Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Psalm 78:13:
Chichewa Contempary Chichewa translation, 2002/2016:
“He divided the lake in half and passed them through,
He made the water to stand upright like a wall.” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
Newari:
“He divided the sea in two,
and enabled them to cross the sea from there.
He made the water stand up like a wall.” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
Hiligaynon:
“He split/divided the sea and caused- them -to-go-through/led- them -through;
he made the water like stone-walls.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
Laarim:
“He separated the sea, and they crossed,
he allowed water to stand like a wall.” (Source: Laarim Back Translation)
Nyakyusa-Ngonde (back-translation into Swahili):
“Aliigawanya bahari, akawavusha,
aliyasimamisha maji kama vile kuta.” (Source: Nyakyusa Back Translation)
English:
“Then he caused the Red Sea to divide, causing the water on each side to pile up like a wall,
with the result that our ancestors walked through it on dry ground.” (Source: Translation for Translators)
God transcends gender, but most languages are limited to grammatical gender expressed in pronouns. In the case of English, this is traditionally confined to “he” (or in the forms “his,” “him,” and “himself”), “she” (and “her,” “hers,” and “herself”), and “it” (and “its” and “itself”).
Modern Mandarin Chinese, however, offers another possibility. Here, the third-person singular pronoun is always pronounced the same (tā), but it is written differently according to its gender (他 is “he,” 她 is “she,” and 它/牠 is “it” and their respective derivative forms). In each of these characters, the first (or upper) part defines the gender (man, woman, or thing/animal), while the second element gives the clue to its pronunciation.
In 1930, after a full century with dozens of Chinese translations, Bible translator Wang Yuande (王元德) coined a new “godly” pronoun: 祂. Chinese readers immediately knew how to pronounce it: tā. But they also recognized that the first part of that character, signifying something spiritual, clarified that each person of the Trinity has no gender aside from being God.
While the most important Protestant and Catholic Chinese versions respectively have opted not to use 祂, some Bible translations do and it is widely used in hymnals and other Christian materials. Among the translations that use 祂 to refer to “God” were early versions of Lü Zhenzhong’s (呂振中) version (New Testament: 1946, complete Bible: 1970). R.P. Kramers (in The Bible Translator 1956, p. 152ff. ) explains why later versions of Lü’s translation did not continue with this practice: “This new way of writing ‘He,’ however, has created a minor problem of its own: must this polite form be used whenever Jesus is referred to? Lü follows the rule that, wherever Jesus is referred to as a human being, the normal tā (他) is written; where he is referred to as divine, especially after the ascension, the reverential tā (祂) is used.”
In that system one kind of pronoun is used for humans (male and female alike) and one for natural elements, non-liquid masses, and some spiritual entities (one other is used for large animals and another one for miscellaneous items). While in these languages the pronoun for spiritual entities used to be employed when referring to God, this has changed into the use of the human pronoun.
Lynell Zogbo (in The Bible Translator 1989, p. 401ff. ) explains in the following way: “From informal discussions with young Christians especially, it would appear that, at least for some people, the experience and/or concepts of Christianity are affecting the choice of pronoun for God. Some people explain that God is no longer ‘far away,’ but is somehow tangible and personal. For these speakers God has shifted over into the human category.”
In Kouya, God (the Father) and Jesus are referred to with the human pronoun ɔ, whereas the Holy Spirit is referred to with a non-human pronoun. (Northern Grebo and Western Krahn make a similar distinction.)
Eddie Arthur, a former Kouya Bible translation consultant, says the following: “We tried to insist that this shouldn’t happen, but the Kouya team members were insistent that the human pronoun for the Spirit would not work.”
In Burmese, the pronoun ko taw (ကိုယ်တော်) is used either as 2nd person (you) or 3rd person (he, him, his) reference. “This term clearly has its root in the religious language in Burmese. No ordinary persons are addressed or known by this pronoun because it is reserved for Buddhist monks, famous religious teachers, and in the case of Christianity, the Trinity.” (Source: Gam Seng Shae in The Bible Translator 2002, p. 202ff. )
In Thai, the pronoun phra`ong (พระองค์) is used, a gender-neutral pronoun which must refer to a previously introduced royal or divine being. Similarly, in Northern Khmer, which is spoken in Thailand, “an honorific divine pronoun” is used for the pronoun referring to the persons of the Trinity (source: David Thomas in The Bible Translator 1993, p. 445 ). In Urak Lawoi’, another language spoken in Thailand, the translation often uses tuhat (ตูฮัด) — “God” — ”as a divine pronoun where Thai has phra’ong even though it’s actually a noun.” (Source for Thai and Urak Lawoi’: Stephen Pattemore)
The English “Contemporary Torah” addresses the question of God and gendered pronouns by mostly avoiding pronouns in the first five books of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament (unless God is referred to as “lord,” “father,” “king,” or “warrior”). It does that by either using passive constructs (“He gave us” vs. “we were given”), by using the adjective “divine” or by using “God” rather than a pronoun.
Some Protestant and Orthodox English Bibles use a referential capitalized spelling when referring to the persons of the Trinity with “He,” “His,” “Him,” or “Himself.” This includes for instance the New American Standard Bible or The Orthodox New Testament, but most translations do not. Two other languages where this is also done (in most Bible translations) are the closely related Indonesian and Malay. In both languages this follows the language usage according to the Qur’an, which in turn predicts that usage (see Soesilo in The Bible Translator 1991, p. 442ff. and The Bible Translator 1997, p. 433ff. ).
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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 rare (られ) 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, tate-rare-ru (立てられる) or “establish/erect” is used.
The various Greek, Aramaic, Latin and Hebrew terms that are translated as “sea,” “ocean,” or “lake” in English are all translated in Chichewa with one term: nyanja. Malawi, where Chichewa is spoken, has a lot of lakes but does not share a border with the ocean. (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
The psalmist begins his recital of God’s wonderful deeds, the mighty acts and miracles he wrought as he led the Hebrews out of Egypt.
Again in verse 12 their fathers seems, because of verse 9, to be the ancestors of the Ephraimites; but it is much more likely that this refers to the ancestors who were a faithless generation (verse 8).
The marvels in the land of Egypt (verse 12) are the plagues, described in verses 43-51.
Zoan is identified as the city of Rameses (Exo 1.11), a royal storage city on the eastern side of the Nile Delta; it was also called Tanis (the Septuagint). Zoan is not mentioned in Exodus in connection with the departure from Egypt. In some languages it will often be necessary to identify Egypt as the “country called Egypt.”
The account of the parting of the waters for the Israelites to escape safely from the Egyptians is recorded in Exodus 14.21-29. The waters stood “like walls” (see Exo 15.8); the Hebrew word for “walls” means “barrier, dam,” and the same expression is used of the crossing of the Jordan (Josh 3.13, 16). Revised Standard Versionlike a heap is not clear; New Jerusalem Bible “stand like a wall” and New International Version “stand firm like a wall” can be misunderstood. The picture is that of a path on the sea floor, with the waters of the Sea of Reeds (the Red Sea; see comment at 106.7) standing like walls on either side. The expression divided the sea may give a wrong understanding in many languages. Since the sense is that he separated the water in order to make a passage, it will often be better to translate “he made a path through the sea” or “he made a place for them to walk through the sea.” The second half of verse 13 may give the reader difficulty, since it is implied that the path through the sea went between the standing walls of water. In order to provide a clearer picture for the reader, it may be necessary to say, for example, “he made the water stand like walls on both sides of the path.”
Because of the strangeness of the instrumental use of a cloud as an object to lead someone, in some languages it will be clearer to say, for example, “God made a cloud go ahead of them in the daytime to guide them” or “God sent a cloud ahead of them during the day so they would know where to go.”
Line b is understood by reading the verb led from line a. It will sometimes be necessary to avoid ellipsis and to repeat the verb in the second line, or use a suitable synonym.
What is called in Exodus 13.21-22 “a pillar of fire” is here referred to as a fiery light; see New English Bible “a glowing fire,” New Jerusalem Bible “the light of a fire.”
Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Reyburn, William D. A Handbook on the Book of Psalms. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1991. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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