Featured Words Hard to Translate

I've seen their website. Still an impressive school after all these years!

Nathan Brown, mentioned above as the first translator of the NT into Japanese, was an American, so even in the heyday of Carey, he was much admired in America. The first American foreign missionary was Adoniram Judson, who has a fascinating story. In case you've never heard his story, he was a congregationalist headed for India, and on the ship over he thought he should study baptism to be able to correct Carey. However, instead he made himself into a Baptist, and was baptized when he reached India. He was not allowed to say in India, however, and ended up being the first missionary to Burma, where he translated the Bible and planted many churches. We have a student in our college from that Baptist tradition in Myanmar.

Brown was on the committee for the first Japanese Bible translation as its Greek expert, but parted company with them amicably when the Presbyterian on the committee would not agree to translate with "immerse." His own NT, finished before theirs, had several reprints and a revision, but did not last, no doubt because mainly of his "Immersion" rendering appealing mainly just to Baptists. Also, he translated into colloquial Japanese, which was simply not done until after WW2. All written Japanese documents in those days were in classical Japanese.

 

Wow, I didn't know that. Kind of sad, really. People all over are less polite, I suppose. In Japan, young people are eschewing the polite speech--until they try to get a job, that is, and then they are cut down to size. We had a dear elderly lady in our church who taught English in the high schools, and one day two boys talked to her as if she were the inferior and they were above her in society. She was devastated!

 

Consider the word "spirit." This can be truly hard to translate! You have several usages to worry about: the "Holy Spirit," simply the "Spirit" (capital S for the Person), the lower case "spirit" for the human spirit, evil spirits, and finally the word as influence. (See 1 John 4:6, "the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.")

Consider just the basic word, πνεῦμα? “A translation for the ‘Holy Spirit’ used for some time in one Sudanic language meant only ‘clean breath,’ and that meant nothing, for whoever saw a ‘clean breath’?” (Eugene Nida, God’s Word in Man’s Language (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1952, p. 44).

“Translators usually have as much difficulty with the word for ‘spirit’ as with any other in the language. To a considerable extent this is due to the fact that the Greek pneuma and the English spirit have such very wide areas of meaning.” (Ibid., 210). “If one employs the aboriginal word for spirit, the translation may imply that Jesus possessed a familiar spirit" (Ibid., 213). A "familiar spirit" is a demon companion.

If the language has a high incidence of respect language, care must be taken to see that the Holy Spirit is mentioned with respect. In Japanese this means using 御霊 (Mitama, “honorable Spirit”) instead of just 霊 (rei, “spirit”), in which the first character is an honorific prefix.

 

Thank you! Very informative about the difficulties of translating this word.

Interestingly enough, both the Hebrew and Greek words for "spirit" have multiple meanings like you have described. The BDB lexicon has for the Hebrew word ruach (רוּח), "wind, breath, mind, spirit." Also, the Greek word pneuma (πνεῦμα) is translated as spirit, wind, and breath.

 

The word for repentance, metanoia (μετάνοια), can be difficult to translate. This is a definite case where theology influences translation. The Friberg defines it this way: "strictly later knowledge, subsequent correction; (1) religiously and morally, as a change of mind leading to change of behavior repentance, conversion, turning about (MT 3.8; 2C 7.10); (2) as a change of opinion in respect to one's acts regret, remorse (a popular Greek usage not found in the NT)" (Timothy Friberg, Barbara Friberg, and Neva Mille, Analytical Lexicon of the Greek New Testament, 260).

So, the base or core meaning is “religiously and morally, as a change of mind leading to change of behavior.” Actually, when you think about it, a change in one’s fundamental way of thinking will always produce a change in action. Therefore, the translator should be looking for a word depicting a serious change of mind, a change in one’s fundamental thinking.

Mistaken renderings would include anything that indicate emotional responses to the Gospel, such as sorrowing. According to 2 Cor. 7:10, "For godly sorrow [metanoia] worketh repentance to salvation not to be repented of: but the sorrow of the world worketh death." This usage makes it obvious that sorrow is not a part of repentance, but a result of it.

 

That's typical of Japanese teens nowadays. However, things change when they get out of high school or college and have to apply for a job. The companies whip then into polite shape, because if you want to do business in Japan you absolutely must be polite. I've heard that companies put their new employees through a type of boot camp to teach to be polite.

 

I count five levels of honorifics in Japanese, the three you mentioned, then two more above that: talking to someone over a superior (the company owner, for example), and talking to the emperor (something I never did, thank the Lord!). So, the verb for "is":
1. da だ
2. desu です
3. de gozaimasu　でございます
4. de irrasshaimasu でいらっしゃいます
5. Who knows! 　僕は知らない！

 

Varaious theological terms are difficult to translate. For example, "adoption" (huiothesia, ὑιοθεσία occurs in five places in the NT:
Ro 8:15 For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
Ro 8:23 And not only [they], but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, [to wit], the redemption of our body.
Ro 9:4 Who are Israelites; to whom [pertaineth] the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service [of God], and the promises; {covenants: or, testaments}
Ga 4:5 To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.
Eph 1:5 Having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to himself, according to the good pleasure of his will,

The problem is that many societies (and therefore many languages) do not have the concept of adoption. In Japanese society it is very rare, and Japanese laws are ambiguous about it. I know of one lawsuit where a Japanese father refused to recognize the baby he had with an unmarried Filipino woman--allowed under Japanese law. So the baby was stateless. A missionary couple tried to adopt the baby, and it went to the Japanese supreme court before they got justice.

The Japanese word is a four character, complicated word. The average Japanese does not recognize it. You can check it out here: Jisho.org: Japanese Dictionary

What we used in our Japanese translation was youshi (養子), which is used in special cases when a man without a son for an heir legally adopts his son-in-law, who then changes his name so the lineage does not die.

 

"Justify" (dikaioo, δικαιόω) is another tough one. I imagine (don't know for sure) that many tribal societies which do not have a legal system would have trouble with this one. Eugene Nida wrote, "The Zacapoaxtla Aztecs speak of it as 'heart-straightening.' The Conobs say that it means 'having a straight soul.' The Popolucas in the state of Veracruz, Mexico, say that this means 'walking straight'" (God's Word in Man's Language, p. 145).

So, quite often a whole phrase is needed to say this one word. This is true in Japanese, which uses gi to mitomerareru (義と認められる), meaning "to be recognized as righteous." Now, the Chinese character for "righteous" (義) is quite interesting. It is made up of the following radicals: sheep (羊), hand (手), and ax (斧). These 2nd & 3rd characters make up together "I," so that righteousness in Chinese is "a sheep above me." I have no doubt that this comes from the original monotheistic religion of China, which had sheep sacrifices to the supreme God, Shang Di (上帝, "upper emperor").