Translation "siempre devuelve el golpe el mar"

Question

Hello... I'm just wondering what does mean the sentence "siempre devuelve el golpe el mar"

My guess is that it's idiomatic - literally it means "the sea tide always comes back"

and figuratively "karma always comes back" - "your bad deeds will hount you"

but well...I am just guessing, please help

Answer 1

To me it is saying, "The sea always strikes back." (whether this is something like "what goes around comes around," I don't know.)

Hi Dani. Can you explain how we know "el mar" must be the subject and not "el golpe"? Gracias. - jellonz, Nov 25, 2016

"El golpe" is the blow or strike. To me it's obvious that "el mar" is delivering "el golpe." Not a grammar problem here, just logic. - Daniela2041, Nov 25, 2016

Would it be logical to say that the strike delivers/returns the sea? Hardly. - Daniela2041, Nov 25, 2016

I meant grammatically. - jellonz, Nov 25, 2016

Setting logic aside, or coming up with some context like Neptune getting angry, is there no grammatical rationale behind it? - jellonz, Nov 25, 2016

I've explained all I know how. I'm done with this. - Daniela2041, Nov 25, 2016

@Jellonz...Maybe you can open another thread and ask your question. :) - rac1, Nov 25, 2016

Thanks Amber. I think it's a valid question so I will :) - jellonz, Nov 25, 2016

Answer 2

This sentence interests me because like you I translate it as "The sea always returns the hit" which probably would be a saying meaning something like: If you go up against something great/powerful/natural expect to get knocked back.

But if this is the case then my question is (please excuse my habit of question hijacking): How do we know "el mar" is the subject of this sentence when it contains another noun "el golpe"? What prevents the sentence being read as "The impact always returns the sea" for example?

haha exactly ;) Well most probably nothing prevents it, only the context.... But I am a newbie so I don't know ;) - Leflur-Fluflur, Nov 24, 2016