forget

The Hebrew, Latin, and Greek that is translated as “forget” in English is translated in Noongar as dwangka-anbangbat, lit. “ear-lose.” (Source: Portions of the Holy Bible in the Nyunga language of Australia, 2018).

See also remember and forget (Japanese honorifics).

complete verse (Psalm 88:12)

Following are a number of back-translations as well as a sample translation for translators of Psalm 88:12:

  • Chichewa Contempary Chichewa translation, 2002/2016:
    “Are your miracles known to the place of darkness,
    or your righteous work in the country of forgotten people?” (Source: Mawu a Mulungu mu Chichewa Chalero Back Translation)
  • Newari:
    “What? Is it in the dark place
    and in the place where all righteous work is forgotten
    that Your amazing works are known?” (Source: Newari Back Translation)
  • Hiligaynon:
    “Your (sing.) miracles and righteousness are- not -seen in the dark place of the dead ones,
    where everything will- no-longer -be-remembered.” (Source: Hiligaynon Back Translation)
  • Laarim:
    “Would people see miracles in a dark place,
    or would people see your kindness in a land where all things are forgotten by people?” (Source: Laarim Back Translation)
  • Nyakyusa-Ngonde (back-translation into Swahili):
    “Je, miujiza yako inaonekana katika giza?
    Au unyofu wako unaonekana katika nchi ya ambao hawakumbukwi?” (Source: Nyakyusa Back Translation)
  • English:
    “No one in the deep dark pit ever sees the miracles that you perform,
    and no one in the place where people have been completely forgotten tells about your being good to us.” (Source: Translation for Translators)

righteous, righteousness

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The Greek, Hebrew, and Latin terms that are translated in English mostly as “righteous” as an adjective or personified noun or “righteousness” (also as “upright(ness)” and “just(ice)”) are most commonly expressed with concept of “straightness,” though this may be expressed in a number of ways. (Click or tap here to see the details)

Following is a list of (back-) translations of various languages:

  • Bambara, Southern Bobo Madaré, Chokwe (ululi), Amganad Ifugao, Chol, Eastern Maninkakan, Toraja-Sa’dan, Pamona, Batak Toba, Bilua, Tiv: “be straight”
  • Laka: “follow the straight way” or “to straight-straight” (a reduplicated form for emphasis)
  • Sayula Popoluca: “walk straight”
  • Highland Puebla Nahuatl, Kekchí, Muna: “have a straight heart”
  • Kipsigis: “do the truth”
  • Mezquital Otomi: “do according to the truth”
  • Huautla Mazatec: “have truth”
  • Yine: “fulfill what one should do”
  • Indonesian: “be true”
  • Navajo (Dinė): “do just so”
  • Anuak: “do as it should be”
  • Mossi: “have a white stomach” (see also happiness / joy)
  • Paasaal: “white heart” (source: Fabian N. Dapila in The Bible Translator 2024, p. 415ff.)
  • (San Mateo del Mar Huave: “completely good” (the translation does not imply sinless perfection)
  • Nuer: “way of right” (“there is a complex concept of “right” vs. ‘left’ in Nuer where ‘right’ indicates that which is masculine, strong, good, and moral, and ‘left’ denotes what is feminine, weak, and sinful (a strictly masculine viewpoint!) The ‘way of right’ is therefore righteousness, but of course women may also attain this way, for the opposition is more classificatory than descriptive.”) (This and all above from Bratcher / Nida except for Bilua: Carl Gross; Tiv: Rob Koops; Muna: René van den Berg)
  • Central Subanen: “wise-good” (source: Robert Brichoux in OPTAT 1988/2, p. 80ff. )
  • Xicotepec De Juárez Totonac: “live well”
  • Mezquital Otomi: “goodness before the face of God” (source for this and one above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
  • Eastern Huasteca Nahuatl: “the result of heart-straightening” (source: Nida 1947, p. 224)
  • Eastern Highland Otomi: “entirely good” (when referred to God), “do good” or “not be a debtor as God sees one” (when referred to people)
  • Carib: “level”
  • Tzotzil: “straight-hearted”
  • Ojitlán Chinantec: “right and straight”
  • Yatzachi Zapotec: “walk straight” (source for this and four previous: John Beekman in Notes on Translation November 1964, p. 1-22)
  • Makonde: “doing what God wants” (in a context of us doing) and “be good in God’s eyes” (in the context of being made righteous by God) (note that justify / justification is translated as “to be made good in the eyes of God.” (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific notes in Paratext)
  • Aari: The Pauline word for “righteous” is generally rendered by “makes one without sin” in the Aari, sometimes “before God” is added for clarity. (Source: Loren Bliese)
  • North Alaskan Inupiatun: “having sin taken away” (Source: Nida 1952, p. 144)
  • Nyamwezi: wa lole: “just” or “someone who follows the law of God” (source: Pioneer Bible Translators, project-specific translation notes in Paratext)
  • Venda: “nothing wrong, OK” (Source: J.A. van Roy in The Bible Translator 1972, p. 418ff. )
  • Ekari: maakodo bokouto or “enormous truth” (the same word that is also used for “truth“; bokouto — “enormous” — is being used as an attribute for abstract nouns to denote that they are of God [see also here]; source: Marion Doble in The Bible Translator 1963, p. 37ff. ).
  • Guhu-Samane: pobi or “right” (also: “right (side),” “(legal) right,” “straightness,” “correction,” “south,” “possession,” “pertinence,” “kingdom,” “fame,” “information,” or “speech” — “According to [Guhu-Samane] thinking there is a common core of meaning among all these glosses. Even from an English point of view the first five can be seen to be closely related, simply because of their similarity in English. However, from that point the nuances of meaning are not so apparent. They relate in some such a fashion as this: As one faces the morning sun, south lies to the right hand (as north lies to the left); then at one’s right hand are his possessions and whatever pertains to him; thus, a rich man’s many possessions and scope of power and influence is his kingdom; so, the rich and other important people encounter fame; and all of this spreads as information and forms most of the framework of the people’s speech.”) (Source: Ernest Richert in Notes on Translation 1964, p. 11ff.)
  • German New Testament translation by Berger / Nord (publ. 1999): Gerechtheit, a neologism to differentiate it from the commonly-used Gerechtigkeit which can mean “righteousness” but is more often used in modern German as “fairness” (Berger / Nord especially use Gerechtheit in Letter to the Romans) or Gerechtestun, also a neologism, meaning “righteous deeds” (especially in Letter to the Ephesians)
  • “did what he should” (Eastern Highland Otomi)
  • “a clear man, good [man]” (Mairasi) (source: Enggavoter 2004)

See also respectable, righteous, righteous (person), devout, and She is more in the right(eous) than I.

addressing God

Translators of different languages have found different ways with what kind of formality God is addressed. The first example is from a language where God is always addressed distinctly formal whereas the second is one where the opposite choice was made.

Click or tap here to see the rest of this insight

Like many languages (but unlike Greek or Hebrew or English), Tuvan uses a formal vs. informal 2nd person pronoun (a familiar vs. a respectful “you”). Unlike other languages that have this feature, however, the translators of the Tuvan Bible have attempted to be very consistent in using the different forms of address in every case a 2nd person pronoun has to be used in the translation of the biblical text.

As Voinov shows in Pronominal Theology in Translating the Gospels (in: The Bible Translator 2002, p. 210ff. ), the choice to use either of the pronouns many times involved theological judgment. While the formal pronoun can signal personal distance or a social/power distance between the speaker and addressee, the informal pronoun can indicate familiarity or social/power equality between speaker and addressee.

In these verses, in which humans address God, the informal, familiar pronoun is used that communicates closeness.

Voinov notes that “in the Tuvan Bible, God is only addressed with the informal pronoun. No exceptions. An interesting thing about this is that I’ve heard new Tuvan believers praying with the formal form to God until they are corrected by other Christians who tell them that God is close to us so we should address him with the informal pronoun. As a result, the informal pronoun is the only one that is used in praying to God among the Tuvan church.”

In Gbaya, “a superior, whether father, uncle, or older brother, mother, aunt, or older sister, president, governor, or chief, is never addressed in the singular unless the speaker intends a deliberate insult. When addressing the superior face to face, the second person plural pronoun ɛ́nɛ́ or ‘you (pl.)’ is used, similar to the French usage of vous.

Accordingly, the translators of the current version of the Gbaya Bible chose to use the plural ɛ́nɛ́ to address God. There are a few exceptions. In Psalms 86:8, 97:9, and 138:1, God is addressed alongside other “gods,” and here the third person pronoun o is used to avoid confusion about who is being addressed. In several New Testament passages (Matthew 21:23, 26:68, 27:40, Mark 11:28, Luke 20:2, 23:37, as well as in Jesus’ interaction with Pilate and Jesus’ interaction with the Samaritan woman at the well) the less courteous form for Jesus is used to indicate ignorance of his position or mocking (source Philip Noss).

In Dutch and Western Frisian translations, however, God is always addressed with the formal pronoun.

See also female second person singular pronoun in Psalms.

work(s) (of God) (Japanese honorifics)

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 to do this is through the usage (or a lack) of an honorific prefix as shown here in the widely-used Japanese Shinkaiyaku (新改訳) Bible of 2017. When the referent is God, the “divine” honorific prefix mi- (御 or み) can be used, as in mi-ude (みわざ) or “work (of God)” in the referenced verses.

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

Translation commentary on Psalm 88:10 - 88:12

In these three verses, by means of rhetorical questions the psalmist gives expression to the belief that the dead in Sheol are completely cut off from Yahweh’s care and concern. Yahweh performs no wonders there (verses 10a, 12a), as he had when he freed his people from Egypt. His steadfast love (chesed; see comments, 5.7), his faithfulness (ʾemunah; see 36.5), his saving help (tsedaqah; see 5.8) are all absent from Sheol, which is called the grave (see verse 5b), Abaddon, which means “destruction” (the Hebrew name comes from the verb “to perish”; see comments on “broken” in 31.12), the darkness (see verse 6), the land of forgetfulness (verse 12b), that is, the land where the inhabitants are forgotten by God (see verse 5c). It is less likely, as Biblia Dios Habla Hoy has it, that the land of forgetfulness means “the land where everything is forgotten.” All these names and phrases accurately portray the concept of Sheol, the world of the dead, which was prevalent at that time. Good News Translation has imitated the Hebrew in using rhetorical questions in verses 10-12 as an effective way of expressing the despairing, hopeless attitude of the psalmist. In some cases strong negative statements may be more effective; for example:

• You make no miracles for the dead,
and they do not rise up and praise you.
Your constant love is never mentioned in the grave,
and no one speaks of your faithfulness in the place of destruction.
No one sees your miracles in that place of darkness,
nor your goodness in the land of the forgotten.

Abaddon or Good News Translation‘s “place of destruction” is synonymous with the grave, and the translator should avoid giving the impression that they refer to different places. Wonders known must often be recast as active; for example, “Do the dead in the grave see the great works that you do?” Land of forgetfulness may sometimes be rendered as “that place of the dead where God is no longer concerned with dead people” or “in the grave where God pays no attention to the dead.”

In verse 10a the psalmist speaks of the dead, but in verse 10b he uses the more dramatic shades. In verse 11a the ordinary term grave is paralleled in verse 11b by the more literary level Abaddon, and in verse 12a the common darkness is matched by the more imaginative land of forgetfulness. In this series of parallel lines the writer is moving the idea of death forward toward the point of total extinction. Translators should pay particular attention to see that the terms they use and the poetic devices they employ reflect this movement.

In verse 10b the dead are called the shades. The Hebrews did not speak of the “souls” or “spirits” of the dead surviving in Sheol, as did the Greeks; the “shades” or “shadows” were pale, lifeless, ineffectual, shadowy images or replicas of the former living, active, robust self. Care should be taken not to picture them as ghosts, however, since this introduces elements not present in the Hebrew concept.

In the translation of the rhetorical questions in verses 10-12, the translator must first decide if such a sequence of questions is natural in the receptor language. If the questions are natural, do they require responses, since they assume a negative reply? Are there implicit elements that need to be made explicit in the receptor language? If the keeping of the question form will result in an unnatural style, the translator may have to recast these questions as statements. Examples are given here of two ways to handle the questions of verse 10 and three ways to treat them in verse 11. The same applies equally well to verse 12 or to any other rhetorical question. Verse 10: “Do you make miracles for the dead? No! Do the dead praise you? Never!” or, as negative statements, “You do not perform miracles for the dead, and they do not get up and praise you.” In verse 11: “Is your constant love spoken of in the grave? No! Is your faithfulness spoken of in the place of the dead? Never!” As negative statements: “Your constant love is not spoken of in the grave, nor is your faithfulness spoken of in the place of the dead.” With further adjustments for implicit information: “Do the dead in their graves speak about how you always love them, or do they talk about how faithful you are to them in the world of the dead?” Each question in the last rendering may in turn be followed by a negative reply or may be transformed into a negative statement, each case depending on the requirements of the receptor language.

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 .