4On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives, which lies before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley, so that one half of the mount shall withdraw northward and the other half southward.
The name that is transliterated as “Jerusalem” in English is signed in French Sign Language with a sign that depicts worshiping at the Western Wall in Jerusalem:
While a similar sign is also used in British Sign Language, another, more neutral sign that combines the sign “J” and the signs for “place” is used as well. (Source: Anna Smith)
“Jerusalem” in British Sign Language (source: Christian BSL, used with permission)
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Zechariah 14:4:
Kupsabiny: “On that day God will come and stand on the Mountain of Olives that is on the East side of Jerusalem. That mountain will be divided into two so a broad valley will be seen from East to West. Half/part of that mountain will move to the side of North and the other (part) to the side of South.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Newari: “On that day he will stand on the Mount of Olives, on the east side of Jerusalem. The Mount of Olives will be spilt in two parts from east to west making a wide valley. Half the mount of Olives will move to the north and half of the mountain will move to the south.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “In that day, he will-stand on Mount of Olives, to the east of Jerusalem. This mountain will-be-split from east to west. Half of the mountain will-move toward the north and the other half-of-it will-move toward the south, and will-become a wide valley in the center of it.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “On that day, he will stand on Olive Tree Hill, east of Jerusalem. Olive Tree Hill will be split into two parts, with a large valley between the parts. Half of the hill will move toward the north and half will move toward the south.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
The cardinal directions “east” and “west” are easy to translate into Maan here since the language uses “where the sun comes up” and “where the sun goes down.” For “north” the translator had “facing toward the sun rising to the left,” and for “south” she had “facing toward the sun rising to the right.” So the listener had to think hard before knowing what direction was in view when translating “to the north and south, to the east and west.” So, in case all four directions are mentioned, it was shortened by saying simply “all directions.” Manya uses a similar nomenclature for the cardinal directions. (Source: Don Slager)
Likewise, Yakan has “from the four corners of the earth” (source: Yakan back-translation) or Western Bukidnon Manobo “from the four directions here on the earth” (source: Western Bukidnon Manobo back-translation).
Kankanaey is “from the coming-out and the going-away of the sun and the north and the south” (source: Kankanaey back-translation), Northern Emberá “from where the sun comes up, from where it falls, from the looking [left] hand, from the real [right] hand” (source: Charles Mortensen), Amele “from the direction of the sun going up, from the direction of the sun going down, from the north and from the south” (source: John Roberts), Ejamat “look up to see the side where the sun comes from, and the side where it sets, and look on your right side, and on your left” (source: David Frank in this blog post ).
In Lamba, only umutulesuŵa, “where the sun rises” and imbonsi, “where the sun sets” were available as cardinal directions that were not tied to the local area of language speakers (“north” is kumausi — “to the Aushi country” — and “south” kumalenje — “to the Lenje country”). So “north” and “south” were introduced as loanwords, nofu and saufu respectively. The whole phrase is kunofu nakusaufu nakumutulesuŵa nakumbonsi. (Source C. M. Doke in The Bible Translator 1958, p. 57ff. )
“West” is translated in Tzeltal as “where the sun pours-out” and in Kele as “down-river” (source: Reiling / Swellengrebel).
In Morelos Nahuatl, “north” is translated as “from above” and “south” as “from below.” (Source: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
In Matumbi cardinal directions are defined as in relation to another place. “East” for instance typically is “toward the beach” since the coast is in the eastern direction in Matumbi-speaking areas. “North” and “south” can be defined as above or below another place. (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)
The Hebrew text that gives instructions where to place items in the tabernacle with the help of cardinal directions (north and south) had to be approached in the Bambam translation specific to spacial concepts of that culture.
Phil Campbell explains: “There are no words in Bambam for north and south. In Exodus 26:35, God instructs that the table is to be placed on the north side and the lamp on the south side inside the tabernacle. The team wants to use right and left to tell where the lamp and table are located. In many languages we would say that the table is on the right and the lampstand is on the left based on the view of someone entering the tabernacle. However, that is not how Bambam people view it. They view the placement of things and rooms in a building according to the orientation of someone standing inside the building facing the front of the building. So that means the table is on the left side and the lampstand is on the right side.”
