Semantic Analysis

Salvation word-field

English “salvation,” “saved,” and “deliverance” collapse into a single Burmese term, ကယ်တင်ခြင်း, which is an asset here: unlike some target languages that must choose between competing near-synonyms, Burmese has one clear, non-Buddhist rescue-word already established in the Judson tradition. The semantic risk is not ambiguity within Burmese but interference from the adjacent, phonetically unrelated but conceptually competing term နိဗ္ဗာန်ရောက်ခြင်း (attaining nirvana), which occupies the same “ultimate deliverance” semantic slot in the reader’s existing worldview.

Righteousness word-field

ဖြောင့်မတ်ခြင်း (righteousness) sits in semantic tension with သီလ (moral precepts observed for merit) and ကုသိုလ် (merit itself). All three occupy the general space of “being good,” but only ဖြောင့်မတ်ခြင်း in this curriculum’s usage denotes a status conferred by God rather than a quality built up by the person. Segments must never let ဖြောင့်မတ်ခြင်း drift toward describing an achievement.

Spirit/soul word-field

ဝိညာဉ် (spirit/soul/consciousness) is the broadest and riskiest word-field in the glossary. It covers ghosts, nats, the Buddhist consciousness-continuum, and, only in its full compound form သန့်ရှင်းသောဝိညာဉ်တော်, the Holy Spirit. Because Theravada doctrine denies a permanent self, this word-field has no fully safe “bare” form — the qualifying words သန့်ရှင်းသော (holy) and တော် (honorific for the divine) are doing essential theological work every time, not just stylistic elevation.

Glory/power word-field

ဘုန်း (glory, but also merit-power) and တန်ခိုး (power/might) overlap partially. တန်ခိုးတော် (God’s power) is comparatively safe; ဘုန်းတော် (God’s glory) requires more care because ဘုန်း alone is the same word used for a monk’s or king’s earned spiritual potency. The distinguishing signal is always the honorific တော်, which marks the referent as divine rather than human-earned.