The Hebrew that is typically translated as “guilt offering” in English is translated in Chol as “offerings for responsibility for sinning as well as for sinning itself.”
altar
The Greek, Latin and Hebrew that is translated as “altar” in English is translated in a number of ways:
- Obolo: ntook or “raised structure for keeping utensils (esp. sacrifice)” (source: Enene Enene)
- Muna: medha kaefoampe’a or “offering table” (source: René van den Berg)
- Luchazi: muytula or “the place where one sets the burden down”/”the place where the life is laid down” (source: E. Pearson in The Bible Translator 1954, p. 160ff. )
- Tzotzil: “where they place God’s gifts” (source: John Beekman in Notes on Translation, March 1965, p. 2ff.)
- Tsafiki: “table for giving to God” (source: Bruce Moore in Notes on Translation 1/1992, p. 1ff.)
- Noongar: karla-kooranyi or “sacred fire” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang)
- Uma: “offering-burning table” (source: Uma Back Translation)
- Yakan: “place for sacrificing” (source: Yakan Back Translation)
- Tagbanwa: “burning-place” (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
- Tibetan: mchod khri (མཆོད་ཁྲི།) or “offering throne” (source: gSungrab website )
- Bura-Pabir: “sacrifice mound” (source: Andy Warrren-Rothlin)
- Kalanga: “fireplace of sacrifice” (source: project-specific notes in Paratext)
The Ignaciano translators decided to translate the difficult term in that language according to the focus of each New Testament passage in which the word appears (click or tap here to see the rest of this insight
Willis Ott (in Notes on Translation 88/1982, p. 18ff.) explains:
- Matt. 5:23,24: “When you take your offering to God, and arriving, you remember…, do not offer your gift yet. First go to your brother…Then it is fitting to return and offer your offering to God.” (The focus is on improving relationships with people before attempting to improve a relationship with God, so the means of offering, the altar, is not focal.)
- Matt. 23:18 (19,20): “You also teach erroneously: ‘If someone makes a promise, swearing by the offering-place/table, he is not guilty if he should break the promise. But if he swears by the gift that he put on the offering-place/table, he will be guilty if he breaks the promise.'”
- Luke 1:11: “…to the right side of the table where they burn incense.”
- Luke 11.51. “…the one they killed in front of the temple (or the temple enclosure).” (The focus is on location, with overtones on: “their crime was all the more heinous for killing him there”.)
- Rom. 11:3: “Lord, they have killed all my fellow prophets that spoke for you. They do not want anyone to give offerings to you in worship.” (The focus is on the people’s rejection of religion, with God as the object of worship.)
- 1Cor. 9:13 (10:18): “Remember that those that attend the temple have rights to eat the foods that people bring as offerings to God. They have rights to the meat that the people offer.” (The focus is on the right of priests to the offered food.)
- Heb. 7:13: “This one of whom we are talking is from another clan. No one from that clan was ever a priest.” (The focus in on the legitimacy of this priest’s vocation.)
- Jas. 2:21: “Remember our ancestor Abraham, when God tested him by asking him to give him his son by death. Abraham was to the point of stabbing/killing his son, thus proving his obedience.” (The focus is on the sacrifice as a demonstration of faith/obedience.)
- Rev. 6:9 (8:3,5; 9:13; 14:18; 16:7): “I saw the souls of them that…They were under the table that holds God’s fire/coals.” (This keeps the concepts of: furniture, receptacle for keeping fire, and location near God.)
- Rev. 11:1: “Go to the temple, Measure the building and the inside enclosure (the outside is contrasted in v. 2). Measure the burning place for offered animals. Then count the people who are worshiping there.” (This altar is probably the brazen altar in a temple on earth, since people are worshiping there and since outside this area conquerors are allowed to subjugate for a certain time.)
See also altar (Acts 17:23).
In the Hebraic English translation of Everett Fox it is translated as slaughter-site and likewise in the German translation by Buber / Rosenzweig as Schlachtstatt.
burnt-offering
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 Greek Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate 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).
See also offering (qorban).
complete verse (Leviticus 7:2)
Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Leviticus 7:2:
- Kupsabiny: “An animal which is to appease sin must be slaughtered where the sacrifices that are completely burned are slaughtered and then the blood is sprinkled on all sides of the altar.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
- Newari: “The ram for the guilt offering must be killed in the same place as the burnt offering is killed. Its blood must be sprinkled on the sides [lit.: right and left] of the altar.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
- Hiligaynon: “The offering as a payment for sin is-to-be-slaughtered there at the slaughtering-place of the burnt offering. And its blood is-to-be- sprinkled around the altar.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
- English: “Each animal that is to be offered by such people must be slaughtered in the same place where the animals that will be completely burned on the altar are slaughtered, and their blood must be sprinkled against all sides of the altar.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
Translation commentary on Leviticus 7:2
In the place …: that is, on the north side of the altar. This is the same place where the animals for the burnt offerings are slaughtered. See 1.11. Good News Translation makes this explicit, and such clarification may be desirable in other languages.
They kill … they shall kill: the subject in each case is indefinite. Many versions use a passive form here (New Jerusalem Bible, New Jerusalem Bible, New International Version, as well as Good News Translation). If the receptor language has no passive form and requires a definite subject with the active, “the priests” may be used. The verb kill actually means “slaughter,” that is, to cut the throat of the animal.
The guilt offering: the animal brought as an offering.
Its blood shall be thrown on the altar round about: literally “he shall throw….” See 1.5, where the subject is plural, “Aaron’s sons,” rather than singular. Here Revised Standard Version translates as a passive, but in those languages where passives are unnatural or nonexistent, one may continue with the indefinite third person plural subject.
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 .
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