When we first moved in to live among this people group, we had no idea how we would be able to communicate the precious love letter from God to them. First of all, we didn’t know the language, second, we didn’t know the culture, and third, we had no idea how the spiritual vocabulary would come together for communicating the most important message in the universe!
But you know, after we invested the six and a half years in language and culture study, it was amazing how we began discovering the need vehicles for truth. And here then is a list of some of the vocabulary that came together for us:
Even though the P language had no specific word to talk about HOLY, it was still important for them to understand this key attribute of God. And as we taught the Scriptures and laid things out in their proper historical context, the way for communicating God’s holiness came right out of their mouths.
They began to say:
God is not a fool-around-one
God does not mix with evil
God is surpassingly bright
God cannot co-exist with ugliness (bad)
To talk about a person who is proud, we found a idiom that says it this way:
One who thinks emphatically only in his own heart
It says in Ephesians 4:30 that we have been sealed until the day of redemption. Well we found no word for seal…..BUT they have pigs and they mark them by cutting a certain design in their ears. And so that became our work for the translation. So we wrote, “We have become ear-cut by the Spirit of God until the day of redemption” and the people totally got it!!
In the P language, we discovered that the word heart was used for the conscience. And to speak about having a clear conscience, they used an idiom this way:
I don’t think with my heart like fire burning
And when they said that they had a guilty conscience, they would say:
Because I have stolen, I think severe burning
When it came to translating the important concept of new birth from John 3, we right away tried to use the literal form “to be born again”. However that didn’t fly at all! But then I decided to use another term I had found. And this is the way I found it:
First we discovered the word for egg
Then we discovered the verb for to lay an egg
Then we discovered that a woman is “eggy” each month
Then we found out when we studied their kinship that the real dad was always referred to as the “true egger”, and that the real mom was the “true eggess”.
Then we discovered that they the dad and mom “egged” their children.
And so, with this in mind, I ran a possible translation of new birth past the P believers. “If anyone is not egged again, he will not be able to live in the sphere of God’s rule” Well this went over great with the people! They got it!!
- God the Father = the true Father
- God the Son =the true Son
- Holy Spirit =the true Spirit
God’s attributes:
1. holy, light, tata chja, chjaîdë oa miredëmêde, cjarîda oa ëba cjiareâmîdëde
2. omnipotent, use an idiom that says, God has many bones, ju chiameti 3. omnipresent, everyhere-one, oëratime
4. omniscient, knows all things, chjänaiti oa dabamede 5. self existent, the One who is alone, jibëamaime
6. eternal without beginning, taruparea decjiade, without death, jaborea decjiade he is the forever-one, bucho aname, ara ûîdërë cjiamêde, he didn’t create himself, idëpea oa cjiadëmede
7. sovereign Ütë tjamô judi eamî japamêde dëbëpareâ decjiarî
8. spirit, tjo, icjara decjiade 9. immutable tjaoëdiä tjaoëdiäpe järeâ decjiade
10. trinity tjararîmê
- Satan, Ichiae with corrective teaching
- Angels, âdërijîrî mûîtjoî, the servants from Heaven
- Demons, yaröca, Ichiae jâ mûîtjoî
- Pride, jibëa chjirämo joretamere japeade
- Sin, doing bad, doing evil against God, not having ear holes for God,
- Create out of nothingness parepa, ichi maearë pareapeâdejê chjønâî oa
- Heaven, adë
- Hell, cjôdë tja anâräpê, the big lake of fire, NOTE: some of the vocabulary we could just put together because we knew the language. We’d go to the Greek and see what the original meaning was and then we’d put together a word for it.
- Ocean, the big water
- in the image of God, pio jënemi da oa pareapea
- Man’s spirit, tjo
- Sacrifice, yürü
Acceptable, jabechji - Apostle, -Jechurë chjadoâ judi, a Jesus-sent one
- Sealed,
-Ephesians 1, sealed unto the day of redemption -coâ oa cjiamî darî cjiareârê we are as if our ears are cut
-gôê cäâ oa cjiamî darî cjiareârê, we are as if we have been branded
Birthright, -yabomêrê mitëreâ üdë, that which the older brother grabs
Emotion is expressed idiomatically using the liver:
- joy, I am without a liver Phil.4:4 rejoice ever more will be “continue on in the non-liver state”
- anger, I have a hot liver
- disgust, I feel my liver
- everything is fine, I have a cool liver
- I cry easily, I have a soft liver
- I’m disappointed, I’m liverized!
- pricking conscience, I think with a burning liver peace, ma chjupi cjiari joretarea da,
sinful,
-ugly spirit, bad, to do evil,
Conscience and mind,
-chji,
tree of the knowledge of God and evil,
-the tree that makes you know evil as well as good
tree of life,
-the eternal life giving tree
fellowship,
-orî bagarî ëba cjiareâ daeâdirê, jadü cjiareâ daeâdirê
germs,
-worms, they talked about teeth worms and this got us going on it
to blame,
-aechide, aenô, to hurl, to throw (words at another)
Possess,
-irâdiä cjaeäâdejê po jûî Ichiae judi, Satan entered the snake
-irâdiä nîbäâde Ichiae judi, Satan spoke thru the snake
spiritual death,
-Ütë tjamô jûî âdë cjarîdapeâdirôjôê, Ütë tjamô pio jûî nøta orî bagarî ëba cjiareâmîdëpeâdirê
To be born again,
-jabëchja cjiari ado nöria oa cjia
circumcision, budo
faith, quënâ
justify, to make right, to make acceptable
alter,
-gûnâreâ mecha, a killing table
save, salvation, to make to pass through, when someone is drowning and you save him, this is the same word
Saviour, the one who makes to pass thru
deliver, to make to come out of a bad situation
Deliverer, the one who makes to come out of a bad situation
baptism, gôe cjaeä chuda to be placed into dipping
tree of the knowledge of good and evil,
the tree that makes you know evil as well as good
thank-you, no word for this but we started to say, “chjaderi japeareneque” to say, you did me well.