The correspondences involving semantically exocentric expressions, i.c. idioms and figures of speech, are best classified in terms of types of necessary adaptations, e.g. metaphors to metaphors, metaphors to similes, metaphors to nonmetaphors, and nonmetaphors to metaphors.

With an obvious metaphor, c.g. Adam's apple, it is clear that some adjustment in lexical form is inevitable, especially in regions where apples are unknown and no one has ever heard of Adam. In Uduk, for example, this anatomical feature becomes "the thing that wants beer". However, correspondences between metaphors may involve rather similar areas of meaning. In Lahu, a language of Burma and Southwest China, one cannot translate literally the hymn "Stand up, stand up, for Jesus" without being somewhat silly, for Lahus simply do not "stand up" for their leaders. On the other hand, one can say "to stand firm", and this is the expression used. Similarly in Loma the expression "withered hand" (Mark 3 :3) does not make sense, for hands do not "wither" as plants do. However, one can speak of a "dead hand", and make perfectly good sense.

The metaphors in a language are often closely related to the actual experience of the people. In Valiente, a language of Panama, a proper translation of the line“Just as I am, though tossed about”(which begins the second stanza of a famous hymn) is "just as I am with a swollen spleen". The basis of this metaphor is the fact that persons who have chronic malaria normally have swollen spleens, and they are also frequently beset by constant worry and mental turmoil.

If semantically exocentric expressions in the source language are translated literally, they are generally interpreted as endocentric (i.e. more or less literally), unless practical or linguistic clues signal that the expression used involves an unusual extension of meaning. For this reason one often finds that a simile is the most effective way of rendering a metaphor. Words such aslike" and "as" immediately cue the reader to the fact that the words in question are to be taken in a special sense. In the Trique translation of Mark 4:20, accordingly, one does not say that some of the persons "bear fruit thirtyfold", but "some are like seeds that increase to thirty". By means of the term "like" one indicates that the people are like seed which grows up and produces thirty grains to a plant.  Without this shift from metaphor to simile the passage can be very confusing. Likewise in Navajo one cannot speak of people "being hungry and thirsty for righteousness" (Matthew 5 :6). On the other hand, one can say "like hungcring and thirsting, they desire righteousness", in which case a simile proves to be the real equivalent of the metaphor.