Honorary "are" construct denoting God (“hand over”)

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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 usage of an honorific construction where the morpheme are (され) is affixed on the verb as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. This is particularly done with verbs that have God as the agent to show a deep sense of reverence. Here, watas-are-ru (渡される) or “hand over” is used.

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

Translation commentary on Lamentations 2:7

Verse 6, which continued the subject of verse 5, spoke of the rejection of the ruler and of the priests, who played a key role in the worship in the Temple. The poet now goes on to say that the buildings themselves have become the subject of ridicule.

Scorned his altar: scorned is a different word than the one translated “spurned” in verse 6; however, the sense is the same. In some languages “reject” may be expressed negatively as “not to accept”; for example, “The Lord does not accept his altar.” Or it may be expressed as direct discourse: “The Lord says, ‘I will not receive your offerings from my altar,’ ” or “The Lord says, ‘This altar is not mine.’ ”

Altar refers to the place at the Temple where sacrifices are burned as offerings or gifts for God. In some languages a descriptive equivalent can be “place where gifts are made to God” or “place for burning sacrifices to God.”

Disowned his sanctuary may sometimes be translated, for example, “the Lord has gone away and abandoned his Temple,” “the Lord has turned his back on his Temple,” or “the Lord says, ‘This Temple is not mine.’ ” For sanctuary see comments on 1.10.

Delivered into the hand of the enemy is a widely used idiom meaning “he has turned over to the enemy” or “he has given to the enemy.” The objects given are the walls of her palaces. This expression is unclear since what her refers back to is not stated. However, the parallelism is very strong, and so it is best to take her palaces as referring to Zion’s Temple. Accordingly a translation such as Good News Translation “He allowed the enemy to tear down its (the Temple’s) walls” is recommended to translators.

A clamor was raised in the house of the LORD refers to noises made by the enemy, and probably these were battle cries, or as New English Bible says, “they raised shouts of victory.” That noise was as great as on the day of an appointed feast. New Jerusalem Bible says “From the uproar they made in Yahweh’s temple it might have been a festival day,” and adds in the footnote “But it was the enemy’s war cry.” In translation it will often be necessary to make clear that the reason for the shouting is to claim victory; for example, “the enemy shouted when they had defeated us” or “the enemy shouted to show they had captured the Temple.”

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. A Handbook on Lamentations. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1992. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .