tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Oct 24 12:24:03 2006
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Re: Jesus' General
McArdle wrote:
>There's a blogger who calls himself "Jesus' General" and features a
>rotating translation of this phrase in his blog title. One of the
>languages looks to be Klingon, but I'm having a little trouble making
>sense of the translation:
>
> HoD'ma' ioH'a'
>
>First, although {HoD] is captain, I haven't found any suffix {'ma'}, and
>such a thing may not even be possible. It might be that {HoD'ma'} is a
>typo for {HoD'a'}, an augmented captain, but if so, why not just use {Sa'}?
It's probably a typo for {-ma'} "our (if capable of using
language)": {HoDma'} "our captain".
>As for {ioH'a'}, this is probably {joH'a'}, an augmented lord.
An Augment, eh? <G> {joH'a'} "great lord, overlord, lord of lords, etc."
was fairly widely used for for "god" before the word {Qun} was revealed in
1999:
There is a Klingon word that could be translated "god" or "super-
natural being": {Qun}. In talking of times long ago (pre-Kahless?),
Klingons mention these beings, and there seem to have been a good
number of them (the plural of {Qun} is {Qunpu'} since they are or
were presumably capable of using language, which is what the plural
suffix {-pu'} implies). Though too little is known of ancient Klingon
theology, there doesn't seem to have been a single {Qun} that stood
out from the rest. Indeed, the {Qunpu'} appear to have acted collec-
tively. {Qunpu'} are distinct from {qa'pu'} "spirits" (such as the
spirits of the dishonored dead which reside at Gre'thor). {Qun'a'}
"great god" [...] may or may not be an appropriate translation for a
single supernatural being in a monotheistic system, since the {Qun'a'}
would still be one among many. [st.klingon 7/19/1999]
>Is this a reasonable way to refer to Jesus (I suppose there must be an
>accepted way to do this, given the KBTP)?
I don't know what the KBTP uses, but Glen Proechel transcribed the
Hebrew/Aramaic form Yeshu *{je'Su'} in his condensed Klingon New Testament
translation "Good News for the Warrior Race". And for Christians at least,
the usual Klingon patronymic {JESUS Qun puqloD} "Jesus, son of G-d" is obvious.
>But even assuming it is, shouldn't "the great Lord's general" be {joH'a'
>HoD'a'} (if not {joH'a' Sa'})?
You're right; ranks and titles follow the proper name. In Klingon "Jesus's
general" and "General Jesus" are both {JESUS Sa'}. I'm not sure there's an
easy way to distinguish the two.
OTOH it may not be possession or a title, but rather apposition: {HoDma'
joH'a'} "our captain, the great lord".
--
Voragh
Ca'Non Master of the Klingons