God's anger, wrath of God

The Hebrew and Greek that is translated into English as “the wrath of God” or “God’s anger” has to be referred to in Bengali as judgment, punishment or whatever fits the context. In Bengali culture, anger is by definition bad and can never be predicated of God. (Source: David Clark)

Translations in other languages:

  • Quetzaltepec Mixe: “translated with a term that not only expresses anger, but also punishment” (source: Robert Bascom)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “the coming punishment of God on mankind” (source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “God’s fearful/terrible future punishing of people” (source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Tagbanwa: “the coming anger/hatred of God” (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Tenango Otomi: “the punishment which will come” (source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)
  • Bariai: “God’s action of anger comes forth in the open” (source: Bariai Back Translation)
  • Mairasi: “His anger keeps increasing (until it will definitely arrive)” (source: Enggavoter 2004)

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) is used as in mi-ikari (御怒り) or “wrath (of God)” in the referenced verses. (Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

See also anger and the coming wrath.

anger

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The Hebrew, Latin and Greek that is translated as “anger” or similar in English in this verse is translated with a variety of solutions (Bratcher / Nida says: “Since anger has so many manifestations and seems to affect so many aspects of personality, it is not strange that expressions used to describe this emotional response are so varied”).

  • Chicahuaxtla Triqui: “be warm inside”
  • Mende: “have a cut heart”
  • Mískito: “have a split heart”
  • Tzotzil: “have a hot heart”
  • Mossi: “a swollen heart”
  • Western Kanjobal: “fire of the viscera”
  • San Blas Kuna: “pain in the heart”
  • Chimborazo Highland Quichua: “not with good eye”
  • Chichewa: “have a burning heart” (source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation) (see also anger burned in him)
  • Citak: two different terms, one meaning “angry” and one meaning “offended,” both are actually descriptions of facial expressions. The former can be represented by an angry stretching of the eyes or by an angry frown. The latter is similarly expressed by an offended type of frown with one’s head lowered. (Source: Graham Ogden)

In Akan, a number of metaphors are used, most importantly abufuo, lit. “weedy chest” (the chest is seen as a container that contains the heart but can also metaphorically be filled with other fluids etc.), but also abufuhyeε lit. “hot/burning weedy chest” and anibereε, lit. “reddened eyes.” (Source: Gladys Nyarko Ansah in Kövecses / Benczes / Szelid 2024, p. 21ff.)

See also God’s anger and angry.

complete verse (Psalm 90:11)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Psalm 90:11:

  • Chichewa Contempary Chichewa translation, 2002/2016:
    “Who knows the power of your wrath?
    For your wrath is great like the respect which You deserves.” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
  • Newari:
    “Who can know the power of Your anger?
    Does anyone know that Your wrath is as great
    as the fear You deserve.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon:
    “There-is-no-one who was-able-to-experience your (sing.) whole anger.
    And while our (excl.) knowledge about your (sing.) anger increases our (excl.) respect for you (sing.) also increases.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Laarim:
    “Who know the strength of your anger?
    For your anger is great,
    like the respect which we should give you.” (Source: Laarim Back Translation)
  • Nyakyusa-Ngonde (back-translation into Swahili):
    “Ni nani anajua nguvu ya hasira yako?
    Ni nani anajali ambayo yanaleta ghadhabu yako?” (Source: Nyakyusa Back Translation)
  • English:
    “No one has fully experienced the powerful things you can do to them when you are angry with them,
    and people are not afraid that you will greatly punish them because of your being angry with them.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

addressing God

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

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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.

Translation commentary on Psalm 90:11 - 90:12

As suggested in the introduction above and in the comment on verse 7, verse 11 is the end of the confessional unit, and translators may wish to make the division into units in that way rather than as found here.

The meaning of the two rhetorical questions in verse 11 is not at once apparent. The first one seems to mean that no one has ever really experienced the full effect of God’s anger against human sin; consequently a person should always be conscious of the punishment that awaits sin. Considers is “knows” in Hebrew–a verb for deep, intimate knowledge. Thus the request in verse 12 comes as a consequence of acknowledging the need for such knowledge. But verse 11b, if parallel with verse 11a, is quite obscure in Hebrew: “as your fear (so is) your rage.” Revised Standard Version is unintelligible. Good News Translation takes “your fear” to be an objective genitive phrase, that is, fear of God, produced by his fury. New Jerusalem Bible has “Your wrath matches the fear of You” (similarly New International Version). Traduction œcuménique de la Bible is “The more we fear you, the more we know your fury,” which it explains in a footnote: “your fury is up to the measure of the fear you inspire.” New Jerusalem Bible has “who fears you, your wrath?” Another possible rendering is to carry over the verb “who understands” from line a and translate line b “and (who understands) your fury, so that he shows you due reverence?” New American Bible is different: “or (who knows) your indignation toward those who fear you?” And Dahood translates “or (who can understand) that those who fear you can be the object of your fury?” In face of such diversity, the most a translator can do is choose the rendering that seems to fit the context best. If the translator follows Good News Translation and Revised Standard Version power of thy anger, in many languages this noun phrase will have to be recast as a clause, “Who has felt the powerful effect when God is angry?” In languages in which an object must be associated with God’s anger, it is possible to say “… when God is angry at the bad things which people do?”

Verse 12 begins the series of petitions found in each succeeding verse. The verse is a plea; the psalmist asks God to make him realize how short life is, so as to get a heart of wisdom (see Deut 32.29). The literal translation to number our days in line a would mean “to keep an account of the days (already lived),” so as to be aware of how many are still left. Bible en français courant translates, “Make us understand that our days are numbered.”

Wisdom, as elsewhere in Psalms and Proverbs, here includes heavy emphasis on reverence for God. In languages in which “become wise” merely means to be bright and intelligent, it will be better to make the content of such wisdom associated with God; for example, “so that we may have God’s wisdom in our hearts.”

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 .