Yeah, because Wikipedia is such a great tool to be using for translating

Anyways, we’re human, we make mistakes. I don’t know the circumstances of that line, so I can’t really say what when through the TLs head and why.

but when there are obvious words that don’t seem to match up with what you think they should be (since wiseman is a pretty big stretch from “wisdom” considering that there are other words when referring to a person as wise as compared to the wisdom they hold), I recommend at least doing a google search using the unknown word along with something like 意味 to see what any japanese sites might have.

typing in はんにゃ　意味 to google brought me this link on the first page (http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/leaf/jn/160272/m0u/) with the #2 definition describing it in more detail than my dictionary gave (although it’s in japanese)

either way, it’s understandable that there will be things that people miss or don’t know when translating, and I just wanted to inform chihiro that this particular one was incorrect since the term will likely be used again in this season

It’s not just Google Translate that does that either. Jisho.org, a J-E Dictionary site, doesn’t turn it up either.

May I ask what dictionary you’re using? Most online dictionaries and programs use the Edict dictionary database, which obviously doesn’t have 般若.

You’re right that the TLs could talk to each other about things, but we don’t normally do it because it’s rarely an issue. If the dictionary throws up a fairly normal word for a japanese word we don’t know, we’re probably not going to ask about it.

either way, even if you didn’t know what a han’nya was, the first dictionary I use gives this as the #2 definition for 般若: “2) (鬼女の面） (a Noh mask with) the face of a female demon.” So maybe using google translate to look up unknown words isn’t the best way. Since chihiro seems to have a number of TLers on the staff list, I’d recommend asking the others when there are things one person doesn’t understand, since even if they don’t have the cultural knowledge, chances are another one of them might…. I am surprised that no one picked up on han’nya as a demon though since even if you hadn’t encountered it while studying japanese, it comes up in anime more than a few times (one shining example being Han’nya from rurouni kenshin with the easily recognizable han’nya mask)

anyways, I’m sorry if I came off as abrasive at all, I really do appreciate that chihiro is subbing sekirei especially since there aren’t really any other groups doing it

北の般若
this isn’t referring to wisdom or a wiseman… a han’nya is generally understood as a female demon… in fact, the evil faces often seen behind Miya are exactly what han’nya look like… and since they’ve made it pretty clear that Miya is the 4th major power in the city (one for each cardinal direction), it should also be pretty clear that this term is referring to Miya as a demon, and definitely not as a “wiseman”