4. Translating Figurative Language: Idioms, Metaphors, and Poetry
Chapter 4: Translating Figurative Language: Idioms, Metaphors, and Poetry
Some years ago, when Eastern Europe was still under Soviet control, one of the authors of this book and his wife spent most of one summer speaking and teaching in churches and seminaries in the “Iron Curtain” countries. Although many of the students and pastors knew English as a second language, many others did not; so the issue of communication became a matter of special concern — especially because the professor’s language was laced with a profusion of idioms, many of which were not at all understandable to second-language people. To his utter chagrin, but to the delight of many later on, the wife of the accompanying missionary couple kept a list of his idioms (two pages long) and then showed them to him! His problem was that English was his first language, and probably no language in history uses as many idioms as does modern English.
For biblical translators this problem plays in reverse; that is, how does one transfer the idioms of two dead languages (ancient Hebrew and Koine Greek) into modern English, while trying to be faithful to both languages? It is fair to say that idioms represent some of the greatest challenges for a translator.
An idiom may be defined as “an expression whose meaning cannot be understood from the combined meanings of its individual words.” It goes without saying (an idiom!) that you cannot translate idioms literally if you hope to retain their meaning. Suppose a traveling businessman says to his colleague, “By the way, I’m hitting the road at the crack of dawn.” Consider how a “literal” translation of this might sound:
Such literal renderings of idioms don’t communicate accurately because idioms don’t “mean” what they “say.” An accurate translation of the sentence above would be something like, “I wanted to let you know that I am leaving very early in the morning.” Although the original idioms are lost, not to mention some of the “color” of the language, the meaning is retained. The challenge for a translator is to determine the meaning of the idiom in the original language, and then to identify a different idiom or other wording in the receptor language that means the same thing.
To help get the point across, consider the following “short story,” count the number of American English idioms (all beginning with an “s”), and then think of how one might “translate” this into plain English — or German or French(!):
“Idiomania”
My career had seen better days. I was skating on thin ice, scraping the bottom of the barrel, and ready to say uncle. The boss and I did not see eye to eye, and he told me to shape up or ship out. There was no silver bullet. It was a safe bet I was going to sink or swim. Nobody could save my bacon. My smart-aleck colleague was a stick-in-the-mud and a snake in the grass who would sell me down the river as soon as shake a stick at me. I could smell a rat, so I steered clear of him. I had one slim chance. It was a shot in the dark, but if I could keep a stiff upper lip, stick to my guns, and sail close to the wind, I would get a second chance. The saving grace was that at the last minute I got a second wind and was saved by the bell.
A literal translation of this would be completely meaningless, since the story has nothing to do with skating, thin ice, barrels, uncles, eyes, bullets, bets, swimming, bacon, and so on.
Translating Biblical Idioms
The Bible contains hundreds of Hebrew and Greek idioms. Many of these make no sense when translated literally. For example, in John 10:24 the people ask Jesus (literally), “Until when will you take up our souls?” The Greek idiom “take up souls” means to “keep in suspense,” so even the NASU translates, “How long will You keep us in suspense?” Similarly, in John 9:21 the parents of the man born blind tell the religious leaders that their son “has lifespan.” This idiom means he is “of age” (NASU, TNIV, ESV) or “old enough” (NJB, GNT, CEV) to speak for himself. (Notice that “of age” is an English idiom.) Mark 1:32, translated literally, says that Jesus healed all “those having badly.” The Greek idiom means “those who were sick.” In cases like these, even formal equivalent versions must abandon a literal policy and translate idiomatically.
Other Hebrew and Greek idioms may be comprehensible when translated literally, but result in awkward or obscure English. First Samuel 10:9 (ESV) reads, “When he [Saul] turned his back to leave Samuel, God gave him another heart.” The Hebrew idiom “give a new heart” means “to change one’s disposition or heart attitude.” Most versions read “God changed his heart” (NASU, HCSB, TNIV). Esther 1:14 (ESV) speaks of the close advisers to King Xerxes “who saw the king’s face.” The Hebrew idiom means those “who had special access to the king” (cf. NASU, TNIV, NIV, NRSV, HCSB).
In Joshua 10:6 (ESV) the men of Gibeon say to Joshua, “Do not relax your hand from your servants.” The Hebrew idiom “relax your hand” means to “abandon,” and most versions say “do not abandon your servants” (NASU, HCSB, NRSV, TNIV, GW, NET; cf. NKJV). Mark 1:2 NKJV reads, “I send my messenger before Your face.” “Before your face” is a Greek idiom which means “ahead of you,” and most versions translate accordingly (HCSB, NET, NIV, TNIV, NAB, GNT, GW). While the original NASB used “before your face,” its 1995 update (NASU) revises this to “ahead of you.” The NRSV similarly revises the RSV. The ESV retains the awkward “before your face.”
In cases like these, the reader may be able to figure out the idiom by thinking about it for awhile. But what was clear and natural to the original readers now sounds strange and awkward. Consider the common Hebrew and Greek idioms “answered and said,” which introduce many quotations in both Old and New Testaments. The idiom does not describe two actions — “answered” and “said” — but one. It simply means that the person “answered.” In attempting to translate word-for-word, formal equivalent versions produce unnatural (and sometimes mislead-ing) English. Compare the following versions at the beginning of Genesis 27:37:
“Isaac answered and said to Esau” (ESV, NKJV, NASB)
“Isaac answered Esau” (NIV, TNIV; cf. GNT)
“Isaac replied to Esau” (NET, NJB, NASU; cf. NAB)
No English speaker today would say “he answered and said to me.” All of the functional equivalent versions (GNT, CEV, GW, NCV, NLT) and the mediating ones (NIV, TNIV, HCSB, NET, NAB) recognize the idiom and translate it simply “answered” or “replied.” While the original NASB used “answered and said” 186 times in the Old and New Testaments, its revision (NASU) uses it only 75 times, usually replacing it with “replied.” The revisers evidently recognized that this was a Hebrew idiom, not an English one. Oddly, while the RSV correctly interpreted the idiom as “answered” in all but seven instances, its revision called the ESV reintroduced “answered and said” sixty-one times in the Old Testament (but never in the New Testament).
Here is a sampling of more idioms from the Old and New Testaments. We have noted a formal equivalent version in the center column and a more idiomatic translation on the right.
In cases like these, the more literal rendering is usually comprehensible, but it is not clear or natural. No one today under forty, and not raised on Scripture, would ever say that they are going to “take a wife” or that a woman is “with child.” Others would do so only as a light-hearted echo of the biblical language on which they were raised.
Deciding whether a Hebrew or Greek idiom is normal English can sometimes be tricky business (an idiom, by the way). This is especially so because of the profound impact the KJV has had on the English language. Some idioms have entered English precisely because they were translated literally in the KJV. Second Chronicles 36:13 says that King Zedekiah “stiffened his neck” against turning to the Lord (NASU, RSV, ESV, NRSV, NKJV). This Hebrew idiom means he became stubborn or rebellious. Since “stiff-necked” appears in an English dictionary (= “extremely obstinate and arrogant”), the NIV, TNIV, and NAB chose to retain the idiom, translating that Zedekiah “became stiff-necked.” Other versions translate idiomatically as “obstinate” (HCSB) or “stubborn” (NET, CEV, GW), presumably assuming that for most readers a stiff neck requires a chiropractor rather than a repentant heart.
There are some cases where retaining even an awkward idiom picks up an important wordplay in the original text. For example, in Genesis 40:13 Joseph interprets the dream of Pharaoh’s former cup-bearer, telling him that Pharaoh will “lift up your head” and restore him to his former position in the royal court. The Hebrew idiom “lift up your head” here means “release” (GW), “reinstate” (NET), or “pardon” (GNT, CEV). These are all legitimate translations. Yet a few verses later (40:19), Joseph tells the imprisoned baker that Pharaoh will also “lift up your head — from you! —and hang you on a tree” (ESV). The same Hebrew idiom now means to execute. In order to capture this play on words, many versions retain the unusual idiom “lift up your head” in both verses (NAB, NJB, HCSB, NKJV, NASU, NRSV). The NIV and TNIV astutely use “lift off your head” in the second. Here, as elsewhere, translators must make difficult decisions about which features of the text should be retained and which may be sacrificed for greater clarity.
Metaphors and Similes
Communication is made more interesting and colorful by using comparison. There are many figures of speech in Scripture that use comparison: metaphors, similes, analogies, parables, allegories, and so on. Similes are explicit comparisons between two things, using the words “like” or “as”: “People are like sheep.” In metaphors the two things are directly equated so that the comparison is implicit rather than explicit: “People are sheep.”
The metaphors and similes of Scripture can present challenges for Bible translators, especially for those working in tribal contexts. In a tropical region where snow is unknown, the statement that God will make your sins “as white as snow” (Isa. 1:18) would be meaningless. The rule translators generally follow in such contexts is that if the comparison is single-faceted (the comparison here being only the color of snow), then a different metaphor may be used, or if none can be found, the translation can be made without a comparison. This verse could be translated “as white as cotton,” use the name of a white flower, or simply be “very white.” In contexts where “white” implies racial superiority, the phrase could be translated “very clean.” Little is lost since the only point being made concerns cleanness or purity.
However, if the metaphor is multifaceted, it should be retained (perhaps with explanatory notes describing what it is). For instance, sheep play a critical role in Scripture: “The LORD is my shepherd” (Ps. 23:1); sinners are like lost sheep (Isa. 53:6; Luke 15:4); Jesus is the Lamb who was slain (Rev. 5:6). To remove these metaphors in a culture where sheep are unknown would have implications for many passages and so does harm to the overall message of the Bible. The best solution here is to retain the metaphor and educate people about the nature of sheep.
These cultural issues are less of a concern in contemporary English versions, since translators can assume a basic knowledge of many biblical cultural items. Most modern readers are familiar with biblical things like sheep, camels, wolves, lamps, swords, and the like. But less common items are another matter, which we will discuss along with other kinds of difficult cultural questions in chapter 6.
For the sake of simplicity, some English versions occasionally reduce the metaphors of Scripture to abstractions. In 2 Samuel 22:2 the Lord is called “my rock, my fortress.” Most English versions retain both metaphors, but the GNT translates “my rock” as “my protector.” While this may be helpful for younger children or people at a simpler reading level, most readers can quite easily comprehend the metaphor. Our opinion is that translators should retain such metaphors whenever possible.
Similarly, in Matthew 6:3 the metaphorical idiom “do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing” is rendered by the CEV as “don’t let anyone know about it,” and by the NCV as “don’t let anyone know what you are doing.” These versions are explicitly geared toward readers with limited reading and comprehension skills, for whom the metaphor was evidently deemed too difficult. Almost all other versions retain the metaphor.
One compromise solution for versions geared toward remedial readers is to add a clarifying word or phrase. In the example above from 2 Samuel 22:2, the CEV includes both the metaphor and the abstract meaning: “my mighty rock, my fortress, my protector.” Similarly, while the first edition of the NLT (1996) translated “spare the rod” in Proverbs 13:24 with the abstraction, “refuse to discipline your children,” the 2004 revision reintroduced the metaphor with an explanatory phrase, “spare the rod of discipline.” This kind of translation both retains the metaphor and helps the reader comprehend it.
Live versus Dead Metaphors
Although we recommend retaining the metaphors of Scripture as much as possible, there is an important exception: when the metaphor is dead rather than live. A live metaphor illustrates a point with a concrete image, which continues to be evoked in the mind of readers. In the phrase “God is my rock,” the reader considers the characteristics of a rock and then determines which features apply to the subject and which do not. God is not “hard,” but he is “strong.” God is not a material object, but he is a source of protection. A dead metaphor, by contrast, has lost its concrete image in the minds of readers, who move directly to the abstract meaning. Consider the following metaphorical idioms in English:
In these and many others, the reader’s mind goes directly to the abstract meaning without pausing to think about the metaphorical “picture.” The first idiom means something like “he made his argument well.” Readers would not first envision either driving or a home. “She lost face” means “she lost social status.” No reader would envision a face disappearing. Nor would readers normally picture straw, grapes, bottoms, shoulders, pies, cakes, chickens, minds, beheadings, or distant shouting with these other idioms. The metaphors have become so familiar that the reader does not consider the concrete image but moves directly to the abstract meaning. These are dead metaphors. Translated literally, they do not communicate well to readers of a different language. “That’s as simple as a dessert pastry” would be a poor translation of “that’s as easy as pie”!
Here are some dead metaphorical idioms of Scripture, which even formal equivalent versions recognize as dead.
The challenge for translators is to determine whether a metaphor is live, dead, or somewhere in between. In Luke 1:69 Jesus is identified as a “horn of salvation in the house of . . . David” (NASU, TNIV, HCSB, ESV). Some versions translate this as a “mighty Savior from the royal line of David” (NLT) or something similar (cf. GNT, CEV, GW, NCV). The image of a horn comes from the Old Testament and originally signified the horns of powerful animals like a ram or ox. But by the first century this may have been a dead metaphor, so that hearers would have thought immediately of something “mighty” or “powerful” (cf. Ps. 18:2). Similarly, the phrase “house of David” would not conjure up a home, but rather a dynastic line of kings. In this case, the translation “a mighty Savior from the royal line of . . . David” (NLT) may be exactly what a first-century reader would have envisioned.
Consider also Ephesians 5:2 (NASU), where Paul tells believers to “walk in love” (cf. ESV, HCSB, NKJV). The Greek idiom “walk in . . .” means to live life by certain standards, and so the NIV renders the idiom “live a life of love” (cf. TNIV). The NET Bible and NAB say “live in love.” Some have criticized these translations, since (it is claimed) the Hebrew mind viewed life as a journey and Paul here pictures believers “walking” down the path of life. While this is possible, in this context it is unlikely. Like the English idiom “walk the talk,” the Greek idiom (“walk in . . .”) was probably dead in contexts like this and was heard by its original readers simply as “live this way.”
Sometimes formal equivalent versions will translate metaphorical idioms as literally as possible in order to capture “all of the meaning.” But what is forgotten is that idioms don’t mean what they say. This would be like translating the English idiom “by the way” as “along the path” and then explaining that the speaker is viewing life as a journey, picturing himself along life’s path. While this is a nice thought, it is simply wrong. To the English speaker “by the way” is simply an idiomatic way of saying, “I want to say something else.”
Since translators are not reading Hebrew or Greek as native speakers, there is a tendency to force a literal sense on metaphors and idioms that were never intended to be heard that way. Once again this creates a challenge for translators. Careful study of the historical and literary contexts is necessary. A good rule of thumb (another idiom!) is that if similar images commonly appear beside the metaphor (e.g., images related to paths, walking, or journeying; cf. Psalm 1), then it is probably live. If not, it is probably dead.
Once again, all translation involves interpretation, and decisions must be made on a case-by-case basis concerning whether the metaphor is live, dead, or somewhere in between. The translator cannot simply “play it safe” by retaining all metaphors, since turning a dead metaphor into a live one introduces meaning into the text that the original author did not intend.
The Extended Metaphor: Poetry
One of the more remarkable features of being human is our ability (often propensity) to communicate not only with the straightforward language of everyday speech, but also with poetry, the “language of the heart.” Because poetry is a deliberate attempt to communicate at a level of emotive language beyond mere prose, this can be the most difficult to transfer into a receptor language. Here especially, it is often true that “something is lost in translation.”
This reality can pose special difficulties for Bible translators, since well over one-third of the Hebrew Bible comes to us in the form of poetry (Job, Psalms, Proverbs, much of the prophets). There are good reasons for this. The majority of people for whom the Old Testament was written did not themselves read, but were read to; and for several reasons poetry is much more easily memorized than prose. So while translating Hebrew poetry into English may not be as difficult, for example, as translating Shakespeare into German, it nonetheless poses special problems for the translator.
These problems were articulated in the first “How to” book as threefold. First, as already noted, poetry by its very nature is intentionally emotive in a way that prose is not. Second, the psalms in particular are musical poems that functioned in Israel the way hymn books have traditionally functioned in the church. Third (and now the point of this chapter), the vocabulary of poetry is purposely metaphorical.1
For the translator, these realities pose problems of both structure and meaning. We will illustrate these from one of the best-known psalms, Psalm 23.
Structure
Almost all scholars recognize that the poems that make up the Hebrew Psalter have various forms of structure, just as is true of the various poems of English poets. Classical English poetry was dictated by both rhyme and meter. For example, Alfred Lord Tennyson’s “In Memoriam” was composed of eleven quatrains (stanzas of four lines each), which had a structural pattern of a b b a and a rhythmic pattern of four beats to a line, starting with an offbeat. It thus begins (with markers added):
While none of us would ever be so pedantic as to cite it with this stress pattern so obvious, it is nonetheless the deliberate pattern that holds the entire poem together: all eleven quatrains have this same pattern.
Hebrew poetry, on the other hand, is almost never expressed with “rhyme.” Rather, while tending to have lines of similar length and stress, it is most noticeable for its patterns of parallelism, either “synonymous” (where two lines say the same thing in different ways), “antithetical” (where the second line is the opposite of the first), or so-called “synthetic” (where the second, and sometimes third, build upon the first).
This parallelism can make the discovery of units within a psalm more difficult. Although a growing consensus has emerged as to what constitutes a unit within a given psalm, differences of analysis will always exist. For example, at issue in Psalm 23 is the placement of verse 4, which the KJV rendered: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.” Some translations (RSV, NRSV, ESV) set this verse off as a separate unit, thus dividing the psalm into three stanzas. Others place verse 4 at the beginning of verses 5 and 6 (NASU, NAB). This is problematic because all of verses 1 – 4 are held together by the pastoral imagery of a shepherd with his sheep, while in verses 5 – 6 the poet reflects on enjoying hospitality and protection as a guest in the house of Yahweh. Thus, most contemporary versions, on the basis of this content, divide the psalm into two parts, verses 1 – 4 and 5 – 6 (TNIV, GNT).
Meaning
In some ways Psalm 23 may not be the best place to illustrate translating meaning since it is one of the best-known psalms in the English Bible. Translators are reluctant to alter the well-known phrases of the KJV. At the same time, this very reluctance may be used to demonstrate the challenges of translating Hebrew poetry. We select three lines from the poem to illustrate how retaining traditional language can sometimes be at odds with accurately reproducing meaning.
First, in verse 1, the “I shall not want” (KJV), which is retained in versions in the KJV line of revision (ASV, RSV, NASB, NRSV, ESV), has been changed to something more meaningful in almost all other English versions. The problem is that “want” is rarely used anymore to express the concept of being in need. If a person “wants” in today’s English, that person “desires” something, whereas the Hebrew means “I lack nothing” (TNIV, NJB; cf. REB, NAB). The GNT puts it positively: “I have everything I need” (cf. NLT). Our point here is that the Hebrew meaning is quite clear, and when translated into idiomatic English, one keeps both the poetry and the meaning.
Second, in the fourth line, which spells out “how” Yahweh is the poet’s good shepherd, the KJV speaks of being led “in the paths of righteousness.” This rendering exposes the difficulty of the Hebrew construct relationship between two nouns, to be discussed briefly in chapter 5. Is it to be understood as qualitative, that is, “paths characterized by righteousness,” or descriptive, indicating the shepherd’s care in leading his sheep in the “right paths”? As before, the KJV tradition has tended to stay with the traditional interpretation (ASV, RSV, NASB, ESV), as did the NIV. The NRSV in this case broke ranks and joined most other modern English translations in rendering it “right paths” (TNIV, HCSB, NET, REB, NAB, NLT, GNT). The reason for this is easy to see: the traditional rendering “paths of righteousness” adds a religious dimension to a pastoral poem (green pastures, quiet waters, refreshes me). The more recent tendency is to stay with the pastoral imagery of sheep being led by a shepherd along the “right paths.”
Third, “walk through the valley of the shadow of death” is perhaps the most difficult phrase in the psalm to translate. Even the KJV translators included a marginal note, “Read deep gloom, and so elsewhere.” The difficulty lies with the Hebrew word tzalmawet, which ordinarily means “deep shadow” or “deep darkness” (as in Jer. 2:6, NRSV, ESV; cf. TNIV “utter darkness”), but which was rendered “in the midst of the shadow of death” in the Septuagint. Versions within the KJV tradition usually retain “shadow of death,” with a footnote to “the darkest valley” (ASV, RSV, NASB, ESV). Other contemporary versions reverse this, translating “the darkest valley” in the text (NRSV, REB, NAB, TNIV, GNT), often with a note to “shadow of death.”
