11Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels surrounding the throne and the living creatures and the elders; they numbered myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands,
The Greek that is translated as “elder” in most English versions (“presbyter” in The Orthodox New Testament, 2000) is translated as “Old-Man Leader” in Eastern Highland Otomi (source: John Beekman in Notes on Translation November 1964, p. 1-22) and in Bacama as mi kpan-kpani vɨnə hiutə: “big/old person of house of prayer” (source: David Frank in this blog post ).
Other translations include:
“the people who command among the people of Jesus” in Lalana Chinantec
“the old men who watched over the believers” in Morelos Nahuatl
“the ones guarding the brethren” in Isthmus Mixe (source for this and two above: Viola Waterhouse in Notes on Translation August 1966, p. 86ff.)
Apali: “God’s one with talk from the head” (“basically God’s messenger since head refers to any leader’s talk”) (source: Martha Wade)
Michoacán Nahuatl: “clean helper of God” (source: B. Moore / G. Turner in Notes on Translation 1967, p. 1ff.)
Noongar: Hdjin-djin-kwabba or “spirit good” (source: Warda-Kwabba Luke-Ang)
Wè Northern (Wɛɛ): Kea ‘a “sooa or “the Lord’s soldier” (also: “God’s soldier” or “his soldier”) (source: Drew Maust)
Iwaidja: “a man sent with a message” (Sam Freney explains the genesis of this term [in this article): “For example, in Darwin last year, as we were working on a new translation of Luke 2:6–12 in Iwaidja, a Northern Territory language, the translators had written ‘angel’ as ‘a man with eagle wings’. Even before getting to the question of whether this was an accurate term (or one that imported some other information in), the word for ‘eagle’ started getting discussed. One of the translators had her teenage granddaughter with her, and this word didn’t mean anything to her at all. She’d never heard of it, as it was an archaic term that younger people didn’t use anymore. They ended up changing the translation of ‘angel’ to something like ‘a man sent with a message’, which is both more accurate and clear.”)
Following are a number of back-translations of Revelation 5:11:
Uma: “After that I also saw and I heard the voices of many angels, thousands and tens of thousands their manyness. They stood around the Seat of the King and the living things with those elders.” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
Yakan: “Then I looked again and I heard the voices of thousands of angels. They stood surrounding the throne and the four angels of-different-kind and the twenty four elders.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
Western Bukidnon Manobo: “And then I looked around and I heard the angels of God singing. They were very many because they were thousands upon thousands. They were standing around the seat of the ruler along with the four creatures and the elders.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
Kankanaey: “I looked-across-a-distance again and I heard the voices of multiple-thousands of angels who couldn’t be counted who were surrounding the throne and the living creatures and leaders.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
Tagbanwa: “Well as I looked again, suddenly/unexpectedly I heard millions and millions of angels who voiced-loudly, the number of them couldn’t be counted. They were all around that king’s seat, those four created living beings and those twenty four elders. They were joining-in- too -in-response.” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
Tenango Otomi: “Looking again, I saw very many angels surrounding where are the twenty-four who are around the four who stand at the corners of the chair. The number of the angels I saw was thousands and thousands of them, and they sang.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)
Then I looked, and I heard: it is not necessary to suppose that in saying “I looked” John means that he actually saw all the countless millions of angels. This marks the first appearance of these participants in the drama.
John describes the precise order: first the innermost throne, then the four living creatures, then the twenty-four elders, and now the millions of angels. The word around is better translated by New Jerusalem Bible “gathered around”; Good News Translation and Translator’s New Testament “They stood around” is too specific. A verb like “surrounded” (New Revised Standard Version, New American Bible, Revised) or “encircled” (New International Version) is better.
Numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands: the Greek word translated “myriad” means ten thousand. The whole expression means “millions and millions of them” (Biblia Dios Habla Hoy), “countless thousands” (New American Bible, Revised “they were countless in number”); or else “too many to count” (see a similar expression in 9.16).
An alternative translation model for this verse is:
• Again I looked, and I heard the voices of countless numbers of angels standing around the throne, the four living creatures, and the elders.
Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on The Revelation to John. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .
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