In Gbaya, the notion of “my inmost being yearning” in Song of Songs 5:4 is described as a pounding heart (lit. “liver”) emphasized with mgbut-mgbut, an ideophone used to describe the pounding feeling inside one’s chest.
Ideophones are a class of sound symbolic words expressing human sensation that are used as literary devices in many African languages. Since the subject matter of Songs of Songs is particularly conducive to the use of ideophones, there are a total of 30 ideophones in the Gbaya Bible in that short biblical book alone. (Source: Philip Noss)
The interconfessional Chichewa translation (publ. 1999) uses the ideophones pisu and phwii in Song of Songs 5:4. Pisu is used to emphasize soft, sliding, stealthy motion of the hand slipping in (and suggest intimacy, gentleness, and expectancy) and phwii describes a sudden pop in the chest, a rush of emotion (“heart exploded”), creating a tense juxtaposition of emotions. (Source: Ernst Wendland)
Ideophones are a class of sound symbolic words expressing human sensation that are used as literary devices in many African languages. (Source: Philip Noss)
The Hebrew in Song of Songs 5:4 that is translated as “opening” or similar in English is translated in Elhomwe as “window” because of naturalness. (Source: project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
The translation in Kalanga with tjigwele was able to maintain “the ambiguity between a hole in the (bedroom) door that enables him to open the door and a more explicit reference to sexual activities.” (Source: project-specific notes in Paratext)
In Dari it is translated as sorakh darvazeh (سوراخ دروازه) or “the hole of the door” (a hole used to open the door) to allow for sexual allusion as well (source: Andy Warren-Rothlin).
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Song of Solomon 5:4:
Kupsabiny: “But while still (speaking), my beloved pushes the hand through (a hole) there by the grating in the door wanting to open (it). Then my heart was beating tik, tik,… thinking that I might see my beloved!” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Newari: “When my beloved came to open the bolt, My heart began to flatter.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “My beloved reached-for the lock/bar of the door, and how happy I (was)/(I could-not-express my happiness).” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “The one who loves me put his hand through the opening in the wall, and I was thrilled that he was there.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
The young woman hears her lover apparently trying to enter the room. The phrase put his hand to is the regular Hebrew expression “to stretch out one’s hand.” Normally this is followed by the preposition “on, by,” but in this case we find the preposition min, meaning “from.” With the woman inside the room, the preposition must here mean “in through.” The noun latch is actually “hole” in Hebrew and can refer literally to the window or opening in the wall referred to in 2.9. The meaning then is “my beloved put his hand through the opening” as in New American Bible. He put his hand inside either to beckon her or to touch her.
However, it is widely recognized that hand (yad) has a secondary meaning “penis” (as in the lexicon by Brown, Driver, and Briggs [BDB], for instance); and at least some commentators think the word “hole” has a double meaning as well. The two meanings would be recognized by any Israelite who heard and read these poems. These facts may be included in a footnote, though some readers may be able to catch the secondary meanings of this passage without these helps.
And my heart was thrilled within me: knowing that he is so close makes her anxious; her heart is now pounding wildly. Heart is not the same Hebrew noun as used in verse 2 but is the same noun used in verse 14, where it is translated “body.” The Hebrew actually refers to a person’s internal organs (New English Bible “my bowels”; Jerusalem Bible “the core of my being”), with the sense that this is where emotions originate. Good News Translation merely describes the response as “I was thrilled” without identifying any part of the body. This is quite acceptable.
The translation was thrilled within me depends on a slight alteration to the text, which would give “my insides growled inside because of him.” This colorful description can also be given as “I yearned for him,” as in Jer 31.20. Though the textual change followed by Revised Standard Version and some others does have minor manuscript support, we prefer to follow the original Hebrew text: “I [or, my whole being] longed for him.” If the Revised Standard Version text is followed, then perhaps a footnote indicating the alternative meaning is advisable.
For translation we may suggest:
• My lover put his hand through the opening,
And I was moved in the innermost part of my being.
• My beloved put his hand through the latch,
And my whole being longed for him.*
Footnote: * Some manuscripts have “I was thrilled [or, moved] within me.”
Quoted with permission from Ogden, Graham S. and Zogbo, Lynell. A Handbook on the Book of Song of Songs. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1998. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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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 third person singular and plural pronoun (“he,” “she,” “it” and their various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. While it’s not uncommon to avoid pronouns altogether in Japanese, there are is a range of third person pronouns that can be used. In these verses a number of them are used that pay particularly much respect to the referred person (or, in fact, God, as in Exodus 15:2), including kono kata (この方), sono kata (その方), and ano kata (あの方), meaning “this person,” “that person,” and “that person over there.”
My beloved put his hand to the latch: In this clause the woman implied that she could hear the man put his hand into the latch to try to open the door. The Hebrew phrase that the Berean Standard Bible translates as put his hand to means “to stretch out his hand.” But here in 5:4 it is used with a Hebrew word which probably indicates that he put his hand through (something). (For more details, see the next note on the word latch.)
Some ways to translate the clause are:
• Imply that the man put his hand through an opening. For example:
My love thrust his hand through the hole in the door… (New Jerusalem Bible) -or-
Then my darling’s hand reached to open the latch… (Contemporary English Version)
• Use a phrase with a more general meaning. For example:
My lover tried to unlatch the door (New Living Translation (2004)) -or-
The one I love tried to use his hand to open the door.
latch: The Hebrew word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as latch is literally “hole.” It implies that there was an opening in the door. A person could reach through it to open the door. The God’s Word calls this opening a “keyhole.” However, it was larger than many modern keyholes, since a person could put his hand through it.
5:4b
my heart pounded for him: This phrase is a figure of speech. It tells the woman’s response when she heard the man trying to open the door (5:4a). She longed for his love, and she urgently wanted to be with him. The phrase may also imply that her sexual desires were aroused.
In some languages people do not talk about the heart when they refer to romantic feelings. Languages have different ways to refer to such feelings, and some languages use a figure of speech. It is important to use a natural way in your language. Some other ways to translate the phrase are:
I longed for him. -or-
I was filled with desire for him. -or-
my inmost being yearned for him (New Revised Standard Version) -or-
I was thrilled that he was near (Good News Translation)
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