In conclusion, the aesthetic and symbolic nature of poetry presents unique challenges for the translator. Poetry that uses rhyme or assonance is especially difficult, since words with equivalent meanings across languages seldom also share formal features (like rhyme or assonance). This is less of a problem with Hebrew poetry, which is characterized primarily by parallelism of content rather than by rhyme. The greatest challenge when translating Hebrew poetry is to determine the meaning of figurative language and then find appropriate cultural parallels in the receptor language.
Other Figures of Speech
Rhetorical Questions
Just as metaphors don’t always “mean what they say,” so other figures of speech also function in nonliteral ways. Questions, for example, can be real questions requesting information (“How old are you?”) or rhetorical questions that serve many other purposes. The question “Are you crazy?” when someone performs a dangerous stunt does not expect an answer, but is a way of saying “You are acting crazy!” “Don’t you think I know that?” is an expression of frustration or indignation. “Will you stay for dinner?” is not a question but an invitation, meaning “Please stay for dinner.” “Isn’t that beautiful?” functions as an exclamation, “That’s beautiful!”
The Bible has many rhetorical questions that function in a variety of ways. In John 11:9 Jesus says, “Are there not twelve hours of daylight?” This packs more rhetorical punch than the bland statement, “There are twelve hours of daylight.” Many rhetorical questions provide emphasis. When Paul says, “Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace?” (Rom. 6:15), he means, “We should certainly not sin . . .” “How can Satan cast out Satan?” (Mark 3:23) means “Satan surely cannot cast out Satan.”
Rhetorical questions can emphasize facts that are obviously true or untrue. Pilate says in John 18:35, “Am I a Jew?” meaning “I am certainly not a Jew!” Paul says, “Is Christ divided?” (1 Cor. 1:13) meaning Christ is not divided. Rhetorical questions can also express commands or rebukes. “Why are you bothering this woman?” (Matt. 26:10) means “Stop bothering this woman.” “Why are you so afraid?” (Mark 4:40) means “Don’t be afraid” or “You should not be so afraid.” Rhetorical questions can also replace conditional clauses. “Is any one of you sick?” (James 5:14) means “If any one among you is sick . . .”
Rhetorical questions can present challenges for Bible translators, since some languages do not use rhetorical questions or use them very differently than in the Bible. Jesus’ statements “Why are you so afraid?” or “How can Satan cast out Satan?” would be seriously misunderstood if interpreted as requests for information. This is less of a problem with English versions, since, as with metaphors, English uses rhetorical questions in many of the same ways as Hebrew and Greek.
English versions geared especially toward children or remedial readers occasionally translate rhetorical questions as statements. For example, the rhetorical question “Who can forgive sins but God alone?” (Mark 2:7) is rendered by the NCV as “Only God can forgive sins,” and “Why trouble the teacher any more?” (Mark 5:35) as “There is no need to bother the teacher anymore.” The goal here is to avoid misunderstanding for young readers or for those for whom English is a second language. (The NCV arose from a version originally designed for the deaf community.) As we have emphasized throughout this book, different Bible versions serve different purposes; so it is appropriate to have versions with adjusted rhetorical questions for readers for whom they are difficult to understand.
Hyperbole, Irony, and Sarcasm
Like idioms and rhetorical questions, other figures of speech will be misunderstood if taken literally. Hyperbole is exaggeration intended for dramatic effect. It is hyperbole when the women of Jerusalem sing that “Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands” (1 Sam. 18:7 TNIV). Both numbers are hyperbolic and form a Hebrew poetic parallelism indicating great prowess in battle. Matthew relates that the Messiah’s birth disturbed King Herod “and all Jerusalem with him” (Matt. 2:3). Obviously, not every person in Jerusalem heard the news. Jesus uses hyperbole when he says that the scribes and Pharisees “strain out a gnat but swallow a camel” (Matt. 23:24).
Irony occurs when the apparent meaning of a statement is contrary to its real meaning. Sarcasm is usually ironic, but is also intended to mock or deride. Jesus’ statement to the religious leaders in Mark 7:9 is both ironic and sarcastic: “You have a fine way of setting aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions!” (TNIV). The CEV captures this sarcasm well: “You are good at rejecting God’s commands so that you can follow your own teachings!”
Paul similarly mocks his opponents in Corinth when he says, “Already you have all you want! Already you have become rich! You have begun to reign — and that without us!” (1 Cor. 4:8 TNIV). Although the Corinthians had great pride in their spirituality, they were in fact spiritually immature. At Jesus’ trial, the soldiers sarcastically mock Jesus: “And they began to call out to him, ‘Hail, king of the Jews’ ” (Mark 15:18 TNIV). This statement is both sarcastic and ironic. Jesus’ enemies sarcastically mock him, but the Christian reader knows he is indeed king of the Jews.
In most cases the average English reader will understand that these are figures of speech by reading them in context. Functional equivalent versions occasionally add a clarifying word or phrase to make the meaning clear. For example, the NLT adds the word “taunted” in Mark 15:18: “Then they saluted him and taunted, ‘Hail! King of the Jews!’ ” The CEV similarly reads that “They made fun of Jesus and shouted, ‘Hey, you king of the Jews!’ ” This is a case of making explicit what is implicit in the text. We will see more examples of this in chapter 6 on language and culture.
Synecdoche and Metonymy
As with metaphors, figures of speech like synecdoche and metonymy make language more colorful and interesting. Synecdoche occurs when a part is used for the whole, or vice versa. “He owns a nice set of wheels” uses a part (wheels) to describe the whole (a car). “California just passed a new law” uses the whole (California) to refer to a part (the state legislature). Metonymy occurs when one thing is used for something related to it. “The pen is mightier than the sword” means that ideas are ultimately more effective than military force. “The White House released a statement” refers to a press release from the executive branch of the United States government.
There are many examples of both synecdoche and metonymy in the Bible. When Jesus says “the Son of Man has no place to lay his head” (Matt. 8:20 TNIV), he means he has no home of his own. This is synecdoche: a place to lay his head represents a home. That Job “did not sin with his lips” (Job 2:10 NASU) means that he “did not sin in what he said” (TNIV). This is metonymy: lips are associated with speaking. To “die by the sword” (Jer. 11:22 TNIV) means to “die in battle” (NLT, CEV). The “hand of the LORD” can refer to the power of the Lord (1 Kings 18:46; Acts 11:21) or judgment from the Lord (Ex. 9:3).
Formal equivalent versions almost always retain literal translations of synecdoche and metonymy. Functional equivalent versions sometimes clarify them. In 1 Kings 18:46 the NLT translates “the hand of the LORD was on Elijah” as “the LORD gave special strength to Elijah.” Mediating versions tend to translate synecdoche and metonymy literally unless they are considered too obscure or nonstandard English. The TNIV, HCSB, and NET all translate “sin with his lips” in Job 2:10 as “sin in what he said.” TNIV and HCSB retain “die by the sword” in Jeremiah 11:22, while the NET renders the metonymy “killed in battle” (with a footnote giving a literal translation).
Conclusion
When translating idioms, metaphors, and other figures of speech, the goal should be the same as with all good translation: to preserve as much of the meaning as possible for the target audience. For idioms (which don’t mean what they say) this involves finding a different, but equivalent, idiom in the target language. When there is no equivalent idiom, it means simply translating the idiomatic meaning without using figurative language.
For metaphors, translators must first determine whether that metaphor is live or dead. Live metaphors retain the concrete “picture” in the mind of the original readers and so can be preserved in translation. Dead ones have lost that image and so should be replaced with an equivalent metaphor or idiom in the target language.
Figurative language like that surveyed in this chapter is often closely linked to particular social and cultural situations. For example, using the American English idiom “couch potato” assumes a cultural context where people sit (or lie!) on couches while watching television. Culture and language can be closely related. In chapter 6 we will pursue additional translation challenges that arise when moving from the biblical cultures to our own.
For Further Reading
Caird, G. B. The Language and Imagery of the Bible. Philadelphia: Westminster, 1980.
Ryken, Leland. Words of Delight: A Literary Introduction to the Bible. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1992.