It all comes back to the cows... again...

I went into the office of one the translation teams here today to talk about some literacy issues. We're starting to do our plans for next year already, so I was curious what the education officials in their homeland had been asking for so we can start to plan our next round of teacher training and which books to publish next... but that's beside the point. I interrupted the team members as they were translating a verse from Numbers.

Now, keep in mind, this team comes from a culture that is pretty much completely wrapped up in their cows. Their cows are everything. They name their children after their favourite cows. They live, sleep, breath, eat, together with their cows. They sing about their cows. When they dance, they raise their arms in the pose of the horns of their favourite cows. And they have a gizzilion and one words for the various cows, depending on the age, the sex, the colour, the patter, the size of the horns, the curve of the horns... I'm sure I've heard somewhere just how many words they have for the subtleties in the differences of all these cows, but I can't remember exactly how many. But it's a serious lot of words.

So the team has a few decisions to make when the team comes across the following verse from Numbers 19:
2 "Here is another legal requirement commanded by the LORD: Tell the people of Israel to bring you a red heifer, a perfect animal that has no defects and has never been yoked to a plow..." (NLT)

2 "The people of Israel must bring Moses a reddish-brown cow that has nothing wrong with it and that has never been used for plowing." (CEV)

2 "Tell the People of Israel to get a red cow, a healthy specimen, ritually clean, that has never been in harness." (MSG)

It's pretty specific as to what kind of cow they had to bring, but for these folks here, the colour of the cows are very significant. So they have to figure out what was the significance of a "red" or "reddish-brow" "cow" or "heifer" in the OT, and figure out what colour and type of bovine creature has that same significance in their culture. Not easy, I tell you. And the team was asking me for advice! Um, yeah, me, who really doesn't even know the difference between a "cow" and a "heifer" in my own mother tongue.

Who knew you'd need some sort of degree in ranching to be a translation consultant?