complete verse (Leviticus 26:26)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Leviticus 26:26:

  • Kupsabiny: “I shall block where your food comes from so that ten women shall share one cooking spot to make all the bread they have on it. They shall divide it to people for each person to be eating a little. Even if a person gets something to eat, he shall not be satisfied.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “Since it is like that, I will not allow grain to grow [lit.: come] in your place. At that time ten women will bake bread in one oven. And when they feed you no one will have enough.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “Your (plur.) food (supply) will-be-lacking, so only one wood-oven will-be-used by ten women to bake bread, and they will- still -divide- this -between you (plur.). You (plur.) will-eat but you (plur.) will- not -get-full/(not -be-satisfied).” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “When I cut off your food supply, there will be very little flour with which to make bread. As a result, ten women will be able to bake all their bread in only one oven. When the bread is baked, each woman will divide it among the members of her family, but there will be very little for each one, and when they have eaten all of it, they will still be hungry.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

1st person pronoun referring to God (Japanese)

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 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”.

formal 2nd person plural pronoun (Japanese)

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 Japanese shows different degree of politeness is through the choice of a formal plural suffix to the second person pronoun (“you” and its various forms) as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. In these verses, anata-gata (あなたがた) is used, combining the second person pronoun anata and the plural suffix -gata to create a formal plural pronoun (“you” [plural] in English).

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

Translation commentary on Leviticus 26:26

When: the relationship between the first proposition and what follows is made clearer in Good News Translation by using “so that” after the first clause, rather than introducing the verse with When. New English Bible joins the two parts with “… until….” The result of the cutting off of the food supply will be a scarcity of flour for making bread, so that one oven will serve for ten families.

Break your staff of bread: this is a figure of speech for famine (compare Psa 105.16). There are many ways in which this may be expressed in the languages of the world; for example, “I will send great hunger,” or “I will give you no food,” or “I will deprive you of things to eat.” Good News Translation approaches the same meaning with “I will cut off your food supply.”

Ten women shall bake your bread in one oven: instead of using the simple future tense, it may be better to say “ten women will be able to use a single oven for baking bread” or “one oven will be enough to serve ten families.” This is the result of the famine. There will be so little bread that one oven would serve ten different families. Normally each family had its own oven, but the famine would reduce the need by one tenth. In some languages this may have to be made explicit by saying something like “there will be so little bread that one oven will be enough for ten women to cook in.” On the word for oven, see 2.4.

Shall deliver your bread again by weight: the subject here is the women who were responsible for giving out the bread. There will be so little that they will have to measure out the small quantities to each recipient. Compare Ezekiel 4.16-17.

It may be difficult for translators to see why the Revised Standard Version rendering includes the word again in this phrase. The idea is archaic English for “in return.” They put the flour into a common loaf and then get it back “again.” Some other languages also have special expressions for this idea, but in many languages again may be ignored.

Eat, and not be satisfied: this is the opposite of “eat your fill” in 25.19. It is intended to highlight the desperate situation in which the disobedient Israelites will find themselves.

Quoted with permission from Péter-Contesse, René and Ellington, John. A Handbook on Leviticus. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1990. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .