give thanks

The Greek that is translated as “give thanks” in English is Tzotzil as “saying to God: Because of you.” (Source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)

complete verse (Matthew 26:27)

Following are a number of back-translations of Matthew 26:27:

  • Uma: “After that he also took a cup full of anggur, he said thank you to God and he offered it to them, he said: ‘You all drink it,” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
  • Yakan: “Then he took a glass and after he had given thanks to God, he gave it to them he said, ‘All of you drink this,” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “And then he took a cup that was filled with wine of the grape, and he thanked God for it also, and he handed it to them, and he said, ‘All of you drink from this,” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “Then he took a cup that had grape juice (fermented or otherwise) put in it and thanked God. Then he gave it to them saying, ‘Take this so that all of you will drink some (lit. cause-it-to-be-dripped),” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Tagbanwa: “The cup is what he next held. He gave thanks again to God and then said, ‘All of you drink.” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Tenango Otomi: “Then he held the glass containing the juice of the grape. Having thanked God, he gave it to the learners for each to drink a bit. He said to them: ‘All you drink this.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)

the last supper (image)

Click here to see the image in higher resolution.

Willy Wiedmann, the artist, commented on this picture: “In spite of some difficulty, and unlike Leonardo da Vinci [see here ] I did not set my last supper in a theatrical scene with Jesus in the center behind an elongated table with all the disciples, with two at each end so that that there are 11 seated behind the table. And not like the panel by Juan de Juanes (1623-79) [see here ] in which the six disciples left and right are very dynamic figures. And also not like Martin Schongauer’s Last Supper [see here ] with a slightly shorter table (also incidentally very similar to Juanes in the attitudes of the figures) and two figures seen from the back in the foreground of the panel. Instead I have given the Master the middle place to the foreground, with his back to us to finally leave the controversial Jesus-existential questions unanswered. Slightly symbolically it means that he is leaving his world. The iris color is meant to transfer the rainbow to Jesus, that God once linked to Noah (my kingdom is not of this world). I attempted to present answers that correspond to the characters of each individual.”

Image and text taken from the Wiedmann Bible. For more information about the images and ways to adopt them, see here .

For other images of Willy Wiedmann paintings in TIPs, see here.

 

Painting by Wang Suda 王肅達 (1910-1963),
Copyright by the Catholic University Peking, China.

Text under painting translated from Literary Chinese into English:

Beginning of the Holy Communion
You have this as food and this is my body.

Image taken from Chinese Christian Posters . For more information on the “Ars Sacra Pekinensis” school of art, see this article , for other artworks of that school in TIPs, see here.

the last supper (icon)

Following is a contemporary Ukrainian Orthodox icon of the last supper by Ulyana Tomkevych.

 

Orthodox Icons are not drawings or creations of imagination. They are in fact writings of things not of this world. Icons can represent our Lord Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the Saints. They can also represent the Holy Trinity, Angels, the Heavenly hosts, and even events. Orthodox icons, unlike Western pictures, change the perspective and form of the image so that it is not naturalistic. This is done so that we can look beyond appearances of the world, and instead look to the spiritual truth of the holy person or event. (Source )

give (Japanese honorifics)

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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 to do this is through the usage (or a lack) of an honorific prefix as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017.

In these verses, the verb that is translated as “give” in English is translated in the Shinkaiyaku Bible as o-atae (お与え), combining “to give” (atae) with the respectful prefix o-. (Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

See also respectful form of “give” (kudasaru), respectful form of “give” (tamawaru).

Translation commentary on Matthew 26:27

The text says that he took a cup, but many translators find it helpful to say “a cup of wine.” See 9.17 for a discussion of “wine.”

Took … had given thanks … gave is similar to the series of verbs used in verse 26, with had given thanks replacing “blessed,” and “broke” being omitted because of the shift from bread to a cup. Good News Translation specifies that the thanks were given “to God,” while Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch translates “spoke a prayer of thanks,” thereby accomplishing the same goal.

Drink of it is preferable to “Drink it” of Good News Translation, since in many languages persons do not drink a cup but rather drink from one (New American Bible, New International Version “from it”). The text may appropriately be rendered “Then he took a cup that was full of wine … and said, ‘Each of you, drink some of the wine from this cup.’ ”

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 .