leprosy, leprous

The Greek and Hebrew terms that are often translated as “leprosy (or: defiling/skin disease)” or “leprous (person)” in English is translated in Mairasi as “the bad sickness,” since “leprosy is very common in the Mairasi area” (source: Enggavoter 2004).

Following are various other translations:

  • Shilluk: “disease of animals”
  • San Mateo Del Mar Huave: “devil sore” (this and the above are indigenous expressions)
  • Inupiaq: “decaying sores”
  • Kaqchikel: “skin-rotting disease” (source for this and three above: Eugene Nida in The Bible Translator 1960, p. 34f. )
  • Noongar: “bad skin disease” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang)
  • Tzotzil “rotting sickness” (source: Ronald D. Olson in Notes on Translation January, 1968, p. 15ff.)
  • Usila Chinantec “sickness like mal de pinta” (a skin disease involving discoloration by loss of pigment) (source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)

See also stricken and leprosy healed.

Learn more on Bible Odyssey: Leprosy (Word Study) and leprosy .

Translation commentary on Leviticus 14:57

To show …: Good News Translation takes the whole of verse 57 as belonging to a single sentence with the law as the subject. On the other hand, Revised Standard Version and most other versions take the first part of this verse as the completion of the sentence begun in verse 54. This does not alter the meaning greatly, but it does make for a rather long and complicated sentence. The Good News Translation rendering will be a better model for many languages.

Quoted with permission from Péter-Contesse, René and Ellington, John. A Handbook on Leviticus. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1990. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .