desert / wilderness

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The Greek, Hebrew and Latin that is translated as “desert” or “wilderness” in English is translated in a number of ways:

  • Mairasi: “a place where noisiness is cut off (or: stops)” (source: Enggavoter 2004)
  • Muna: pandaso bhalano pr “big barren-field” (source: René van den Berg)
  • Balinese: “barren field” (source: J.L. Swellengrebel in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 75ff. )
  • Wantoat: “uninhabited place” (source: Holzhausen 1991, p. 38)
  • Umiray Dumaget Agta: “where no people dwell” (source: Larson 1998, p. 98)
  • Shipibo-Conibo: “where no house is” (source: James Lauriault in The Bible Translator 1951, p. 32ff. )
  • Amri Karbi: “waterless region/place” (source: Philippova 2021, p. 368)
  • Ocotlán Zapotec: “large empty place” (source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
  • Pa’o Karen: “jungle” (denoting a place without any towns, villages and tilled fields) (source: Gordon Luce in The Bible Translator 1950, p. 153f. )
  • Low German translation by Johannes Jessen, publ. 1933, republ. 2006: “steppe”
  • Yakan: “the lonely place” (source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “a land where no people lived” (source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “the place with no inhabitants” (source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Matumbi uses various term: lubele (desert, sandy place without water) — used in John 11:54, lupu’ngu’ti (a place where no people live, can be a scrub land, a forest, or a savanna) — used in Mark 1:3 et al.), and mwitu (a forest, a place where wild animals live) — used in Mark 1:13 et al.) (Source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)
  • Chichewa Contemporary translation (2002/2016): chipululu: a place uninhabited by people with thick forest and bush (source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)

Note that in Luke 15:4, usually a term is used that denotes pastoral land, such as “eating/grazing-place” in Tagbanwa (source: Tagbanwa Back Translation).

See also wilderness and desolate wilderness.

complete verse (Numbers 13:21)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Numbers 13:21:

  • Kupsabiny: “So, those people started to head to the North and they went to check out that country, beginning from the wilderness of Zin up to Rehob which was near Lebo-hamath.” (Source: Kupsabiny Back Translation)
  • Newari: “Since it was like that, they went up from there, exploring the country from the wilderness called Zin up to Rehob near [lit.: before] Lebo-hamath.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon: “So they went and they looked/explored the land from the desolate-place of Zin until/(all the way to) Rehob near Lebo Hamat.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • English: “So those men went to Canaan. They went through the entire land, from the Zin desert in the south all the way to Rehob town near Lebo-Hamath in the north.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

Translation commentary on Numbers 13:21

So they went up and spied out the land …: After Moses gave his instructions, the twelve chosen leaders fulfilled them. At the beginning of this new paragraph it may be necessary to specify that the pronoun they refers to these leaders by saying “the men” (Good News Translation), “The twelve men” (Contemporary English Version), or “the explorers.” Went up renders the same Hebrew verb translated “Go up” in verse 17 (see the comments there). For spied out, see verse 2.

From the wilderness of Zin to Rehob indicates that the men explored the whole land of Canaan. Good News Translation makes this explicit by saying “from the wilderness of Zin in the south [of Canaan] all the way to Rehob … in the north [of Canaan].” This verse is a geographical summary of the whole expedition, not just the beginning of their journey. For this reason it may be set apart as a paragraph of its own. If this is not done, the text may be read as if it were a straight narrative sequence, which is incorrect. In the verses that follow, some places of the journey between the wilderness of Zin and Rehob are mentioned more specifically. The Hebrew form of the name Zin is literally tsin, starting with a different sound than z or s. The wilderness of Zin is not to be confused with the wilderness of Sin (see A Handbook on Numbers at Exo 16.1), which was apparently located somewhere to the south of the region of Zin. For the Hebrew word rendered wilderness (midbar), see 1.1. Rehob was a town.

Near the entrance of Hamath specifies the location of Rehob. Some translations treat the Hebrew word for entrance (leboʾ) as part of the name of the city here; for example, New Revised Standard Version says “near Lebo-hamath,” and New International Version has “toward Lebo Hamath.” We recommend these renderings since 1 Kgs 8.65 indicates that “Lebo” was part of the name. This place was regarded as the northern limit of Israel (see 34.8) and may well be the same as the valley between the two ranges of the Lebanon Mountains. Through this valley a person had access to the city of Hamath (so Noth, page 105). So the rendering “near Hamath Pass” (Good News Translation; similarly Bijbel in Gewone Taal) is plausible as well. Together, Rehob and Hamath lay approximately along the northern border of what would later become the traditional territory of Israel.

Quoted with permission from de Regt, Lénart J. and Wendland, Ernst R. A Handbook on Numbers. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2016. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .