This will be the last of the Bible verses which I will translate into Dyirbal, at least for now. I may well return to this language in future.
As this is thus a Finale of sorts, I shall translate two verses from the Book of Job: these being 38:28 – 29.
Job 38:28
KJV: Hath the rain a father? or who hath begotten the drops of dew?
Dyirbal: Baŋulma gambalmi ŋuma? Wañdyu baraymbaray duŋgarañu?
baŋulma is built from two components:
1. baŋul = the Class 1 Genitive Noun Marker.
2. -ma = the Interrogative Clitic.
In order to build a Yes/No Question in Dyirbal, one simply adds –ma to the first word in that sentence, regardless as to what that word be.
gambalmi is the Genitive form of the word gambal, which means rain.
Several times have we seen the word galbin, which means son of male ego/father.
Here, we finally meet the word ŋuma, the word for father/paternal uncle.
This meaning pair is common across Australian languages.
wañdyu is the Ergative Human Interrogative.
In plain English, this means who, and specifies one that is exerting active agency.
baraymbaray is a Time word which means morning or dawn.
duŋgarañu means wept or cried.
This is an Intransitive Verb, meaning that it should not be able to take an Ergative Agent.
This is a deliberate use of Grammar: wordplay that is not possible in either English or Hebrew.
Job 38:29
KJV: Out of whose womb came the ice? and the hoary frost of Heaven, who hath gendered it?
Dyirbal: Wañuŋu gurraŋunu birgil mayin? bayi barmba dayu wañdyu wugan?
wañuŋu is the Dyirbal word for whose.
gurraŋunu is the Ablative Declension of the Noun gurra, which means vagina.
I chose the word vagina for two reasons:
1. I could not find the word for womb.
2. It is a reference to a Dyirbal myth, which we explore later.
birgil is a Noun which means frost or wintertime.
mayin (from mayil) is a Verb which means either came out or comes out.
I considered using mayilŋgañu (from mayilŋgay), which means either come out forcibly or come out quickly. I chose not to in order to depart from the referenced Dyirbal myth.
bayi barmba is a Noun which means quartz.
In Dixon’s Dyirbal grammar, I found only the word bala birgil for frost/ice.
When I translate these Bible verses, I uses Bible Hub in order to use the original Hebrew as a guide.
In many translations, the phrase hoary frost is replaced with crystal bason.
bayi barmba (quartz) seemed like a close enough substitute.
It is the 2nd reference to the aforementioned Dyirbal myth. I will briefly outline said myth at the end.
wañdyu we explored above.
wugan (from wugal) means gave or gives.
Whilst parsing the Hebrew exegesis on Bible Hub, I found that the KJV’s gendered/gendereth is often rendered as gave/gives in more modern translations.
The Dyirbal Myth.
It concerns Ŋagaŋunu (lit. from the leg), also known as First Man.
Whilst walking through the Cairns Rainforest, a boil appears on his leg, out of which pops his son, whom he names after himself. Every day, he hunts a kangaroo, and feeds his son with the blood from its heart.
One day, two sisters discover this child, and take turns to breastfeed the young lad.
The woman flee when they hear the man return. They hide up a short tree.
First man gives his son his daily heart’s blood, but the poor lad throws up. From-the-leg looks at the vomit, and sees the breastmilk therein. He realises that women are nearby, and eventually finds them.
He attempts to have his way with them, but he can’t. Between their legs is nothing.
With two pieces of quartz covered in a leaf, he sits them down, thereby creating the vaginal opening.
(With a kangaroo heart and vulva he creates the vulva and vaginal lips, then with cucumber halves he creates the inner wall.)
The story ends with the two ladies growing tired of his sexual appetites. They enlisti the help of a suicidal yellow walnut (Buñdyan), who explodes and showers the man with live coals, sending him running into the bush.
I could explore the theology of this story, but that would stretch the remit of this newsletter.
Nevertheless, I encourage any non-believers to compare & contrast this story with the creation of Eve from the rib of Adam.