Fuyug houses are built with poles which cannot be put into rock, so in this passage the Fuyug translation for the term that is “rock” in English becomes “firm ground” and “sand” becomes “soft ground.” (Source: David Clark)
Likewise, and for the same reason, the wise man builds his house in Manam on “firm ground” as well. (Source: Blaine Turner in Holzhausen 1991, p. 47)
Since speakers of Karakalpak do indeed build their houses on sand, the translators had to find a slightly different solution to not imply that the Karakalpaks themselves are foolish. They ended up choosing shege qum, the term for loose yellow sand along river banks, since this indeed is a kind of sand Karakalpaks would not build their houses on. (Source: Holzhausen / Riderer 2010, p. 57)
The parable of the wise builder is translated in Yaosakor Asmat as “the wise builder is like the person who builds a house on stilts made of iron wood which last a long time, while the foolish builder is the one who builds a house on stilts made of white wood which will rot quickly.”
Daud Soesilio (in Noss 2007, p. 175) explains: “In Pirimapun, a swampy area on the southern coast of Indonesian Papua, the parable of the wise builder who builds on stone foundation and the foolish builder who builds on sand was rendered into the Asmat language as ‘the wise builder is like the person who builds a house on stilts made of iron wood which last a long time, while the foolish builder is the one who builds a house on stilts made of white wood which will rot quickly.’ This adaptation is necessary since one cannot find a single stone in this swampy area, and all houses are built on stilts. They use iron wood stilts for their more permanent houses, and they only use white wood stilts for the temporary houses that they use when they go hunting. White wood will not last. It is also interesting to point out that they use sand from the beach to make their walking paths firm.”
Following are a number of back-translations of Matthew 7:24:
Uma: “‘Whoever hears my words and follows them, that person is like a smart person who builds his house on top of a strong foundation stone.” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
Yakan: “‘So-then, whoever hears those my words and follows/obeys them, he is like a man who is a real expert in thinking who built his house on stone/rock.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “Whoever hears all of these my advices and he carries them out, he is like a wise person. For this wise person, he built a house on a large stone.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “‘All who hear and believe/obey what I am saying can be compared to a wise/intelligent person who built his house on a rock.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Tagbanwa: “‘Therefore whoever listens and obeys these things I am teaching, he is like a wise/thinking person who built his house on ground with rocks in it and put-posts-down-deep. (This is what makes a Tagbanwa house sturdy.)” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
Tenango Otomi: “Concerning the person who hears all that I speak and does what I say, such a one is to be compared with a man who is wise and builds his house on rock.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)
Martu Wangka: “If a person hears/obeys my talk and sits obedient to me, he who belongs to Jesus will be like another, like this working-bloke. This knowledgeable working-bloke will build correctly a house on a big flat rock.” (Source: Carl Gross)
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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 Japanese shows different degree of politeness is through the choice of a first person singular and plural pronoun (“I” and “we” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. The most commonly used watashi/watakushi (私) is typically used when the speaker is humble and asking for help. In these verses, where God / Jesus is referring to himself, watashi is also used but instead of the kanji writing system (私) the syllabary hiragana (わたし) is used to distinguish God from others.
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 Matthew 7:24-29:
If you obey my teachings, you’re wise —
you’ve built your house on solid rock.
Neither drenching rains, nor floods, nor hurricanes
can shake that house from its solid foundation.
If you disobey my teachings, you’re foolish —
you’ve built your house on shifting sands.
Drenching rains, floods, or hurricanes can shake that house,
and it will collapse with a loud crash.
Jesus surprised everyone by teaching with such authority
as they had never witnessed before —
not even from the most renowned biblical scholars!
Living Water is produced for the Bible translation movement in association with Lutheran Bible Translators. Lyrics derived from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®).
As the books of Leviticus (26.1-46) and Deuteronomy (28.1-68; 30.15-20) draw to an end with the pronouncement of blessings and curses, so the Sermon on the Mount concludes with a promise (7.24-25) and a warning (7.26-27).
In Greek the pronoun of mine is emphatic. The demonstrative pronoun these (not found in Luke) indicates clearly that these words refer to the content of the Sermon which is now being brought to its conclusion.
There will be languages where some grammatical features will indicate that these words refer to the ones just spoken. However, it is important that the reference should be not only to the immediately preceding verses. It may be necessary to say “all these things I have said” or “what I have said here.”
In the context does is the equivalent of “obeys” (Good News Translation). Similarly in verse 26 “does not do” means “does not obey” (Good News Bible).
It may not be possible to say one does or even “obeys” words. In such cases translators can have “does what I have said to do” or “obeys these instructions.”
Good News Translation and a number of other translations (Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch, New English Bible, Phillips, New American Bible) see in the Greek future tense will be like a present meaning: “is like.” This is because, in English and in some other European languages, the present tense is used to describe something that is true whenever it may occur. Other languages may have their own ways of saying such things.
In place of the impersonal passive will be like, some manuscripts have a first person singular active form “I will liken.” TC-GNT believes that the alternative reading may have been influenced by the scribes’ familiarity with the Lukan form of the saying: “I will show you what he is like” (6.47; 24.45; 25.2, 4, 8, 9). Wise man is a traditional and literal rendering. New English Bible (“who had the sense [to build]”) and Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch (“who thought about what he was doing [and built]”) are more dynamic. The phrase wise man is usually translated literally but can also be rendered as “a man of good judgment,” “a sensible man,” or “a person who considered carefully what he was doing.”
The rock (so also New International Version): the use of the definite article the in this construction is unnatural for English speakers, though it is found in the Greek text. Good News Translation “on rock” is a more natural equivalent. Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch has “on rocky (that is, rock-like) ground.” See comment on “the sand” in verse 26.
To build a house upon the rock does not mean it was built on rocks, that is, that the builder used rocks as a foundation. It refers more to being built on a solid rock. This is a problem in many parts of the world where houses are built without foundations, and are in fact built on soil or sand quite frequently. (It is granaries that are built on rock so as to keep out termites.) In such places translators have often wanted to say “built his house in a solid way” or “built it on a high place.” This does change the analogy of Jesus quite a bit, and it may be better to say “built his house on a rock to make it very strong.”
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 .
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