18The prince shall not take any of the inheritance of the people, thrusting them out of their holding; he shall give his sons their inheritance out of his own holding, so that none of my people shall be dispossessed of their holding.”
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Ezekiel 46:18:
Kupsabiny: “A king must not rob people of their things. Any land that he gives as inheritance to his children, must be divided from his own land only so that he does not oppress his people by robbing their fields/land.’” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “The leader should not take the land of the people. When he will-give land to his children, it-should only just be his land that he will-give, so-that my people will- not -lose the land.’” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “The king must not take any land that the people own and force them to live somewhere else. The land that he gives to his sons must be from his own property, not from anyone else’s property, in order that none of my people will be forced to leave his own property.’ ’” (Source: Translation for Translators)
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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.
The prince shall not take any of the inheritance of the people: Not only do the rules in verses 16-18 prevent the king’s family from losing their family property, but they also prevent the king from using his power to take other people’s family property. Again inheritance refers to family property.
Thrusting them out of their property refers to the king taking the property of other people by force. Thrusting renders the same Hebrew word translated “oppress” in 45.8b (see the comments there). Complete Jewish Bible renders this clause as “thereby evicting them wrongfully from their property.”
He shall give his sons their inheritance out of his own property: See verse 16.
So that none of my people shall be dispossessed of his property is literally “so that my people may not be scattered, every man from his possession” (similarly King James Version). The Hebrew here gives a strong picture of people being forced to leave their homes and being scattered all over the country. The rule in this verse aims to prevent common people becoming homeless. My people refers to God’s people, the ordinary Israelites.
A model for this verse is:
• The king must not force anyone else off their land or take any of the family property of the other Israelites. If he wants to give his sons more land or property, he must give them parts of his own family property, [not someone else’s]. This is so that none of my people will lose their family property [and become homeless and destitute].”
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 .
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