Linguistic Gap Analysis: Luke (English → Kannada)

0. Purpose and Method

This document executes Phase 1 Step 8: a systematic gap analysis of Kannada theological vocabulary against the eight doctrinal emphases of the Luke curriculum. It answers three questions for every load-bearing concept:

1. Does an existing Kannada term exist, and if so, does it carry unwanted freight from Karnataka’s dominant religious traditions (mainstream Hindu devotional practice, Haridasa Krishna-bhakti centered at Udupi, Veerashaiva/Lingayat Sharana tradition, and the regional Shakta tradition centered on Chamundeshwari at Mysore)?
2. Where vocabulary is missing entirely, should the gap be filled by transliteration, compounding, or descriptive paraphrase?
3. Where too many competing Kannada terms exist (“crowded semantic neighborhoods”), what fencing rule (a required companion word, a forbidden substitution, or a mandatory translator note) prevents drift toward the wrong neighbor?

This analysis extends, and must never contradict, the Romans baseline translation_memory.json and the Luke-specific 08_core_glossary.md and updated bible_term_registry.json. Where those documents already fixed a rendering, this analysis explains why — the gap-analysis reasoning behind the glossary decision — and flags residual risk for Phase 2 review routing.

---

1. Doctrine Vocabulary Matrix

#	Doctrine	Available Kannada Term(s)	Weaknesses / Collision Risk	Recommended Strategy
1	Jesus as Savior for All Nations and All People (Jew/Gentile, Rich/Poor)	ರಕ್ಷಕ (savior), ರಕ್ಷಣೆ (salvation), ಅನ್ಯಜನಾಂಗದವರು (Gentiles), ಬಡವರು/ಧನಿಕ (poor/rich)	ರಕ್ಷಕ can be heard as “a protector/deliverer” among many chosen ishta-devatās in bhakti practice (each devotee may have a personally chosen protector-deity); Karnataka readers may not automatically infer exclusive, universal savior. Universality claims also brush against real, socially significant caste categories (esp. table-fellowship and commensality contexts below).	Retain ರಕ್ಷಕ (established) but require it be co-anchored in context with unqualified universality markers (“ಎಲ್ಲಾ ಜನರಿಗೆ,” “ಸಕಲ ಜನಾಂಗಗಳಿಗೆ”) at every occurrence in core passages (1:47; 2:10-11,30-32) so the exclusivity + universality combination — one Savior for literally everyone — cannot be read as one deity among several personal options. Do not soften Jew/Gentile or rich/poor pairings.
2	The Holy Spirit’s Work in Salvation History	ಪವಿತ್ರಾತ್ಮ (baseline Critical term); ದೇವರ ಸಾಮರ್ಥ್ಯ (power of God); ಅಭಿಷೇಕಿಸು (anoint); ಆವರಿಸು (overshadow)	ಪವಿತ್ರಾತ್ಮ itself is secure (never ಪರಮಾತ್ಮ, per baseline). Risk is at the level of verbs describing the Spirit’s action: ಆವರಿಸು (overshadow, 1:35) and ಅಭಿಷೇಕಿಸು (anoint, 4:18) each have live ritual/devotional counterparts (respectively: divine energy-descent in tantric/yogic devotional idiom; and liṅga/mūrti abhiṣeka at Śaiva shrines and Śravaṇabeḷagoḷa). Also “clothed with power from on high” (24:49) risks a Śākta-tradition (Chamundeshwari) “power descending on a devotee” resonance.	Keep ಪವಿತ್ರಾತ್ಮ as the stable anchor noun throughout; treat every Spirit-action verb (ಆವರಿಸು, ಅಭಿಷೇಕಿಸು, ಸಾಮರ್ಥ್ಯವನ್ನು ಧರಿಸಿಕೊಳ್ಳಿ) as requiring a mandatory translator note tying the action back to this one Person of the Trinity acting once, historically, redemptively — never a repeatable energy-transfer technique.
3	Good News to the Poor and Marginalized	ಬಡವರು (poor), ಸುವಾರ್ತೆ (gospel), ಧನ್ಯರು (blessed), ಅಯ್ಯೋ (woe)	Real gap: Kannada has abundant vocabulary for ritual or caste impurity/marginality (e.g., terms tied to untouchability history) but no single existing Christian-tradition term for Luke’s deliberately economic-and-social category of ಬಡವರು that also carries the theological weight of “these are the gospel’s first addressees.” Risk of readers spiritualizing ಬಡವರು into “poor in spirit only,” erasing Luke’s insistence on literal poverty.	Retain ಬಡವರು as a plain, non-euphemistic economic term; require a translator note at 4:18; 6:20; 7:22; 14:13,21; 16:20-22; 19:8 explicitly stating both literal-economic and extended-marginalized senses are intended together, not one substituted for the other.
4	Repentance and Forgiveness of Sins	ಮಾನಸಾಂತರ (repentance), ಪಾಪ ಕ್ಷಮೆ (forgiveness of sins), ಬಿಡುಗಡೆ (release), ದೀಕ್ಷಾಸ್ನಾನ (baptism)	Crowded neighborhood: ಪ್ರಾಯಶ್ಚಿತ್ತ (ritual self-expiation) sits immediately adjacent to ಮಾನಸಾಂತರ in ordinary religious Kannada usage and must be actively fenced out. ದೀಕ್ಷಾಸ್ನಾನ sits adjacent to ದೀಕ್ಷೆ, the term for guru-bestowed or Liṅgāyat iṣṭaliṅga initiation. The Greek wordplay ἄφεσις (forgiveness/release) cannot be preserved in Kannada at all — a genuine untranslatable gap.	Fence ಮಾನಸಾಂತರ against ಪ್ರಾಯಶ್ಚಿತ್ತ with an explicit forbidden-substitution rule (see §3 below). Fence ದೀಕ್ಷಾಸ್ನಾನ with a catechetical footnote distinguishing one-time public identification from lineage-initiation. Accept the ἄφεσις wordplay loss as unrecoverable; mandate a translator note at 1:77; 3:3; 4:18; 24:47 cross-referencing the shared Greek root so reviewers understand the loss is deliberate, not careless.
5	Prayer and Dependence on God	ಪ್ರಾರ್ಥನೆ/ಪ್ರಾರ್ಥಿಸು (prayer), ಕೇಳಿರಿ/ಹುಡುಕಿರಿ/ತಟ್ಟಿರಿ (ask/seek/knock), ಒಪ್ಪಿಸುತ್ತೇನೆ (commit my spirit)	ಪ್ರಾರ್ಥನೆ itself is safe and well-established in Kannada Christian usage. The risk is pragmatic/functional: everyday Kannada religious practice includes ಹರಕೆ (vow-bargaining prayer — “if you grant X, I will give/do Y”) at both Hindu shrines and, syncretistically, at some Christian pilgrimage sites in Karnataka. Luke’s prayer texts (11:1-13; 18:1-14) risk being heard through this transactional frame rather than confident child-to-Father asking.	No lexical fix is available or needed — ಪ್ರಾರ್ಥನೆ stands — but Phase 2 must carry a standing doctrinal note at every extended prayer-teaching passage (11:1-13; 18:1-14) contrasting confident filial asking with ಹರಕೆ-style bargaining, since the distinction is pragmatic/cultural rather than lexical.
6	The Kingdom of God Present and Future	ದೇವರ ರಾಜ್ಯ (kingdom of God, baseline), ಸಮೀಪಿಸು (draw near), ನಿಮ್ಮ ಮಧ್ಯದಲ್ಲಿ / ನಿಮ್ಮ ಒಳಗೆ (17:21)	ದೇವರ ರಾಜ್ಯ itself is stable. The acute gap is at 17:21: Kannada’s two natural renderings of ἐντὸς ὑμῶν split exactly along the fault line separating biblical theology from Liṅgāyat iṣṭaliṅga-indwelling and Vedantic antaryāmin doctrine (a divine Self already present within, awaiting only inward realization) — a doctrinally live, not merely stylistic, choice.	ನಿಮ್ಮ ಮಧ್ಯದಲ್ಲಿ (“in your midst/among you”) is fixed as the required rendering (already flagged Critical in the registry); ನಿಮ್ಮ ಒಳಗೆ is a forbidden substitution for this specific verse. No comparable risk attaches to ಸಮೀಪಿಸು, which safely holds the already/not-yet tension.
7	The Cost and Joy of Discipleship	ಶಿಷ್ಯ (disciple), ಹಿಂಬಾಲಿಸು (follow), ಶಿಲುಬೆ (cross), ಸಂತೋಷ (joy)	ಶಿಷ್ಯ risks guru-śiṣya lineage framing (a student advancing through a teacher’s attained wisdom toward eventual independent mastery or the teacher’s status) rather than perpetual, dependent following of a living Lord. ಸಂತೋಷ is safe, but its near-neighbor ಆನಂದ is a crowded-neighborhood risk (see §3). The “hate” idiom (14:26) is a structural translation gap with no natural Kannada equivalent that preserves both the hyperbole and the priority-claim simultaneously.	Retain ಶಿಷ್ಯ but attach a standing note at first occurrence (5:30) clarifying the relationship is to Christ as living, sovereign Lord, not a guru whose attainment the disciple eventually equals or inherits. Retain ಸಂತೋಷ as primary joy-term throughout (never ಆನಂದ as primary). Handle 14:26 by descriptive paraphrase plus mandatory idiom note rather than literal ದ್ವೇಷಿಸು.
8	Jesus’ Compassion and Table Fellowship with Sinners	ಕನಿಕರಪಡು/ಕರುಣೆ (compassion), ಜೊತೆ ಊಟಮಾಡುವುದು (table fellowship), ಪಾಪಿಗಳು (sinners), ಸುಂಕದವರು (tax collectors), ಸಮಾರ್ಯದವನು (Samaritan), ಕುಷ್ಠರೋಗಿ (leper)	No lexical gap — Kannada vocabulary for compassion and shared meals is adequate. The risk is entirely pragmatic/social: shared eating across status boundaries remains a live, high-stakes marker in many Karnataka communities where caste-conditioned commensality expectations persist socially even where formally rejected in doctrine (cf. the Lingayat movement’s own historic anti-caste reform, noted in the Romans baseline). A flattened translation could read as generic hospitality, losing the narrative’s scandal.	No new term needed; require a standing pragmatic note at every table-fellowship passage (5:29-32; 7:36-50; 14:12-24; 15:1-2,23-32; 19:5-7) instructing translators/reviewers to preserve the social risk Jesus takes, framed as gracious invitation rather than confrontation, avoiding both over-softening (generic hospitality) and over-politicizing (direct caste-polemic framing not present in the source).

---

2. Missing Vocabulary: Genuine Lexical Gaps

These are concepts for which no existing Kannada term, Christian or otherwise, adequately covers the source concept — true gaps rather than crowded neighborhoods.

Concept	Nature of the Gap	Resolution Adopted
ἄφεσις wordplay (forgiveness/release, 4:18 vs. 1:77; 3:3; 24:47)	Kannada has no single word spanning both “release from captivity” and “forgiveness of sin” as one root does in Greek. This is a genuine untranslatable pun, not a mistranslation risk.	Split unavoidably into ಪಾಪ ಕ್ಷಮೆ / ಬಿಡುಗಡೆ; compensate with a mandatory translator’s note at all four occurrences explaining the shared Greek root, so the theological point (the Jubilee release Isaiah promised is forgiveness of sin) is taught explicitly rather than assumed to be self-evident from the Kannada text.
μισέω priority idiom (14:26)	Kannada, like most languages, has no comparative-priority idiom that reads naturally as hyperbole meaning “love X less by comparison” without either (a) sounding like a literal command to hate family, or (b) being softened into meaninglessness.	Do not render literally as ದ್ವೇಷಿಸು. Use a descriptive paraphrase preserving the absolute priority claim (e.g., “ತನ್ನ ಕುಟುಂಬಕ್ಕಿಂತಲೂ ನನ್ನನ್ನು ಹೆಚ್ಚಾಗಿ ಪ್ರೀತಿಸದಿದ್ದರೆ” — “if he does not love me more than his family”) with a mandatory footnote citing the Semitic idiom and Matthew 10:37’s parallel.
”Today” (σήμερον) as an eschatological marker with fronted emphatic force (2:11; 4:21; 19:5,9; 23:43)	Kannada word order does not reproduce Greek’s emphatic sentence-initial fronting; ಇಂದು alone is semantically correct but not automatically emphatic in Kannada syntax.	Accept ಇಂದು as the fixed rendering (per curriculum-wide consistency requirement) but require Phase 2 segment-level attention to sentence construction (e.g., leading with ಇಂದು rather than burying it mid-clause) so the emphatic force is reconstructed through word order rather than lexical choice.
”Year of the Lord’s favor” as unrepeatable historical-Jubilee fulfillment (4:19)	No existing Kannada phrase names a one-time, historically fulfilled Jubilee-year concept; the nearest available cultural category (ಶುಭ ವರ್ಷ, an astrologically auspicious year) is calendrical/repeatable and merit/omen-based, the opposite of what the text claims.	Coin the descriptive phrase ಕರ್ತನ ಕೃಪಾವರುಷ (“the Lord’s year of grace”) rather than borrowing an existing cultural phrase; mandatory translator note explaining Leviticus 25 Jubilee background, since no OT-literacy can be assumed.
Structural equivalent to the Davidic-covenant/Jubilee background assumed throughout Luke 1-4	Neither Haridasa bhakti nor Veerashaiva tradition has a structural parallel to a historical, dynastic, promise-and-fulfillment covenant literature. This is not a lexical gap but a conceptual scaffolding gap.	No single term resolves this; Phase 3 catechetical materials (outside this document’s scope) must supply the OT narrative background rather than expecting any Kannada term alone to carry it. Flagged here so Phase 2 segment translators do not over-load individual terms (e.g., ಒಡಂಬಡಿಕೆ) trying to compensate lexically for a missing narrative frame.

---

3. Crowded Semantic Neighborhoods: Fencing Requirements

These are concepts where Kannada has too many available terms, several of which are the established, natural word in general religious usage but carry unwanted doctrinal freight when applied to this curriculum’s content. Each requires an explicit fence: a forbidden substitution, a mandatory companion word, or a mandatory translator note.

