complete verse (2 Corinthians 6:14)

Following are a number of back-translations of 2 Corinthians 6:14:

  • Uma: “Don’t be connected with people who don’t believe in the Lord Yesus. It just isn’t fitting. Do you think that people who do God’s will and people who reject God are just the same? Can it happen that light mixes with dark?” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
  • Yakan: “Do not go along with the people who do not follow Isa Almasi, because good and bad cannot be mixed. Like light and darkness also cannot be mixed.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “Brethren, don’t you marry people who are not believers in our Lord Jesus, because it’s not allowable that good and bad become one. It’s not also allowable that light and darkness be together.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “Don’t marry or be-partners-with non believers because you won’t be-in-rhythm. Is it perhaps possible (expects negative answer) that a righteous and a crooked (i.e. wicked) person can be-in-harmony? Is it indeed possible (expects negative answer) that brightness and darkness can accompany-one-another?” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Tagbanwa: “Brethren, is it not so that, if you use- two animals -to-plow in a single yoke, it will not work out if one is a horse, and the other is a cow? Like that also, it will not work out if believers in Cristo are-constant-companions-of those who don’t believe. For what’s this, do righteousness and evil go-together or is it like that too with light with darkness?” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Tenango Otomi: “And now, do not want that you carry along the people who are not believers. Because it is by another word which the believer walks by than the word which the person who is not a believer walks by. Concerning the person who walks in all that is good, he does not do the same as does the person who walks in evil. They walk differently, just like light appears different than darkness.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)

righteous, righteousness

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The Greek, Hebrew, and Latin terms that are translated in English mostly as “righteous” as an adjective or personified noun or “righteousness” (also as “upright(ness)” and “just(ice)”) are most commonly expressed with concept of “straightness,” though this may be expressed in a number of ways. (Click or tap here to see the details)

Following is a list of (back-) translations of various languages:

  • Bambara, Southern Bobo Madaré, Chokwe (ululi), Amganad Ifugao, Chol, Eastern Maninkakan, Toraja-Sa’dan, Pamona, Batak Toba, Bilua, Tiv: “be straight”
  • Laka: “follow the straight way” or “to straight-straight” (a reduplicated form for emphasis)
  • Sayula Popoluca: “walk straight”
  • Highland Puebla Nahuatl, Kekchí, Muna: “have a straight heart”
  • Kipsigis: “do the truth”
  • Mezquital Otomi: “do according to the truth”
  • Huautla Mazatec: “have truth”
  • Yine: “fulfill what one should do”
  • Indonesian: “be true”
  • Navajo (Dinė): “do just so”
  • Anuak: “do as it should be”
  • Mossi: “have a white stomach” (see also happiness / joy)
  • Paasaal: “white heart” (source: Fabian N. Dapila in The Bible Translator 2024, p. 415ff.)
  • (San Mateo del Mar Huave: “completely good” (the translation does not imply sinless perfection)
  • Nuer: “way of right” (“there is a complex concept of “right” vs. ‘left’ in Nuer where ‘right’ indicates that which is masculine, strong, good, and moral, and ‘left’ denotes what is feminine, weak, and sinful (a strictly masculine viewpoint!) The ‘way of right’ is therefore righteousness, but of course women may also attain this way, for the opposition is more classificatory than descriptive.”) (This and all above from Bratcher / Nida except for Bilua: Carl Gross; Tiv: Rob Koops; Muna: René van den Berg)
  • Central Subanen: “wise-good” (source: Robert Brichoux in OPTAT 1988/2, p. 80ff. )
  • Xicotepec De Juárez Totonac: “live well”
  • Mezquital Otomi: “goodness before the face of God” (source for this and one above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
  • Eastern Huasteca Nahuatl: “the result of heart-straightening” (source: Nida 1947, p. 224)
  • Eastern Highland Otomi: “entirely good” (when referred to God), “do good” or “not be a debtor as God sees one” (when referred to people)
  • Carib: “level”
  • Tzotzil: “straight-hearted”
  • Ojitlán Chinantec: “right and straight”
  • Yatzachi Zapotec: “walk straight” (source for this and four previous: John Beekman in Notes on Translation November 1964, p. 1-22)
  • Makonde: “doing what God wants” (in a context of us doing) and “be good in God’s eyes” (in the context of being made righteous by God) (note that justify / justification is translated as “to be made good in the eyes of God.” (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)
  • Aari: The Pauline word for “righteous” is generally rendered by “makes one without sin” in the Aari, sometimes “before God” is added for clarity. (Source: Loren Bliese)
  • North Alaskan Inupiatun: “having sin taken away” (Source: Nida 1952, p. 144)
  • Nyamwezi: wa lole: “just” or “someone who follows the law of God” (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
  • Venda: “nothing wrong, OK” (Source: J.A. van Roy in The Bible Translator 1972, p. 418ff. )
  • Ekari: maakodo bokouto or “enormous truth” (the same word that is also used for “truth“; bokouto — “enormous” — is being used as an attribute for abstract nouns to denote that they are of God [see also here]; source: Marion Doble in The Bible Translator 1963, p. 37ff. ).
  • Guhu-Samane: pobi or “right” (also: “right (side),” “(legal) right,” “straightness,” “correction,” “south,” “possession,” “pertinence,” “kingdom,” “fame,” “information,” or “speech” — “According to [Guhu-Samane] thinking there is a common core of meaning among all these glosses. Even from an English point of view the first five can be seen to be closely related, simply because of their similarity in English. However, from that point the nuances of meaning are not so apparent. They relate in some such a fashion as this: As one faces the morning sun, south lies to the right hand (as north lies to the left); then at one’s right hand are his possessions and whatever pertains to him; thus, a rich man’s many possessions and scope of power and influence is his kingdom; so, the rich and other important people encounter fame; and all of this spreads as information and forms most of the framework of the people’s speech.”) (Source: Ernest Richert in Notes on Translation 1964, p. 11ff.)
  • German New Testament translation by Berger / Nord (publ. 1999): Gerechtheit, a neologism to differentiate it from the commonly-used Gerechtigkeit which can mean “righteousness” but is more often used in modern German as “fairness” (Berger / Nord especially use Gerechtheit in Letter to the Romans) or Gerechtestun, also a neologism, meaning “righteous deeds” (especially in Letter to the Ephesians)
  • “did what he should” (Eastern Highland Otomi)
  • “a clear man, good [man]” (Mairasi) (source: Enggavoter 2004)

See also respectable, righteous, righteous (person), devout, and She is more in the right(eous) than I.

Translation commentary on 2 Corinthians 6:14

Mismated translates a word meaning “yoked with another of a different kind.” Paul may have had in mind the admonition of Deut 22.10, which forbids plowing with an ox and a donkey yoked together. In what way the Christians are not to be yoked together is not stated. Good News Translation interprets this as working together. Possibly it refers to marriage, but this meaning is probably too limited in this context. The verb occurs only here in all the New Testament. But a related word is found in Phil 4.3, where it is translated “yokefellow.” Other translations of the verb here have rendered it “harness yourselves in an uneven team with” (New Jerusalem Bible) and “consent to be yokefellows” (Knox). The verb and the negation are together translated in Contemporary English Version as “stay away from…,” by Moffatt as “keep out of all incongruous ties with…,” and elsewhere as “refuse to be united with….”

Unbelievers refers to persons who are not Christians. More specifically, in the context between appeals to the Corinthians to be reconciled to Paul, he possibly has in mind his opponents in the church at Corinth, who have rejected his apostolic authority. In areas where Islam is strong, translators must pay careful attention to the meaning of the word for unbelievers, since it is very likely to carry the meaning of “non-Muslim.” In such cases it is better to use an expression like “people who do not believe in Christ.”

Partnership … fellowship: these two words are different in Greek but virtually synonymous in meaning in this context. The first is used only here in the New Testament and comes from an expression for having something together with someone else. The related verb form occurs in 1 Cor 9.10, 12; 10.21. The second occurs frequently—especially to describe the close association believers have with each other (Acts 2.42 and Gal 2.9) or the fellowship of believers with Christ (1 Cor 1.9). Its basic meaning is that several people share a common feature or common activity, and this binds them in a special unity.

Righteousness: in Paul’s writings the word righteousness usually refers to being put right with God, but here the sense seems to be that of right conduct. See also the comments on this term at 3.9 and 5.21.

Iniquity: this same term is translated elsewhere in RSV as “wickedness” (Matt 24.12) and “lawlessness” (2 Thes 2.7; Heb 1.9; 1 John 3.4). It carries the basic meaning of illegality or violation of God’s laws and stands in radical opposition to righteousness both here and in Rom 6.19. Since these two terms are abstract, some languages will require that they be personified by talking about “a righteous person” or “righteous people” on the one hand and “an evil person” or “evil people” on the other.

Light and darkness, as with righteousness and iniquity, express opposites. Here light and darkness are used metaphorically to refer to moral qualities or to belief and unbelief (see Rom 13.12; Eph 5.11-14; 1 Thes 5.5). In some languages it may be necessary to use the words for “daylight” and “night” to express these two figures of speech.

The two questions in this verse are rhetorical questions. The implicit reply to both questions is that there is certainly no partnership, no fellowship. God’s New Covenant retains the question form but adds the word “why?” to the first question; such an addition in English clearly suggests that a negative response is implied: “Why, what kinship is there between righteousness and lawlessness?” In languages where the rhetorical nature of these questions may not be recognized, translators may need to restructure and express these two questions as emphatic statements. Others will possibly express the idea as follows: “a righteous person and an evil person cannot agree with each other, and light cannot unite with darkness. Is this not true?”

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellingworth, Paul. A Handbook on Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .