Featured Translating into Japanese

Well, ya think??

 

So we end up with wannabes, like the guy who called me in Japan and wanted to help, but knew neither Greek nor Japanese.

 

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Gary Larson said it all with "Farside."

 

Believe it or not, one of the most difficult issues we had in translating the NT into Japanese was the term "Son of God." The phrase normally used was kami no miko (神の御子). The first Chinese character is "God." No problem. Then we have the possessive particle from the Japanese hiragana alphabet. Finally we have a two character word with the first character being the honorific prefix mi- (御), used for many different words but sometimes pronounced "o" or "ohn" or "go." The last character is simply "child."

We saw several problems with this rendering, in spite of its having been used for many, many years. First of all, it's the word used for the Emperor's child, so it doesn't seem appropriate for Jesus, who was not just a human child. Secondly, it is genderless, not masculine. Thirdly, for a new translation we wanted to break new ground and cause readers to think more deeply about their faith and their Savior.

The normal word for "son" simply would not do, since it is used sometimes as a euphemism in a way that could cause great confusion. Uncle Miya came up with the answer. There is a word for "son" that is used at times of celebration for someone's son: Goshisoku (御子息). It has the same honorific prefix pronounced differently, then the two characters for "son," only reversed. It's respectful, masculine, and easily readable.

We asked many Japanese believers, both members and pastors, about this possibility, and most were cautiously approving. One pastor even wrote an essay about the usage. After 86,000 "John and Romans," we've still not had any negative opinions! So hopefully it will be gradually accepted as a replacement for the old word--but I'm not holding my breath.

 

Thanks for waiting for an answer. It's spring break, and the wife and I were out having some fun on Thurs. and Fri.

Our term for "Son of Man" followed the traditional rendering (Hito no Ko, 人の子), which emphasizes the humanity of Christ, as I believe the Hebrew, Greek and English all do. It's not perfect, but it does supply an almost correct meaning. The word for "son" in this case (ko, 子) is not male specific, but we saw no good other option.

 

Concerning the difficulties of Japanese honorifics, consider these possibilities for just "do."

1. する = Plain for "to do." This can be made more polite by using the passive form, which usage negated the passive meaning.
2. します = polite form of #1. This can be made more polite by using the passive form.
3. 致す = more polite word than #1 & 2.
4. 致します = politer form of #3
5. お致しになる = extremely polite, formed by adding an honorific prefix to #3, which has been given the noun form, then adding a further polite word, "to become."
6. お致しになります = Making "to become" more polite.

Fortunately for my ministry, I was sent to a language school which still taught all of these polite forms, since the course was written pre-WW2. It was called the Naganuma Course after the linguist who wrote it and started the school.

While I was there they began revising the course, and once I was put experimentally in a class that was testing out a new textbook. Everyone else in the class was Chinese, so they knew all of the Chinese characters already. I had to work my head off to keep up--but I loved it!

 

I left out a word. Seen above, the word itasu is an honorific verb for what I do. there is a different word for what someone else does (2nd person), which is nasaru (なさる). It would be rude to say to someone else, "What are you doing (itasu)?" And it would be rude and prideful for me to say, "I am doing..." (nasaru).

 

Now consider the grammatical problems of translating into Japanese, a language completely different in grammar from the source language, whether it be Hebrew (quite different from English), Greek (some similarities to English), or English.

Here are some areas Japanese is completely different.

1. Japanese sentences are verb final, meaning the syntactical order is subject, object, verb (SOV).

2. Unlike English and Greek ouns, Japanese nouns are not inflected--meaning they do not have endings that change the meaning. Greek is a highly inflected language. So one Greek noun can have five cases with singular and plural forms, making ten endings. English is much less inflected than Greek, but one inflected noun in English is "book," which can become "books."

3. Japanese verbs can become adjectives, and Japanese adjectives can become verbs. For example, iku (行く) can become ikitai (行きたい) or ikanai (行かない, not going), both adjectival forms which can modigy a noun. So, ikanai hito (行かない人) means "the guy who is not going," and so forth.

4. There is no future tense in Japanese. Future events can be portrayed with a subjunctive word or phrase ("may be..."), or the present tense in the case of the Greek future, which is not subjunctive. The first Japanese version in colloquial rather than classical Japanese came in the 1950s. Unfortunately they got this point wrong, so in Acts 1:11, for example, it says, "This same Jesus...may return in like manner...."

5. But then the adjective turn around and become a past tense verb, as in ikitakatta (行きたかった), "I wanted to go."

6. Japanese has no definite or indefinite articles. Greek does not have an indefinite article, but the definite article is very important. So, often you just can't get the nuances of the Greek article into Japanese.

7. Japanese does have particles to tack on the end of sentences showing questioning, emphasis, etc. It has other particles for within sentences showing possession, the direct and indirect objects, etc.

8. Japanese has no participles. The Greek particle is very important, so you have to find a way in Japanese to portray that. One way is to use the present tense very like an adjective, directly modifying the noun.

Well, that's enough of that. If you don't like grammar you may be completely bored by now. Tough! Suck it up and wait for my next post. Or, just use this post to put yourself to sleep.

 

So much for grammar. Lexical meaning is also a problem in Japanese. One example is "baptize" (βαπτίζω) with its noun cognate "baptism" (βάπτισμα). The first Japanese New Testament was translated by a Baptist, Nathan Brown. He had previously been on a team with Presbyterians and others. When he insisted on translating the word with "immerse," the opposition was great, so he left and did his own version using a word for "immerse." The team he broke away from ended up translating the first complete Bible into Japanese, called the Motoyaku (元訳), meaning "original translation."

Since then, however, all Japanese versions have transliterated instead of translating. So, back in 2005 I put it to my friends right here on this forum of the BB as to whether in our Japanese NT we should translate or transliterate. Everyone said, "Translate!!" And my son came out strongly for translating, also, so that's what we did. Instead of the transliteration baputesuma (バプテスマ)　we went with the Chinese compound shinrei (浸礼) meaning "immersion rite." And that is how the BB influenced a Japanese Bible translation!!

Anyone still here remember that?

 

I can see that happening! Don't remember so good myself nowadays!

 

Another difficult semantic problem in Bible translation is what word to use for the God of the Bible. Remembering the huge influence of Chinese on Japanese, I have counted six different possibilities in the Chinese language.
1. Shen (神). This is a generic word for “god,” used to describe various spirits. It was used in the typical local, shamanistic religions of China.

2. Shang Di (上帝), meaning “upper emperor," or perhaps "emperor above.” This is the name for the monotheistic God of the original Chinese religion. It has been used in more modern Bible translations.

3. Aloho. This was a transliteration of the Syrian word for the Hebrew Elohim, and was used by the Nestorians in the Tang Dynasty, when China was ruled by the Mongolians.

4. Zhēnzhǔ (真主), meaning “true Lord.” This was used by the Nestorians.

5. Tian (天) is the Chinese word for heaven used by Confucius (551-479 BC) to mean his monotheistic “God.” Interestingly enough, “Heaven” is sometimes used in the Old Testament to mean God.

6. Tiānzhǔ (天主), “Lord of Heaven,” was used by Catholics, starting with Matteo Ricci, the famous Jesuit missionary to China.

Nowadays there are two versions of the Chinese Union Version which you can buy, depending on your preferred name for God: the "Shang Di" and the "Shen."

In Japanese, all versions use the character for Shen, normally pronounced kami in Japanese, and shin in compounds in Japanese. I don't really know any other possibility in Japanese. Even though kami is the word used in the Shinto religion, it's still pretty much a generic term.