The Partisans’ Song now in Maori

November 2, 2020 by J-Wire Newsdesk
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Perth’s We Are Here! Foundation has published The Partisans’ Song in Maori, the 30th translation of the famous Holocaust melody.

Bielski partisan fighters (Naliboki Forest, Belarus, 1943)

Hēmi Kelly, a lecturer at Te Ara Poutama, Faculty of Māori and Indigenous Development and a researcher at Te Ipukarea, The National Māori Language Institute at the Auckland University of Technology.

The version was recorded in Perth with the song being sung in Yiddish, Hebrew, Noongar and English.

Ellenbrook Secondary College and Carmel Jewish School
And now the lyrics in Maori

Kaua rawa e mea ko te mate anahe tō huarahi,

Ahakoa āraia ana te kiko o te rangi e te pōuriuri,

Kei te tata mai te wā kua roa e tāria ana;

Ka rū te whenua i te takahi a ngā wae – ki te haka!

Mai i te whenua o te nīkau, ki te whenua kōkēi o te huka,

E haere nei mātou i runga i te kōharihari me te tiwhatiwha;

Katoa ngā wāhi i pipī ai ō mātou toto ki te papa,

Ka puāwai mai i reira tō mātou māia me tō mātou kaha.

Ka whiti tonu te rā i te ata, ka ao te rangi,

Katoa ngā raru o nanahi ka ngaro me te hoa kakari;

Ā, ki te roa te wā i mua i te aranga mai anō o te rā,

Tukua mā tēnei wai ngā tau e whakaaomārama.

I titongia ai tēnei waiata ki te toto, kaua ki te matā;

Ehara i te waiata e haria ai e ngā manu o ō te raumati rā

Engari nā te iwi i te kauhanga riri a Tū,

Tēnei waiata a mātou i hari ki te pū me te pohū.

Kaua rawa e mea ko te mate anahe tō huarahi,

Ahakoa āraia ana te kiko o te rangi e te pōuriuri,

Kei te tata mai te wā kua roa e tāria ana;

Ka rū te whenua i te takahi a ngā wae – ki te haka!

We Are Here! Foundation’s Eli Rabinowitz told J-Wire: “More languages to come!”

 

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