Target Concept	Chosen Term	Crowding Neighbor(s)	Why the Neighbor Is Dangerous	Fencing Rule
Repentance	ಮಾನಸಾಂತರ	ಪ್ರಾಯಶ್ಚಿತ್ತ	Ritual/self-performed expiation earning removal of sin’s effects; inverts the doctrine that forgiveness is received, not earned by prescribed acts.	Forbidden substitution: ಪ್ರಾಯಶ್ಚಿತ್ತ must never render μετάνοια in any Luke passage.
Joy	ಸಂತೋಷ	ಆನಂದ	Strong Vedantic/bhakti association with mystical bliss of union/absorption (sat-chit-ānanda; the bliss-state anticipating or accompanying Aikya-merger). Applying it to Luke’s relational, historically-grounded rejoicing risks importing an absorption-endpoint the text does not teach.	ಆನಂದ is never the primary rendering of χαρά in any Luke passage; may appear only in a translator’s explanatory note contrasting the two senses, never in the running text.
Baptism	ದೀಕ್ಷಾಸ್ನಾನ	ದೀಕ್ಷೆ (alone)	ದೀಕ್ಷೆ names guru-lineage or Liṅgāyat iṣṭaliṅga initiation — entry into an ongoing teacher-disciple or devotional-object relationship, quite unlike a one-time public identification with repentance.	ದೀಕ್ಷಾಸ್ನಾನ (the compound including -ಸ್ನಾನ, “washing”) is required, never the bare ದೀಕ್ಷೆ; mandatory catechetical footnote at 3:3 (first occurrence) and 3:21 (Jesus’ own baptism).
Anointed / anoint	ಅಭಿಷೇಕಿಸು	(no safe alternative exists)	ಅಭಿಷೇಕ is the standard Kannada term for ritual pouring of sacred substances over a deity’s image or a Śiva-liṅga (e.g., Rudrābhiṣeka; the Mahāmastakābhiṣeka at Śravaṇabeḷagoḷa) — a devotee’s ritual act upon a divine object, the reverse direction of agency from the Spirit’s commissioning act upon a living person.	No forbidden-substitution rule is possible since no established alternative exists; instead, a mandatory translator note is required at every occurrence (4:18 above all) explicitly naming and reversing the expected direction of agency.
Wisdom (of the child Jesus)	ಜ್ಞಾನ (compounded as ಬುದ್ಧಿ-ಜ್ಞಾನ)	ಜ್ಞಾನ (bare)	Bare ಜ್ಞಾನ is the technical term for Advaita Vedānta’s liberating gnosis (jñāna-mārga), a path of self-attained enlightenment ending in realization of non-difference from Brahman — entirely unlike Jesus’ ordinary human maturing described in 2:40,52.	Bare ಜ್ಞಾನ is disfavored as a standalone rendering; the compound ಬುದ್ಧಿ-ಜ್ಞಾನ or an explanatory phrase (“ಮಾನವ ಸಹಜ ಬೆಳವಣಿಗೆಯ ಜ್ಞಾನ”) is preferred at 2:40 and 2:52.
Paradise	ಪರದೈಸು (transliteration)	ಸ್ವರ್ಗ	ಸ್ವರ್ಗ in mainstream Hindu cosmology denotes a temporary heavenly abode earned by accumulated puṇya, from which the soul eventually returns to the rebirth cycle — exactly inverting 23:43, where the criminal has performed no meritorious act and receives an unearned, permanent promise.	ಸ್ವರ್ಗ is disfavored as the primary rendering; the transliteration ಪರದೈಸು is required with a mandatory clarifying note contrasting merit-earned temporary heaven with grace-given permanent presence with Christ.
Hades	ಪಾತಾಳ / ನರಕ	ನರಕ (as sole term, without qualification)	ನರಕ in mainstream Hindu cosmology is typically one of several temporary hells that purify karma before rebirth — Luke 16:26’s “great chasm… fixed” depicts a permanent, unbridgeable state, the opposite of a purifying, time-limited stage.	ನರಕ may be used but must always be paired with or glossed by ಪಾತಾಳ and a mandatory translator note stressing the fixed, non-purificatory nature of the state depicted; theologian review required at every occurrence (10:15; 16:23-26).
Redemption	ವಿಮೋಚನೆ	(semantic overlap with ಮೋಕ್ಷ/ಮುಕ್ತಿ family, already forbidden elsewhere for “salvation”)	ವಿಮೋಚನೆ shares a root-sense field (“release/liberation”) with the forbidden ಮೋಕ್ಷ/ಮುಕ್ತಿ terms for salvation, risking the same collapse into dissolution-of-self liberation the baseline already fences against.	ವಿಮೋಚನೆ is retained (no better alternative exists) but is always anchored to a specific redemptive-historical referent in context (e.g., “ದೇವರು ತನ್ನ ಜನರನ್ನು ವಿಮೋಚಿಸಿದನು” with explicit object), never left as an abstract liberation-state term standing alone.
Ascension	ಆರೋಹಣ	(yogic/kuṇḍalinī “ascent of consciousness” idiom in some Karnataka devotional-mystical circles)	ಆರೋಹಣ can describe a mystic’s or yogi’s spiritual ascent of consciousness — an inward, repeatable, attainable experience — quite unlike Christ’s unique, bodily, historical, one-time exaltation.	Pair ಆರೋಹಣ with the descriptive phrase ಪರಲೋಕಕ್ಕೆ ಒಯ್ಯಲ್ಪಟ್ಟನು (“was carried up to heaven”) at every occurrence (24:51) rather than using ಆರೋಹಣ alone.
Worship	ಆರಾಧಿಸು	ನಮಸ್ಕರಿಸು	ನಮಸ್ಕಾರ functions in everyday Kannada as a generic respectful greeting offered equally to elders, teachers, and deities — far too weak for the disciples’ exclusive divine worship of the risen Christ at 24:52.	ನಮಸ್ಕರಿಸು is disfavored for προσκυνέω in Christological worship contexts; ಆರಾಧಿಸು is required.
Kingdom “within/among you”	ನಿಮ್ಮ ಮಧ್ಯದಲ್ಲಿ	ನಿಮ್ಮ ಒಳಗೆ	ನಿಮ್ಮ ಒಳಗೆ (“within you, inside your own being”) directly overlaps Liṅgāyat iṣṭaliṅga-indwelling theology and the Vedantic antaryāmin doctrine of an already-present indwelling divine Self awaiting inward realization — precisely reversing Jesus’ point to a hostile external audience.	ನಿಮ್ಮ ಒಳಗೆ is a forbidden substitution at 17:21 specifically; ನಿಮ್ಮ ಮಧ್ಯದಲ್ಲಿ is mandatory; theologian review required before Phase 2 use, per the registry.
Power of God / power from on high	ದೇವರ ಸಾಮರ್ಥ್ಯ	ಶಕ್ತಿ	ಶಕ್ತಿ in Karnataka’s prominent Śākta tradition (Chamundeshwari at Mysore, former Mysore royal tutelary deity) names a specific divine-feminine power distinct from, and potentially rival to, the one God’s saving power — acutely salient at 24:49’s “clothed with power,” which could otherwise echo a Śakti-descent idiom.	ಶಕ್ತಿ is a forbidden substitution throughout (carried forward from the Romans baseline); ದೇವರ ಸಾಮರ್ಥ್ಯ is mandatory in every Luke occurrence, especially 1:35; 4:14,36; 5:17; 24:49.
Scripture	ಗ್ರಂಥ	ವಚನ	ವಚನ has a strong, specific association with the Veerashaiva Sharana poet-saints’ devotional-poetic literature — inspired spiritual wisdom born of mystical experience, but not claiming to be God’s own spoken word.	ವಚನ is disfavored for γραφή/βιβλίον; ಗ್ರಂಥ is required at 4:17-21 and 24:27,44-45.

---

4. Transliteration vs. Paraphrase Decisions

Term	Decision	Rationale
Messiah / Christ	Transliterate (ಮೆಸ್ಸೀಯ / ಕ್ರಿಸ್ತ)	Carried from Romans baseline; no Kannada paraphrase can carry the specific OT-promised-deliverer referent without collapsing into “avatar” or “great teacher” categories.
Paradise	Transliterate (ಪರದೈಸು)	Existing Kannada term ಸ್ವರ್ಗ carries incompatible merit/temporariness freight (§3); transliteration plus footnote is safer than paraphrase, which would need to negatively define the term (“not a temporary merit-heaven”) every time.
Sabbath	Transliterate (ಸಬ್ಬತ್ / ಸಬ್ಬತ್ ದಿನ)	Established Kannada Christian convention; avoids confusion with ಹಬ್ಬ (generic festival day), which would understate its covenantal/legal significance.
Mammon	Transliterate + gloss (ಮಮ್ಮೋನ, ಧನ/ಸಂಪತ್ತು ಎಂಬ ವಿವರಣೆಯೊಂದಿಗೆ)	The personification-as-rival-master sense would be lost in a plain paraphrase (“money”); transliteration preserves the proper-noun, quasi-personal force Jesus intends.
Abba/Father address	Retain baseline ಅಬ್ಬಾ for cross-reference; Luke itself uses ತಂದೆ (Πάτερ) directly	Luke does not use the transliterated Aramaic form; the Kannada rendering must follow Luke’s own Greek (ತಂದೆ), while ಅಬ್ಬಾ is retained in the glossary only to preserve consistency with Romans 8:15 cross-references.
Anoint	Transliterate-adjacent verb retained (ಅಭಿಷೇಕಿಸು) despite risk	No equally established Christian alternative exists in Kannada; paraphrase (“ದೇವರು …ಗೆ ಸಾಮರ್ಥ್ಯ ಕೊಟ್ಟನು,” “God empowered him”) loses the specific messianic-office technical sense tied to Isaiah 61 and Davidic/priestly/royal anointing typology. Retained with mandatory note rather than replaced.
Year of the Lord’s favor	Paraphrase/coin (ಕರ್ತನ ಕೃಪಾವರುಷ) rather than transliterate or borrow ಶುಭ ವರ್ಷ	No existing Kannada phrase captures Jubilee-fulfillment; coining a compound from already-established baseline vocabulary (ಕರ್ತ + ಕೃಪೆ + ವರುಷ) is safer than importing an astrological-calendrical idiom.
Son of Man	Paraphrase/compound (ಮನುಷ್ಯಕುಮಾರ), not transliteration	The Danielic apocalyptic-messianic technical sense has no transliteration precedent in Kannada Christian usage; a compound noun preserving both “son” and “of humanity” is the established solution and must retain titular force at every occurrence.
Hades	Retain existing term with fencing, not transliteration (ಪಾತಾಳ / ನರಕ, always glossed)	A transliteration (ಹೇಡಿಸ್) would be unfamiliar and communicatively empty for the target reading level (Class 8-10); the existing term is retained but fenced per §3 above rather than replaced.
Kingdom of God	Paraphrase, not transliteration (ದೇವರ ರಾಜ್ಯ)	Fully established from the Romans baseline; a transliterated “ಬಸಿಲೇಯ” would be meaningless to the target audience and is never considered.
Synagogue	Paraphrase (ಸಭಾಮಂದಿರ), not transliteration	A transliteration would erase the useful visual/conceptual distinction from both ದೇವಸ್ಥಾನ/ಗುಡಿ (Hindu temple) and ಸಭೆ (church); the descriptive compound “assembly-hall” retains the historical, Jewish-specific referent clearly.
”Hate” priority idiom (14:26)	Paraphrase with mandatory note, not literal translation	See §2; literal transliteration is not applicable (this is a Semitic idiom, not a proper noun), and literal lexical translation (ದ್ವೇಷಿಸು) actively misleads; only a paraphrase-plus-note resolves it.

---

5. Ranked List of Highest-Risk Ambiguities in Luke

Ranked by combined severity (doctrinal centrality × likelihood of syncretistic misreading in the Karnataka context), for Phase 2 review-routing priority.

1. Luke 17:21, “the kingdom of God is ἐντὸς ὑμῶν” — Critical. The single Kannada rendering choice directly determines whether the text sounds like biblical inaugurated eschatology or Liṅgāyat/Vedantic indwelling-Self doctrine. Zero tolerance for ambiguity; mandatory theologian pre-approval before any Phase 2 segment use, per the registry.

2. “Anointed” / anointing language (4:18, the core passage’s climactic term) — Critical. ಅಭಿಷೇಕಿಸು is retained with no safe alternative, meaning every single occurrence carries residual risk of being heard as ritual image/liṅga anointing (devotee-to-object) rather than the Spirit’s one-time commissioning of a living person (God-to-person, reversed agency). Compounded by falling inside the curriculum’s core passage.

3. Hades / eternal conscious torment vs. temporary karmic naraka (16:19-31) — Critical. The rich man and Lazarus parable’s “fixed… great chasm” (16:26) is precisely the point where a purifying, temporary, karma-driven afterlife framework would invert the text’s meaning if the fencing note is dropped in translation or omitted in teaching.

4. Paradise vs. svarga (23:43) — Critical. A single unqualified word choice (ಸ್ವರ್ಗ instead of ಪರದೈಸು) at the cross would silently convert an unearned, permanent gift into a merit-based, temporary reward — reversing the scene’s entire grace-logic (a criminal receiving what he did not and could not earn).

5. ἄφεσις wordplay loss (forgiveness/release, 1:77; 3:3; 4:18; 24:47) — High. Not a mistranslation risk per se, but a lost argument: Isaiah’s Jubilee “release” is Luke’s chosen figure for the forgiveness Jesus brings, and if the shared root is never explained, readers may treat 4:18’s “release to the captives” as social/political liberation only, decoupled from the personal forgiveness taught elsewhere — a live risk given Luke’s simultaneous, genuine emphasis on actual social liberation for the poor.

6. “Son of Man” flattening (extremely frequent, 25+ occurrences) — Critical by doctrine, High by practical risk. The sheer frequency of this term in Luke creates cumulative risk that some translator, somewhere in a long document, will flatten ಮನುಷ್ಯಕುಮಾರ toward a generic “a person” gloss under time pressure, quietly erasing the Danielic titular claim across many passages at once.

7. Joy (χαρά) drifting toward ಆನಂದ under stylistic pressure — High. Because ಆನಂದ is the more “elevated” or “poetic” Kannada word for joy in general literary usage, there is a real risk that a translator seeking stylistic elegance in warmly emotional passages (2:10; 15:7,10,32; 24:52) will reach for ಆನಂದ against the fencing rule, quietly importing mystical-absorption bliss connotations.

8. Table fellowship passages read as generic hospitality (5:29-32; 7:36-50; 14:12-24; 15:1-2,23-32; 19:5-7) — High. Because no lexical error is even possible here (the vocabulary is safe), this risk is invisible to term-level QA checks and can only be caught by a pragmatic/cultural reviewer instructed to ask whether the social scandal of the scene survives translation.

9. Baptism vs. dīkṣe-style guru-initiation (3:3-21; 7:29-30; 12:50) — High. The compound ದೀಕ್ಷಾಸ್ನಾನ mitigates but does not eliminate the risk that hearers default to the far more common bare ದೀಕ್ಷೆ association with entering an ongoing guru-lineage or Liṅgāyat iṣṭaliṅga relationship.

10. “Poor” (ಬಡವರು) spiritualized away (4:18; 6:20; 7:22) — High. Because “the poor” is theologically central across multiple Christian traditions globally, there is a cross-cultural temptation (not unique to Kannada) to read it as a metaphor for “the spiritually needy” generically, erasing Luke’s insistence on literal economic and social poverty as a real, addressed audience.

11. Ascension vs. yogic/kuṇḍalinī ascent idiom (24:51) — Medium-High. Lower likelihood of confusion than items above because the surrounding bodily-resurrection narrative context strongly anchors the meaning, but the term ಆರೋಹಣ alone, extracted into a hymn, liturgy excerpt, or short devotional quote outside its narrative context, carries real residual risk.

12. “Hate” priority idiom (14:26) — Medium-High. Confined to a single verse and therefore lower cumulative exposure than items above, but a literal mistranslation here could be independently sensational/scandalous (appearing to command hatred of family) in ways that damage the curriculum’s broader credibility if mishandled even once.

13. Redemption (ವಿಮೋಚನೆ) drifting toward mokṣa-adjacent abstraction (1:68; 2:38; 21:28) — Medium. Lower risk than items above because the fencing (always anchoring to a specific redemptive-historical object) is a relatively easy discipline to maintain once flagged, but worth monitoring across the many Lukan redemption references.

14. Wisdom (2:40,52) drifting toward jñāna-mārga associations — Medium. Confined to two verses describing the child Jesus’ human growth; real but narrow exposure.

15. Worship (ಆರಾಧಿಸು vs. ನಮಸ್ಕರಿಸು, 24:52) — Medium. Single climactic occurrence; risk is real but easily corrected by a standing glossary rule with minimal ongoing monitoring needed.

---

6. Summary Recommendation for Phase 2 Handoff

• All Section A baseline terms in 08_core_glossary.md are gap-analysis-cleared for direct reuse; no changes recommended.
• All Section B new Luke terms are gap-analysis-cleared for provisional adoption into translation memory v2, conditioned on the fencing rules in §3 of this document being encoded as machine-checkable forbidden-substitution and mandatory-note rules in the Phase 2 validation pipeline (parallel to the existing Romans forbidden-substitution list).
• Items ranked 1–6 above (§5) require mandatory human theologian pre-approval of a single fixed rendering before any Phase 2 segment containing them is processed, not merely post-hoc review — these are consistency-critical, curriculum-wide decisions, not per-segment judgment calls.
• Items ranked 7–15 require standing translator notes and native-speaker/theologian review per the routing already specified in the updated bible_term_registry.json, with no additional pre-approval gate required beyond normal Phase 2 flagging.