complete verse (Isaiah 13:12)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Isaiah 13:12:

  • Kupsabiny: “I shall make people to be few in the land.
    surpassing the clean/pure gold of Ophir.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “I will make people scarcer than extremely pure gold,
    and even much more expensive than the gold of Ophir.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “Only few people will be left. They are more harder to find compare than the pure gold from Ofir.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “And because I will cause most people to die,
    people will be harder to find than gold,
    harder to find than fine gold from Ophir in Arabia.” (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 Isaiah 13:12

More details of the coming punishment are provided here. In exaggerated poetic style, Yahweh says that after the disaster human beings will be as difficult to find as gold, because so many will die.

I will make men more rare than fine gold: The Hebrew word for men usually refers to males, but here it has in view any people who survive, whether male or female. Good News Translation is explicit with “Those who survive.” Fine gold is gold that has been refined to become pure metal. Good News Translation omits the adjective fine, as well as the reference to Ophir in the next line, since the word “gold” itself adequately conveys the meaning.

And mankind than the gold of Ophir: Whereas in the previous line the Hebrew term for males was used, here the word for mankind is a general term for human beings (Hebrew ʾadam). The verb make … more rare in the previous line serves this line as well. If fine gold is hard to find, the gold of Ophir is even harder to find. This intensifies the image of scarcity. The location of Ophir is unknown, but it was famous for the quality of its gold (see Psa 45.9). Ophir may have been in East Africa or in southwest Arabia. Solomon’s trading fleet sailed there to obtain gold (1 Kgs 9.26-28).

Some translation examples for this verse are:

• I will cause people to become more scarce than refined gold, human beings more rare than Ophir’s gold.

• I will cause people to be so few that they will be as rare as pure gold, more scarce than gold from Ophir.

Quoted with permission from Ogden, Graham S. and Sterk, Jan. A Handbook on Isaiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2011. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .