Translatingthe term ‘spirits’in 1 Peter 3:19 into Sangu, alanguageof Tanzania

Abstract

The identity of the ‘spirits’ in 1 Peter 3:19 has puzzled many Christians. When the Sangu Bible translation team got to this passage, the question arose as to how this challenging passage could be translated well for the Sangu audience, especially as they do not have a generic term for ‘spirit’. In order to show the process, the translation team had to work through to get a good solution, in the first section, the translation style of the Sangu team will be defined and placed in the wider frame of what constitutes Bible translation. Along with this, the Sangu team is presented as part of the larger Mbeya Cluster Project which serves 13 different Bantu languages in Bible translation, a grouping which tries to make use of important synergies. In the second section, the influence of the Swahili Union Version as the major Bible translation in Tanzania on translation choices will be described. It will be shown how this version impacts the translation, as it influences the Sangu translators in their understanding of a passage and the Sangu people group as the recipient audience, who compare the new translation in their vernacular with the translation in Swahili to see how well the Bible has been translated. In a third section, the Sangu spirit worldview will be presented in the way it has been elicited during different interviews with the Sangu community. This will help to get an inventory of words that could be used for ‘spirits’. Exegesis makes up the fourth part of the thesis, in which the question asked is what interpretation of the ‘spirits’ could be the best for the purpose of the letter of 1 Peter, also giving insight into how different interpretations of 1 Peter 3:19 evolved. The fifth and last section summarizes and weaves the previous chapters together and presents a translation model which the Sangu team could follow in translating the term ‘spirits’ in 1 Peter 3:19.

The identity of the ‘spirits’ in 1 Peter 3:19 has puzzled many Christians. When the Sangu Bible translation team got to this passage, the question arose as to how this challenging passage could be translated well for the Sangu audience, especially as they do not have a generic term for ‘spirit’. In order to show the process, the translation team had to work through to get a good solution, in the first section, the translation style of the Sangu team will be defined and placed in the wider frame of what constitutes Bible translation. Along with this, the Sangu team is presented as part of the larger Mbeya Cluster Project which serves 13 different Bantu languages in Bible translation, a grouping which tries to make use of important synergies. In the second section, the influence of the Swahili Union Version as the major Bible translation in Tanzania on translation choices will be described. It will be shown how this version impacts the translation, as it influences the Sangu translators in their understanding of a passage and the Sangu people group as the recipient audience, who compare the new translation in their vernacular with the translation in Swahili to see how well the Bible has been translated. In a third section, the Sangu spirit worldview will be presented in the way it has been elicited during different interviews with the Sangu community. This will help to get an inventory of words that could be used for ‘spirits’. Exegesis makes up the fourth part of the thesis, in which the question asked is what interpretation of the ‘spirits’ could be the best for the purpose of the letter of 1 Peter, also giving insight into how different interpretations of 1 Peter 3:19 evolved. The fifth and last section summarizes and weaves the previous chapters together and presents a translation model which the Sangu team could follow in translating the term ‘spirits’ in 1 Peter 3:19.