adultery

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The Hebrew and Greek that is translated as “adultery” in English (here etymologically meaning “to alter”) is typically understood as “marital infidelity.” It is (back-) translated in the following ways:

  • Highland Totonac: “to do something together”
  • Yucateco: “pair-sin”
  • Ngäbere: “robbing another’s half self-possession” (compare “fornication” which is “robbing self-possession,” that is, to rob what belongs to a person)
  • Kaqchikel, Chol: “to act like a dog” (see also licentiousness)
  • Toraja-Sa’dan: “to measure the depth of the river of (another’s) marriage”
  • North Alaskan Inupiatun: “married people using what is not theirs” (compare “fornication” which is “unmarried people using what is not theirs”) (source for this and all above: Bratcher / Nida)
  • Purari: “play hands with” or “play eyes with”
  • Chicahuaxtla Triqui: “talk secretly with spouses of our fellows”
  • Isthmus Zapotec: “go in with other people’s spouses”
  • Tzeltal: “practice illicit relationship with women”
  • Huehuetla Tepehua: “live with some one who isn’t your wife”
  • Central Tarahumara: “sleep with a strange partner”
  • Hopi: “tamper with marriage” (source for this and seven above: Waterhouse / Parrott in Notes on Translation October 1967, p. 1ff.)
  • German: Ehebrecher or “marriage breaker” / Ehe brechen or “breaking of marriage” (source: Zetzsche)
  • In Falam Chin the term for “adultery” is the phrase for “to share breast” which relates to adultery by either sex. (Source: David Clark)
  • In Ixcatlán Mazatec a specification needs to be made to include both genders. (Source: Robert Bascom)
  • Likewise in Hiligaynon: “commit-adultery-with-a-man or commit-adultery-with-a-woman” (source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)

See also adultery, adulterer, adulteress, and you shall not commit adultery.

idol / idols

The Hebrew, Greek and Latin that is translated as “idol(s)” in English is translated in Central Subanen as ledawan or “images.” (Source: Robert Brichoux in OPTAT 1988/2, p. 80ff. )

In German, typically the term Götze is used. Originally this was used as a term of endearment for Gott (“God” — see here ), later for “icon” and “image, likeness.” Luther started to use it in the 16th century in the meaning of “false god, idol.”

Other terms that are used in German include Götzenbild(er) (“image[s] of idols”) or Bildnis (“image” — Protestant) / Kultbild (“cultish image” — Catholic) (used for instance in Exodus 20:4 and Deuteronomy 5:8). The latest revision of the Catholic Einheitsübersetzung (publ. 2016) also uses the neologism Nichtse (“nothings”) in 1 Chron. 16:26 and Psalm 96:5. (Source: Zetzsche)

See also worthless idols.

complete verse (Ezekiel 23:37)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Ezekiel 23:37:

  • Kupsabiny: “They worshipped idols and murdered (people). They listened to idols and killed their children whom they bore for me to become sacrifices to those idols.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “For they committed-adultery and killed. They committed-adultery by worshipping little-gods, and their children themselves, whom they dedicated to me when they were born, they offered to the little-gods/false-gods as their food.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “It is as though the people of those cities have committed adultery and have murdered people. They have been unfaithful to me by worshiping idols. They have even sacrificed their own children, who belonged to me, to be food for their idols.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

1st person pronoun referring to God (Japanese)

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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 first person singular and plural pronoun (“I” and “we” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. The most commonly used watashi/watakushi (私) is typically used when the speaker is humble and asking for help. In these verses, where God / Jesus is referring to himself, watashi is also used but instead of the kanji writing system (私) the syllabary hiragana (わたし) is used to distinguish God from others.

(Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )

See also pronoun for “God”.

Translation commentary on Ezekiel 23:37

For they have committed adultery, and blood is upon their hands: God states two charges against the sisters immediately. They are adultery and “murder” (Good News Translation). Their adultery consisted of being unfaithful to God by worshiping idols. Blood is upon their hands means they were guilty of murder.

With their idols they have committed adultery: For the Hebrew word rendered idols (“foul idols” in New Jerusalem Bible), see 6.4. Contemporary English Version uses nonfigurative language here by saying “They have been unfaithful by worshiping idols.” This is a good model if using adultery would confuse readers, but otherwise translators should try to keep this imagery.

And they have even offered up to them for food the sons whom they had borne to me: Compare 16.20-21 and 20.26. The sisters were murderers because they even killed their own children as sacrifices to the false gods. Child sacrifice was practiced by the Canaanite people among whom the Israelites lived, but the Old Testament always condemned it. They have even offered up to them for food means that when the sisters sacrificed their children to the false gods, they thought it was a way of feeding the gods. Sons is better rendered “children” (Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version) in this context. Whom they had borne to me highlights the fact that God had a marriage relationship with Israel, so God claimed the children of Oholah and Oholibah as his own.

A model for this verse is:

• For they have committed adultery against me by worshiping the idols of false gods. And they have committed murder by killing their children and giving them to the false gods as if they were food for them. Those were my children too!

Quoted with permission from Gross, Carl & Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Ezekiel. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2016. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .