[Tlhingan-hol] The Lord's Prayer

Tue Apr 17 10:44:46 PDT 2012

At 01:23 '?????' 4/17/2012, you wrote:
>As the Butterfly translation had actually been published on-line, I
>wanted to focus on that one first.
>
>9 Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name.
>Suto'vo'qorDaq SoHtaH vavmaj; ponglIj quvmoH.
>
>**So am I correct in saying that God's name can't speak?
>There seems to be some debate on this topic..

That's been answered, but as you perceived debate I'll reiterate that 
{vavma' } is required and {ponglIj} is correct. The god is depicted 
as speaking, the name not.

> >Qov:
> >"Hallowed be thy name" is a wish that something happen, See TKD 
> 4.2.9 appendix.
>
>**Is it? I didn't gloss that from the text.
>**I took it as "Your name is hallowed"

That sort of thing is why I recommended using a Greek textual 
analysis to be sure you got the meaning.  You said you were, so it's 
surprising the one you chose didn't make it clear that it was a 
request. 
<http://www.lords-prayer-words.com/>http://www.lords-prayer-words.com/ 
calls it a petition, and a prayer that it be so.

> >Qov:
> >I'm not one to profess expertise on theology, but as I understand 
> it Stovokor is the in-between place with the ferry, not the reward 
> place with the god.
>
>As I understand it, Sto-vo-Kor is the afterlife for the honored dead
>where they fight with Kahless in the Black Fleet.
>The opposite of Gre'thor, where the un-honored dead go.

Ah, so there's no in-between place: the un-honoured just hang around 
the river the whole time. Where does QI'tu' come in?  For a 
translation rather than a cultural rendering, "Paradise" seems a very 
good gloss, with Sto-vo-Kor matching Valhalla better.

>10 Thy kingdom come.
>wo'Daj cher
>
>**Yes, that should be {wo'lIj} unless the kingdom can speak...

And the verb form there means it's also a wish. It would be "Thy 
kingdom comes," were it a statement.

>Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
>tera'Daq chutDaj luloblu'; 'e' rur Suto'vo'qorDaq.

As above.  Think of it as short for "let thy will be done" -- a 
pretty much perfect translation of -jaj.

I think the order of the phrases needs to be reversed. The idea is 
that his law is already perfectly obeyed in heaven and the prayer 
petitions that his will be likewise obeyed on Earth. At any rate, a 
noun with an N5 can't be the subject of rur.

> >Voragh:
> > cherjaj wo'lIj
>  may your empire be established

I know Voragh already pointed out that it needs to be {wo'lIj 
cherlu'jaj} to accurately translate the English (and presumably the Greek).

>11 Give us this day our daily bread.
>DaHvam tIr ngoghDaj junob.
>
>**Typo. Should be {DaHjajvam}

Why not just DaHjaj or jajvam. Is something added by making it "this 
today"? Read some commentary on the unusual Greek word that is 
translated into English as "daily". You may decide to replace it with 
DaHjaj tIr ngogh 'ut.

> >Qes 'utlh:
> >(And if you're happy to Klingonise "heaven" to Suto'vo'qor, why 
> tIr ngogh and not something more general, like Soj? I've always 
> felt that tIr ngogh is clunky and only a description of something a 
> Klingon's seen on Earth, that it implies Klingons don't have bread 
> themselves, apart from chabmey.)
>
>**As {tIr ngogh} was revealed well before TalkNow! came out, I'll
>continue to believe that it's really a Klingon food until we have
>further evidence that it's not.
>I do, however, consider most of the TalkNow words to not be Klingon objects.

Do consider though that the meaning of English food words has mutated 
through time, so that meat used to refer to food in general (hence 
"sweetmeats"), and some of the interpretations I looked at seemed to 
think that bread represented not only more than just bread, but more 
than just food in terms of our daily survival requirements. I don't 
know the Greek for bread, so I don't know what the word is the 
original, but it might be. The Greeks had bread. I guess bread was 
invented in mesopotamia. I recognize the word for bread in the Latin.

>***So I think that leaves us with this:
>
>9 Our Father which art in heaven,
>
>Suto'vo'qorDaq SoHtaH vavma';

Isn't it more an invocation to {Suto'vorqaor Dabbogh vavma'} than 
telling him where he is?

>Hallowed be thy name.
>
>quvjaj ponglIj.
>
>10 Thy kingdom come.
>
>chenjaj wo'lIj

As above. This sounds like you're asking that his empire establish 
something, perhaps his name.

>Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.
>
>tera'Daq chutlIj luloblu'; 'e' rur Suto'vo'qorDaq.
>
>***Someone mentioned not likeing this line.
>Suggestions on fixing it?

As I mentioned, it's more than not liking. You need to get rid of the 
N5 suffixes on nouns that interact with the verb. Without spending 
any time on it, my first pass would be:

Suto'vo'qor rurchoHjaj tera', chutlIj loblu'mo'.

"May Earth come to resemble Sto-vo-kor, because your law is obeyed."

Some people (lojmIt tI'wI' nuv) would insist that the verbal -mo' 
clause precede, the way a noun -mo' clause needs to, but there's no 
support for that in TKD, just his stylistic preference, and I think 
it flows better following.

>Everything I come up with keeps the same awkwardness
>
>11 Give us this day our daily bread.
>
>DaHjajvam tIr ngoghmaj junobneS.

It's definitely an imperative "Give us."  The -neS is there to 
emphasie that it's a polite request and not a demand, but it's still 
an imperative, ghonobneS all the way.

>***If we take the rest from an a fore mentioned translation (that I
>haven't taken the time to look over as it's 4:22 am) we have:
>
>12 And forgive us our debts,
>
>  'ej yemmeymaj tIbIjneSQo';

I'd be tempted to go with {yemmeymajmo' ghobIjneSQo'}  - it's not the 
sins that are punished.

>as we forgive our debtors.

Random ignorant comment: I know there are different versions of the 
prayer corresponding to different Christian traditions. I don't know 
how strong the affiliations between the versions and the sects are. 
If the one that contracted you is strong about wanting the "debts" 
version and not the "trespasses" version, maybe yemmey isn't the 
direction to go here. If they don't care which version then ignore my babbling.

>maHvaD yembogh nuvpu' DIbIjbe'moH.

I'm not quite getting what the -moH does there.

>13 And lead us not into temptation,
>
>chotlhu'moHneSQo',

Correct that prefix.

>but deliver us from evil:
>
>'ach mIghghachvo' ghotoDneS.

We know better now about how to use -ghach. I don't think it's 
unforgivably egregious there, but I was thinking of rendering it as 
{X mIgh}, and went to look at what doors the original had left open 
for X. Quoting Wikipedia [yeah, yeah, but it's your contract, you 
find better sources]:

"The original Greek, as well as the Latin version, could be either of 
neuter (evil in general) or masculine (the evil one) gender. [...] 
Later parts of Matthew refer to the devil when discussing similar 
issues. [...] While <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Calvin>John 
Calvin accepted the vagueness of the term's meaning, he considered 
that there is little real difference between the two interpretations, 
and that therefore the question is of no real consequence."

I'd use that to justify translating evil as mIghwI'.

I'm also looking twice at {mIghvo' ghotoD}. The suffix -vo' is for 
motion away from and we have to be careful not to fall into the trap 
of using it just because the English uses from. In this case I think 
the metaphorical sweeping up of salvation justifies it.

>For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory, for ever.
>
>reH SoHvaD wo', HoS je, batlh je.

The "For" here is in the sense of "because, but there's no verb to 
attach a -mo' to. I'm not sure that that part of the meaning is 
vital. The commentaries I looked at doesn't mention it and my latin 
isn't good enough to see if that's there. In Klingon that would have 
to be {reH SoHvaD taHmo' wo', HoS je, batlh je}. It makes me smile 
(in a good way) because if it were "Thine be the kingdom, etc," then 
you'd have to use {taHjaj wo'}. And that rocks, doesn't it?

>Amen
>
>'amen.

I'm pretty sure Amen means qaSjaj.

- Qov