salvation

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The Greek, Latin and Hebrew that is translated with “salvation” (or “deliverance”) in English is translated in the following ways:

  • San Blas Kuna: “receive help for bad deeds” (“this help is not just any kind of help but help for the soul which has sinned)
  • Northwestern Dinka: “help as to his soul” (“or literally, ‘his breath'”) (source for this and the one above: Nida 1952, p. 140)
  • Central Mazahua: “healing the heart” (source: Nida 1952, p. 40)
  • Tzeltal: col: “get loose,” “go free,” “get well” (source: Marianna C. Slocum in The Bible Translator 1958, p. 49f. )
  • Aari: “the day our Savior comes” (in Rom 13:11) (source: Loren Bliese)

in Mairasi its is translated as “life fruit” or “life fruit all mashed out.” Lloyd Peckham explains: “In secret stories, not knowable to women nor children, there was a magical fruit of life. If referred to vaguely, without specifying the specific ‘fruit,’ it can be an expression for eternity.” And for “all masked out” he explains: “Bark cloth required pounding. It got longer and wider as it got pounded. Similarly, life gets pounded or mashed to lengthen it into infinity. Tubers also get mashed into the standard way of serving the staple food, like the fufu of Uganda, or like poi of Hawaii. It spreads out into infinity.” (See also eternity / forever)

In Lisu a poetic construct is used for this term. Arrington (2020, p. 58f.) explains: “A four-word couplet uses Lisu poetic forms to bridge the abstract concrete divide, an essential divide to cross if Christian theology is to be understood by those with oral thought patterns. Each couplet uses three concrete nouns or verbs to express an abstract term. An example of this is the word for salvation, a quite abstract term essential to understanding Christian theology. To coin this new word, the missionary translators used a four-word couplet: ℲO., CYU. W: CYU (person … save … person … save). In this particular case, the word for person was not the ordinary word (ʁ) but rather the combination of ℲO., and W: used in oral poetry. The word for ‘save’ also had to be coined; in this case, it was borrowed from Chinese [from jiù / 救]. These aspects of Lisu poetry, originally based on animism, likely would have been lost as Lisu society encountered communism and modernization. Yet they are now codified in the Lisu Bible as well as the hymnbook.”

In the Contemporary Chichewa translation (2002/2016) it is translated with chipulumutso which is used to refer to an act of helping someone who is in problems but cannot help him/herself come out of the problems because of weakness. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)

See also save and save (Japanese honorifics) / salvation (of God) (Japanese honorifics).

complete verse (Psalm 62:3)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Psalm 62:3:

  • Chichewa Contempary Chichewa translation, 2002/2016:
    “Until when will all of you contend with a person?
    Will you bring him down (to the) ground like a weak wall,
    like a shaken fence?” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
  • Newari:
    “How long will you continue to attack a lone person
    who seems like a wall about to fall down?” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon:
    “All of you (plur.) who (are) my enemies, until when will- you (plur.) yet -attack me to-destroy me?
    I (am) like a stone-wall about-to fall-down or a leaning fence.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Laarim:
    “Until when are you (plur.) going to fight against a person?
    Would you throw him down,
    who is like a fence that wants to fall?” (Source: Laarim Back Translation)
  • Nyakyusa-Ngonde (back-translation into Swahili):
    “Hadi lini mtanishambulia mimi?
    Je, ninyi wote mniue?
    Ambaye niko kama vile ukuta ambao umeinama,
    kama wigo ambao unataka kuanguka.” (Source: Nyakyusa Back Translation)
  • English:
    “When will you, my enemies, stop attacking me?
    I feel that I am as useless against you as a wall that is about to fall over or a broken-down fence.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

2nd person pronoun with low register (Japanese)

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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 second person pronoun (“you” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. The most commonly used anata (あなた) is typically used when the speaker is humbly addressing another person.

In these verses, however, omae (おまえ) is used, a cruder second person pronoun, that Jesus for instance chooses when chiding his disciples. (Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

See also first person pronoun with low register and third person pronoun with low register.

Translation commentary on Psalm 62:3 - 63:4

The psalmist does not identify his enemies who are trying to ruin him. He speaks of himself in the third person as one who occupies a “place of honor” (Good News Translation, verse 4a), so he is a man of some importance.

There are two verbs in verse 3a (Revised Standard Version set upon … shatter), both of uncertain form and meaning. The first one occurs only here; the second one usually means “to murder,” but only Weiser has this meaning (“slay”); also possible, “strike”; New Jerusalem Bible “crush”; New English Bible “battering”; New American Bible “beat him down.” Good News Translation has expressed the meaning of the two verbs by “attack”; using the Good News Translation language, the two verbs could be separately expressed by “… will all of you attack and do away with a man…?” It should be understood, of course, that the question is rhetorical–it is not a request for information. If a rhetorical question is difficult for most readers, the meaning can be expressed by means of a statement, “All of you must quit attacking a man who is no stronger than a broken-down fence, and trying to do away with him.”

The psalmist’s enemies are trying to ruin him by bringing him down as though he were a leaning wall, a tottering fence (verse 3c). Some (Briggs, Dahood) take these figures to apply to the psalmist’s enemies, but most take them to refer to the psalmist himself. Good News Translation has reduced the two synonymous figures to one, “no stronger than a broken-down fence.” In most language areas both a leaning wall and a tottering fence are fully understood. The translator must decide if the two expressions really represent mere duplication, or if the reader will think of two distinct types of structures.

The psalmist’s enemies are liars and hypocrites (verse 4b-d); see similar language in 12.1; 28.3; 55.21. Here again, curse means to use certain words to cause ruin or disaster (see comments at 59.12).

If the use of the third person to refer to the psalmist himself is difficult or strange, it is possible to switch to the first person, as follows (using Good News Translation language): “I am no stronger than a broken-down fence; so how much longer will you attack me? All you want to do is to bring me down from my place of honor….”

It is to be noticed that in verse 4 the psalmist’s enemies are spoken of in the third person; for consistency with verse 3, Good News Translation has used the second person.

For Selah see 3.2.

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 .