complete verse (1 Samuel 30:19)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of 1 Samuel 30:19:

  • Kupsabiny: “Nothing whatsoever was lost! David rescued children and old people whom the enemies had taken along including the teenage boys and girls and everything those enemies had looted.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “David brought back all the things they had plundered and taken away, sons, daughters, along with all the goods they had taken for themselves. Nothing was missing.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “Nothing at-all (was) missing, young/child our old/elderly-person, male or female, or anything-else the Amaleknon had-taken. David recovered/reclaim/took-back all this,” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “Nothing was missing. They took all their people back to Ziklag—young people and old people, their wives, their sons and their daughters. They also recovered all the other things that the men of the Amalek people-group had taken from Ziklag.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

David

The name that is transliterated as “David” in English is translated in Spanish Sign Language with the sign signifying king and a sling (referring to 1 Samuel 17:49 and 2 Samuel 5:4). (Source: John Elwode in The Bible Translator 2008, p. 78ff. )


“Elizabeth” in Spanish Sign Language, source: Sociedad Bíblica de España

In German Sign Language it is only the sling. (See here ).


“David” in German Sign Language (source )

For more information on translations of proper names with sign language see Sign Language Bible Translations Have Something to Say to Hearing Christians .

The (Protestant) Mandarin Chinese transliteration of “David” is 大卫 (衛) / Dàwèi which carries an additional meaning of “Great Protector.”

Click or tap here to see a short video clip about David (source: Bible Lands 2012)

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: David .

Translation commentary on 1 Samuel 30:19

Small or great: see the comments on verse 2. Contemporary English Version has “No one was missing—young or old, sons or daughters.”

Spoil: see the comments at verse 16.

The conjunction or is not intended to indicate that there is a clear difference in meaning between spoil and anything that had been taken. The two expressions refer to essentially the same objects, with the words anything that had been taken emphasizing that everything was recovered. The Hebrew is more literally “… spoil, up to everything that they had taken.”

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellington, John E. A Handbook on the First and Second Books of Samuel, Volume 1. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2001. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .