Written by Jessica Brown
May 18, 2021
Internalization
The Ranmo translation team uses a process called "oral drafting" to form the initial draft of our written translation. There are several reasons for this, including being able to capture a natural way of expressing deep meaning from the start (rather than trying to make a very "wooden" translation sound more understandable-clear and natural-later on) and being able to better utilize the natural skills which an oral society brings to the translation process. It allows the team to function with people from varying educational levels involved, bringing different gifts to the table. For us, it began more out of logistical necessity than anything else. After taking a class about oral translation last year, I came to appreciate more of the benefits connected to this process.
One of the initial steps in oral drafting involves listening to the English passage, followed by exegetical discussion in Ranmo to come to a rich understanding of the meaning of the English passage of Scripture, which can then be expressed by a skilled storyteller in Ranmo. After more discussion and several times of re-telling the passage, this oral draft is then recorded and formed into a written draft which is further revised as the team refers to written translations and exegetical materials to ensure accuracy (this is also followed by advisor check, village check, and external consultant check). This step of understanding the passage well enough to express it again naturally in a new way or new language is called "internalization."
This step of internalization is most often very rewarding and time-consuming, as our team takes what is learned from a very in-depth Bible study looking at the structure, context, and style of a passage and then reiterates the meaning of the passage into a completely new language and culture! By this point, many questions about the meaning have been addressed, but expressing it in a new language is sure to bring up more considerations likely not addressed by exegetical reference materials written for English speakers! Internalization is an oral rendering of this meaning which includes such features as voice inflection and possibly gestures (or anything else-I sometimes doodle images along with a Scripture passage when first internalizing it); but to give you a taste of what it looks like, I've included a transcribed version of my internalization of Isaiah 58, which I shared during our oral translation class. (Isaiah 58 is a chapter which I like to read in conjunction with 2 Corinthians 5.) Just to be perfectly clear, this is NOT a translation or intended to be used as a reference material, it is simply my internalization (rumination and regurgitation of meaning) of this part of a passage of Scripture. It is also not any sort of commentary or devotional application (although internalization can be a great devotional tool to force you to deeply consider and express meaning in varying/unique ways).
Background of Isaiah 58 portion:
God is responding to His people whom He sees are divided: they appear to seek Him out and want to feel close to Him, yet they do as they please and make outward displays of religion while not displaying the true heart of God’s children in reaching out to others.
Internalization:
But THIS is the kind of fasting I, your God, want to see you display: the chains of injustice being broken off, the yoke of oppression being lifted, so that captives go free and burdens are thrown off with glee! I want to see the have-nots treated generously, so that you share with the hungry, house the wanderer, clothe the naked, and finally, instead of turning away from your very own family, you generously embrace them.
THEN, you will be on display like brilliant daybreak, and in that very moment you will find healing and restoration. Just as the Israelites followed the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night, so this excellent way of living will guide you on the path ahead while the Lord himself guards you from behind. When you call to the Lord, He WILL respond. When you beg for help, He will remind you, “I am right here beside you.”
And again, remember, I want to see you rise up as a change agent: lifting the yoke of oppression, stemming the tide of false accusations and gossip, pouring your blessings out to the hungry, reaching out to the unseen and forgotten in their persecution.
THEN, you will be on display like a beacon in the night, turning darkness to daylight. The Lord will guide you from day to day, filling you up again in the desert and restoring your soul. You will resemble a flourishing garden, or fresh springwater which never runs dry. Your citizens will rise up again to reconstruct their ancestral ruins and rebuild their heritage, winning the title, “Master Craftsman, who builds up fortified walls stronger than before and restores wellbeing to each family in our neighborhood.
Finally, as the highlight of this restoration, I want to see a turnaround in what devotion looks like. Instead of doing whatever seems good to you on my sacred Sabbath, I want to see your hands and feet given over to accomplishing My will instead of yours, your soul taking delight in the special day I’ve established for you to praise, honor, and acknowledge God above, instead of doing whatever seems good to you or making useless human promises.
THEN, your soul will also delight in the LORD’s presence, and I, your God, will put you on triumphant display as you ride high above the valleys and enjoy the feast of your forefather Jacob’s inheritance. This is what the Lord your God wants you to hear from his very own mouth.
One of the initial steps in oral drafting involves listening to the English passage, followed by exegetical discussion in Ranmo to come to a rich understanding of the meaning of the English passage of Scripture, which can then be expressed by a skilled storyteller in Ranmo. After more discussion and several times of re-telling the passage, this oral draft is then recorded and formed into a written draft which is further revised as the team refers to written translations and exegetical materials to ensure accuracy (this is also followed by advisor check, village check, and external consultant check). This step of understanding the passage well enough to express it again naturally in a new way or new language is called "internalization."
This step of internalization is most often very rewarding and time-consuming, as our team takes what is learned from a very in-depth Bible study looking at the structure, context, and style of a passage and then reiterates the meaning of the passage into a completely new language and culture! By this point, many questions about the meaning have been addressed, but expressing it in a new language is sure to bring up more considerations likely not addressed by exegetical reference materials written for English speakers! Internalization is an oral rendering of this meaning which includes such features as voice inflection and possibly gestures (or anything else-I sometimes doodle images along with a Scripture passage when first internalizing it); but to give you a taste of what it looks like, I've included a transcribed version of my internalization of Isaiah 58, which I shared during our oral translation class. (Isaiah 58 is a chapter which I like to read in conjunction with 2 Corinthians 5.) Just to be perfectly clear, this is NOT a translation or intended to be used as a reference material, it is simply my internalization (rumination and regurgitation of meaning) of this part of a passage of Scripture. It is also not any sort of commentary or devotional application (although internalization can be a great devotional tool to force you to deeply consider and express meaning in varying/unique ways).
Background of Isaiah 58 portion:
God is responding to His people whom He sees are divided: they appear to seek Him out and want to feel close to Him, yet they do as they please and make outward displays of religion while not displaying the true heart of God’s children in reaching out to others.
Internalization:
But THIS is the kind of fasting I, your God, want to see you display: the chains of injustice being broken off, the yoke of oppression being lifted, so that captives go free and burdens are thrown off with glee! I want to see the have-nots treated generously, so that you share with the hungry, house the wanderer, clothe the naked, and finally, instead of turning away from your very own family, you generously embrace them.
THEN, you will be on display like brilliant daybreak, and in that very moment you will find healing and restoration. Just as the Israelites followed the cloud by day and the pillar of fire by night, so this excellent way of living will guide you on the path ahead while the Lord himself guards you from behind. When you call to the Lord, He WILL respond. When you beg for help, He will remind you, “I am right here beside you.”
And again, remember, I want to see you rise up as a change agent: lifting the yoke of oppression, stemming the tide of false accusations and gossip, pouring your blessings out to the hungry, reaching out to the unseen and forgotten in their persecution.
THEN, you will be on display like a beacon in the night, turning darkness to daylight. The Lord will guide you from day to day, filling you up again in the desert and restoring your soul. You will resemble a flourishing garden, or fresh springwater which never runs dry. Your citizens will rise up again to reconstruct their ancestral ruins and rebuild their heritage, winning the title, “Master Craftsman, who builds up fortified walls stronger than before and restores wellbeing to each family in our neighborhood.
Finally, as the highlight of this restoration, I want to see a turnaround in what devotion looks like. Instead of doing whatever seems good to you on my sacred Sabbath, I want to see your hands and feet given over to accomplishing My will instead of yours, your soul taking delight in the special day I’ve established for you to praise, honor, and acknowledge God above, instead of doing whatever seems good to you or making useless human promises.
THEN, your soul will also delight in the LORD’s presence, and I, your God, will put you on triumphant display as you ride high above the valleys and enjoy the feast of your forefather Jacob’s inheritance. This is what the Lord your God wants you to hear from his very own mouth.
January 18, 2021
Fixtures in the Picture
As I write surrounded by the slight chill of early morning and the hooting of owls, the setting takes me back to moonlit nights in the village, “doing life” with dear friends. Maybe we would weave a fakana (mat) by moonlight, or sit by a fire sharing stories, or find peace and strength through singing together plaintive local melodies accompanied by a slightly out-of-tune guitar and many exuberant voices. Or heading down a moonlit path to the house of one of my closest girlfriends in the village, Sarima. Or the time my village family heard it was going to be my birthday (it’s not a cultural tradition for them to celebrate birthdays) and picked up on the fact that I was a bit homesick. So Ngaf (host father) made an announcement in church to have a potluck meal that evening and happened to also invite a translator friend from the neighboring language group to the surprise party. My heart was overjoyed to be surrounded by a different kind of family singing their version of “happy birthday.” Or the evening I was dressed in the traditional cassowary-feather headband at a ceremony holding my nggethe (namesake) for the first time. Or the spontaneous song festival of youth from three language groups sharing their dramatized praise songs in a moonlit clearing.
With all these memories, several people are fixtures in the picture. Over the last few months, several of these fixtures have passed away and gone to be with our Savior. We had been praying and keeping up with news of a friend our own age who was being treated for severe illness, and just yesterday we received word that he also has passed away. We so wish we could be with the rest of our village family to share tears and remember these pillars of the village who have touched many lives. In lieu of that, this is a humble tribute from afar to their memory.
Bakam was the founder of our village of Yentortho. He received the gospel at a neighboring area and wanted so much to share the light that he brought three clans together into one village for the express purpose of planting a church and growing to know the Lord together. He had many dreams of being a teacher in the village, some of which had to be laid aside when an accident rendered him partially crippled. But he was always seeking to allow the Lord to work through him, and he so dearly wanted to be part of the translation work. Increasing deafness made this also impossible when I had first arrived, but after a committee was formed, he became “the little engine that could” in promoting the translation efforts and increasing community support for the local translators’ work. During the worst trial the village had seen in years, directly involving Bakam’s family, he stood joyful and strong against the general whisperings of fear about sorcery and instead offered forgiveness to his unfaithful wife, much like Hosea in the Old Testament. Soon afterwards, mostly alone as far as immediate family was concerned, Bakam’s battle with cancer began, and he traveled to Torres Strait islands for treatment. Now, several years later at the news of his passing, his joyful face comes clearly to mind as both a father of the village and of many spiritual children.
Isok was a motherly and exuberant lady who married into the village from a neighboring area. My memory of her is of going to her yard on my first trip to the village and finding her weaving a mat. I asked her to teach me, and she gave me many more details than my mind could absorb in the early stages of language immersion. Amazingly, I was able to understand her communication that day that her biggest heartache (which she continually brought before the Lord) was that she had not been able to have her own children. But many young people were brought under her wings as they came from other villages to attend the local community school. And in spite of her circumstances never changing, at every event she would be present as one of the most active in praise to her Lord. No visitor could enter the village without her coming to dance around them and offer them the hospitality of some garden fruit. She joined our translation team a couple of years ago and was always bringing watermelon or cucumbers to refresh us during our work time in the stifling heat of the church building. She will be remembered as a mother of many.
This brings us to Safu, who was taken at a much younger age, and many were dependent on his steadfast service. His wife Ella is my direct village sister of the same age as me, and together they were raising a sweet family of eight children (Nakwir, Buti, Joe, Giru, Kiam, Jessica, Kerati, and Timothy). Safu accompanied Ngaf (host father) to pick me up from Kiriwa village on my first trip to stay in the village, and he beamed to tell me that he was my nakum (brother-in-law). I didn’t understand all that was meant by this at first, but it didn’t take long to begin to see. When I arrived, I was introduced to his baby daughter, whom they had given my name even before I came to live there! As I teetered ever so slightly going up the steep staircase of my host family’s house, he noticed and promptly set to work building a handrail. He seemed to have a servant’s heart, and his wife Ella was a vibrant lady who loved to laugh at her children’s antics. My first Saturday after I had learned most everyone would go out hunting or fishing that weekend, I blundered through a request to join their family for an outing, and received the very welcome invitation to come with them fishing. We walked a good distance, caught 14 fish in nets (along with the boys finding a few lizards) and returned to the village at dusk only to have them enjoy telling everyone about how our day had gone and how proud they were that I wanted to go along with them. This was the start of a cherished friendship and their family were my closest geographical neighbors in the village as well.
As time went on, if a frustration ever arose in making travel arrangements, Safu would help me sort it out and try to address any concerns. When it came time to move to a new garden place, he and Ella helped me find one closer to the village so I could easily make the daily trip for yams after a day of translation work. Local people loved to joke with me (as has become the modern day custom for in-laws in their village to joke) that if something came up, I should just have my nakum do it. With a ready smile and glad to be identified as family, he often would! He and my uncle lovingly built my village house a couple of years after I arrived. Several years later when my husband Tim came to the village to meet everyone, Safu was so thrilled to call Tim his Sanggra clan brother, and their last baby is now named Timothy. Every night from my new house (and sometimes in person), I would get in on Safu and Ella’s devotion time with their children, a precious thing to have a family be so intentional in devotions together. Safu often liked to sing a consecration song something like “Take My Life and Let it Be.”
Safu led singing at church and had written many local worship songs, which he was thrilled to have me record in the evenings and later to have form the majority of the Ranmo songbook. When the translation work began, Ngaf Katan (my uncle) who was also the local preacher was the first to express interest, and he really enjoyed playing with words, as was evident from his wonderful local illustrations he would use in his sermons to help others understand abstract concepts. He is the chairman of our translation team and a great teacher who can thoroughly discuss translation issues but does not overpower those learning and will step back and challenge others to try their hand at a new task even if he is more adept at it. He also happens to be one of two local carpenters so is often quite in demand for village projects. When Safu realized that Ngaf Katan could not carry the workload alone, he then joined the translation work along with a couple of others, and his keen observation skills quickly became invaluable in moving the team forward with him acting as the communication point and logistical organizer of our team who also was willing to take the lead in reading the new alphabet aloud or whatever daunting task might face the team at any moment.
With all these memories, several people are fixtures in the picture. Over the last few months, several of these fixtures have passed away and gone to be with our Savior. We had been praying and keeping up with news of a friend our own age who was being treated for severe illness, and just yesterday we received word that he also has passed away. We so wish we could be with the rest of our village family to share tears and remember these pillars of the village who have touched many lives. In lieu of that, this is a humble tribute from afar to their memory.
Bakam was the founder of our village of Yentortho. He received the gospel at a neighboring area and wanted so much to share the light that he brought three clans together into one village for the express purpose of planting a church and growing to know the Lord together. He had many dreams of being a teacher in the village, some of which had to be laid aside when an accident rendered him partially crippled. But he was always seeking to allow the Lord to work through him, and he so dearly wanted to be part of the translation work. Increasing deafness made this also impossible when I had first arrived, but after a committee was formed, he became “the little engine that could” in promoting the translation efforts and increasing community support for the local translators’ work. During the worst trial the village had seen in years, directly involving Bakam’s family, he stood joyful and strong against the general whisperings of fear about sorcery and instead offered forgiveness to his unfaithful wife, much like Hosea in the Old Testament. Soon afterwards, mostly alone as far as immediate family was concerned, Bakam’s battle with cancer began, and he traveled to Torres Strait islands for treatment. Now, several years later at the news of his passing, his joyful face comes clearly to mind as both a father of the village and of many spiritual children.
Isok was a motherly and exuberant lady who married into the village from a neighboring area. My memory of her is of going to her yard on my first trip to the village and finding her weaving a mat. I asked her to teach me, and she gave me many more details than my mind could absorb in the early stages of language immersion. Amazingly, I was able to understand her communication that day that her biggest heartache (which she continually brought before the Lord) was that she had not been able to have her own children. But many young people were brought under her wings as they came from other villages to attend the local community school. And in spite of her circumstances never changing, at every event she would be present as one of the most active in praise to her Lord. No visitor could enter the village without her coming to dance around them and offer them the hospitality of some garden fruit. She joined our translation team a couple of years ago and was always bringing watermelon or cucumbers to refresh us during our work time in the stifling heat of the church building. She will be remembered as a mother of many.
This brings us to Safu, who was taken at a much younger age, and many were dependent on his steadfast service. His wife Ella is my direct village sister of the same age as me, and together they were raising a sweet family of eight children (Nakwir, Buti, Joe, Giru, Kiam, Jessica, Kerati, and Timothy). Safu accompanied Ngaf (host father) to pick me up from Kiriwa village on my first trip to stay in the village, and he beamed to tell me that he was my nakum (brother-in-law). I didn’t understand all that was meant by this at first, but it didn’t take long to begin to see. When I arrived, I was introduced to his baby daughter, whom they had given my name even before I came to live there! As I teetered ever so slightly going up the steep staircase of my host family’s house, he noticed and promptly set to work building a handrail. He seemed to have a servant’s heart, and his wife Ella was a vibrant lady who loved to laugh at her children’s antics. My first Saturday after I had learned most everyone would go out hunting or fishing that weekend, I blundered through a request to join their family for an outing, and received the very welcome invitation to come with them fishing. We walked a good distance, caught 14 fish in nets (along with the boys finding a few lizards) and returned to the village at dusk only to have them enjoy telling everyone about how our day had gone and how proud they were that I wanted to go along with them. This was the start of a cherished friendship and their family were my closest geographical neighbors in the village as well.
As time went on, if a frustration ever arose in making travel arrangements, Safu would help me sort it out and try to address any concerns. When it came time to move to a new garden place, he and Ella helped me find one closer to the village so I could easily make the daily trip for yams after a day of translation work. Local people loved to joke with me (as has become the modern day custom for in-laws in their village to joke) that if something came up, I should just have my nakum do it. With a ready smile and glad to be identified as family, he often would! He and my uncle lovingly built my village house a couple of years after I arrived. Several years later when my husband Tim came to the village to meet everyone, Safu was so thrilled to call Tim his Sanggra clan brother, and their last baby is now named Timothy. Every night from my new house (and sometimes in person), I would get in on Safu and Ella’s devotion time with their children, a precious thing to have a family be so intentional in devotions together. Safu often liked to sing a consecration song something like “Take My Life and Let it Be.”
Safu led singing at church and had written many local worship songs, which he was thrilled to have me record in the evenings and later to have form the majority of the Ranmo songbook. When the translation work began, Ngaf Katan (my uncle) who was also the local preacher was the first to express interest, and he really enjoyed playing with words, as was evident from his wonderful local illustrations he would use in his sermons to help others understand abstract concepts. He is the chairman of our translation team and a great teacher who can thoroughly discuss translation issues but does not overpower those learning and will step back and challenge others to try their hand at a new task even if he is more adept at it. He also happens to be one of two local carpenters so is often quite in demand for village projects. When Safu realized that Ngaf Katan could not carry the workload alone, he then joined the translation work along with a couple of others, and his keen observation skills quickly became invaluable in moving the team forward with him acting as the communication point and logistical organizer of our team who also was willing to take the lead in reading the new alphabet aloud or whatever daunting task might face the team at any moment.
November 30, 2020
Chasing Down Counterfactual Conditionals |
I was visiting the area Bible school for the Morehead area when I heard of Billy Graham’s passing. The local Bible school teachers are very up-to-date with his legacy, so we watched one of his films as a memorial. As they were discussing this film, they began speculating, “If Billy Graham was still alive, would he visit Papua New Guinea?” While their question may seem simple in English, it actually contains several areas of complexity for translation.
Our last consultant had identified a need to analyze how Ranmo language expresses the various uses of the conditional English word if. In the question about Billy Graham, this type of use is called a counterfactual conditional. Counterfactual conditionals are conditional sentences which discuss what would have been true under different circumstances (when Billy Graham was still alive).
But how does this relate to the translation of Scripture? Here is one verse which we have revised since analyzing this specific counterfactual structure. In John 18:36, Jesus tells Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were [but it isn’t], my servants would fight…” Originally, our translation draft had Jesus’ statement sound like an uncertainty, rather than a counterfactual conditional.
This type of structure is also found in passages treating such important topics as the resurrection. In 1 Corinthians 15, there is a repeated counterfactual conditional phrase, “If Christ is not risen [but He is!]…” Imagine how important it will be to use the right structure in expressing and teaching this essential truth! This analysis of structures in the language takes a fair bit of my (Jessica’s) time right now to search and find patterns from various examples of language I’ve recorded with Ranmo friends.
Our last consultant had identified a need to analyze how Ranmo language expresses the various uses of the conditional English word if. In the question about Billy Graham, this type of use is called a counterfactual conditional. Counterfactual conditionals are conditional sentences which discuss what would have been true under different circumstances (when Billy Graham was still alive).
But how does this relate to the translation of Scripture? Here is one verse which we have revised since analyzing this specific counterfactual structure. In John 18:36, Jesus tells Pilate, “My kingdom is not of this world. If it were [but it isn’t], my servants would fight…” Originally, our translation draft had Jesus’ statement sound like an uncertainty, rather than a counterfactual conditional.
This type of structure is also found in passages treating such important topics as the resurrection. In 1 Corinthians 15, there is a repeated counterfactual conditional phrase, “If Christ is not risen [but He is!]…” Imagine how important it will be to use the right structure in expressing and teaching this essential truth! This analysis of structures in the language takes a fair bit of my (Jessica’s) time right now to search and find patterns from various examples of language I’ve recorded with Ranmo friends.
November 1, 2020
Bible Translation Needs Around the World
In light of present-day globalization, where the opportunity to meet someone from another place may be right next door, why do we mention that God has called us to serve spiritually and physically isolated peoples? This map showing where the majority of languages still needing Bible translation are located may give you some idea about this. Papua New Guinea is located in the Pacific region of this map. Most of these language groups with remaining Bible translation needs are either physically-isolated (thus also having very limited access to medical, educational, and discipleship resources) or spiritually-isolated in areas where there is likely major persecution of believers.
World map is adapted from a free graphic at https://www.vecteezy.com/free-vector/world-map.
If you'd like to hear stories about the impact of Bible translation around the world, or hear how the current needs are being addressed by partnering organizations in the Bible translation movement, click on the buttons below.
September 10, 2019
The Centurion's Servant
Take a trip with me into the musings of a translation advisor. While looking over the chapters of Luke which our local translation team drafted, this question came up: Why, or in what way, was the centurion’s servant in Luke 7:2 dear or highly valued? Ranmo doesn’t have a general term to ascribe worth or value to someone or something except for “price.” The people tend to describe someone’s value based on specific qualities. So to consider the best possibilities for the translation, we need to explore deeper. This involves looking at commentaries and notes from other translators around the world. In this case, it also helped to have a resident seminarian in Tim. Here’s what it looks like when Tim and I work together on a consideration like this.
I looked up the word’s range of meaning in the original language and then gave Tim the English explanation of expressions we might be able to use in Ranmo, ranging from “good worker” to “upstanding” to “close to one’s heart.” Then we both looked at commentaries for ideas of how people have understood the context historically, checked a parallel story from Matthew, looked at the back translation (English gloss) of a neighboring language for comparison, and came to a way of describing the servant to the local translation team so they can make a decision on which expression best captures the meaning.
Basically, we came to the conclusion this servant worked harder, was more upright or reliable, and thus was more of a benefit or blessing to his master, similar to how Potiphar viewed Joseph’s management of his household before he was sent to prison. I have learned from colleagues that many PNG languages have an expression for someone who “surpasses” expectations or others of their same status. This fits well with the idea of this servant being “more” in several areas, and we have a term in Ranmo, mintum, which expresses that.
Now that we put all that effort into understanding a tiny piece of the context, we have to discuss as a translation team how to adequately bring out this interesting description of the servant without overstating anything and thus moving the emphasis away from the subject or main character of the story, the centurion. (By the way, next time your read this passage, you might find it interesting to note the two ways the centurion is described, first by the Jews and then in his own introduction to Jesus.)
I looked up the word’s range of meaning in the original language and then gave Tim the English explanation of expressions we might be able to use in Ranmo, ranging from “good worker” to “upstanding” to “close to one’s heart.” Then we both looked at commentaries for ideas of how people have understood the context historically, checked a parallel story from Matthew, looked at the back translation (English gloss) of a neighboring language for comparison, and came to a way of describing the servant to the local translation team so they can make a decision on which expression best captures the meaning.
Basically, we came to the conclusion this servant worked harder, was more upright or reliable, and thus was more of a benefit or blessing to his master, similar to how Potiphar viewed Joseph’s management of his household before he was sent to prison. I have learned from colleagues that many PNG languages have an expression for someone who “surpasses” expectations or others of their same status. This fits well with the idea of this servant being “more” in several areas, and we have a term in Ranmo, mintum, which expresses that.
Now that we put all that effort into understanding a tiny piece of the context, we have to discuss as a translation team how to adequately bring out this interesting description of the servant without overstating anything and thus moving the emphasis away from the subject or main character of the story, the centurion. (By the way, next time your read this passage, you might find it interesting to note the two ways the centurion is described, first by the Jews and then in his own introduction to Jesus.)