inclusive vs. exclusive pronoun (Neh 4:21)

Many languages distinguish between inclusive and exclusive first-person plural pronouns (“we”). (Click or tap here to see more details)

The inclusive “we” specifically includes the addressee (“you and I and possibly others”), while the exclusive “we” specifically excludes the addressee (“he/she/they and I, but not you”). This grammatical distinction is called “clusivity.” While Semitic languages such as Hebrew or most Indo-European languages such as Greek or English do not make that distinction, translators of languages with that distinction have to make a choice every time they encounter “we” or a form thereof (in English: “we,” “our,” or “us”).

For this verse, the Jarai translation uses the exclusive pronoun, excluding the reader.

Translation commentary on Nehemiah 4:21

This verse summarizes the continuation of the work. Half of the people worked while the other half stood guard with their spears, as Good News Translation makes explicit. Since the builders no longer went home at night outside Jerusalem (see the next verse), Nehemiah was able to extend their working hours from the usual sunrise to sunset (see Deut 24.15) to all the daylight hours from the break of dawn till the stars came out. This brought the beginning of the work day from sunrise to the earliest light of the dawn, and the end of the work day from the time of sunset to the time when it was dark enough to see the stars. This added at least two hours to the work day. Translators must therefore be more precise than saying “from sunrise to sunset” as in New Living Translation. For easy understanding, Good News Translation provides a good model for the whole verse.

Quoted with permission from Noss, Philip A. and Thomas, Kenneth J. A Handbook on Nehemiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2005. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .