How do we translate the Scriptures into Toba? In dialogues, we need to use words and phrases that are natural in Toba. For example, when Jesus spoke to Mary, his mother, how would he address her in Toba?

This is José’s translation for the verse in question:

Which means:

Jesus then replies:
- You Mary, Why are you telling me this? Still not yet I’m arriving at my time when my Father honours me.

Here’s another example from John’s Gospel. The Greek text of this verse
says (with literal translation word for word):






The New International Version translates it as follows:

The problem in this verse is the word “woman”. Would you address your mother like that? There’s nothing in the Greek to suggest Jesus was being anything other than polite, so in English a better word might be “Mum” or “Mother”.  

For instance, Peterson’s “The Message” has:

And the Good News Bible doesn’t have anything; it just says:

Now, that’s ok for English. But, what about Toba? How do the Tobas address their mothers? Certainly not with the word “woman”, and although it’s quite possible for Jesus to have said “Mum”, in the end José preferred another possibility: for Jesus to have called his mother by her name, Mary.