The olive family has over four hundred species in the world. Many of them grow in Africa, India, and Australia, but it is the one in the Bible, the European Olive Olea europaea, that has become famous. It is likely that the olive was domesticated in Egypt or the eastern Mediterranean basin in the third millennium B.C. The botanist Newberry argued that Egypt was its original home. We know from the Bible that olives grew in the hills of Samaria and in the foothills. There is a wild variety, called Olea europaea sylvestris, that is smaller than the domestic one; it produces a smaller fruit with less oil. The Apostle Paul refers to this wild variety in Romans 11:17 and 11:24. Olives are easily propagated by cuttings and by grafting fruitful species into less fruitful ones. They grow best on hillsides where the rain drains off quickly. The fruit forms by August but does not ripen until December or January.
The olive is not a big tree, reaching up to perhaps 10 meters (33 feet), but with pruning it is usually kept to around 5 meters (17 feet) tall. The leaves are grayish green above, and whitish underneath. The bark of young trees is silvery gray but gets darker and rougher as the tree ages. The trunk also gets twisted and hollow and may reach over a meter in thickness. Olives grow for hundreds of years, and some in Israel have possibly reached two thousand years.
The fruit of the olive is about 2 centimeters (1 inch) long and a bit more than a centimeter (1/2 inch) thick. It has a hard stone inside and a soft skin that covers the oily flesh. Today a mature tree may yield 10-20 kilograms (22-44 pounds) of fruit, which, when processed, will yield 1.3-2.6 kilograms (3.6 pounds) of oil.
For the Jews the “big three” trees were the vine, the fig, and the olive. People ate olive fruits, but more importantly, they squeezed the oil from the fruits, and used it for cooking, for lamps, for rubbing on the body, for medicine, and in religion. Jacob poured olive oil on the stone where he saw a vision of angels, declaring it a holy place (Genesis 28:18). Moses, similarly, anointed the Tabernacle and its equipment with olive oil mixed with sweet-smelling resins (Exodus 40:9). Aaron and the priests who served in the Tabernacle were also anointed (Exodus 29:21).
Some types of wild olive grow in Africa, India, and Australia, but are not well-known. The so-called “African olive” produces a black, oil-bearing fruit much like an olive. It is common as a snack in northern Nigeria. The “Chinese olive” is also a species of Canarium and may be a possible cultural substitute, if it produces edible fruit and oil. The “Russian olive” grown in dry regions of the world is a member of the Elaeagnus family and not a true olive. A variety of olive (Olea cuspidate) is used for building in India and Nepal, but it is probably not possible to use it in the Bible except perhaps in a study Bible where you could say that the biblical olive was related to this tree.
Since most of the kinds of olive trees in the world do not have edible fruit, it may not be possible to substitute a local variety. If it is done, however, a footnote would be required saying that the Palestinian kind produced edible fruit and oil. If a variety of Canarium is eaten in your area, you could use the local name for it. Otherwise transliterate from a major language.
The various Greek, Aramaic, Ge’ez, and Latin and Hebrew terms that are translated as “sea,” “ocean,” or “lake” in English are all translated in Chichewa with one term: nyanja. Malawi, where Chichewa is spoken, has a lot of lakes but does not share a border with the ocean. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
God transcends gender, but most languages are limited to grammatical gender expressed in pronouns. In the case of English, this is traditionally confined to “he” (or in the forms “his,” “him,” and “himself”), “she” (and “her,” “hers,” and “herself”), and “it” (and “its” and “itself”).
Modern Mandarin Chinese, however, offers another possibility. Here, the third-person singular pronoun is always pronounced the same (tā), but it is written differently according to its gender (他 is “he,” 她 is “she,” and 它/牠 is “it” and their respective derivative forms). In each of these characters, the first (or upper) part defines the gender (man, woman, or thing/animal), while the second element gives the clue to its pronunciation.
In 1930, after a full century with dozens of Chinese translations, Bible translator Wang Yuande (王元德) coined a new “godly” pronoun: 祂. Chinese readers immediately knew how to pronounce it: tā. But they also recognized that the first part of that character, signifying something spiritual, clarified that each person of the Trinity has no gender aside from being God.
