99866
I hope this question is not a duplicate and it belongs here. I wanted to ask
as simple question about particle や (ya) and と (to) which was used in a
translation from an Arabic text.

Here's the Arabic text:

> اِنَّمَا الۡحَيٰوةُ الدُّنۡيَا لَعِبٌ وَّلَهۡوٌ It's quoted from the Qur'an
> chapter 47 verse 36.

Here's the transliteration:

> innamalhayaatuddunyaa la'ibun wa lahwun

Here's the English translation:

> [This] worldly life is only amusement and diversion.

Here's the Japanese translation by Ryoichi Mita:

> この世の生活は，（一時の）遊びや戯れに過ぎない。

In the Japanese translation, the particle "ya" was used for the list. However,
as you can see from the transliteration, the Arabic text starts with "innamaa"
which indicates a list with **limited** items. So based on my current
understanding of Japanese, the particle "to" should be used instead of "ya".
Is that correct or is there another rule regarding the use of "ya" and "to"
that I'm not aware of?
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2023-06-07T08:08:01.410
99863
2023-06-07T09:23:53.433
50011
question
particle-と particle-や
Should I use や or と for إِنَّمَا?
I am completely unfamliar with the underlying Quranic text. But や seems
absolutely appropriate in this context. A great way to think about it is "AやB"
= "things such as A and B".

If I'm not mistaken, the original text isn't saying "This wordly life is
amusement and diversion and nothing else". It's moreso saying something like
"This worldly life is amusement and diversion and such".

To conclude, と would primarily be used when you're referring to specific
things, and nothing else. Whereas や can be used to mean things "of a sort",
and you're only pointing out a few examples.

As an example, it's like if I wanted to say "Humans normally feel things like
love and anger". I obviously don't mean for "love" and "anger" to be an
exhaustive list. I mean that there's a greater list/concept, and I'm just
pointing out "love" and "anger" in particular. So in this case, one should use
"愛や怒り" (ai ya ikari), not "愛と怒り" (ai to ikari).
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2023-06-07T09:21:19.437
99865
2023-06-07T09:21:19.437
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99863
answer
I don’t know Arabic and therefore can’t tell which better conveys the nuance
of the original. So, I will answer about how I take the Japanese translation
and its alternative with と.

> この世の生活は，（一時の）遊び **と** 戯れに過ぎない。

This is fine but sounds a bit like この世の生活 is both 遊び **and** 戯れ at the same
time. However, if I understand correctly, 遊び and 戯れ, or amusement and
diversion, basically refer to one same thing said in two different ways. や
kind of blurs this two-thing-ness.
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2023-06-07T09:23:53.433
99866
2023-06-07T09:23:53.433
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answer