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.

complete verse (Hosea 4:2)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Hosea 4:2:

  • Kupsabiny: “People spend their time on cursing and lying,
    murdering, stealing and adultery.
    They always shed the blood of people.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “Here is only cursing, lying, murder,
    stealing, and committing adultery.
    Your evil deeds multiply more and more.
    One murder happens after the other.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “In exchange, what- you (plur.) -do is cursing others, lying, killing, stealing and committing-adultery-with-a-man or committing-adultery-with-a-woman. These (are) already spread-out everywhere, and the killings just follow-after-the-other/[lit. follow-follow].” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “Everywhere in this land they curse others, they murder others, they steal, and they commit adultery.
    They act violently toward others
    and commit one murder after another.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Hosea 4:2

There is swearing, lying, killing, stealing, and committing adultery; they break all bounds: The Hebrew construction here is literally “To swear and to lie and to kill and to steal and to commit adultery they break out.” The series of crimes are in an infinitive form that shows that past activity continues into the present, but this construction does not express a performer of the crimes. The crimes just “break out” (New Revised Standard Version), apparently indicating that they flourish. The infinitives function as nouns. There is a clear reference here to words used in the core document of the covenant, the Decalogue (Exo 20.1-17). Three of the Hebrew words here occur in the Decalogue: the words for killing, stealing, and committing adultery. The words for swearing and lying are clearly associated with it: do not use the name of Yahweh in vain, and do not give false testimony.

The Hebrew word for swearing can refer either to a curse or an oath. The context implies that it is done sinfully. Good News Translation assumes it is an oath by saying “They make promises and break them.” Wolff believes it means cursing others, and this involves the improper use of God’s name (Exo 20.7). Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch (1982) follows this sense with “One misuses God’s name to curse others.” The context may help us to determine which meaning is intended. Since it is put against the backdrop of the Decalogue, using the name of Yahweh in vain by invoking his name is the most likely meaning.

Lying refers both to telling lies in court (perjury, false witness) and to telling lies in business. New English Bible renders swearing and lying as a unit, saying “oaths are imposed and broken.”

Killing refers to premeditated murder (Exo 20.13).

Stealing usually refers to taking things by stealth (Exo 20.15), including breaking into a home to get things. It may also include stealing a person, not in the modern concept of kidnaping, but to keep as a wife, or to sell as a slave.

Committing adultery involves breaking the marriage relationship by sexual intercourse with another person (Exo 20.14). It does not include fornication, which is sexual intercourse between unmarried people, but if a precise term is not available in the receptor language, a word that also includes fornication will do.

All of the above crimes show how the Israelites were not faithful to each other in their community life. Most of the crimes were punishable by death in certain circumstances, according to Israel’s ancient laws.

They break all bounds renders a single Hebrew verb that involves a metaphor. It is as if the people were breaking through a figurative wall or boundary of moral decency, as in an outburst of evil. Good News Translation translates this verb without a figure of speech, saying “Crimes increase.”

And murder follows murder is literally “and blood touches upon blood,” referring to the way one bloody murder is hardly finished when another one occurs. Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch says “bloodshed is the order of the day.”

A translation model for this verse is:

• Cursing, lying, murdering, stealing, and committing adultery flourish;
and one bloodbath follows after another.

Quoted with permission from Dorn, Louis & van Steenbergen, Gerrit. A Handbook on Hosea. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2020. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .

SIL Translator’s Notes on Hosea 4:2

4:2a–b

Cursing and lying, murder and stealing, and adultery: These are five specific examples of the sins that the people had committed. These five sins are forbidden in the Ten Commandments. If you already translated the Ten Commandments in a different book of the Bible, you should translate these five sins in a similar way here.

The statement in 4:2a–b indicates that people frequently committed sins like these. It does not indicate that people committed only these sins.

Here are some other ways to translate this statement:

You curse and lie and kill and steal and commit adultery. (New Living Translation (1996))
-or-
There is cursing, lying, murdering, stealing, and adultery. (God’s Word)
-or-
Cursing, dishonesty, murder, robbery, unfaithfulness—these happen all the time. (Contemporary English Version)

4:2a

Cursing: The commandment against cursing is in Exodus 20:7 and Deuteronomy 5:11. Here Cursing probably means to put curses on people using God’s name as part of the curse. It does not mean to use profane or vulgar words, a common meaning of “cursing” in English.

Some English versions use expressions that refer to making a false promise. But making a false promise is also a type of lying. Since lying is the next sin listed in this verse, you should translate “cursing” in a way that clearly shows the difference between it and lying.

lying: The commandment against lying is in Exodus 20:16 and Deuteronomy 5:20. Here lying means to be dishonest in ways that are harmful to other people. This meaning includes deceiving people in order to cheat them and giving false testimony in a legal case.

Here are some other ways to translate this word:

dishonesty (Contemporary English Version)
-or-
deception (New American Standard Bible)

murder: The commandment against murder is in Exodus 20:13 and Deuteronomy 5:17. In this context, murder refers to killing a person illegally. It does not refer to executing a criminal or killing an enemy soldier in battle. The word can refer to killing a person either intentionally or accidentally.

4:2b

stealing: The commandment against stealing is in Exodus 20:15 and Deuteronomy 5:19.

adultery: The commandment against adultery is in Exodus 20:14 and Deuteronomy 5:18.

4:2c

are rampant: The Hebrew verb that the Berean Standard Bible translates as are rampant is literally “they have broken out.” It refers figuratively here to breaking through “moral barriers and restraints.”

There are two main ways to interpret the meaning of the verb and what it refers to:

(1) The verb means that the five sins listed in 4:2a–b have greatly increased. It implies that people commit these sins everywhere in the land. For example:

Swearing, lying, and murder, and stealing and adultery break out (New Revised Standard Version)

(2) The verb means that violence has greatly increased. It implies that people commit violent crimes everywhere in the land. For example:

You make vows and break them; you kill and steal and commit adultery. There is violence everywhere— (New Living Translation (2004))

It is recommended that you follow interpretation (1) along with most English versions.

Here is another way to translate 4:2a–c:

Cursing, lying, killing, stealing and adultery are everywhere. (New Century Version)

In some languages, it may be more natural to use a general term for the five sins. For example:

crimes increase (Good News Translation)
-or-
People break ⌊my laws ⌋ (God’s Word)

4:2d

one act of bloodshed follows another: This clause is a continuation of interpretation (1) in 4:2c. It focuses on repeated crimes that involve bloodshed in addition to the five sins that “are rampant” (4:2a–c). It means that murders and similar bloody crimes occur one after another.

Here are some other ways to translate this clause:

and there is one murder after another (Good News Translation)
-or-
One murder follows another. (New Century Version)

Most versions that follow this interpretation translate this clause with a word such as bloodshed or “murder,” a specific kind of bloodshed. If your language has an expression that refers to bloody crimes in general, you may want to use it here.

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