While the most important Protestant and Catholic Chinese versions respectively have opted not to use 祂, some Bible translations do and it is widely used in hymnals and other Christian materials. Among the translations that use 祂 to refer to “God” were early versions of Lü Zhenzhong’s (呂振中) version (New Testament: 1946, complete Bible: 1970). R.P. Kramers (in The Bible Translator 1956, p. 152ff. ) explains why later versions of Lü’s translation did not continue with this practice: “This new way of writing ‘He,’ however, has created a minor problem of its own: must this polite form be used whenever Jesus is referred to? Lü follows the rule that, wherever Jesus is referred to as a human being, the normal tā (他) is written; where he is referred to as divine, especially after the ascension, the reverential tā (祂) is used.”
In that system, one kind of pronoun is used for humans (male and female alike) and others for natural elements, non-liquid masses, and some spiritual entities (one other is used for large animals and another one for miscellaneous items). While in these languages the pronoun for spiritual entities used to be employed when referring to God, this has changed into the use of the human pronoun.
Lynell Zogbo (in The Bible Translator 1989, p. 401ff. ) explains: “From informal discussions with young Christians especially, it would appear that, at least for some people, the experience and/or concepts of Christianity are affecting the choice of pronoun for God. Some people explain that God is no longer ‘far away,’ but is somehow tangible and personal. For these speakers God has shifted over into the human category.”
In Kouya, God (the Father) and Jesus are referred to with the human pronoun ɔ, whereas the Holy Spirit is referred to with a non-human pronoun. (Northern Grebo and Western Krahn make a similar distinction.)
Eddie Arthur, a former Kouya Bible translation consultant, says the following: “We tried to insist that this shouldn’t happen, but the Kouya team members were insistent that the human pronoun for the Spirit would not work.”
In Burmese, the pronoun ko taw (ကိုယ်တော်) is used either as 2nd person (you) or 3rd person (he, him, his) reference. “This term clearly has its root in the religious language in Burmese. No ordinary persons are addressed or known by this pronoun because it is reserved for Buddhist monks, famous religious teachers, and in the case of Christianity, the Trinity.” (Source: Gam Seng Shae in The Bible Translator 2002, p. 202ff. )
In Thai, the pronoun phra`ong (พระองค์) is used, a gender-neutral pronoun which must refer to a previously introduced royal or divine being. Similarly, in Northern Khmer, which is spoken in Thailand, “an honorific divine pronoun” is used for the pronoun referring to the persons of the Trinity (source: David Thomas in The Bible Translator 1993, p. 445 ). In Urak Lawoi’, another language spoken in Thailand, the translation often uses tuhat (ตูฮัด) — “God” — ”as a divine pronoun where Thai has phra’ong even though it’s actually a noun.” (Source for Thai and Urak Lawoi’: Stephen Pattemore)
The English “Contemporary Torah” addresses the question of God and gendered pronouns by mostly avoiding pronouns in the first five books of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (unless God is referred to as “lord,” “father,” “king,” or “warrior”). It does that by either using passive constructs (“He gave us” vs. “we were given”), by using the adjective “divine” or by using “God” rather than a pronoun.
Some Protestant and Orthodox English Bibles use a referential capitalized spelling when referring to the persons of the Trinity with “He,” “His,” “Him,” or “Himself.” This includes for instance the New American Standard Bible or The Orthodox New Testament, but most translations do not. Two other languages where this is also done (in most Bible translations) are Twents as well as Indonesian and Malay. In the latter two languages this follows the language usage according to the Qur’an, which in turn predicts that usage (see Soesilo in The Bible Translator 1991, p. 442ff. and The Bible Translator 1997, p. 433ff. ).
On that day: These words mark the beginning of a new discourse unit when they occur at the beginning of a sentence in Hebrew, as in 12.4, 6, 8, 11; 13.1; 14.20. Here they are not in fact at the beginning of the sentence, and do not indicate a new unit. Of the available versions, only King James Version and Revised Version follow the Hebrew word order. In many languages as in English, it may be more natural for a time expression to come at the beginning of the sentence. If so, then translators should consider some form of wording which is not identical with the wording they use in places where “On that day” does function as the marker of a new unit. Translators might say, for instance, “When that day [or, time, as in Bible en français courant and Parola Del Signore: La Bibbia in Lingua Corrente] comes” instead of “On that day.” It is better not to omit the phrase completely as Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch and Contemporary English Version do.
His feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives: This statement is made about the LORD, and is one of the most striking places in the Old Testament where the LORD is spoken of as if he had body parts like a human being. His feet is a figure of speech called a synecdoche, in which a part stands for the whole: his feet represent the LORD himself in the act of standing. Translators should retain the figure if at all possible. In some cultures such language is offensive when used about God, and in cases like this, translators may give the meaning of the figure, namely, “he shall stand.” But if they feel obliged to do this, they should put the literal form of the Hebrew in a footnote.
The Mount of Olives is a ridge about four kilometers (two and a half miles) long, to the east of Jerusalem. It is higher than the city and completely blocks the view eastwards from the city. This is the only time the name Mount of Olives occurs in this form in the Old Testament. Its significance for the prophet probably lay in the fact that this was the place where Ezekiel saw the glory of the LORD stand when it was departing from the city (Ezek 11.23). When the glory of the LORD returned (Ezek 43.2), it also came from the east, but no mention is made of a mountain on that occasion. The Mount of Olives is also associated with the departure of King David from Jerusalem when he was fleeing from Absalom (2 Sam 15.30). In many languages the name Mount of Olives will be familiar from the New Testament. It may be translated as “the mountain where olive trees grow.”
Which lies before Jerusalem on the east: This clause explains the relationship of the Mount of Olives to the city for the benefit of readers who were not familiar with the geography of the Jerusalem area. In many languages a shorter form of expression will be sufficient, such as “to the east of Jerusalem” (Good News Translation) or “east of Jerusalem” (New International Version, Contemporary English Version).
The Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley: The effect of the LORD’s presence is here described in terms of the effect of a very powerful earthquake. This kind of comparison is found quite frequently in the Old Testament, for example in Jdg 5.5; Psa 97.5; Amos 9.5; Micah 1.3-4; Nahum 1.5. There is no existing valley such as that described here. Its creation is part of the change that will take place when the LORD finally intervenes in human history. In translating a very wide valley, translators should try to use a word that describes a broad and relatively flat-bottomed area between the mountains. The word “gorge” in Jerusalem Bible and New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh refers to a steep and usually narrow cleft, and is rather misleading. Split in two … may also be expressed as “divided down the middle, forming a wide valley that runs [or, goes] from east to west” (similarly Contemporary English Version).
So that one half of the Mount shall withdraw northward, and the other half southward: These clauses add further detail about the geographical changes that will take place when the LORD comes. In meaning they match fully with the previous clause. Withdraw means “move backwards,” that is, away from the newly formed valley. The mention of northward and southward means that with east and west above, all the four main points of the compass have been mentioned. In many languages the terms for these directions may be complex expressions, but translators need not worry about this, as some of the Hebrew words are also complex. The word for west, for instance, is related to the Mediterranean Sea, and of the two different words used for east, the second is directly related to the sunrise, and the first is related to the direction straight ahead, on the assumption that the speaker is facing the rising sun. See also the notes on verse 8.
The whole description in this verse has some points of resemblance with the description given by the Jewish writer Josephus in the late first century A.D. of the earthquake that took place in the days of King Uzziah, about 760-750 B.C. (compare Amos 1.1). It seems that there was a strong folk memory of this event (which is referred to in the next verse), but the changes pictured here are on a much vaster scale than what happened in Uzziah’s day.
In traditional Christian interpretation, this verse is often linked with the ascension of Jesus from the Mount of Olives and the promise of his return (Acts 1.9-12). There are various views about these events, and translators must be careful not to slant their rendering toward any particular interpretation, or even to a Christian interpretation rather than a Jewish one. For instance, it would be quite unacceptable to translate verses 3-4 here in such a way as to give the impression that “the LORD” or his feet were intended to refer to the LORD Jesus. This may eventually prove to be the case, but neither the translation nor any footnotes in a Bible to be published by the Bible Societies should state this directly. A fuller discussion of the events of the end time is the task of theologians and preachers but not of translators.
Quoted with permission from Clark, David J. & Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Zechariah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2002. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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