pray / prayer

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The Hebrew, Aramaic, Latin, and Greek that is translated as “pray” (or “prayer”) in English is often translated as “talking with God” (Central Pame, Tzeltal, Chol, Chimborazo Highland Quichua, Shipibo-Conibo, Kaqchikel, Tepeuxila Cuicatec, Copainalá Zoque, Central Tarahumara).

Other solutions include:

  • “beg” or “ask,” (full expression: “ask with one’s heart coming out,” which leaves out selfish praying, for asking with the heart out leaves no place for self to hide) (Tzotzil)
  • “cause God to know” (Huichol)
  • “raise up one’s words to God” (implying an element of worship, as well as communication) (Miskito, Lacandon) (source of this and all above: Bratcher / Nida)
  • “speak to God” (Shilluk) (source: Nida 1964, p. 237)
  • “talk together with Great Above One (=God)” (Mairasi) (source: Enggavoter, 2004)
  • “call to one’s Father” (San Blas Kuna) (source: Claudio and Marvel Iglesias in The Bible Translator 1951, p. 85ff. )
  • “beg” (waan) (Ik). Terrill Schrock (in Wycliffe Bible Translators 2016, p. 93) explains (click or tap here to read more):

    What do begging and praying have to do with each other? Do you beg when you pray? Do I?

    “The Ik word for ‘visitor’ is waanam, which means ‘begging person.’ Do you beg when you go visiting? The Ik do. Maybe you don’t beg, but maybe when you visit someone, you are looking for something. Maybe it’s just a listening ear.

    When the Ik hear that [my wife] Amber and I are planning trip to this or that place for a certain amount of time, the letters and lists start coming. As the days dwindle before our departure, the little stack of guests grows. ‘Please, sir, remember me for the allowing: shoes, jacket (rainproof), watch, box, trousers, pens, and money for the children. Thank you, sir, for your assistance.’

    “A few people come by just to greet us or spend bit of time with us. Another precious few will occasionally confide in us about their problems without asking for anything more than a listening ear. I love that.

    “The other day I was in our spare bedroom praying my list of requests to God — a nice list covering most areas of my life, certainly all the points of anxiety. Then it hit me: Does God want my list, or does he want my relationship?

    “I decided to try something. Instead of reading off my list of requests to God, I just talk to him about my issues without any expectation of how he should respond. I make it more about our relationship than my list, because if our personhood is like God’s personhood, then maybe God prefers our confidence and time to our lists, letters, and enumerations.”

In Luang it is translated with different shades of meaning (click or tap here to read more):

  • For Acts 1:14, 20:36, 21:5: kola ttieru-yawur nehla — “hold the waist and hug the neck.” (“This is the more general term for prayer and often refers to worship in prayer as opposed to petition. The Luang people spend the majority of their prayers worshiping rather than petitioning, which explains why this term often is used generically for prayer.”)
  • For Acts 28:9: sumbiani — “pray.” (“This term is also used generically for ‘prayer’. When praying is referred to several times in close proximity, it serves as a variation for kola ttieru-yawur nehla, in keeping with Luang discourse style. It is also used when a prayer is made up of many requests.”)
  • For Acts 8:15, 12:5: polu-waka — “call-ask.” (“This is a term for petition that is used especially when the need is very intense.”)

Source: Kathy Taber in Notes on Translation 1/1999, p. 9-16.

See also Nehemiah’s prayer (image).

complete verse (Psalm 55:2)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Psalm 55:2:

  • Chichewa Contempary Chichewa translation, 2002/2016:
    “hear and answer me.
    My thoughts are afflicting me and am run out of wisdom” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
  • Newari:
    “Listen to my voice and give answer.
    I am being buried by great trouble.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon:
    “Listen and answer me.
    I (am) troubled with my problems/worries.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Laarim:
    “Listen to me and answer me.
    The bad worry has finishes me.” (Source: Laarim Back Translation)
  • Nyakyusa-Ngonde (back-translation into Swahili):
    “Unisikie na kunijibu,
    nimechoka na shida zangu.” (Source: Nyakyusa Back Translation)
  • English:
    “Listen to me, and answer me, because I am overwhelmed by all my troubles.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

will (of God) (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. When the referent is God, the “divine” honorific prefix mi- (御 or み) can be used, as in mi-kokoro (みこころ) or “will (of God)” in the referenced verses. Two verses (Ezra 10:11 and Ephesians 1:9) use mi-mune (みむね) with the same honorific prefix and meaning.

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

See also will and doing the will of God.

Japanese benefactives (kotaete)

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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 benefactive construction as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. Here, kotaete (答えて) or “answer” is used in combination with kudasaru (くださる), a respectful form of the benefactive kureru (くれる). A benefactive reflects the good will of the giver or the gratitude of a recipient of the favor. To convey this connotation, English translation needs to employ a phrase such as “for me (my sake)” or “for you (your sake).”

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

Translation commentary on Psalm 55:1 - 55:3

The psalm opens with a cry to God to listen to the psalmist’s prayer and answer him (verses 1-2a). For hide not thyself in verse 1b, see similar language and comments in 13.1; 27.9a.

Attend to me is a rather old-fashioned form of English; a more normal way of expressing the thought is “Listen to me” or “Pay attention to me.” When the psalmist asks God to answer him, the translator must not think in terms of answering a question. Here the term has the meaning of responding to the psalmist’s plea for help. Therefore in translation one must often say, for example, “help me.”

Then the psalmist describes his condition: I am overcome by my trouble (verse 2b). The Hebrew verb is of uncertain meaning; this form occurs elsewhere only in Genesis 27.40, where it appears to mean “break loose”; see New Jerusalem Bible “I am tossed about.” The Septuagint has “I am grieved” (also Vulgate); Jerome “I am humiliated.” The general idea is clear enough: worry, concern, lack of peace; one possibility is “distraught”; Weiser “restless.”

As the Revised Standard Version verse division shows, the initial verb form of the fifth line of the psalm (Revised Standard Version I am distraught) is in the Masoretic text the end of verse 2, not the beginning of verse 3. For aesthetic reasons Good News Translation has placed the verse number 3 at the beginning of the line.

I am distraught translates a verb which means “be in a stir” (the Septuagint translates “I am troubled”). Good News Translation “the threats of my enemies” translates what is literally “the voice of my enemy”; see New Jerusalem Bible “outcry” and New Jerusalem Bible “clamor,” both of which are better than Revised Standard Version noise.

In verse 3b oppression translates a word found only here in the Old Testament. Good News Translation in verse 3b supplies the verb “crushed” as being more appropriate for oppression; the Hebrew text has only one verb for both lines, namely, am distraught. The phrase because of the oppression of the wicked must be restructured in many languages; for example, “I am crushed by the evil people who oppress me” or “I am defeated because bad people oppress me.”

In verse 3c they bring translates the causative form of a Hebrew verb which means “to totter, shake” (see “be moved” in 10.6), with the direct object trouble. Briggs sees the figure of an enemy force rolling stones down from the heights upon the foe in the valley. There seems to be no need for the kind of a note that Revised Standard Version has; the other translations do not feel the need of one. New Jerusalem Bible translates “they heap up charges against me,” and New Jerusalem Bible “they bring evil upon me.” Bible en français courant may be recommended: “they cause evil to fall upon me.”

Cherish enmity translates a verb found only here in the Psalms; it means to nurse a grudge, to cherish hatred (K-B). New English Bible translates the line “they revile me in their anger” (also New International Version). A number of translations see hostile activity expressed by the verb; New Jerusalem Bible “furiously harass me”; Traduction œcuménique de la Bible “attack me with fury”; Biblia Dios Habla Hoy “attack me furiously.”

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Reyburn, William D. A Handbook on the Book of Psalms. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1991. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .