Semantic Analysis

Several Punjabi terms in this Language Package carry a narrower, broader, or differently-loaded semantic range than their English source word.

Narrower-than-English terms

• ਪਵਿੱਤਰ ਲੋਕ (saints): must be used for all believers corporately (Romans 1:7), never for a spiritually elevated figure with a following — that elevated sense belongs to ਸੰਤ, explicitly rejected for this use because Punjab’s Sant tradition remains a living, active religious category today.
• ਰਸੂਲ (apostle): deliberately narrower than the loosely available ਗੁਰੂ, which in Sikh usage denotes a reserved, revelation-bearing office rather than a generic “authoritative teacher.”

Broader-than-English terms

• ਸਮਰੱਥਾ (power): used consistently for “power of God” (Romans 1:16) specifically to avoid ਸ਼ਕਤੀ, the Hindu goddess-power-coded term; ਸਮਰੱਥਾ (capacity/ability) is broader and safer even though slightly less vivid in casual speech.
• ਨਿਹਚਾ (faith): covers both “belief” and “trust” in Punjabi, an advantage since Romans uses “faith” to mean active, personal trust in Christ, not mere intellectual assent.

Terms carrying unintended religious-system baggage

• ਮੁਕਤੀ: this is the pipeline’s clearest case of a term whose everyday semantic range is not simply “off” but actively split between two live theological systems — Sikh liberation-from-transmigration and Christian reconciliation-through-Christ — using the identical word. Unlike a false-friend term that is simply wrong, ਮੁਕਤੀ is genuinely ambiguous in current usage, which is exactly why this glossary requires an explanatory gloss rather than a substitution.
• ਕਿਰਪਾ: broader than English “grace” in that it is already a well-developed devotional category in Sikh theology (God’s gracious glance, ਨਦਰ); translators must narrow its reference to Christ-mediated grace specifically wherever it appears in a soteriological context.

Implication

Where a Punjabi term’s semantic range overlaps with a live, contemporary religious system rather than a historical or textual one, the glossary’s notes field carries extra weight — it is not just flagging a translation nuance but managing genuine, present-day ambiguity a reader will encounter outside this curriculum as well.