20Then Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, “Blessed be he by the Lord, whose kindness has not forsaken the living or the dead!” Naomi also said to her, “The man is a relative of ours, one of our nearest kin.”
The Hebrew that is translated as “kinsman-redeemer” (or “next-of-kin” or “close relative”) is translated in Yasa as “a near family member who has responsibility for protecting the family.”
Joshua Ham explains why: “One of the most important terms in the book of Ruth is the Hebrew word go’el. This word is often translated kinsman-redeemer in English Bibles. In ancient Hebrew culture, the go’el could play many roles. If a married man died without children, his brother (acting as go’el) was expected to marry the widow and carry on the dead man’s lineage. If someone was forced to sell their family land (keeping in mind that family land was very important in the Old Testament), a family member (again acting as go’el) was supposed to eventually restore the family’s title to the land. If a family member was murdered, it was up to the go’el to seek justice.
“As you can imagine, there’s just no way we’re going to find a single word in any language that covers all of those cultural aspects. And if we tried to explain all of those aspects in the text itself, it would get unwieldy pretty fast. So in translating a word like go’el, we try to pick out the most salient points. In the Yasa text of Ruth, we ended up with something like ‘a near family member who has responsibility for protecting the family.’ It’s a bit smoother in Yasa than it sounds in English!”
In Cusco Quechua it is translated as “close relative of a corpse.”
The translation consultant Bill Mitchell (in Omanson 2001, p. 428) tells this story: “The translators struggled to translate the idea [of the near relative responsible for helping a family or clan member hit by misfortune, for example, loss of property, liberty or life]. The translation consultant asked them, ‘Is there anyone in your wider family who takes responsibility for a relative in such circumstances?’ They replied, ‘Yes, of course.’ ‘What do you call that person,’ the consulted asked. ‘There is no special name,’ they said. The consultant replied, ‘If a widow or an orphan needed help, what would they say to this person?’ ‘It will probably seem a bit strange to you, but they would say: ‘You are my close relative and I am your corpse.’’ The translators introduced this into their translation. When they tested it out with different groups, they found that it communicated the Hebrew concept of go’el very well.”
In Southern Birifor it is translated as “funeral husband.” (Source: Andy Warren-Rothlin)
The Hebrew that is transliterated as “Naomi” in English is translated in Spanish Sign Language with the sign for “changed identity” referring to the many life changes that Naomi goes through in the book of Ruth. (Source: Steve Parkhurst)
The Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Ge’ez, and Latin terms that are typically translated as “mercy” (or “compassion” or “kindness”) in English are translated in various ways. Bratcher / Nida classify them in (1) those based on the quality of heart, or other psychological center, (2) those which introduce the concept of weeping or extreme sorrow, (3) those which involve willingness to look upon and recognize the condition of others, or (4) those which involve a variety of intense feelings.
While the Englishmercy originates from the Latinmerces, originally “price paid,” Romance languages (Italian, Spanish, Corsican, Catalan, Friulian) and other Germanic languages (German, Swedish, Danish — Barmherzigkeit, barmhärtighet and barmhjertighed, respectively) tend to follow the Latin misericordia, lit. “misery-heart.”
The Greek, Hebrew, Latin, Ge’ez, and Aramaic that is translated into English as “(to) bless” or “blessed” is translated into a wide variety of possibilities.
The Hebrew term barak (and the Aramaic term berak) also (and originally) means “kneel” (a meaning which the word has retained — see Gen. 24:11) and can be used for God blessing people (or things), people blessing each other, or people blessing God. While English Bible translators have not seen a stumbling block in always using the same term (“bless” in its various forms), other languages need to make distinctions (see below).
In Bari, spoken in South Sudan, the connection between blessing and knees/legs is still apparent. For Genesis 30:30 (in English: “the Lord has blessed you wherever I turned”), Bari uses a common expression that says (much like the Hebrew), ‘… blessed you to my feet.'” (Source: P. Guillebaud in The Bible Translator 1965, p. 189ff. .)
Other examples for the translation of “bless” when God is the one who blesses include (click or tap here to see the rest of this insight):
“sprinkle with a propitious (lit. cool) face” (a poetic expression occurring in the priests’ language) (Toraja Sa’dan) (source for this and above: Reiling / Swellengrebel)
“give good things” (Mairasi) (source: Enggavoter 2004)
“ask good” (Yakan) (source: Yakan Back Translation)
“praise, say good things” (Central Yupik) (source: Robert Bascom)
“showing a good heart” (Kutu) (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
“good luck — have — good fortune — have” (verbatim) ꓶꓼ ꓙꓳ ꓫꓱꓹ ꓙꓳ — ɯa dzho shes zho (Lisu). This construction follows a traditional four-couplet construct in oral Lisu poetry that is usually in the form ABAC or ABCB. (Source: Arrington 2020, p. 58)
wodala — denoting a person who is considered fortunate because he/she has something good that the majority of people do not have. It also acknowledges someone as a causative agent behind “being blessed.” (Chichewa) (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
In Tagbanwa a phrase is used for both the blessing done by people and God that back-translates to “caused to be pierced by words causing grace/favor” (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation) and in Benabena a term denoted “good spell” or “good magic” (source: Renck 1990, p. 112).
Ixcatlán Mazatec had to select a separate term when relating “to people ‘blessing’ God” (or things of God): “praise(d)” or “give thanks for” (in 1 Cor. 10:16) (“as it is humans doing the ‘blessing’ and people do not bless the things of God or God himself the way God blesses people” — source: Robert Bascom). Eastern Bru and Kui also use “praise” for this a God-directed blessing (source: Bru back translation and Helen Evans in The Bible Translator 1954, p. 40ff. ) and Uma uses “appropriate/worthy to be worshipped” (source: Uma back translation).
When related to someone who is blessing someone else, it is translated into Tsou as “speak good hopes for.” In Waiwai it is translated as “may God be good and kind to you now.” (Sources: Peng Kuo-Wei for Tsou and Robert Hawkins in The Bible Translator 1962, pp. 164ff. for Waiwai.)
Some languages associate an expression that originally means “spitting” or “saliva” with blessing. The Bantu language Koonzime, for instance, uses that expression for “blessing” in their translation coming from either God or man. Traditionally, the term was used in an application of blessing by an aged superior upon a younger inferior, often in relation to a desire for fertility, or in a ritualistic, but not actually performed spitting past the back of the hand. The spitting of saliva has the effect of giving that person “tenderness of face,” which can be translated as “blessedness.” (Source: Keith Beavon)
Martin Ehrensvärd, one of the translators for the DanishBibelen 2020, comments on the translation of this term: “As for ‘blessing’, in the end we in most instances actually kept the word, after initially preferring the expression ‘giving life strength’. The backlash against dropping the word blessing was too hard. But we would often add a few words to help the reader understand what the word means in a given context — people often understand it to refer more to a spiritual connection with God, but in the Hebrew texts, it usually has to do with material things or good health or many children. So when e.g. in Isaiah 19:25 the Hebrew text says ‘God bless them’, we say ‘God bless them’ and we add: ‘and give them strength’. ‘And give them strength’ is not found in the overt Hebrew text, but we are again making explicit what we believe is the meaning so as to avoid misunderstanding.” (Source: Ehrensvärd in HIPHIL Novum 8/2023, p. 81ff. )
The Hebrew and Greek that is translated as “neighbor” or “relative” in English is translated in the Contemporary Chichewa translation (2002/2016) and the Buku Lopatulika translation (1922/2018) with just one word: nansi. This word can also be translated as neighbors whom you share a blood relation with because in Chewa context a community is mostly comprised of people of blood relations. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
Many languages distinguish between inclusive and exclusive first-person plural pronouns (“we”). (Click or tap here to see more details)
The inclusive “we” specifically includes the addressee (“you and I and possibly others”), while the exclusive “we” specifically excludes the addressee (“he/she/they and I, but not you”). This grammatical distinction is called “clusivity.” While Semitic languages such as Hebrew or most Indo-European languages such as Greek or English do not make that distinction, translators of languages with that distinction have to make a choice every time they encounter “we” or a form thereof (in English: “we,” “our,” or “us”).
For this verse, the Jarai and the Adamawa Fulfulde translation both use the inclusive pronoun, including everyone.
Naomi’s statement that God (Yahweh) cares for both “the living and the dead” corresponds to the Bantu world view, not so much due to the agency of God as mentioned, but because the dead are seemingly put on an equal plane with the living—they comprise but one social community.
It is difficult to render the Hebrew term go’el adequately in Chichewa/Chitonga due to the cultural differences involved. In general, the function of this person in society was to protect the interests of the family and clan: their land, property, freedom, and posterity. Thus he had the obligation to “redeem” (through personal purchase) what had been lost, to avenge the death of kinsmen, and should he happen to be the closest relative to a deceased male of child-bearing age, to marry the widow. The problem is that, not unexpectedly, there is no single term which would cover all of these functions in any Central African language. There would be a “clan representative” (Chichewa: nkhoswe), usually the senior woman’s eldest brother, who does conduct negotiations with his counterparts in matters such as marriage and legal disputes (customary law). But he would never personally be responsible for carrying out acts of revenge or to act as husband in a levirate marriage (not as nkhoswe, that is). The best, then, that can be done in translation is to employ a descriptive phrase which focuses upon the most relevant components of the term’s meaning in this particular context; e.g., Chichewa: “(he is) one of our relatives, the one who has the responsibility of nourishing us” (or: bringing us up, i.e., caring for us).
Following are a number of back-translations of Ruth 2:18-20:
Noongar: “Ruth took the wheat to her house, and Naomi saw what she had gathered. Then Ruth gave her mother-in- law the bread she had not eaten herself. Her mother-in-law asked her, ‘Where did you gather wheat? Where did you work today? May God bless the man who saw you.’ So Ruth told her mother-in-law everything about the man and his wheatfield. Ruth said, ‘This man is called Boaz.’ Naomi said to her daughter, ‘May God bless this man. He has not stopped being merciful to people living and dead.’ Naomi then told Ruth, ‘This man is our relative, our right-way man.’” (Source: Bardip Ruth-Ang 2020)
Eastern Bru: “Then he brought the grain back to the town. She brought to her mother-in-law the grain she had gleaned. And Ruth brought out the leftover food that she had kept back and gave that to her mother-in-law.Her mother-in-law asked her: ‘Today where did you glean this? Whose field did you glean in? I ask God to give blessing to the one who helped you.’ After that Ruth told her mother-in-law: ‘That man who allowed me to glean in his field today was named Boaz.’Then Naommi said to her daughter-in-law: ‘May God give him blessings. Surely God has not given up doing good to those still living and to those still living and to those who have died.” And Naomi said: ‘Surely this person is from our clan also very near to us.’” (Source: Bru Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “She brought these/it back-home to town and showed-(it) to her mother-in-law Noemi. Then she took-out her leftover food and gave (it) to Noemi. Noemi asked her, ‘Where did you(sg) glean some heads-of-grain earlier? Whose field? Blessed is the man who treated you(sg) well.’ Ruth told Noemi that she gleaned there in the field of a man whose name was Boaz. Noemi said to Ruth, ‘May the LORD bless Boaz. He continued to show his kindness to the people who are still alive and to the dead-ones already.’ And she also said, ‘That Boaz is our(incl) close relative; he is one (of those) who has (a) responsibility to-take-care of us(incl).’” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “She carried it back to town, and showed to her mother-in-law how much she had gathered. Ruth also showed to her the grain that was left over after she had eaten enough from what Boaz had given her at lunchtime. Her mother-in-law asked her, ‘Where did you gather grain today? In whose field did you work? God will surely bless the man who was kind to you.’ Then Ruth told her about the man in whose field she had been working. She said, ‘The name of the man who owns the field where I worked today is Boaz.’ Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, ‘I hope/desire that Yahweh will bless him! He has not stopped acting kindly toward us, who are still living, and to our husbands who have died.’ Then she added, ‘That man is a close relative of Elimelech; he is one of those who has a responsibility to help those who are his relatives.’” (Source: Translation for Translators)
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