[1811] in tlhIngan-Hol
Re: I would like a translation
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Thu Oct 21 15:03:24 1993
Reply-To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@klingon.east.sun.com>
From: Mark Reed <Mark.Reed@cad.gatech.edu>
To: "Klingon Language List" <tlhIngan-Hol@klingon.east.sun.com>
Date: Thu, 21 Oct 1993 14:59:16 -0400 (EDT)
In-Reply-To: <1428.mmw8970@[128.194.3.85]_POPMail/PC_3.2.2> from "Matthew White
acre" at Oct 21, 93 10:54:31 am
\I came up with an interesting word recently, but I don't know if the
\concept will be as clear in other people's minds. What concept in conveyed
\by the following word. I don't mean the literial translation, but the
\meaning.
\
\muSHa'chu'taHwI''a'
Well, the literal translation is as good a place to start as any in searching
for the meaning...
muSHa' - to love
chu' - perfectly
taH - continuously
wI' - one who or that which
'a' - large, great
So I get "Great one who loves perfectly forever". With the added
implications of your .sig, I'd guess that this was a name for God (or
possibly Jesus, inasmuch as that distinction matters in Christianity).
I'd hazard a guess that this is not a concept which tlhIngan Hol was designed
to express. Of course, we know very little about Klingon religion; it's in the
same category as food and native flora/fauna as far as exclusion from the
original edition of TKD. Everything in those categories was added as a result
of references on-screen, such as "veqlargh", so the likelihood is that the
vocabulary hasn't beeen "discovered" yet, rather than that the concepts are
missing.
If there were a noun equivalent of "-Ha'", then tacking it onto "veqlargh"
might be a reasonable way to try to get at the concept of a god who is a
positive force. It could be that "veqlargh" means "god", but in the Klingon
mindset all gods are evil, so the word is translated in such a way as to
convey the connotations (non-canonical though it be, I seem to recall from TFR
that the Klingons viewed the universe as out to get them, and any supernatural
beings were cruel ones).
I understand that there were some religious services at the camp, some
scripture translated - what was used there?
-marqoS
