The Hebrew, Greek, Ge’ez, and Latin that is translated as “soul” in English is translated in Chol with a term that refers to the invisible aspects of human beings (source: Robert Bascom), in Yagaria with oune or “shadow, reflection” (source: Renck, p. 81), and in Elhomwe as “heart” (source: project-specific translation notes in Paratext).
The Mandarin Chineselínghún (靈魂 / 灵魂), literally “spirit-soul,” is often used for “soul” (along with xīn [心] or “heart”). This is a term that was adopted from Buddhist sources into early Catholic writings and later also by Protestant translators. (Source: Zetzsche 1996, p. 32, see also Clara Ho-yan Chan in this article )
In Chichewa, moyo means both “soul” and “life.” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
The now commonly-used English idiom “eat, drink, and be merry” (meaning enjoy yourselves and also not to give any thought to the future, because life is short) was first coined in 1526 in the English New Testament translation of William Tyndale. (Source: Crystal 2010, p. 277)
In Russian, this phrase (ешь, пей и веселись / yesh’, pey i veselis’) is also widely-used as an idiom. The wording of the quote originated in the Russian Synodal Bible (publ. 1876). (Source: Reznikov 2020, p. 41)
For other idioms in English that were coined by Bible translation, see here.
The following is a stained glass window depicting The Parable of the Rich Fool by Arthur J. Dix, 1898. From St John’s church, Bowness-on-Windermere, England:
Hosted by Wikimedia Commons under a Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication
Stained glass is not just highly decorative, it’s a medium which has been used to express important religious messages for centuries. Literacy was not widespread in the medieval and Renaissance periods and the Church used stained glass and other artworks to teach the central beliefs of Christianity. In Gothic churches, the windows were filled with extensive narrative scenes in stained glass — like huge and colorful picture storybooks — in which worshipers could ‘read’ the stories of Christ and the saints and learn what was required for their religious salvation. (Source: Victoria and Albert Museum )
Following is a 1973 painting of the JESUS MAFA project, a response to New Testament readings from the Lectionary by a Christian community in Cameroon, Africa. Each of the readings was selected and adapted to dramatic interpretation by the community members. Photographs of their interpretations were made, and these were then transcribed to paintings:
From Art in the Christian Tradition, a project of the Vanderbilt Divinity Library, Nashville, TN. Image retrieved March 23, 2026. Original source: librairie-emmanuel.fr.
Following are a number of back-translations of Luke 12:19:
Noongar: “Then I can say, ‘You happy man! You own all the good things, everything you desire for many years. Sit, eat and drink, and life will become happy!”” (Source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang)
Uma: “After that, I will no longer work, for my stored-things will be many, enough for me to use for several years. Thus, I can just sit-around-in-the-house, eat, drink and continually have-fun!'” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
Yakan: “Then I will say to myself, I have really been lucky. I have been able to store up much for many years in the future. I will rest now. I will eat and drink and have fun.'” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “And then, since I really now have everything nice, I will no longer work, because I have come to own everything that I will need for many years. Therefore I will just relax and eat well, and drink, and have a good time,’ he said.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “Then I will say to myself, ‘I am a fortunate (appreciation particle) person! These good-things that I have stored-away will suffice for how many years. I will take-life -easy! I will eat-and-eat, drink-and-drink, and enjoy-myself and that’s all!'” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Tagbanwa: “And then I will just sit around (lit. cause-my-leg-to-swing), for I will say, I will never lack anything for however many years. I’ll just be getting up to eat, drink and enjoy-myself.'” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
Barclay Newman, a translator on the teams for both the Good News Bible and the Contemporary English Version, translated passages of the New Testament into English and published them in 2014, “in a publication brief enough to be non-threatening, yet long enough to be taken seriously, and interesting enough to appeal to believers and un-believers alike.” The following is the translation of Luke 12:15-21:
Jesus stood up and warned the crowd, “Don’t be greedy!
Wealth won’t get you where you want to go.”
Then he told them this story:
“At harvest time a rich man had an abundant crop,
but he didn’t have enough room to store it all.
After thinking things over for a while,
he finally decided to tear down his old barns
and build super sized storage bins.
“Once I do this,” he smiled and said to himself,
“I’ll have enough set aside for years to come.”
So he decided to live his life to the max.
But as he celebrated, the voice of God thundered,
“Stupid fool! Tonight you die. Then who will get it all?”
Jesus concluded by saying,
“This is what happens to people who pile up wealth
without weighing the thunderous judgment of God.”
kai erō tē psuchē mou ‘and I will say to my soul,’ i.e. ‘I will say to myself.’ This reflexive use of psuchē is also true of the following vocative psuchē as a way of self-addressing (cf. Ps. 103.1, 2, 22 and other places). But in v. 20 psuchē means ‘life’ as something which is given to man and can be taken away from him. This ambiguous use of psuchē is intentional.
echeis polla agatha keimena eis etē polla ‘you have many goods laid up for many years.’ eis etē polla goes with polla agatha primarily, meaning ‘enough for many years.’ polla agatha here includes panta ton siton kai ta agatha mou of v. 18, i.e. agatha has a wider meaning here than in v. 18.
keimai here ‘to be stored up,’ ‘to be laid by, or, up.’
anapauou ‘take your rest, or, ease,’ ‘relax,’ imperative.
euphrainou ‘be merry,’ ‘enjoy yourself,’ ‘have a good time.’
(V. 20) eipen de autō ho theos ‘but God said to him,’ contrasting with, and interrupting what he said to himself (v. 19).
aphrōn ‘you fool,’ vocative, cf. on 11.40.
taute tē nukti ‘this very night,’ emphatic.
tēn psuchēn sou apaitousin apo sou ‘they demand your life from you,’ present tense expressing the imminence of what will happen. tēn psuchēn sou (cf. on v. 19) is emphatic by position. For apaiteō cf. on 6.30. The agent implied in apaitousin is God.
ha de hētoimasas ‘what you have prepared,’ relative clause serving as subject of the main clause tini estai. For hetoimazō cf. on 1.17.
tini estai ‘for whom shall it be?,’ i.e. ‘to whom shall it go?’
Translation:
My soul (1), Soul (2) … (v. 20) … your soul (3). By using the same term thrice Luke effectively brings out the contrast between what the rich man thinks to be the case, i.e. that he is master of his soul just as he seems to be of his goods, and what God knows it to be, i.e. that he is to lose both. In some languages one has the translational luck that one term is idiomatic in the three occurrences, e.g. ‘life,’ in Zarma; ‘soul/breath (of life)’ in Tzeltal, and in Shona 1966, which in (2) personalizes the term; ‘heart’ in Medumba, and in Sranan Tongo, which in (3) has ‘your heart will cease to beat.’ The contrast is also sufficiently preserved when the term in question occurs only once in v. 19, e.g. ‘say to my soul, “Now you have…” (20)…, “… your soul is required of you…” .’ Often, however, it would be so unidiomatic to use the same term twice or thrice that differentiation is obligatory. Cf. e.g. Thai 1967: (1) ‘inner being (lit. mind-heart)’—(2) ‘inner being (id.)’—(3) ‘life’; Tae’ 1933: ‘soul—you here—breath-of-life’; Batak Toba: ‘soul—soul—breath-of-life’; Ekari: ‘self—you—(living) soul (lit. thought-word)’; Kituba, Leyden: ‘self’—left untranslated—‘life’; New English Bible, Willibrord, or Good News Translation: ‘self—man, or, lucky man—life.’ In such languages one may try to bring out the contrast in another way, e.g. by rendering (3) as ‘the soul you think is yours,’ or by emphasizing the contrast between the two forms of address, saying e.g. ‘you lucky man’ for (2) and ‘you foolish man’ in v. 20. For soul see also 1.46 and references.
Laid up for many years, or, ‘which have been (or, which I have) laid up (for you) for many years,’ ‘enough for years on end’ (Balinese, cf. also ‘many years not-yet exhausted,’ in Tae’ 1933).
Take your ease, or, “take life easy” (Good News Translation), can better be rendered as a proposal or permission, e.g. ‘(now) you should/may take your ease,’ The same holds true of the subsequent imperatives.
Eat, drink, cf. “eat and drink” in 5.30; the reference is to feasting, as shown by the subsequent be merry, or “enjoy yourself” (New English Bible), “have a good time” (Phillips).
(V. 20) Fool, or ‘you fool(ish man)’; and see 11.40.
Assuming these words to be spoken by day, this night refers to the coming night, which implies a reference to the next day in languages where the day is taken to begin at sunset.
Your soul is required of you. A literal rendering of the Greek by ‘they require,’ ‘somebody requires’ may suggest God as agent (e.g. in Zarma, Ekari), but will more often be taken as referring to unmentioned human beings; hence shifts to the passive (in some European versions and in Lomwe, Shona, Kele, Thai 1967, Tzeltal), or to ‘I require’ (cf. Kituba, Trukese), or to renderings such as, “you will have to give up your life” (Good News Translation), ‘your-spirit will drift-away from you’ (Pohnpeian). To require of, or, ‘to ask (back) from,’ ‘to call/take from,’ ‘to reclaim from (as one does a loan)’ (The Four Gospels – a New Translation, Bahasa Indonesia KB, Batak Toba), and cf. ‘you will have these words addressed to you, “Give me here your soul” ’ (Shona 1966).
The things you have prepared is emphatic by position. If emphasis has to be expressed otherwise, one may say something like, ‘(all) those things you have been preparing up till now.’ To prepare, or, ‘to set/make ready,’ or, in this context, ‘to store up’ (Medumba), ‘to collect’ (Sranan Tongo), since the reference is to the goods rather than to the barns.
Whose will they be, or, ‘who will acquire/possess them.’ This clause may better come first, cf. e.g. ‘to whom will you leave the things you have collected’ (Sranan Tongo), ‘who will call-his-own all that you prepared’ (Toraja-Sa’dan).
Quoted with permission from Reiling, J. and Swellengrebel, J.L. A Handbook on the Gospel of Luke. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1971. For this and other handbooks for translators see here . Make sure to also consult the Handbook on the Gospel of Mark for parallel or similar verses.
In this verse the rich man thought about what he would say to himself in the future. He thought about what he would say after he had built his new barns and filled them with good things. The text expresses his thoughts as a quotation within a quotation. In some languages you may need to translate this as indirect speech. For example:
Then I will congratulate myself that I have stored up enough good things to last me for many years. I will plan on taking life easy and enjoying plenty to eat and drink.
12:19a
Then: The Greek conjunction that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Then here introduces what the rich man would say to himself after he had finished storing his goods in his new barns. In some languages it may be more natural to use a word such as “And.”
I will say to myself: The Greek expression that the Berean Standard Bible translates as I will say to myself is literally “I will say to my soul.” Many English versions translate it that way. It introduces what the rich man would think in the future. He was thinking good thoughts about himself. Because of this, it may be appropriate in some languages to use a word meaning “praise/congratulate oneself” or to supply an exclamation with that meaning as part of the quote. For example:
After that I can congratulate myself because I will have set aside enough good things to last for many years. -or-
Then I will say to myself, Lucky man! (Good News Translation)
You have plenty of good things laid up for many years: The rich man was saying that he had stored enough grain and other things to use for many years. He was implying that he did not need to continue to work. Another way to translate this is:
You have all the good things you need for many years. (Good News Translation)
You: The pronoun You here refers to the rich man, who was talking to himself. In some languages it is more natural to use a pronoun like “I.” For example:
Then I can say to myself, “I have enough good things stored to last for many years…” (New Century Version)
laid up: The Greek verb that the Berean Standard Bible translates as laid up here means “stored, put away in a safe place.” It has the same meaning here as the verb that the Berean Standard Bible translates as “store” in 12:17b.
12:19b
Take it easy: The Greek expression that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Take it easy means “rest” or “relax.” Consider what someone would say to himself if he did not need to work hard anymore. For example:
You can live an easy life now. -or-
Now I can rest/relax!
Eat, drink, and be merry: The clause Eat, drink, and be merry was a common expression to refer to celebrating at feasts and parties. Use an expression in your language that refers to parties where people have more than enough to eat and drink.
General Comment on 12:17–19
In these verses Jesus said the words that the man was saying to himself. In some languages it may be more natural to use indirect speech here. For example:
He wondered to himself what he should do, since he had no more place to store his crops. He decided to tear down his barns and build bigger ones, and there store all his grain and other goods. Then he could look with satisfaction on all the good things he had stored up to last him many years. He could take life easy and enjoy himself at parties.
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