3So Abraham rose early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him and his son Isaac; he cut the wood for the burnt offering and set out and went to the place in the distance that God had shown him.
The Greek terms that are translated uniformly as “sacrifice” or “offering” in English have the option of various terms in Luang with different shades of meaning.
For Acts 24:17, himima-rere’a (“holding two hands out”). “The focus of this term is on the gift being given by a person of lower position to a person of higher position.”
For Acts 21:26, hniurliwtu-nwali odawa (“pour out sweat [and] turn into sweaty smell”). “The focus is on the personal cost of the sacrifice.”
For Gen. 22:2-8 and Gen. 22:13, hopopa-hegeuru (“peace sign”). “The focus is on the animal or object being sacrificed, as in the story of the sacrifice of Isaac. This term was used throughout that whole chapter. This term is also used in verses that speak of Jesus as the sacrifice for our sins.”
For Acts 15:29, hoi-tani (“serve with right hand – serve with left”). “This term is used in referring to sacrifices or worship offered to idols or pagan gods.”
Source: Kathy Taber in Notes on Translation 1/1999, p. 9-16.
The Hebrew olah (עֹלָה) originally means “that which goes up (in smoke).” English Bibles often translates it as “burnt-offering” or “whole burnt-offering,” focusing on the aspect of the complete burning of the offering.
The GreekSeptuagint and the LatinVulgate Bibles translate it as holokautōma / holocautōsis (ὁλοκαύτωμα / ὁλοκαύτωσις) and holocaustum, respectively, meaning “wholly burnt.” While a form of this term is widely used in many Romance languages (Spanish: holocaustos, French: holocaustes, Italian: olocausti, Portuguese: holocaustos) and originally also in the Catholic tradition of English Bible translations, it is largely not used in English anymore today (the preface of the revised edition of the Catholic New American Bible of 2011: “There have been changes in vocabulary; for example, the term ‘holocaust’ is now normally reserved for the sacrilegious attempt to destroy the Jewish people by the Third Reich.”)
Since translation into Georgian was traditionally done on the basis of the Greek Septuagint, a transliteration of holokautōma was used as well, which was changed to a translation with the meaning of “burnt offering” when the Old Testament was retranslated in the 1980’s on the basis of the Hebrew text.
In the Koongo (Ki-manianga) translation by the Alliance Biblique de la R.D. Congo (publ. in 2015) olah is translated as “kill and offer sacrifice” (source: Anicet Bassilua) and in Elhomwe as “fire offering.” (Source: project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
The English translation of Everett Fox uses offering-up (similarly, the German translation by Buber-Rosenzweig has Darhöhung and the French translation by Chouraqui montée).
The Greek and Hebrew that is translated as “early in the morning” or “daybreak” in English is translated in Low German as vür Dau un Daak or “before dew and day break” (translation by Johannes Jessen, publ. 1937, republ. 2006).
The name that is transliterated as “Isaac” in English is signed in Spanish Sign Language and French Sign Language with a sign that is linked to his mother’s laughter when she hears that she will be pregnant with him (referring to Genesis 18:12 – 18:15) and also is the meaning of the Hebrew “Isaac” (Yitschaq — “he laughs”):
Click or tap here to see the rest of this insight.
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 to do this is through the usage (or a lack) of an honorific prefix as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017.
The concept of “informing” (“telling”) is translated in the Shinkaiyaku Bible as o-tsuge (お告げ), combining “inform / tell” (tsuge) with the respectful prefix o-. (Source: S. E. Doi, see also S. E. Doi in Journal of Translation, 18/2022, p. 37ff. )
The name that is transliterated as “Abraham” in English is translated in the vast majority of sign languages, including American Sign Language with the sign signifying “hold back arm” (referring to Genesis 22:12).
In Vietnamese (Hanoi) Sign Language it is translated with a sign for that demonstrates his new destiny. Previously, he had been called to wander from his home, and the name “Abram” reflected this movement (see here). The new sign name is in one location and stays there, showing Abraham will be given a land to call his own. At this time, Abraham was in the southern part of Canaan, which is shown on the base arm by the location near the elbow. (Source: The Vietnamese Sign Language translation team, VSLBT)
“Abraham” in Vietnamese Sign Language, source: SooSL
In Tira it is transliterated as Abaram. The choice of this, rather than the widely-known “Ibrahim,” as used in the Tira translation of the Qu’ran, was to offset it against the Muslim transliteration which originates from Arabic. (Source: J.A. Naudé, C.L. Miller Naudé, J.O. Obono in Acta Theologica 43/2, 2023, p. 129ff. )
Click or tap here to see two short video clips about Abraham (source: Bible Lands 2012)
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Genesis 22:3:
Kankanaey: “When it-got-light then (i.e., next day), Abraham went-early to go get-firewood to use-for-burning and he loaded-it (lit. caused-it-to-be-carried) on his donkey. Then he called Isaac and two slaves and they set-off to go to the place that God had told him.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Newari: “Getting up early the next morning, Abraham split wood to light a fire, [and] tied a saddle on the body of a donkey. And taking his son Isaac and two servants he went toward the place God had told him about.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon: “Therefore very early the next morning, Abraham chopped wood as firewood for the offering, and he loaded it on his donkey. He set-out with Isaac and his two male servants to the place that God had-said to him.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
English: “So Abraham got up early the next morning, put a saddle on his donkey, and took with him two of his servants along with his son, Isaac. He also chopped some wood to kindle a fire for a burnt offering. Then they started traveling to the place God told him about.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
Language in the Caucasus (oral translation): “One day God wanted to check/test the prophet Ibrahim. He tells him, ‘You [should/must] completely-burn-as-sacrifice your only dear son Isaac for me on the mountain that I tell you in the land Moriah.” (“This particular story in Genesis does not call Abraham a prophet, but he is understood as such by Islam, which is the background for many OBS readers/listeners. The addition here is perfectly appropriate, since there already is prior Scripture where Abraham is called a prophet [Gen. 20:7, where God instructs Abimelech to return Sarah to Abraham.”]) (Source: Erwin R. Komen and Roman Kim in The Bible Translator 2023, p. 21ff.)
The order of events in verse 3 are not entirely as they would happen. Accordingly, following the comments on the vocabulary, it will be necessary to look at the sequence of events.
So Abraham rose early in the morning: So serves as a marker of consequence following Gen 22.2. Rose … morning means the morning following the instructions in verse 2, and so we may translate “Early the next morning Abraham got up….”
Saddled his ass: saddled should not give the picture of putting a leather saddle with stirrups on the animal. In this context the verb refers to tying or hitching a load on to the animal’s back. The load was the firewood and supplies taken for the journey. Good News Translation “loaded his donkey” expresses this better in English. In some translations this action is linked with cutting the firewood: “he cut some firewood … and put it on the back of his donkey” (see the suggestion for reordering below). In some languages the verb is translated more generally as “got his donkey ready.”
Ass or “donkey” is a small horse-like animal widely used since early times in the Middle East for riding as well as for carrying loads. In areas where this animal is unknown, translators may often use a loan word or a descriptive expression such as “an animal for carrying loads”; however, translators should note that sometimes the context may make the burden-carrying element redundant, as it does in these verses.
Two of his young men: this refers to servants from Abraham’s camp, young men who belong to Abraham as slaves. The term “slave” is not used in the text. A number of translations refer to them as “servants” or “working men.”
And his son Isaac: Isaac is mentioned after the two young men. Good News Translation finds it more appropriate to place Isaac before the two young men, and translators may find it more acceptable to do the same.
He cut wood for the burnt offering: cut refers to splitting the wood so that it would burn well. In some languages there is a special word for firewood that is different from the general term for wood, and the special term is required here: “firewood to burn the sacrifice.”
And arose and went to the place of which God had told him: arose and went represent not two separate events, but rather the first verb indicates the beginning of the action of the second verb; that is “began to go,” or more naturally in English, “started out” (Good News Translation). In some languages, however, this action does require two verbs, to indicate first the departure and then the traveling: “they left there and walked toward the place that God….”
The reordering of some events in verse 3 should give a more natural flow of thought. For example, we may suggest the following:
• The following morning Abraham got up early and split some wood to be used for the sacrifice. He loaded this on his donkey. Then he took his son Isaac and two young servants. Together they started out for the place where God had told him to go.
Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. and Fry, Euan McG. A Handbook on Genesis. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.