down)stream (south)
Mono (DRC): “water place” (south) (source for this and five above: Mietzner / Pasch)
Climatic Phenomena
Shilluk: “opening westwind” (north) and “opening eastwind” (south)
Swahili used to have six directions. In reducing them to four, kusini and kaskazini which used to refer to south-west and north east respectively (the directions from where the two monsoons blow) have become the terms for “south” and north.” (source for this and one above: Mietzner / Pasch)
Bodily Reference Points
Nuer / Burun: “face” and “sun face” respectively (both: east)
Kalenjin: “eye sun” (east) (this and the one above indicate that the sun is “facing” the spectator from its position in the east:
Shilluk: doesn’t use a fixed position of the speaker, instead it has “eye sun morning” for east and “eye sun evening” for west
Mono (DRC): “foot-sun” (east — the start of the sun’s journey)
Burun: “sun leg” (west — the end of the sun’s journey)
Bari: “back” (north — when people are facing south, north is at their back) (source for this and above: Mietzner / Pasch)
Northern Emberá “the looking [left] hand” (north) and “the real [right] hand” (south) (source: Charles Mortensen)
Morelos Nahuatl: “from above” (north) and “from below” (south) (source: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
When all four directions are mentioned, translators tend to avoid listing the four, sometimes verbose terms, and chose solutions like “all directions” (such as in Maan or Manya (source: Don Slager). Yakan has “from the four corners of the earth” (source: Yakan back-translation) and Western Bukidnon Manobo “from the four directions here on the earth” (source: Western Bukidnon Manobo back-translation).
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.”
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Joshua 1:4:
Kupsabiny: “Your country starts from the desert in the south until the Mountain of Lebanon. It goes like that until the big river Euphrates including the whole country of the Hittites, and it follows like that until the ocean of the west.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Newari: “The boundaries of your land will run from the wilderness in the south up to the mountains of Lebanon in the north and from the great Euphrates river in the east up to the great sea in the west, including the country of the Hittites.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “This will-become your (plur.) territory: from the desert in the south until the mountains of Lebanon in the north, and from the great river of the Eufrates in the east, until the sea of the Mediteraneo in the west, and the lands of the Hithanon.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “That land will extend from the desert in the south, to the Lebanon Mountains in the northwest, and to the big Euphrates River in the northeast, and to the Mediterranean Sea on the west. It will include all the land where the descendants of Heth live.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
Click or tap here to see the rest of this insight.
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 choice of a formal plural suffix to the second person pronoun (“you” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. In these verses, anata-gata (あなたがた) is used, combining the second person pronoun anata and the plural suffix -gata to create a formal plural pronoun (“you” [plural] in English).
Your borders: Your is plural, referring to the people of Israel and not just to Joshua.
The Hebrew text seems to define the territory as follows: “from the wilderness and this Lebanon and to the great river, the Euphrates River, all the land of the Hittites and to the great sea at the going down of the sun will be your borders.” Good News Translation takes this to indicate the four limits of the territory: south, “the wilderness,” traditionally called the Negev, and referring to the dry country extending from Beersheba to the desert of Sinai and the Gulf of Aqaba; north, the Lebanon Mountains; east, the Euphrates River; and west, the Mediterranean Sea. In Hebrew “this Lebanon” is puzzling; most translations have simply “the Lebanon.” The name does not refer to the country known today as Lebanon but to the Lebanon Mountains. The Hebrew of verse 4 is literally “From the wilderness (desert) … shall be your border.” Good News Translation inverts the Hebrew order and translates Your borders will reach from…. But the result is a sentence which is both lengthy and difficult, and it will help the reader if the sentence is restructured. For example, “I will give you (plural) all the land from the desert in the south to the Lebanon Mountains in the north. Your borders (or, The borders of your land) will reach from the great Euphrates River in the east. It will include the Hittite country as far as the Mediterranean Sea in the west.” A restructuring of this type will have at least two advantages: (1) It will break verse 4 into two less difficult sentences, and (2) it will tie verse 3 (“I promised Moses that I would give”) more closely with verse 4 (“I will give”).
“All the land of the Hittites” (Revised Standard Version) is omitted in the Greek Old Testament and is thought by some scholars to be a later addition to the text (see Bible de Jerusalem [Bible de Jérusalem]); it denotes the northern part of Syria, which had been part of the Hittite empire. See the similar description of the promised land in Deuteronomy 11.24, which does not include the phrase “all the land of the Hittites.” It seems best to follow the Hebrew text here. Only during the time of David and Solomon did the Israelites actually occupy much of this land.
Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Newman, Barclay M. A Handbook on Joshua. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1983. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
In verse 1:4 Yahweh described the four sides of the land that he was giving to the Israelite people: the south and the north, the east and the west.
from the wilderness: The Hebrew word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as wilderness refers to the dry area in the south of the land of Canaan. Because it was dry, few people lived there, and it was difficult to grow crops there.
Here are some other ways to translate the word wilderness :
desert -or-
deserted place -or-
dry land
and Lebanon: The word Lebanon refers to a range of mountains at the north end of the land that Yahweh gave to the Israelites. These mountains had snow on them all year long, and the word Lebanon means “white” in Semitic languages. The country of Lebanon did not yet exist at this time.
Here are some ways to translate this term:
Lebanon Mountains (Good News Translation) -or-
Lebanon mountain range
Lebanon: The Hebrew is literally “the Lebanon,” which is difficult to understand. The mountains of Lebanon were a long way from where the Israelites were. Possibly it means “over there”, but no English version translates it that way. Many versions omit it, and you may do the same.
Here are some other ways to translate this part of the verse.
Your land will extend from the wilderness ⌊in the south⌋ to the mountains of Lebanon ⌊in the north⌋ . -or-
Your borders will reach from the desert in the south to the Lebanon Mountains in the north (Good News Translation)
1:4b
to the great River Euphrates: The River Euphrates was on the east side of the land that God gave to the Israelites. The phrase the great River describes the Euphrates River. The Euphrates River was very wide.
all the land of the Hittites: The term Hittites refers to one of groups of people who lived in the land of Canaan. The phrase all the land of the Hittites is another way to refer to the land of Canaan.
Here are some other ways to translate this part of the verse:
It will extend from the great Euphrates River ⌊in the east⌋ , across the land that belongs to the Hittites -or-
Your borders will reach from the great river Euphrates ⌊in the east⌋ and include all the land of the Hitti people
1:4c
and west: The phrase and west refers to the west. The Mediterranean Sea was the western boundary of the land that Israel received.
Here are some other ways to translate this part of the verse:
Your land will reach to the Mediterranean Sea in the west -or-
to the Mediterranean Sea where the sun sets
as far as the Great Sea: The term the Great Sea refers to the Mediterranean Sea.
General Comment on 1:4
In some languages it may be clearer to reorder the parts of this verse. For example:
Your land will reach from the Negeb wilderness in the south to the Lebanon mountains in the north. It will reach from the great Euphrates River in the east to the Mediterranean Sea in the west. It will include all the land of the Hittites.
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