pray / prayer

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The Hebrew, Aramaic, Latin, Ge’ez, 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).

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 (Psalm 61:2)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Psalm 61:2:

  • Chichewa Contempary Chichewa translation, 2002/2016:
    “Coming from the ends of the earth I call You
    I call when my heart is becoming weak;
    lead me to the tall rock surpassing me.” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
  • Newari:
    “When my heart was ill at ease,
    I asked You for help from distant places.
    Take me to a rock that will always be secure.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon:
    “Here in a far-away place I call-(out) to you (sing.) because I have-lost hope.
    Take me to a place where there-is-no danger,” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Laarim:
    “I am calling you when I am far from home,
    and I am calling you when my heart is suffering,
    you take me to a large mountain where I hide.” (Source: Laarim Back Translation)
  • Nyakyusa-Ngonde (back-translation into Swahili):
    “Nakulilia kutoka mbali sana,
    wakati moyo wangu umeishiwa nguvu.
    Uniongoze kupanda juu,
    penye mlima mrefu penye kimbilio.” (Source: Nyakyusa Back Translation)
  • English:
    “While I am discouraged and far from my home, I am calling out to you.
    Lead me to the place that is like a high rock on top of which I will be safe.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Japanese benefactives (michibīte)

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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, michibīte (導いて) or “lead/guide” 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 61:1 - 61:3

The psalm opens with a cry to God for help (verses 1-2b), in which the psalmist pictures himself as being at the end of the earth (verse 2a). Most take this to mean, as does Good News Translation, that he is “far from home,” in exile in some foreign country; Dahood, however, takes it to mean that he is near death, that is, on the brink of Sheol, which the psalmist calls the earth (also Taylor and others). It is recommended that the idea of being far away from his own country be represented in translation.

My heart is faint (Good News Translation “In despair”) indicates lack of courage or of hope; Bible en français courant translates “I can endure no more.”

In his prayer for protection the psalmist asks God to take him to the rock that is higher than I; the Hebrew may mean “a rock too high for me (to climb by myself)”; New Jerusalem Bible translates “a rock that is high above me.” The figure is a bit strange but its sense seems clear enough: it is a figure of security and safety (see the use of “rock” in 27.5d and discussion). Some translate “Place me safely on a high rock” (Biblia Dios Habla Hoy) or “lift me up and set me upon a rock” (New English Bible, which changes one letter and uses a different word division in the Masoretic text). Bible en français courant and New Jerusalem Bible think that it refers to the Temple. Good News Translation “safe refuge” in some languages can be rendered “the place where I am safe” or “the place where you protect me.”

God is the psalmist’s refuge (see comments on 14.6 and 46.1), his strong tower. A tower was an essential part of a city’s defenses (see in 48.12 the towers of Jerusalem), a place which offered protection against the enemy’s attack (see the tower at Thebez, in Judges 9.50-57). If tower is unknown, a local substitute may be suitable and may be used as a simile; for example, “you are like a strong wall protecting me from my enemies.”

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 .