Jeremiah

The name that is transliterated as “Jeremiah” in English is translated in American Sign Language with the sign signifying “prophet (seeing into the future)” and “crying.” (Source: Phil King in Journal of Translation 16/2 2020, p. 33ff.)


“Jeremiah” in American Sign Language (source )

In Swiss-German Sign Language it is translated with a sign that depicts to lament often.


“Jeremiah” in Swiss-German Sign Language, source: DSGS-Lexikon biblischer Begriffe , © CGG Schweiz

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: Jeremiah .

For more information on translations of proper names with sign language see Sign Language Bible Translations Have Something to Say to Hearing Christians .

From his birth there were those who wanted to kill him (image)

“People of high status would ride horses or elephants when they travel. Joseph and Mary are not rich so they walk to escape danger. They must travel through wild countryside where no one is around to help them.”

Drawing by Sawai Chinnawong who employs northern and central Thailand’s popular distinctive artistic style originally used to depict Buddhist moral principles and other religious themes; explanation by Paul DeNeui. From That Man Who Came to Save Us by Sawai Chinnawong and Paul H. DeNeui, William Carey Library, 2010.

For more images by Sawai Chinnawong in TIPs see here.

complete verse (Matthew 2:17)

Following are a number of back-translations of Matthew 2:17:

  • Uma: “That happening fulfilled the Words of the Lord that were uttered by the prophet Yeremia long ago, which say like this:” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
  • Yakan: “Na, it was fulfilled what Nabi Yeremiya said, he said,” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “And by means of this was fulfilled the long-ago prophecy of Jeremiah, the inspired one of God, for Jeremiah said,” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “Therefore what God had-the prophet Jeremias -say was fulfilled saying,” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Tagbanwa: “Well since that’s how it was, what was spoken by Prophet Jeremias long ago was fulfilled, which said,” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Tenango Otomi: “There was a great sadness just like the word written by the spokesman Jeremiah who had said:” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)

prophet

Eugene Nida wrote the following about the translation of the Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek terms that are typically translated with “prophet” in English:

“The tendency in many translations is to use ‘to foretell the future’ for ‘prophesy,’ and ‘one who foretells the future’ for ‘prophet.’ This is not always a recommended usage, particularly if such expressions denote certain special native practices of spirit contact and control. It is true, of course, that prophets of the Bible did foretell the future, but this was not always their principal function. One essential significance of the Greek word prophētēs is ‘one who speaks forth,’ principally, of course, as a forth-teller of the Divine will. A translation such as ‘spokesman for God’ may often be employed profitably.” (1947, p. 234f.)

Following is a list of (back-) translations from other languages (click or tap for details):

  • San Blas Kuna: “one who speaks the voice of God”
  • Central Pame and Vai: “interpreter for God”
  • Kaqchikel, Navajo, Yaka: “one who speaks for God”
  • Northern Grebo: “God’s town crier” (see more about this below)
  • Sapo: “God’s sent-word person”
  • Shipibo-Conibo, Ngäbere: “one who speaks God’s word”
  • Copainalá Zoque: “one who speaks-opens” (a compound meaning “one who discloses or reveals”)
  • Sierra Totonac: “one who causes them to know” (in the sense of “revealer”)
  • Batak Toba: “foreteller” (this and all the above acc. to Nida 1961, p. 7)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “one who is inspired of God” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Alekano: “the true man who descended from heaven” (source: Ellis Deibler in Notes on Translation June 1986, p. 36ff.)
  • Aguaruna: “teller of God’s word” (source: M. Larson / B. Moore in Notes on Translation February 1970, p. 1-125)
  • Ekari: “person who speaks under divine impulse”
  • Mandarin Chinese: 先知 xiānzhī — “one who foreknows” (or the 1946/1970 translation by Lü Zhenzhong: 神言人 shényánrén — “divine-word-man”)
  • Uab Meto: “holy spokesman” (source for this and two above: Reiling / Swellengrebel)
  • Kouya: Lagɔɔ gbʋgbanyɔ — “the one who seeks God’s affairs” (source: Saunders, p. 269)
  • Kafa: “decide for God only” (source: Loren Bliese)
  • Martu Wangka: “sit true to God’s talk” (source: Carl Gross)
  • Eastern Highland Otomi: “word passer” (source: John Beekman in Notes on Translation November 1964, p. 1-22)
  • Obolo: ebi nriran: “one with power of divine revelation” (source: Enene Enene)
  • Mairasi: nonondoai nyan: “message proclaimer” (source: Enggavoter 2004)
  • Highland Totonac: “speaker on God’s behalf”
  • Central Tarahumara: “God’s preacher” (source for this and above: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.)
  • Coatlán Mixe: “God’s word-thrower”
  • Ayutla Mixtec: “one who talks as God’s representative”
  • Isthmus Mixe: “speaker for God” (source for this and two above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
  • Mezquital Otomi / Paasaal: “God’s messenger” (source: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff. and Fabian N. Dapila in The Bible Translator 2024, p. 415ff.)
  • Noongar: Warda Marridjiny or “News Traveling” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang)
  • Kutu: mtula ndagu or “one who gives the prediction of the past and the future” (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
  • French 1985 translation by Chouraqui: inspiré or “inspired one” (“someone in whom God has breathed [Latin: in + spiro]) (source: Watson 2023, p. 45)

In Ixcatlán Mazatec a term is used that specifically includes women. (Source: Robert Bascom)

About the translation into Northern Grebo:

“In some instances these spiritual terms result from adaptations reflecting the native life and culture. Among the Northern Grebo people of Liberia, a missionary wanted some adequate term for ‘prophet,’ and she was fully aware that the native word for ‘soothsayer’ or ‘diviner’ was no equivalent for the Biblical prophet who spoke forth for God. Of course, much of what the prophets said referred to the future, and though this was an essential part of much of their ministry, it was by no means all. The right word for the Gbeapo people would have to include something which would not only mean the foretelling of important events but the proclamation of truth as God’s representative among the people. At last the right word came; it was ‘God’s town-crier.’ Every morning and evening the official representative of the chief goes through the village crying out the news, delivering the orders of the chief, and announcing important coming events. ‘God’s town-crier’ would be the official representative of God, announcing to the people God’s doings, His commands, and His pronouncements for their salvation and well-being. For the Northern Grebo people the prophet is no weird person from forgotten times; he is as real as the human, moving message of the plowman Amos, who became God’s town-crier to a calloused people.” (source: Nida 1952, p. 20)

In American Sign Language it is a person who sees into the future:


“Prophet” in American Sign Language (source )

In British Sign Language it is is translated with a sign that depicts a message coming from God to a person (the upright finger) and then being passed on to others. (Source: Anna Smith)


“Prophet” in British Sign Language (source: Christian BSL, used with permission)

See also prophesy and prophesy / prophetic frenzy.

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: How to Recognize a Biblical Prophet .

donkey

The Hebrew and Greek that is translated as “donkey” in English was translated in the 1900 Kalaallisut (Greenlandic) translation (a newer version was published in 2000) as siutitôĸ or “‘something with big ears.” “[This] is based on the word siut ‘ear’ combined with the same suffix –tôĸ (-tooq).” (Source: Lily Kahn & Riitta-Liisa Valijärvi in The Bible Translator 2019, p. 125ff.)

 

These Hebrew and Greek words (with the exception of pōlos and hupozugion — see discussion below) all definitely refer to the Domestic Donkey equus asinus. However the different words do have slight semantic differences among them.

Chamor and onos are the generic words for donkey while ’athon (feminine gender) refers specifically to a saddle donkey or a donkey used for riding. A saddle donkey is usually a large strong female donkey the males are too difficult to control when they are near a female in heat. The Hebrew word is derived from a root that means “strong”.

‘Ayir refers to the young male or jack donkey (probably with an emphasis on its liveliness and the difficulty in controlling it since the Hebrew root means something like “frisky”).

Onarion means a young donkey of either sex. Some languages will have a special word for a young donkey. This will be appropriate for translating onarion.

The word hupozugion often translated “donkey,” actually indicates any beast of burden. Walter Bauer, the famous German New Testament scholar, has argued very convincingly that the animal referred to in Matthew 21:5 in the expression epi pōlon huion hupozugiou is the foal of a horse not a donkey (1953:220-229). In some languages it will be possible to express this in a way that does not designate a specific species of animal`, as in “beast of burden.”

Pōlos usually refers to a foal, that is a young horse, unless a word for donkey follows.

Donkeys are domestic animals belonging to the same family as the horse, but they are smaller and have longer ears. The donkey bred and used in the Middle East is the domesticated Nubian or Somali Wild Ass Equus Asinus africanus. In its original wild state this was a gray ass with pale, whitish belly and dark rings on the lower part of the legs. It was domesticated in Egypt as early as 2500 B.C. In its domesticated version, as a result of interbreeding with donkeys from Europe and Persia, the donkey came to be a variety of colors from dark brown, through light brown to the original gray and occasionally white. The Hebrew chamor comes from a root meaning “reddish brown.”

Donkeys are good pack animals being able to carry as much as the larger mule without the latter’s unpredictable moods. They also have great stamina and are easy to feed since they eat almost any available vegetation. Larger individual animals (usually females) are also often used for riding.

Donkeys were highly prized in biblical times especially females since they were suitable for packing and riding and had the potential for producing offspring. Donkeys were seen as man’s best friend in the animal kingdom. They were the common man’s means of transport and many ordinary families owned a donkey. They were used for plowing and for turning large millstones as well as a means of transport.

Today domestic donkeys are found all over savannah Africa the Middle East South and Central Asia Europe Latin America and Australia. They do not seem to be reared in rain forest or monsoon areas but they are nevertheless often known in these areas.

A donkey was considered to be a basic domestic requirement and thus the number of donkeys available was a means of measuring the relative prosperity of a society at any given time. While only powerful political or military people rode horses (which were usually owned by the state) the common people rode donkeys. This is the significance of the passage in Zechariah 9:9: the victorious king would return to the city riding a donkey thus identifying himself as a common Israelite rather than a victorious warlord.

In the majority of languages there is a local or a borrowed word for donkey. This is the obvious choice. In areas of Southeast Asia, Papua New Guinea, West Africa, and other places, where donkeys are rare or unknown, the word from the dominant major language or trade language (for example, English, Spanish, French, Chinese, or Arabic) is often transliterated.

In most contexts ’athon should be translated by the equivalent of “female” donkey, but in some contexts riding donkey is better.

‘Ayir should be translated according to the specific context. In Genesis 32:15 the translation should definitely be the equivalent of “male donkey”, and probably also in Judges 10:4 and Judges 12:14. The significance of these latter passages is that female donkeys were the more normal choice of mount.

In Job 11:12 the emphasis is probably on the friskiness of the donkey, and the translation should be the equivalent of “He ties his young donkey to a grapevine, his frisky young ass to the best of the vines” (indicating a certain amount of irresponsibility, and perhaps extravagance).

In Job 11:12 and Zechariah 9:9 the obvious emphasis is on the youth of the donkey, so the equivalent of “colt”, “foal”, “young donkey”, and so on should be used.

Equus asinus (donkey), Wikimedia Commons

Source: All Creatures Great and Small: Living things in the Bible (UBS Helps for Translators)

See also young donkey and wild ass.

Honorary "rare" construct denoting God (“sit”)

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 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, suwa-rare-ru (座られる) or “sit” is used.

(Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

Translation commentary on Matthew 2:17 – 2:18

Then was fulfilled contrasts with “to fulfil” of 1.22 and 2.15. In 2.23 the subjunctive form (“might be fulfilled”) is employed. Good News Translation translates Then was fulfilled as “In this way … came true.” Other ways that could be used are “Then came true what…” or “And so what the prophet Jeremiah said would happen took place.”

The quotation in verse 18 is from Jeremiah 31.15. Scholars debate whether it is a translation of the Hebrew rather than taken from the Septuagint, or whether the author cites the passage from his memory of the Septuagint text, or whether Matthew quotes a source completely different from either the Hebrew we have or the Septuagint. Scholarly opinion is clearly divided, and no dogmatic conclusion is possible. One may only surmise that Matthew felt a great deal of freedom in his choice and use of Old Testament texts, as did, in fact, most writers at that time.

What was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah is made into an active construction by Good News Translation: “what the prophet Jeremiah had said.” The full meaning is “what the Lord had spoken through the prophet Jeremiah,” and some translators use a sentence very much like that. Although “the Lord” is not in the text, it is clearly understood (see comments in 1.22 on “prophets”). A possible translation for this verse, then, is “And so took place what God had said through the prophet Jeremiah would happen.” This may be better in many languages if the order is reversed: “God had spoken through the prophet Jeremiah about what would happen. And now it came true like this.”

It may be necessary in some languages to introduce the quotation in verse 18 with “He said” or “This is what he had said.”

Ramah is an Ephraimite town about eight miles north of Jerusalem (see Judges 19.13 and 1 Sam 1.1). In some languages it may be helpful to say “the town of Ramah.”

Voice may be “the voice of someone,” “someone crying,” or as in Good News Translation, “sound.”

In many languages the passive, A voice was heard, is better handled by an active sentence, as in “People heard a voice,” or “People heard the voice of someone crying,” or “There is a sound coming from Ramah.”

Rachel was the mother of Joseph and Benjamin, and Ephraim was Joseph’s son. The picture in Jeremiah 31.15 is that of the Ephraimites (Rachel’s descendants) going into exile in Babylon.

Wailing and loud lamentation is compressed by Good News Translation to “the sound of bitter weeping.” The reference is to Rachel’s weeping for her children, as the next line makes clear. Radical restructuring may be necessary in order to make evident the relation between all the parts:

“The sound of bitter crying is heard in the town of Ramah.
It is Rachel, crying for her children.
They are dead,
and she refuses to be comforted.”

But other structures can work, too. Some translators will be able to make clear the relation between voice (or, “sound”) and wailing and loud lamentation in two lines, as there are in the text. For example, they might have:

“People heard a voice in Ramah;
it was someone crying bitterly.”

or:

“People heard the voice of someone crying in Ramah;
they heard bitter weeping there.”

or:

“There is a sound coming from the town of Ramah;
the sound of someone weeping bitterly.”

Rachel weeping may be introduced, then, by a phrase such as “It is Rachel,” or “What they hear is Rachel,” or “The crying is coming from Rachel. She is weeping for her children.”

She refused to be consoled: “She refuses to be comforted,” “She cannot be comforted,” or “There is no one who can comfort her.”

Because they were no more means “they are dead” (Good News Translation). Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, 1st edition and Translator’s New Testament also indicate explicitly that death is intended, while most translations prefer to remain ambiguous; for example, “because they were gone” (An American Translation).

There are different ways languages mark the causal relationship seen in because. Some will put the phrase at the end, as in Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation, and use “because,” “for,” “the reason was that they are dead,” or something similar. Other languages will find it more natural to put this clause first, as in our example above: “They are dead, and she refuses to be comforted” or “They are dead. That is why she refuses to be comforted.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .

Translation commentary on Matthew 21:7

Rather than make this verse a continuation of the sentence begun in verse 6, it may be best to introduce a new sentence here, as do New Jerusalem Bible, New International Version, Barclay, and Phillips. One may want to translate “They brought the donkey and the colt to Jesus. Then they threw their cloaks over them, and Jesus got on.” In Greek the last clause of this verse is literally “and Jesus sat on them,” a reference to either the cloaks or the animals. The meaning is probably that Jesus sat on the cloaks which had been placed on the animals. As verse 5 clearly indicates, Matthew understood that Jesus rode upon both animals, though he does not indicate how this was done, whether simultaneously or on one after the other. If one must specify the object upon which Jesus sat by some form other than a pronoun, it may be best to translate “They threw their cloaks over the donkey and the colt, and Jesus sat on the cloaks.” This is a valid translation, inasmuch as the obvious intent of throwing the cloaks upon the animals was for Jesus to sit on the cloaks, and it leaves open the question of just how Jesus rode on the two donkeys, something that Matthew does not answer.

Garments is a general word for clothing, but in this verse, to say the disciples threw their clothes over the donkeys may indicate they (the disciples) were then partially or wholly naked. As indicated by Good News Translation‘s “cloaks,” the reference is probably to their outer garments. See 5.40 for suggestions on translating “cloaks.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on the Gospel of Matthew. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1988. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .