addressing God

Translators of different languages have found different ways with what kind of formality God is addressed.

Like many languages (but unlike Greek or Hebrew or modern English), Tuvan uses a formal vs. informal 2nd person pronoun (a familiar vs. a respectful “you”). Unlike other languages that have this feature, however, the translators of the Tuvan Bible have attempted to be very consistent in using the different forms of address in every case a 2nd person pronoun has to be used in the translation of the biblical text.

As Voinov shows in Pronominal Theology in Translating the Gospels (in: The Bible Translator 2002, p. 210ff. ), the choice to use either of the pronouns many times involved theological judgment. While the formal pronoun can signal personal distance or a social/power distance between the speaker and addressee, the informal pronoun can indicate familiarity or social/power equality between speaker and addressee.

In these verses, in which humans address God, the informal, familiar pronoun is used that communicates closeness.

Voinov notes that “in the Tuvan Bible, God is only addressed with the informal pronoun. No exceptions. An interesting thing about this is that I’ve heard new Tuvan believers praying with the formal form to God until they are corrected by other Christians who tell them that God is close to us so we should address him with the informal pronoun. As a result, the informal pronoun is the only one that is used in praying to God among the Tuvan church.”

In Gbaya, “a superior, whether father, uncle, or older brother, mother, aunt, or older sister, president, governor, or chief, is never addressed in the singular unless the speaker intends a deliberate insult. When addressing the superior face to face, the second person plural pronoun ɛ́nɛ́ or ‘you (pl.)’ is used, similar to the French usage of vous.

Accordingly, the translators of the current version of the Gbaya Bible chose to use the plural ɛ́nɛ́ to address God. There are a few exceptions. In Psalms 86:8, 97:9, and 138:1, God is addressed alongside other “gods,” and here the third person pronoun o is used to avoid confusion about who is being addressed. In several New Testament passages (Matthew 21:23, 26:68, 27:40, Mark 11:28, Luke 20:2, 23:37, as well as in Jesus’ interaction with Pilate and Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman at the well) the less courteous form for Jesus is used to indicate ignorance of his position or mocking.” (Source Philip Noss)

In the most recent Manchu translation of 1835 (a revision of an earlier edition from 1822), God is never addressed with a pronoun but with “father” (ama /ᠠᠮᠠ) instead. Chengcheng Liu (in this post on the Cambridge Centre for Chinese Theology blog ) explains: “In Manchu tradition, as in Chinese etiquette, second-person pronouns could be considered disrespectful when speaking to superiors or spiritual beings. Manchu Shamanist prayers avoided si [‘you’] and sini [‘your’] for this very reason. To use them for God would be, in Lipovzoff’s [one of the two translators] words, ‘the most uncouth and indecent way to speak to the Almighty — as if He were a servant or slave.’ There was also a grammatical problem. In Manchu, si and sini could refer to both singular and plural subjects. For a faith that insisted on the singularity of God, this was potentially confusing. By contrast, repeating ama removed any ambiguity.”

In Dutch, Afrikaans, Gronings, and Western Frisian translations, God is always addressed with the formal pronoun.

See also formal pronoun: disciples addressing Jesus, female second person singular pronoun in Psalms.

complete verse (Nehemiah 9:24)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Nehemiah 9:24:

  • Kupsabiny: “They went to that country and took/conquered it to become theirs. You are the one who conquered for them those nations wherever they were. The Canaanite kings who lived in that nation became weak. Your people could make those people suffer as it pleased them.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “They indeed went-in and took-possession of it. You (sing.) had- them -defeat the Canaanhon who live in that land. You (sing.) handed-over to them the Canaanhon as-well-as their kings so-that your (sing.) people will-do whatever they want to do with them.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “Their children went and took-possession-of the land, because you (sing.) helped them to defeat the inhabitants in Canaan and you (sing.) caused-to-leave the inhabitants there. You (sing.) gave them ability/power to defeat the inhabitants and their kings and to do what they wanted to do to them.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • English: “Their sons went in and took the land from the people that lived there. You enabled them to defeat the descendants of Canaan who lived here in this land. You enabled them to conquer the descendants of Canaan and their kings and the people whom they ruled. You enabled our ancestors to do to those people whatever they wanted to do.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

king

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Some languages do not have a concept of kingship and therefore no immediate equivalent for the Greek, Hebrew, Ge’ez, Aramaic, and Latin that is translated as “king” in English. Here are some (back-) translations:

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  • Piro: “a great one”
  • Highland Totonac: “the big boss”
  • Huichol: “the one who commanded” (source for this and above: Bratcher / Nida)
  • Ekari: “the one who holds the country” (source: Reiling / Swellengrebel)
  • Una: weik sienyi: “big headman” (source: Kroneman 2004, p. 407)
  • Pass Valley Yali: “Big Man” (source: Daud Soesilo)
  • Ninia Yali: “big brother with the uplifted name” (source: Daud Soesilio in Noss 2007, p. 175)
  • Nyamwezi: mutemi: generic word for ruler, by specifying the city or nation it becomes clear what kind of ruler (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
  • Ghomála’: Fo (“The word Fo refers to the paramount ruler in the kingdoms of West Cameroon. He holds administrative, political, and religious power over his own people, who are divided into two categories: princes (descendants of royalty) and servants (everyone else).” (Source: Michel Kenmogne in Theologizing in Context: An Example from the Study of a Ghomala’ Christian Hymn))

Faye Edgerton retells how the term in Navajo (Dinė) was determined:

“[This term was] easily expressed in the language of Biblical culture, which had kings and noblemen with their brilliant trappings and their position of honor and praise. But leadership among the Navajos is not accompanied by any such titles or distinctions of dress. Those most respected, especially in earlier days, were their headmen, who were the leaders in raids, and the shaman, who was able to serve the people by appealing for them to the gods, or by exorcising evil spirits. Neither of these made any outward show. Neither held his position by political intrigue or heredity. If the headman failed consistently in raids, he was superceded by a better warrior. If the shaman failed many times in his healing ceremonies, it was considered that he was making mistakes in the chants, or had lost favor with the gods, and another was sought. The term Navajos use for headman is derived from a verb meaning ‘to move the head from side to side as in making an oration.’ The headman must be a good orator, able to move the people to go to war, or to follow him in any important decision. This word is naat’áanii which now means ‘one who rules or bosses.’ It is employed now for a foreman or boss of any kind of labor, as well as for the chairman of the tribal council. So in order to show that the king is not just a common boss but the highest ruler, the word ‘aláahgo, which expresses the superlative degree, was put before naat’áanii, and so ‘aláahgo naat’áanii ‘anyone-more-than-being around-he-moves-his-head-the-one-who’ means ‘the highest ruler.’ Naat’áanii was used for governor as the context usually shows that the person was a ruler of a country or associated with kings.”

(Source: Faye Edgerton in The Bible Translator 1962, p. 25ff. )

See also king (Japanese honorifics).

Translation commentary on Nehemiah 9:24

The climax of this section of the prayer is that the descendants went in and possessed the land as God had promised. The form of the Hebrew word for descendants makes it clear that they are the same group of people as in the previous verse.

Thou didst subdue before them shows clearly that God was the conqueror on behalf of the Israelites. Nouvelle Bible Segond translates the Hebrew literally as “you humiliated before them,” but the meaning here is “to overcome” (so Good News Translation) or “to conquer.” Contemporary Chinese Bible says “you crushed….” There is no reference here to Joshua who was their leader in the conquest. In Hebrew before them is literally “to their face” and some other languages use a similar expression.

The inhabitants of the land, the Canaanites: See Ezra 9.1. Here Canaanites is in apposition to the inhabitants of the land; that is, the term refers broadly to the people who were living in the land, as Good News Translation renders it. Many languages have a special term for “the children of the land” or “those of the land.” In the Hebrew there is a play on the words subdue (kanaʿ) and Canaanites (kenaʿanim) because of how similar the two words sound to each other.

Didst give them into their hands is a Hebrew idiom that means to give someone power over someone else (see Ezra 5.12). Good News Translation restructures the verse to express its meaning and omits the figure of speech. New International Version uses a similar figure: “you handed the Canaanites over to them.”

As they would: In Hebrew this is literally “according to their will [or, pleasure].” This expression usually has a bad sense (see Gen 16.6; 19.8; Est 9.5). The Israelites were able to treat the rulers and people of Canaan in whatever way they wanted (so Good News Translation). This might be said idiomatically: “as their hearts wished.”

Quoted with permission from Noss, Philip A. and Thomas, Kenneth J. A Handbook on Nehemiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2005. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .