Core Glossary
Core Glossary — Jonah (English → Portuguese)
This glossary consolidates every load-bearing term identified across the full book of Jonah (chapters 1-4) in 07_semantic_analysis.md. It follows the same schema as the baseline bible_term_registry.json: category, risk tier, original-language form, and Portuguese rendering, with explicit notes on Brazilian-context doctrinal collision risk. Terms already present in the baseline Romans Language Package are marked REUSED and must not be re-translated or varied.
1. Terms Reused Exactly from the Romans Baseline
| Term | Category | Risk | Original | Portuguese Rendering | Occurrences in Jonah | Baseline Reuse Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| God | God | Critical | אֱלֹהִים / הָאֱלֹהִים (Elohim) | Deus | 1:1-4:11 (pervasive) | REUSED exactly. |
| LORD | Christology/God | Critical | יְהוָה (YHWH) | Senhor | 1:1-4:11 (pervasive) | REUSED exactly. |
| salvation | Salvation | Critical | יְשׁוּעָה (yeshu’ah) | salvação | 2:9 | REUSED exactly; never “evolução espiritual.” |
| resurrection | Eschatology | Critical | (typological; NT: ἀνάστασις) | ressurreição | typological link at 1:17 (Matt 12:40) | REUSED exactly; NEVER “reencarnação.” This baseline forbidden-substitution rule is more consequential in Jonah than anywhere else in this Language Package, since the book’s central sign (death-like ordeal, three days, emergence to new life) is the Old Testament type Jesus himself uses for his own resurrection. |
| gentiles/nations | Church | Low-Medium | (contextual; Nineveh as a Gentile city) | gentios | 1:2, 3:2-10 (implicit) | REUSED exactly; supports “God’s Compassion for the Nations.” |
| faith/believed | Faith | High | אמן (aman) | fé / crer | 3:5 | REUSED exactly (concept of “fé,” High risk); “creram em Deus” for the verb form. |
| grace | Salvation | High | (conceptually parallel; cf. chanun) | graça | 4:2 (background contrast) | REUSED exactly for the noun “graça”; note that Hebrew chanun/rachum introduce related-but-distinct new adjectival terms (see §2). |
| sin/evil way | Sin | High/Medium | רַע / רָעָה (ra, ra’ah) | pecado / mau caminho | 1:2, 3:8, 3:10, 4:1 | Baseline “pecado” reused where the abstract noun “sin” is intended; contextual “mau caminho” used for the idiom “evil way” (see §2, “turn from evil way”). |
| providence / sovereignty | God | High | (conceptual; cf. manah) | providência | 1:4-17, 4:6-8 (background doctrine) | REUSED conceptually; the new term “appointed” (§2) is the specific Jonah-book vocabulary carrying this doctrine and must be taught consistently with the baseline’s providência entry (never through the Kardecist “lei de causa e efeito”). |
| church/covenant community | — | — | — | — | not directly present | Not applicable to Jonah; no reuse required. |
2. New Terms Introduced by Jonah (Proposed Additions to Translation Memory)
| Term (English) | Original (Hebrew/LXX Greek) | Transliteration | Portuguese Rendering | Risk | Doctrine | Chapters | Alternatives Rejected / Collision Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| turn/repent (human) | שׁוּב (shuv) | shuv | converter-se / afastar-se do mau caminho | Critical | Repentance and Divine Mercy | 3:8, 3:10 | Rejected: “reforma íntima” framing (Kardecist self-directed moral improvement accumulated across incarnations). Must be taught as an immediate, God-enabled turning received in the present life. |
| God relented / relenting | נחם (nacham) | nacham | arrepender-se (applied to God) | Critical | Repentance and Divine Mercy; Sovereignty of God over Creation | 3:9, 3:10, 4:2 | Rejected: any paraphrase suggesting divine fallibility, error-correction, or a “spirit’s” own moral progress (Kardecist collision). Must be taught as covenant-faithful response to genuine repentance, consistent with God’s unchanging character (cf. Malachi 3:6; Romans providência doctrine). |
| appointed/ordained (creation obeys) | מנה (manah) | manah | designou | High | Sovereignty of God over Creation | 1:17, 4:6, 4:7, 4:8 | Rejected: varying the verb per occurrence (mandou/fez/enviou/trouxe), which obscures the single unifying thread of divine sovereignty over fish, plant, worm, and wind alike. Rejected: any framing implying impersonal fate or “lei de causa e efeito.” |
| three days and three nights | שְׁלֹשָׁה יָמִים וּשְׁלֹשָׁה לֵילוֹת / τρεῖς ἡμέρας καὶ τρεῖς νύκτας | shelosha yamim ushelosha leilot / treis hēmeras kai treis nyktas | três dias e três noites | Critical | Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection | 1:17 | Must always be paired with the reused Critical term “ressurreição” in teaching material; never permit a reincarnation-adjacent reading of the ordeal-and-emergence pattern. |
| great fish | דָּג גָּדוֹל / κῆτος | dag gadol / kētos | grande peixe | Medium | Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection | 1:17, 2:1, 2:10 | Rejected: “baleia” (whale) — not required by Hebrew or LXX and introduces a distracting zoological identification that displaces the sign’s theological function. |
| sign | σημεῖον (NT, Matt 12:39-40) | sēmeion | sinal | High | Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection | typological (Matt 12:39-40; Luke 11:29-30) | Rejected: any framing that assimilates “sinal” to mediumistic “signs” from spirit guides, divinatory omens, or Candomblé/Umbanda spirit-communication signs — mainstream, organized practices in Brazil. Must be taught strictly as an authoritative, God-given pointer to Christ’s bodily resurrection. |
| Sheol / belly of Sheol | שְׁאוֹל / בֶּטֶן שְׁאוֹל | She’ol / beten She’ol | Seol | High | Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection | 2:2 | Rejected: any framing as an intermediate “spirit world” of ongoing moral progress (Kardecist astral planes) or a realm accessible to mediums. Must be taught strictly as the biblical realm/power of death from which only God delivers. |
| gracious and compassionate (of God) | חַנּוּן וְרַחוּם (chanun, rachum) | channun, rachum | gracioso e compassivo (alt.: clemente e misericordioso) | Critical | God’s Compassion for the Nations | 4:2 | Direct quotation of Exodus 34:6. Rejected: any conditional or merit-based framing of divine favor (cf. baseline “graça” rejection of “mérito espiritual acumulado ao longo de vidas sucessivas”) — extended freely to an undeserving pagan city. |
| steadfast love / covenant loyalty | חֶסֶד (chesed) | chesed | amor leal (alt.: benignidade) | High | God’s Compassion for the Nations | 2:8, 4:2 | New term distinct from “graça,” “misericórdia,” and “compaixão” — three related Hebrew roots (chesed/chanun/rachum) must not collapse into one Portuguese word if the distinctions matter for a given lesson; recommend consistent use of “amor leal” for chesed specifically. |
| pity/compassion (climactic) | חוּס (chus) | chus | ter compaixão / ter piedade | Critical | God’s Compassion for the Nations | 4:10-11 | The book’s climactic rhetorical question. Must echo the “compassivo” of 4:2 so the deliberate literary link is visible in Portuguese. Rejected: a flattened or merely sentimental rendering that loses the question’s confrontational, unresolved force. |
| believed God (Ninevites) | אמן (aman), Hiphil | he’emin(u) | creram em Deus | High | God’s Compassion for the Nations; reuses baseline “fé” doctrine | 3:5 | Rejected: reading as mere intellectual acknowledgment that God exists; must be taught as saving trust that produced visible repentance, paralleling but not diminishing the baseline’s “fé” doctrine (personal trust, not generic belief). |
| vow | נֶדֶר (neder) | neder | voto | High | Repentance and Divine Mercy | 1:16, 2:9 | Rejected: conflation with Brazilian Catholic popular practice of “votos” made to saints or to Our Lady in exchange for favors. Must be accompanied by a clarifying note that the vow is made and fulfilled to God alone. |
| fast | צוֹם (tsom) | tsom | jejum | Medium | Repentance and Divine Mercy | 3:5, 3:7 | Must be framed as an expression of “obediência da fé” (baseline High-risk term), not a meritorious ritual act that itself secures divine mercy. |
| sackcloth | שַׂק (saq) | saq | veste de saco | Low | Repentance and Divine Mercy | 3:5, 3:6, 3:8 | Standard mourning/penitential garment; low collision risk. |
| ashes | אֵפֶר (epher) | epher | cinza | Low | Repentance and Divine Mercy | 3:6 | Standard term. |
| violence | חָמָס (chamas) | chamas | violência | Medium | Repentance and Divine Mercy | 3:8 | Grounds repentance in concrete ethical conduct, not only religious feeling. |
| turn/relent — “who knows?” idiom | מִי יוֹדֵעַ (mi yodea) | mi yodea | quem sabe? | Medium | Repentance and Divine Mercy; Sovereignty of God | 3:9 | Rejected: reading as fatalistic uncertainty about an impersonal moral mechanism (cf. baseline providência rejection of “lei de causa e efeito”); must convey humble hope in a personal God’s freedom to show mercy. |
| overthrown | הָפַךְ (haphakh) | haphakh | destruída (alt.: transtornada) | Medium | Repentance and Divine Mercy | 3:4 | Echoes the Sodom-and-Gomorrah judgment verb (Genesis 19:25); recommend a teaching note preserving this intertext even if the simpler rendering “destruída” is used in running text. |
| cast lots | גּוֹרָל (goral) | goral | lançar sortes | Medium | Sovereignty of God over Creation | 1:7 | A narrated pagan divinatory custom that God providentially overrules; must not be read as endorsing divination, given the prevalence of divinatory practices in some Afro-Brazilian religious traditions. |
| flee (from God’s presence) | בָּרַח (barach) | barach | fugir | Medium | Human Reluctance versus God’s Universal Love | 1:3 | Theological resistance to a cross-ethnic mission, not mere cowardice; teaching note recommended. |
| presence of the LORD | מִלִּפְנֵי יְהוָה | milifnei YHWH | da presença do SENHOR | Medium | Sovereignty of God over Creation | 1:3, 1:10 | Must not be read as a claim that God is spatially confined; the chapter’s storm and fish immediately demonstrate the opposite. |
| great wind/storm | רוּחַ־גְּדוֹלָה / סַעַר | ruach gedolah / sa’ar | grande vento / tempestade | Medium-High | Sovereignty of God over Creation | 1:4 | Personal, purposive divine act, not impersonal fate; pairs with the “appointed” (manah) doctrine thread. |
| take my life (nefesh) | נַפְשִׁי (nafshi) | nafshi | a minha vida | Medium | Human Reluctance versus God’s Universal Love | 4:3, 4:8 | Reject rendering nefesh as “espírito” here, which risks a Spiritist reading of a discarnate self persisting and progressing beyond this specific death-wish. |
| much cattle/livestock | בְּהֵמָה רַבָּה | behemah rabbah | muito gado | Low | God’s Compassion for the Nations | 3:7-8, 4:11 | Minor extension of divine compassion to animal creation; low risk. |
| Nineveh | נִינְוֵה | Nineveh | Nínive | Low | God’s Compassion for the Nations | 1:1-4:11 | Standard proper name. |
| Tarshish | תַּרְשִׁישׁ | Tarshish | Társis | Low | Human Reluctance versus God’s Universal Love | 1:3 | Standard proper name. |
3. Doctrine-to-Term Cross-Reference
| Doctrine | Primary Terms | Risk Tier(s) Represented |
|---|---|---|
| God’s Compassion for the Nations | gracioso e compassivo, amor leal, ter compaixão, gentios (REUSED), creram em Deus, Nínive | Critical, High, Low |
| Repentance and Divine Mercy | converter-se (shuv), arrepender-se (nacham of God), voto, jejum, quem sabe?, destruída | Critical, High, Medium |
| Human Reluctance versus God’s Universal Love | fugir, Társis, da presença do SENHOR, a minha vida | Medium |
| The Sovereignty of God over Creation | designou (manah), grande vento/tempestade, lançar sortes, providência (REUSED) | High, Medium |
| Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection | ressurreição (REUSED, Critical), três dias e três noites, grande peixe, Seol, sinal | Critical, High, Medium |
4. Registration Note for Phase 2
Per the Language Package’s translation-memory workflow (12_ai_translation_requirements.md, Translation Memory Load and Enforcement Instructions), every new term in §2 above must be:
- Added to
translation_memory.json(version incremented) before Phase 2 segment translation of Jonah begins. - Added to
bible_term_registry.jsonwith matching category/risk/original/transliteration/definition/translation_notes/portuguese_term fields. - Added to
doctrine_risk_registry.jsonunder the five Jonah doctrines listed in the curriculum parameters, withreview_routingset to “Human theologian” for every Critical and High term identified above (fifteen of the twenty-six new terms), consistent with the baseline’s routing convention.
No term in §1 may be re-translated, paraphrased, or given an alternative Portuguese rendering under any circumstances; all reuse baseline entries exactly.
Critical Risk Terms
God
Approved rendering: Deus
Transliteration: Elohim / ha-Elohim (Jonah); theos / Elohim / YHWH (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation / God’s Compassion for the Nations
Original: אֱלֹהִים / הָאֱלֹהִים
Category: God
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. In Jonah, ‘Deus’ is the personal, purposive agent behind every narrative event (storm, lot, fish, plant, worm, wind, Nineveh’s repentance), never an impersonal force or one deity among orixás/spirit guides.
Lord
Approved rendering: Senhor
Transliteration: YHWH (Jonah, printed SENHOR for the tetragrammaton per Almeida convention); kyrios (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: Divine Calling and Commission / The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Original: יְהוָה (YHWH)
Category: God
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Pervasive throughout Jonah (1:1-4:11) as the covenant name of Israel’s God, confessed by Jonah before the pagan sailors as sovereign over sea, storm, and nations — exclusive, supreme lordship, not one deity among the sailors’ assumed pantheon.
Salvation
Approved rendering: salvação
Transliteration: yeshu’ah (Jonah 2:9); sōtēria (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: Prayer and Deliverance from Death
Rejected alternatives: evolução espiritual através de reencarnações sucessivas
Original: יְשׁוּעָה (יְשׁוּעָתָה לַיהוה)
Category: Salvation
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Jonah 2:9’s climactic confession ‘a salvação pertence ao SENHOR’ is structurally parallel to Romans’ thesis that salvation is God’s finished work, not human achievement — never gradual ‘evolução espiritual’ achieved across reincarnations.
Resurrection
Approved rendering: ressurreição
Transliteration: anastasis (typological; NT, cf. Matt 12:40)
Doctrine: Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection
Rejected alternatives: reencarnação
Original: (typological; NT ἀνάστασις, cf. Matt 12:40)
Category: Christology
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. NEVER ‘reencarnação’. This forbidden-substitution rule is more consequential in Jonah than anywhere else in this Language Package, since the book’s central sign (death-like ordeal, fixed three-day span, emergence to new life) is the specific Old Testament type Jesus cites in Matthew 12:40 for his own bodily resurrection.
Jesus
Approved rendering: Jesus
Transliteration: Iēsous / Yeshua
Doctrine: Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Required whenever teaching material cites Matthew 12:39-41 or Luke 11:29-32, where Jesus himself names Jonah’s ordeal as the ‘sinal’ of his own three days before the ressurreição.
Belly Of The Fish
Approved rendering: o ventre do peixe
Transliteration: me’ei ha-dagah / koilias tou kētous (LXX)
Doctrine: Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection
Original: מְעֵי הַדָּגָה (LXX: κοιλίας τοῦ κήτους)
Category: Christology
The specific location Jesus names in Matthew 12:40 (‘in the heart of the earth’) — the direct typological link to Christ’s tomb. Must be taught alongside ‘ressurreição’ and must never suggest a cyclical or repeatable ordeal, given the risk of a Kardecist reincarnation-adjacent reading.
Three Days And Three Nights
Approved rendering: três dias e três noites
Transliteration: shelosha yamim ushelosha leilot / treis hēmeras kai treis nyktas (LXX)
Doctrine: Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection
Rejected alternatives: vários dias / alguns dias (severs the exact numerical link to Matthew 12:40)
Original: שְׁלֹשָׁה יָמִים וּשְׁלֹשָׁה לֵילוֹת (LXX: τρεῖς ἡμέρας καὶ τρεῖς νύκτας)
Category: Christology
Must be rendered with exact numerical and temporal precision, never paraphrased. Must always be paired in teaching material with ‘ressurreição’ (never ‘reencarnação’) to preempt a Kardecist reincarnation reading of the ordeal-and-emergence pattern — the highest-stakes single term in this Language Package.
Turn Repent
Approved rendering: converter-se / afastar-se do mau caminho
Transliteration: shuv
Doctrine: Repentance and Divine Mercy
Rejected alternatives: reforma íntima (Kardecist self-directed moral improvement accumulated across successive reincarnations)
Original: שׁוּב
Category: Repentance
The book’s primary repentance verb (3:8, 3:10): a decisive reorientation of life-direction, not mere remorse. Must be taught as an immediate, God-enabled turning received in THIS present life through faith, never as a task of self-perfection distributed across incarnations. Use ‘converter-se’ for the decisive act itself, paired with ‘afastar-se do mau caminho’ where the Hebrew idiom names the ‘evil way’ explicitly, to keep ethical content visible alongside conversion language.
God Relented
Approved rendering: arrepender-se (aplicado a Deus)
Transliteration: nacham (vayinnachem ha-Elohim)
Doctrine: Repentance and Divine Mercy
Rejected alternatives: Deus mudou de plano (weakens the personal, relational force of the Hebrew)
Original: נחם (וַיִּנָּחֶם הָאֱלֹהִים)
Category: Repentance
The theological hinge of the book (3:9-10; 4:2). REQUIRES the established Almeida-tradition verb ‘arrepender-se’; do not substitute a paraphrase. MANDATORY teaching note at every occurrence distinguishing: (1) this is a change in God’s stated action toward a now-repentant party, not a change in his character (no divine fallibility or caprice); and (2) this is NOT a Kardecist-style ‘spirit’ undergoing its own moral correction or evolution — it is covenant faithfulness responding to real repentance.
Gracious And Compassionate
Approved rendering: gracioso e compassivo (alt.: clemente e misericordioso)
Transliteration: El-channun verachum
Doctrine: God’s Compassion for the Nations
Rejected alternatives: mérito espiritual acumulado ao longo de vidas sucessivas (any conditional/merit-based framing of divine favor)
Original: אֵל־חַנּוּן וְרַחוּם
Category: God
Direct quotation of God’s self-revealed covenant character (Exodus 34:6), cited by Jonah almost accusingly at 4:2. The theological center of the book. Fix the paired adjectives ‘gracioso e compassivo’ as the sole rendering (do not alternate) to preserve verbal identity with 4:10-11’s climactic echo. Must be distinguished from any merit-based or conditional framing of divine favor.
Pity Compassion
Approved rendering: ter compaixão / ter piedade
Transliteration: chus / chas
Doctrine: God’s Pity and the Unresolved Appeal
Rejected alternatives: declarative smoothing of the closing rhetorical question
Original: חוּס / חָס
Category: God
The book’s climactic, deliberately unresolved rhetorical question (4:10-11), echoing ‘compassivo’ (4:2). MUST preserve the rhetorical-question form intact (‘E eu não teria piedade de Nínive…?’) — do not convert to a declarative statement, which would blunt the confrontation the entire book has been building toward.
High Risk Terms
Faith
Approved rendering: fé
Transliteration: aman (Jonah, of the Ninevites); pistis (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: Faith of the Ninevites
Rejected alternatives: convicção espírita, fé genérica em forças espirituais, confiança no próprio progresso moral
Original: אמן (aman)
Category: Faith
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. The Ninevites’ ‘creram em Deus’ (3:5) is a Gentile parallel to this doctrine: personal trust in the true God producing visible, city-wide repentance, not mere intellectual acknowledgment that a deity exists.
Grace
Approved rendering: graça
Transliteration: chanun (related concept, Jonah 4:2); charis (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: God’s Compassion for the Nations
Rejected alternatives: mérito espiritual acumulado ao longo de vidas sucessivas
Original: (conceptually parallel; cf. חַנּוּן, chanun)
Category: God
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Background theological concept against which Jonah’s resentment in 4:2 is set. The related but distinct Hebrew terms chanun/rachum/chesed/chus introduce new Jonah-specific vocabulary (see gracious_and_compassionate, steadfast_love, pity_compassion) that must NOT collapse into this single baseline word.
Sin
Approved rendering: pecado / mau caminho
Transliteration: ra / ra’ah (Jonah); hamartia (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: Repentance and Divine Mercy
Rejected alternatives: erro a ser corrigido em vidas futuras (leitura espírita)
Original: רַע / רָעָה
Category: Sin
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly for the abstract noun ‘pecado’. ‘Mau caminho’ used contextually for the idiom ‘evil way’ (3:8, 3:10). Moral transgression before a personal, holy God, not a correctable ‘erro’ worked off across future incarnations as Kardecism frames moral failure. Note the irony that the same word-family (ra’ah) describes Jonah’s own resentment at 4:1.
Providence
Approved rendering: providência
Transliteration: pronoia (conceptual, Romans baseline); manah (Jonah’s specific vocabulary — see ‘appointed’)
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Rejected alternatives: lei de causa e efeito espírita (regência cármica das reencarnações)
Original: (conceptual; cf. מנה, manah)
Category: Sovereignty
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly for abstract/summary doctrinal statements. Jonah’s concrete narrative vocabulary carrying this doctrine is ‘appointed’ (manah, rendered ‘designou’); use the concrete verb chain as the primary pedagogical vehicle and reserve ‘providência’ for summary statements, never through the Kardecist ‘lei de causa e efeito.‘
Great Wind Storm
Approved rendering: grande vento / tempestade
Transliteration: ruach gedolah / sa’ar
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Original: רוּחַ־גְּדוֹלָה / סַעַר
Category: Creation
A personal, purposive divine act in response to Jonah’s flight, not impersonal fate or meteorology alone. Must be framed consistently with the baseline ‘providência’ entry, never as the Kardecist ‘lei de causa e efeito.‘
Vow
Approved rendering: voto
Transliteration: neder
Doctrine: Vows and Worship of God
Original: נֶדֶר
Category: Worship
Made by both the sailors (1:16) and Jonah (2:9). Brazilian Catholic popular piety strongly associates ‘voto’ with vows made to saints or to Nossa Senhora Aparecida in exchange for a favor. EVERY occurrence must carry a clarifying note that the vow is made and fulfilled to God alone, with no intercessory saint or intermediary figure.
Appointed
Approved rendering: designou
Transliteration: manah
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Rejected alternatives: mandou / fez / enviou / trouxe (individually valid but destroy cross-chapter consistency)
Original: מנה (מָנָה)
Category: Sovereignty
MANDATORY single-verb consistency across ALL FOUR occurrences (fish, 1:17; plant, 4:6; worm, 4:7; east wind, 4:8), without exception. This is the book’s central sovereignty-over-creation device; inconsistent rendering invites a reading through the Kardecist ‘lei de causa e efeito’ rather than one personal God’s deliberate acts.
Sign
Approved rendering: sinal
Transliteration: sēmeion
Doctrine: Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection
Rejected alternatives: sinal desvinculado de seu referente (free-floating usage)
Original: σημεῖον (NT, Matt 12:39-40; Luke 11:29-30)
Category: Christology
The typological designation Jesus applies to Jonah’s ordeal (Matt 12:39-40; Luke 11:29-30). Must not be assimilated to mediumistic ‘signs’ from spirit guides, divinatory omens, or Candomblé/Umbanda spirit-communication signs. EVERY use in a typological context must anchor explicitly to Matthew 12:39-40 in the same sentence or immediate context.
Sheol
Approved rendering: Seol
Transliteration: She’ol / beten She’ol
Doctrine: Prayer and Deliverance from Death
Rejected alternatives: céu / inferno / purgatório / plano espiritual (all carry competing doctrinal freight)
Original: שְׁאוֹל / בֶּטֶן שְׁאוֹל
Category: Eschatology
Transliterated, not paraphrased, following the same Almeida-tradition convention as Abba/Messias/Amém. Must be taught strictly as the biblical realm/power of death from which only God delivers — not an intermediate ‘spirit world’ of ongoing moral progress (Kardecist astral planes) or a realm accessible to mediums. Pair with a short in-context gloss (‘o Seol, o poder da morte’).
Steadfast Love
Approved rendering: amor leal
Transliteration: chesed
Doctrine: God’s Compassion for the Nations
Rejected alternatives: graça (reserved for the baseline term), fidelidade (too abstract, loses relational warmth), bondade (captures only one facet)
Original: חֶסֶד
Category: God
New term for this Language Package; no single Portuguese word fuses chesed’s covenant loyalty + obligation + affection. Fixed compound ‘amor leal’ at both occurrences (2:8, 4:2); must be distinguished from ‘graça’ (baseline) and from chanun/rachum/chus (see gracious_and_compassionate, pity_compassion) so readers track three related-but-distinct Hebrew roots.
Believed God
Approved rendering: creram em Deus
Transliteration: he’eminu belohim (Hiphil of aman)
Doctrine: Faith of the Ninevites
Rejected alternatives: reconheceram a existência de Deus (flattens to intellectual acknowledgment)
Original: אמן (Hiphil, וַיַּאֲמִינוּ בֵּאלֹהִים)
Category: Faith
The Ninevites’ genuine trust in the true God producing visible, city-wide repentance (3:5). Reuses the theological weight of the baseline High-risk ‘fé’ doctrine; must not be read as mere intellectual acknowledgment that a deity exists.
Medium Risk Terms
Gentiles
Approved rendering: gentios
Transliteration: — (contextual; Nineveh and its inhabitants)
Doctrine: God’s Compassion for the Nations
Rejected alternatives: pagãos (pejorative)
Original: (contextual; Nineveh and its inhabitants as a Gentile city and people)
Category: Church
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Nineveh is a pre-church Assyrian imperial capital, Israel’s ancient enemy-nation — a sharper test case for universal compassion than Romans’ generic ‘the nations’ framing; supplement lesson material (not base text) with this distinction.
Mission
Approved rendering: missão
Transliteration: apostolē / pempō (Romans baseline); Jonah’s commission has no single fixed Hebrew noun equivalent — see ‘word_of_the_lord’ and ‘arise_go’
Doctrine: Divine Calling and Commission
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Applies to Jonah’s cross-ethnic sending to Nineveh, the Old Testament’s clearest single-prophet portrait of mission to a hostile Gentile empire.
Word Of The Lord
Approved rendering: a palavra do SENHOR
Transliteration: devar-YHWH
Doctrine: Divine Calling and Commission
Rejected alternatives: uma mensagem (generic message)
Original: דְּבַר־יְהוָה
Category: Calling
The authoritative, self-executing commissioning speech-act opening both 1:1 and 3:1. Must retain the definite, singular divine-speech sense; identical phrase across both chapters signals God’s unchanged commission despite Jonah’s flight.
Flee
Approved rendering: fugir
Transliteration: barach
Doctrine: Human Reluctance versus God’s Universal Love
Rejected alternatives: correr (flattens theological resistance to mere cowardice)
Original: בָּרַח
Category: Calling
Jonah’s flight (1:3) is theological resistance to a cross-ethnic mission of mercy, not mere cowardice. Teaching material should name the motive explicitly, since the base verb alone will not carry this nuance.
Presence Of The Lord
Approved rendering: da presença do SENHOR
Transliteration: milifnei YHWH
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Rejected alternatives: abandonar a Deus (changes the picture)
Original: מִלִּפְנֵי יְהוָה
Category: God
Must not be read as a claim that God is spatially confined to a location Jonah can physically exit, especially against a folk-religious backdrop assuming territorial/localized spirit domains (e.g. a terreiro). The storm and fish immediately demonstrate the opposite.
Proclaim
Approved rendering: prega / proclama
Transliteration: qara
Doctrine: Prophetic Proclamation
Rejected alternatives: avisa (softens to private warning)
Original: קָרָא
Category: Prophecy
Herald’s authoritative public proclamation (1:2, 3:2, 3:4) and the king’s official decree (3:7). Must not be softened to private counsel, nor conflated with Kardecist mediumistic ‘psicografia’-style revelation.
Cast Lots
Approved rendering: lançar sortes
Transliteration: goral
Doctrine: Divination and God’s Sovereignty
Original: גּוֹרָל
Category: Sovereignty
A pagan divinatory custom the sailors use, which God sovereignly overrules to expose Jonah. Must not be presented as a divinely sanctioned method of guidance, given practices such as jogo de búzios in some Afro-Brazilian religious traditions.
Fear The Lord
Approved rendering: temer
Transliteration: yare
Doctrine: Fear of the LORD
Original: יָרֵא
Category: Faith
The sailors’ fear culminates specifically in fearing ‘the LORD’ (1:9-10, 16), not a generic pantheon of maritime deities, prefiguring the Ninevites’ response. Must be taught as reverent, personal recognition of the true God, not generic superstitious dread.
Great Fish
Approved rendering: grande peixe
Transliteration: dag gadol / kētos (LXX)
Doctrine: Jonah as a Sign Foreshadowing Christ’s Resurrection
Rejected alternatives: baleia (whale — not required by Hebrew or Greek; introduces a distracting zoological identification)
Original: דָּג גָּדוֹל (LXX: κῆτος)
Category: Eschatology
The creature God appoints to swallow Jonah for three days and three nights, cited by Jesus in Matthew 12:40. Retain ‘grande peixe’ in all formal lesson text; ‘baleia’ may appear only as a noted popular-culture gloss, never as the primary rendering.
Fast
Approved rendering: jejum
Transliteration: tsom
Doctrine: Repentance and Divine Mercy
Original: צוֹם
Category: Repentance
Corporate abstention from food declared by Nineveh (3:5, 3:7). Must be framed as an outward expression flowing from faith already producing repentance (‘creram… e proclamaram jejum’ — belief precedes and causes the fast), never as a ritual act that itself secures divine mercy.
Violence
Approved rendering: violência
Transliteration: chamas
Doctrine: Repentance and Divine Mercy
Original: חָמָס
Category: Sin
Nineveh’s specific, concrete sin (3:8), grounding repentance in real ethical conduct, not merely religious feeling.
Who Knows
Approved rendering: quem sabe?
Transliteration: mi yodea
Doctrine: Repentance and Divine Mercy
Original: מִי יוֹדֵעַ
Category: Repentance
The king’s rhetorical idiom of tentative, humble hope (3:9). Colloquial Portuguese ‘quem sabe?’ can double as a fatalistic shrug; must be rendered with enough context to convey humble hope in a personal God’s freedom to relent, not uncertainty about an impersonal mechanism such as ‘lei de causa e efeito.‘
Overthrown
Approved rendering: destruída (alt.: transtornada)
Transliteration: haphakh / nehpakhet
Doctrine: Divine Patience and Probation
Original: הָפַךְ (נֶהְפָּכֶת)
Category: Judgment
The threatened judgment (3:4), using the same verb applied to Sodom and Gomorrah’s destruction (Genesis 19:25). A flattened ‘destruída’ is acceptable but loses the Sodom intertext; a teaching note referencing Genesis 19 is recommended.
Take My Life
Approved rendering: a minha vida
Transliteration: nafshi
Doctrine: Human Reluctance versus God’s Universal Love
Rejected alternatives: o meu espírito / a minha alma (invites a Spiritist reading of a discarnate, progressing self)
Original: נַפְשִׁי (קַח־נָא אֶת־נַפְשִׁי)
Category: Anthropology
Jonah’s despairing death-wish (4:3, 4:8). NEVER render nefesh as ‘espírito’ here; the text presents a real wish for the cessation of Jonah’s present bodily life, not a transitional complaint about one incarnation among many.
Jonah Anger
Approved rendering: isso desagradou muito a Jonas / ficou irado
Transliteration: vayera el-Yonah ra’ah gedolah / vayichar lo
Doctrine: Human Anger versus Divine Compassion
Original: וַיֵּרַע אֶל־יוֹנָה רָעָה גְדוֹלָה / וַיִּחַר לוֹ
Category: Anthropology
Jonah’s reaction to God’s mercy toward Nineveh (4:1), using the same word-family (ra’ah, ‘evil’) applied to Nineveh’s own sin (1:2; 3:8, 10). This ironic word-play should be surfaced in teaching notes even where simplified in running text.
Exceedingly Great City
Approved rendering: cidade extremamente grande (alt.: grande diante de Deus)
Transliteration: ir gedolah lelohim
Doctrine: God’s Compassion for the Nations
Rejected alternatives: muito grande (loses the theologically suggestive ‘before God’ idiom)
Original: עִיר גְּדוֹלָה לֵאלֹהִים
Category: Compassion
The Hebrew idiom (3:3), literally ‘a city great to/before God,’ testifies that this pagan city matters to God. A translator’s note preserving the literal gloss ‘(lit. grande diante de Deus)’ is recommended.
Forty Days
Approved rendering: quarenta dias
Transliteration: arba’im yom
Doctrine: Divine Patience and Probation
Original: אַרְבָּעִים יוֹם
Category: Repentance
A fixed biblical period of probation (3:4), echoing the flood, Sinai, wilderness spies, Elijah, Christ’s fast — a pattern largely unfamiliar to Brazilian audiences without OT catechesis; a teaching note is recommended.
Low Risk Terms
Prophet
Approved rendering: profeta
Transliteration: nabi (Jonah, implicit); prophētēs (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: Divine Calling and Commission / Prophetic Proclamation
Rejected alternatives: médium (channeler of spirit messages)
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Jonah is God’s reluctant spokesperson, not a Kardecist medium channeling messages from discarnate spirits.
Prophecy
Approved rendering: profecia
Transliteration: — (Jonah’s proclamation against Nineveh functions as prophetic warning); prophēteia (Romans baseline)
Doctrine: Prophetic Proclamation
Rejected alternatives: psicografia (spirit messages transcribed through mediums)
Inherited from Romans package; reused exactly. Jonah’s proclamation is God-inspired declaration, not psicografia, the well-known Kardecist practice of mediums transcribing messages purportedly from the dead.
Arise Go
Approved rendering: levanta-te, vai
Transliteration: qum, lekh
Doctrine: Divine Calling and Commission
Original: קוּם לֵךְ
Category: Calling
Given identically at 1:2 and 3:2. Preserve the verbatim echo in Portuguese so the disobedience/obedience contrast registers as it does in the Hebrew.
Nineveh
Approved rendering: Nínive
Transliteration: Nineveh
Doctrine: Geography and Setting of the Mission
Original: נִינְוֵה
Category: Geography
Standard proper name; the Assyrian imperial capital, proverbially wicked, and the object of God’s compassion — theologically significant, parallel to the baseline treatment of ‘gentios.‘
Tarshish
Approved rendering: Társis
Transliteration: Tarshish
Doctrine: Geography and Setting of the Mission
Original: תַּרְשִׁישׁ
Category: Geography
Standard proper name; a distant Phoenician/Iberian port representing the opposite direction from Nineveh, geographically and theologically fleeing God’s mission.
Sackcloth
Approved rendering: veste de saco
Transliteration: saq
Doctrine: Outward Signs of Mourning and Contrition
Original: שַׂק
Category: Repentance
Standard mourning/penitential garment (3:5-6). Low collision risk; should be paired with the turn/shuv doctrine so outward signs are not mistaken for the substance of repentance.
Ashes
Approved rendering: cinza
Transliteration: epher
Doctrine: Outward Signs of Mourning and Contrition
Original: אֵפֶר
Category: Repentance
The king’s public self-abasement posture (3:6). Standard term, low doctrinal risk.
King Of Nineveh
Approved rendering: rei de Nínive
Transliteration: melekh Nineveh
Doctrine: Corporate and Universal Repentance
Original: מֶלֶךְ נִינְוֵה
Category: Church
The city’s supreme ruler, who models corporate repentance by publicly humbling himself; reinforces that no human authority stands outside the reach of God’s word.
From Greatest To Least
Approved rendering: do maior ao menor
Transliteration: migedolam ve’ad qetanam
Doctrine: Corporate and Universal Repentance
Original: מִגְּדוֹלָם וְעַד־קְטַנָּם
Category: Church
Merism expressing totality of repentance across every social class (3:5); echoes Romans’ ‘no distinction’ universality language already fixed in the baseline.
Man And Beast
Approved rendering: nem homem nem animal
Transliteration: ha’adam veha-behemah
Doctrine: Corporate and Universal Repentance
Original: הָאָדָם וְהַבְּהֵמָה
Category: Creation
The king’s decree extends the fast even to Nineveh’s animals (3:7), a minor foreshadowing of the sovereignty-over-creation doctrine.
Slow To Anger
Approved rendering: tardio em irar-se
Transliteration: erekh appayim
Doctrine: Divine Patience and Probation
Original: אֶרֶךְ אַפַּיִם
Category: God
Divine patience and forbearance (4:2), part of God’s self-revealed covenant character; judgment delayed is itself an act of mercy.
Plant Qiqayon
Approved rendering: planta
Transliteration: qiqayon
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Rejected alternatives: aboboreira / mamona / hera (specific botanical identifications not required by the disputed Hebrew)
Original: קִיקָיוֹן
Category: Creation
The fast-growing, fast-dying plant God appoints to shade Jonah (4:6-7). Use a generic term; botanical identity is genuinely disputed and inventing precision the source text lacks should be avoided.
Worm
Approved rendering: verme
Transliteration: tola’at
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Original: תּוֹלַעַת
Category: Creation
The small creature God appoints to destroy the plant (4:7); another link in the ‘appointed’ (manah) chain.
East Wind
Approved rendering: vento leste (ardente)
Transliteration: ruach qadim
Doctrine: The Sovereignty of God over Creation
Original: רוּחַ קָדִים
Category: Creation
The final ‘appointed’ instrument (4:8), completing the parallel with the great wind of chapter 1.
Much Cattle
Approved rendering: muito gado
Transliteration: behemah rabbah
Doctrine: God’s Compassion for the Nations
Original: בְּהֵמָה רַבָּה
Category: Creation
Nineveh’s livestock, included within the scope of God’s climactic compassion (4:11); a minor but real extension of divine compassion to animal creation.
Referenced passages