altar

Click here to view graphically

The Greek, Latin and Hebrew that is translated as “altar” in English is translated in a number of ways:

  • Obolo: ntook or “raised structure for keeping utensils (esp. sacrifice)” (source: Enene Enene)
  • Muna: medha kaefoampe’a or “offering table” (source: René van den Berg)
  • Luchazi: muytula or “the place where one sets the burden down”/”the place where the life is laid down” (source: E. Pearson in The Bible Translator 1954, p. 160ff. )
  • Tzotzil: “where they place God’s gifts” (source: John Beekman in Notes on Translation, March 1965, p. 2ff.)
  • Tsafiki: “table for giving to God” (source: Bruce Moore in Notes on Translation 1/1992, p. 1ff.)
  • Noongar: karla-kooranyi or “sacred fire” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang)
  • Uma: “offering-burning table” (source: Uma Back Translation)
  • Yakan: “place for sacrificing” (source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Tagbanwa: “burning-place” (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Tibetan: mchod khri (མཆོད་​ཁྲི།) or “offering throne” (source: gSungrab website )
  • Bura-Pabir: “sacrifice mound” (source: Andy Warrren-Rothlin)
  • Kalanga: “fireplace of sacrifice” (source: project-specific notes in Paratext)
The Ignaciano translators decided to translate the difficult term in that language according to the focus of each New Testament passage in which the word appears (click or tap here to see the rest of this insight

Willis Ott (in Notes on Translation 88/1982, p. 18ff.) explains:

  • Matt. 5:23,24: “When you take your offering to God, and arriving, you remember…, do not offer your gift yet. First go to your brother…Then it is fitting to return and offer your offering to God.” (The focus is on improving relationships with people before attempting to improve a relationship with God, so the means of offering, the altar, is not focal.)
  • Matt. 23:18 (19,20): “You also teach erroneously: ‘If someone makes a promise, swearing by the offering-place/table, he is not guilty if he should break the promise. But if he swears by the gift that he put on the offering-place/table, he will be guilty if he breaks the promise.'”
  • Luke 1:11: “…to the right side of the table where they burn incense.”
  • Luke 11.51. “…the one they killed in front of the temple (or the temple enclosure).” (The focus is on location, with overtones on: “their crime was all the more heinous for killing him there”.)
  • Rom. 11:3: “Lord, they have killed all my fellow prophets that spoke for you. They do not want anyone to give offerings to you in worship.” (The focus is on the people’s rejection of religion, with God as the object of worship.)
  • 1Cor. 9:13 (10:18): “Remember that those that attend the temple have rights to eat the foods that people bring as offerings to God. They have rights to the meat that the people offer.” (The focus is on the right of priests to the offered food.)
  • Heb. 7:13: “This one of whom we are talking is from another clan. No one from that clan was ever a priest.” (The focus in on the legitimacy of this priest’s vocation.)
  • Jas. 2:21: “Remember our ancestor Abraham, when God tested him by asking him to give him his son by death. Abraham was to the point of stabbing/killing his son, thus proving his obedience.” (The focus is on the sacrifice as a demonstration of faith/obedience.)
  • Rev. 6:9 (8:3,5; 9:13; 14:18; 16:7): “I saw the souls of them that…They were under the table that holds God’s fire/coals.” (This keeps the concepts of: furniture, receptacle for keeping fire, and location near God.)
  • Rev. 11:1: “Go to the temple, Measure the building and the inside enclosure (the outside is contrasted in v. 2). Measure the burning place for offered animals. Then count the people who are worshiping there.” (This altar is probably the brazen altar in a temple on earth, since people are worshiping there and since outside this area conquerors are allowed to subjugate for a certain time.)

See also altar (Acts 17:23).


In the Hebraic English translation of Everett Fox it is translated as slaughter-site and likewise in the German translation by Buber / Rosenzweig as Schlachtstatt.

complete verse (Exodus 38:7)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Exodus 38:7:

  • Kupsabiny: “After that he entered (them) into the rings which were in/on both sides of the altar for when it is carried. It was made from boards and the inside was hollow/open.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “They inserted the carrying poles into rings to both sides to carry the altar. They made the altar from planks with hollow vat the center.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “They put-through/inserted the poles into the seemingly-rings on each sides of the altar so the altar can-be-lifted. They made the altar hallow, and it is open inside.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Bariai: “Those two poles were for the shouldering of the table. He inserted them into the table’s four ring-handles, one pole on one side, and the other pole on the other side. And he enclosed that table with good pieces of wood, yet he left the opening below and above so that it remained uncovered.” (Source: Bariai Back Translation)
  • Opo: “They put it through at place which be present its corner, one on right, the one on left. They build white-acacia for altar it have hole like box.” (Source: Opo Back Translation)
  • English: “They put the poles through the rings on each side of the altar. The poles were for carrying the altar.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Exod 38:6 - 38:7

These verses include the same details given in 27.6-8 with only a few changes. Verse 6 condenses what is commanded in 27.6, and of course it changes the tense of the verbs to show completed action. And he put the poles through the rings is literally “and he caused the poles to enter into the rings.” Note that it says the poles and not “its poles” as in 27.7. And here it says on the sides of the altar, not “the two sides of the altar.” To carry it with them, literally “to carry it by them,” is changed from “in carrying it” in 27.7.

He made it hollow, with boards is identical with the first part of 27.8, with the exception of the change in the verb. This probably means “he made it as a hollow wooden box” (Translator’s Old Testament), or “was shaped like an open box” (Contemporary English Version). (See the comment at 27.8.)

Quoted with permission from Osborn, Noel D. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on Exodus. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1999. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .