Extracted text from JBTM_12-1_Spring_2015.pdf:

SPRING 2015 VOLUME 12, NUMBER 1

Bible Translation as Missions

Spring 2015 Vol. 12, No. 1 The Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary

Editor-in-Chief Charles S. Kelley, Th.D. Executive Editor Steve W. Lemke, Ph.D. Editor & BCTM Director Adam Harwood, Ph.D.

2015 EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD Bart Barber, Ph.D. First Baptist Church of Farmersville, TX Rex Butler, Ph.D. New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary

Research Assistant Patrick Cochran

Nathan Finn, Ph.D. Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary

Book Review Editors Archie England, Ph.D. Dennis Phelps, Ph.D.

Eric Hankins, Ph.D. First Baptist Church, Oxford, MS Malcolm Yarnell, Ph.D. Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary

The Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry is a research institute of New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. The seminary is located at 3939 Gentilly Blvd., New Orleans, LA 70126. BCTM exists to provide theological and ministerial resources to enrich and energize ministry in Baptist churches. Our goal is to bring together professor and practitioner to produce and apply these resources to Baptist life, polity, and ministry. The mission of the BCTM is to develop, preserve, and communicate the distinctive theological identity of Baptists. The Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry is published semiannually by the Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry. Copyright 2015 The Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry, New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary. All Rights Reserved. This peridiocal is indexed in the ATLA Religion Database (ATLA RDB), http://www.atla.com.

CONTACT BCTM

(800) 662-8701, ext. 8074 baptistcenter@nobts.edu www.baptistcenter.com

SUBMISSIONS

Visit the Baptist Center website for submission guidelines.

TABLE OF CONTENTS Editorial Introduction Adam Harwood

Form and Function in Bible Translation: Where Theory Meets Practice Dave Brunn

Translation as Transmission Bryan Harmelink

Equipping the Global Church to Translate the Bible into Its Own Language Perry Oakes

Global Church/Bible Agency Partnership: A Proposal for Twenty-First Century Bible Translation Larry B. Jones

Book Reviews

Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry Vol. 12, No. 1 2015

Editorial Introduction Adam Harwood, Ph.D. Adam Harwood is Associate Professor of Theology, occupying the McFarland Chair of Theology; Director of the Baptist Center for Theology and Ministry; Editor, Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary.

pproximately 180 million people have no Scripture in theirheart language.1 A nation with this number of people would be the eighth most populated nation in the world.It would have a population larger than that of Germany and the United Kingdomcombined. Tragically, these180 million people scattered throughout the earth have no access to the biblical accounts of creation, the fall, the flood, the story of Israel or its exodus, its laws, or its prophets. They have no Psalms and they have no account of the life, teachings, death, and resurrection of Jesus. With this need in mind, three research centers co-sponsored on October 20, 2014, a colloquium titled Bible Translation as Missions.2 The articles in this issue of the Journal for Baptist Theology and Ministry represent four of the presentations. The articles are followed by reviews of books in the fields of biblical studies, philosophy, apologetics, and theology. The first article is a transcript of the presentation by Dave Brunn, who serves as an International Translation Consultantandteaches Bible translation at the New Tribes Mission (NTM) Missionary Training Centers in the USA, Canada, and Australia.Brunn narrates some of his experience as a missionary-translator in Papua New Guinea for twenty-one years,especially facilitating the translation of theNew Testament into the Lamogai language. In the next article, Bryan Harmelink, Global Consultant for Bible Translation & Collaboration withWycliffe Global Alliance, addresses the concern for why so many languages have no Scripture by raising the concept of translation as transmission. Next, Perry Oakes, Bible Translator at Wycliffe Associates, details a new and innovative approach to equip the linguistically least of these global church to translate the Bible for themselves. The final article was penned by Larry B. Jones, Senior Vice President of Bible Translation at The Seed Company. In his article, Jones proposes a new partnership between the global church and Bible agencies in order to accomplish the task of beginning Bible translation projects by 2025 for every language that needs it.

This statistic is provided by Wycliffe Bible Translators at https://www.wycliffe.org/about/why, accessed July 3, 2015. 2 The following NOBTS research centers co-sponsored the colloquium: the Baptist Center for Theology & Ministry, the H. Milton Haggard Center for New Testament Textual Studies, and the Global Missions Center. All seven presentations from the event can be accessed at the NOBTS Events YouTube page, available at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMVHu7VnTHH8gp8hcIA_kvg/feed.

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May these articles develop in readers a burden for Bible translation work, and equip us to pray and serve so that all people in every place will have access to Gods Word in their heart language, so they might repent of their sins and trust in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.

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Form and Function in Bible Translation: Where Theory Meets Practice Dave Brunn Dave Brunn is an International Translation Consultant and teaches Bible translation at the New Tribes Missions (NTM) Missionary Training Centers in the USA, Canada, and Australia. Editors Note: Below is a transcript of a presentation by Dave Brunn at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary on October 20, 2014. The transcript maintains the colloqial speech, including the use of contractions. The original presentation, with a Q & A session, can be viewed at: https://youtu.be/NxnIP2981iU.

My wife and I serve with New Tribes Mission. We do Bible translation, but with New Tribes Mission our primary focus is church planting among Unreached People Groups, which means giving them the Scriptures in their language. So there is a lot of translation taking place in todays world, and some of you have probably seen these examples. They were published a number of years ago in Bible Translator. When Coke and Pepsi started marketing their products in China, they made some mistakes. With Coca-Cola, you cant really translate the name. Rather, you have to transliterate it, which means that they tried to find a way that was fairly easy to pronounce in Chinese. The problem initially was that it meant something. At least in one dialect it meant, Bite the wax tadpole. So you can image that this was not quite the effect that they would have hoped. Pepsi didnt do a whole lot better. At that time, Pepsi had a slogan that most of you dont remember because youre too young: Come alive with the Pepsi generation! Pepsis first attempt at translating that into Chinese meant, Pepsi will raise your ancestors from the dead! Id imagine that did something to spike sales until people realized that it didnt really work. So, in 1980, my wife and I went to Papua New Guinea. We moved in among the Lamogai people who lived very, very isolatedno Gospel witness, no Scripture in their language, no churches. So we started by learning their language. This was a language that had never been written down before. We broke it down into writingsI was trained in linguisticsand we taught them how to read and write in their language for the very first time. My wife, Nancy, served as a literacy teacher, and we were a team of missionaries. My main role on the team was to work with the mother-tongue speakers and produce a translation of the New Testament and Old Testament portions in the Lamogai language. Now in case youre not very familiar with New Tribes Mission and translation, we currently have over one hundred translation projects going on around the world, and that doesnt include projects like mine, which is not ongoing. We work in Africa, Latin America, Asia, and the South Pacific. When we do Bible translations,

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it is always within the context of a long-term, ongoing, church-planting effort in that target language, the language thats being translated. So with the Lamogai people, we did Bible translation, we did literacy, but we also did chronological Bible teaching. It took us nearly four months to present the gospel the first time, and this was after we had already spent a full two years learning their language, documenting their culture, and producing a very complete culture file. So we started at the beginning, in Genesis. We hit high points from the Old Testament, and we eventually got to the life of Christ. We presented on the last day of this four-month teaching the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ. It was at that point that we actually presented the gospel. A church was born. So then of course we were involved in discipleship and leadership development. As missionaries going into a place like this, we did not go to export Western forms to try to make them more like us, or to try to make their churches look like ours. Ill tell you right now, their churches, the way they function, do not look very much like ours at all. We had no right to be paternalistic and export our forms, but there is one who has every right to be paternalistic, in a positive sense of course: the eternal Father. Gods Word transcends culture. If theres a difference between what Gods Word says and what a culture says, then Gods Word is right. That of course applies to our own culture, as well as every culture around the world. And we did curriculum development. That means we produced Bible teaching materials through the entire New Testament, and two major potions of the Old Testament. I wasnt sure just how much it was, so I went and looked at the files on my computer. Just to give you an idea: in the New Testament alone, the teaching material amounts to over 750,000 words. I dont know how much exactly that is in pages; its two or three thousand pages. But we have volumes and volumes basically of commentaries through the entire New Testament. So when we first went there, we didnt know what God was going to do. We didnt know who would come to know the Lord. We didnt know who would end up being the leaders in the church. But God did eventually raise up leaders who are choice, choice servants of the Lord. What a privilege it is to serve alongside of them in serving the Lamogai church. The Lamogai people have been on their own for many years now. There are currently churches in fourteen different Lamogai villages, and the last several churches were planted by the Lamogai people, totally apart from any missionary assistance at all. As was mentioned, I now have the privilege of serving as a translation consultant, working with translation teams on their projects, mostly in Asia and the South Pacific, although I am also currently assigned to a Seed Company project in Nigeria. Lord willing, two weeks from today I will be with a group of precious brothers in Nigeria checking some portions of Matthew and John. Based on my years as a translator, I wrote a book about Bible translation, which is really for the church in the English-speaking world.1 As a career translator, I come back and hear people Dave Brunn, One Bible, Many Versions: Are All Translations Created Equal? (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2013). 1

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talking about translation. Sometimes I even hear people arguing about translation. And its evident to me that most of the arguments are not necessary because they are not based on what a translation really is. Translation is an incredibly complex process, and often many people in North AmericaNorth American English speakershave a very limited, over-simplified understanding of what translation actually entails. As a translator, as part of a team, the mothertongue speakers of course were the experts in the language from day one until the end of the project. My job was to be the expert in biblical exegesis, which of course meant I surrounded myself with experts. As a translator and translation facilitator, I was committed to making sure that Gods Word was translated as faithfully and accurately as possible. I thought I had a good idea of what that meant. When I got into the process, however, I encountered some surprises. When I would approach a passage of Scripture to translate into Lamogai, I would look to see what the source text said, and then I would compare as many English versions as I could. Thats where I encountered some surprises. It wasnt surprising that some versions would translate it fairy literally, and others would opt for a more dynamic equivalent. For example, my opponent in place of he who rises up against me, or from my mothers womb translated as from infancy; sons of tumult as riotous revelers; made him king translated as put him on the throne; a branch of her root interpreted as one of the descendants of her line; and is not crowned translated does not win the prize.

SOURCE TEXT

LITERAL

DYNAMIC EQUIVALENT

Job 27:7

he who rises he who rises NASB up against me NKJV up against me

my opponent

Job 31:18

from my from my NASB ESV mothers womb mothers womb

from infancy

Jer 48:45

sons of tumult

ESV

sons of tumult

NASB

riotous revelers

Ez 17:16

made him king

NKJV

made him king

NASB

put him on the throne

Dan 11:7

a branch of her roots

NKJV

a branch of her roots

one of the NASB descendants of her line

2 Tim 2:5

is not crowned

HCSB

is not crowned

NASB win the prize

does not

Now, I dont know if any of these dynamic interpretations bother any of you, but if they do you may be surprised to know that the version that chose the dynamic equivalent renderings in

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these contexts is the NASB, which has often been called the most literal. I think the NASB is an excellent translation, but I find its not nearly as literal as most people think. Of course, its not only the NASB; every literal version frequently uses classical dynamic equivalence translation principles in many, many contexts. The ESV, for example, in Mark 9:3, rather than no launderer on earth, they translated it no one on earth. They let this component of meaning be carried by the verb, which I think is appropriate, but its not their normal strategy. Or in Galatians 1:16, instead of I did not consult with flesh and blood, I did not consult with anyone. A perfectly appropriate rendering, but certainly not literal. As I pressed forward, I noticed that the more literal versions go back and forth taking turns being the most and least literal among their peers. For example, with Hebrew and Greek words that we would most often translate as flesh, sometimes the ESV goes with a very literal rendering, flesh, whereas the NASB goes with more of an interpretive rendering, men, mankind, anyone, living creatures. But in other contexts, its the opposite: the NASB translates it literally, and the ESV opts for more of an interpretive rendering. Again, perfectly appropriate renderings, but maybe not what you would have expected.

Source Text

English Standard Version (ESV)

New American Standard Bible (NASB)

Psa. 65:2

flesh

men

Isa. 66:23

flesh

mankind

Jer. 12:12

flesh

anyone

Dan. 4:12

flesh

living creatures

Joel 2:28

flesh

mankind

Lev. 17:14

flesh

creature

flesh

Rom. 3:20

flesh

human being

flesh

1 Co. 1:26

flesh

worldly standards

flesh

Eph. 6:5

flesh

earthly

flesh

Jude 7

flesh

desire

flesh

As I pressed forward, I was shocked to find that not only are the literal versions not always literal, but theres a surprising number of places where the notably non-literal versions are actually more literal than the versions that we generally think of as literal. So, for example, in Psalm 44:14, a literal rendering would be shaking of the head. The NIV and the New Living Translation both opted for a quite literal rendering, shake their heads. In this case, the ESV and the NASB both translated it laughing stock. Now, if youre familiar with these four versions, and I told you these four renderings and these four versions, many of you probably

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would have guessed the exact opposite. I would have, too, except that I found this example, and I found many more. A number of them are in my book. Translation theorists often use a continuum when ranging from more literal to less literal, and theyll place each version at a point somewhere along that continuum.

IDEAL & REAL Psalm 44:14

shake their heads

Highly Literal

Literal

ESV

laughingstock NASB

Idiomatic

Unduly Free

REAL

IDEAL

(in literal versions)

But I think its more appropriate to define a range. But, actually, every version has two ranges. The ideal range is the stated goals of the translators. Youll read that in the preface or introduction to each Bible version. The real range is where their translational choices actually fall. So, for example, in Psalm 44:14, if a literal version was aiming to use a rendering within their ideal target range, it would be something like shake their heads.

IDEAL & REAL Psalm 44:14

shake their heads

Highly Literal

Literal

IDEAL

ESV laughingstock NASB

Idiomatic

REAL

(in literal versions)

Unduly Free

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But in this particular case, the ESV and the NASB, appropriately so, I believe, chose to step far outside their target area, and they went with a rendering deep in idiomatic territory, laughing stock. Most of the books and articles that have been written about Bible translation and about the debate between literal versus idiomatic focus almost exclusively on the ideal. Its fine to talk about ideals, but if we let the debate and the discussion stay only in the philosophical realm of ideals, it often comes down to little more than a difference of opinion. We need to look at not only the ideal, but also the real. So, when the ESV, NASB, or any version outlines their target area, their stated objectives, in their preface or introduction, theyre making important statements about their translation philosophy. But we have to realize that they are also making important statements about their translation philosophy by the renderings they choose throughout Scripture. For example, in Psalm 44:14, the NASB and ESV translators are making the statement that it is appropriate translation practice to set aside a viable, word-focused rendering and replace it with a dynamic interpretation. That is appropriate translation practice, because of course they did it. In this case, the NASB and ESV would generally aim for the literal side, the NLT is on the idiomatic side, the NIV is closer to the middle but still on the idiomatic side. But in Psalm 44:14, we see them changing places. If we ask, Which version is more literal? it kind of depends on which verse. Now, its true that more often the NASB and ESV are going to be on the literal side and these other two versions on the other side. But you cannot assume, by picking up the NASB, the ESV, or any version that calls itself literal, for any given verse that they have translated it literally. You have to look it up. Translation theorists have sometimes used a meaning-based translation model to describe the translation process, whereby the translator starts with the source-language text, digs beneath the surface to discover the meaning, and then re-expresses that meaning in appropriate target-language or receptive-language forms.

Meaning-based Translation Model Source Language Text

Target Language Text

Discover the meaning

Re-express the meaning

Meaning

Larson, Mildred L., Meaning Based Translation, p.4

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In response to the rising popularity of dynamic equivalence translation, the term formal equivalence was coined. Presumably, formal equivalence translation could be illustrated by a modified version of this chart, where you skip the discovery and re-expression stage and go directly from the form of the source-language text to the form of the target-language text.

Formal Equivalence Model? Source Language Text

Target Language Text

(Omit this Part) Discover the meaning

Re-express the meaning

Meaning

But is this really the strategy that is used by our literal versions? No, not consistently. I dont know of any version in English or any other language that consistently uses this form-to-form model. One of the best places to start in understanding the appropriate relationship between the form of the message and the meaning of the message is with idioms and figures of speech. In English, for example, we say that a person is warm-hearted. That means they are kind and compassionate. Well, if we wanted to use the form-to-form model to translate it into Lamogai, that is possible. We can do that: antoine ingil. But theres a problem, because in Lamogai, warm-hearted means angry. So if I translate this literally, word-for-word, into Lamogai, have I been a faithful translator or an unfaithful translator? Well, sometimes word-for-word is faithful, and it is accurate. But sometimes word-for-word will actually corrupt the inspired meaning of Scripture. A related term in English is coldhearted, which means ruthless, cruel. Again, we can translate that literally into Lamogai: antoine vris. Unsurprisingly, in Lamogai, cold-hearted is simply the opposite of warmhearted. It means that hes not angry anymore; hes calmed down; hes cooled off. A third, related term is hard-hearted. It means stubborn, unteachable. Again, we can translate that literally: antoine namor. This brings about a different kind of a problem. What in the world does that mean? Its meaningless to the Lamogai people. So rather than saying, his heart is harddeep beneath the surface, discover the meaningthey say, veine kauk,

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which means his ears are closed. Of course, now weve changed to a completely different body part. Is that okay, or is that going farther than what would be allowable in good translation practice? To shed light on this, lets look at another example from a real language. Some languages use other body parts to describe the seat of the emotions and the seat of the intellect. For example, in Job 19:27, the NASB has my heart faints within me. If another Bible says, my kidneys faint within me, is that okay? Or, what about, my mind instructs me as my kidneys instruct me (Psa 16:7)? Or, similarly, I was pierced within versus I was pierced in my kidneys (Psa 73:21), and You formed my inward parts as You formed my kidneys (Psa 139:13). Now, Im not going to ask you if you think this is okay. Actually, we dont have to guess if thats okay, because the latter renderings are the Hebrew; the former is the cultural adaptation. So, if one has any questions about this variety of renderings, one would have to ask the NASB translators (though most of them are gone.)

THIS is the

Cultural Adaptation

Hebrew

(English)

{} kidneys Job 19:27 (NASB) My heart faints within me! My kidneys faint within me! Psalm 16:7 (NASB) my mind instructs me. my kidneys instruct me. Psalm 73:21 (NASB) I was pierced within I was pierced in my kidneys Psalm 139:13 (NASB) You formed my inward parts... You formed my kidneys... Leviticus 9:10 (NIV) On the altar he burned the fat, the kidneys and the covering of the liver So, kil yh is the common Hebrew word for kidneys, which in the context of the offerings, where its talking about the physical body part, every English version translates it kidneys (cf. Lev 9:10). But in places where its used figuratively to speak of the seat of the emotions and the seat of the intellect, even our most literal versions translate it several different ways. The ESV and the NASB are both versions that I consider to be excellent, but they allow themselves quite a bit of leeway in the ways that they translated this Hebrew and Greek term. (It occurs once in the New Testament, the word for kidneys, used figuratively). Also, even though their objectives are very close, they didnt translate it the same as each other. Sometimes, they both translated it heart (cf. Job 19:27), and sometimes they both translated it mind (cf. Jer 17:10; 20:12). Sometimes, the ESV translated it heart, while the NASB translated it mind (cf. Psa

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7:9; 16:7; 26:2; Jer 12:2). Is there a difference between the heart and the mind in Scripture? I think there is. And, of course, there are the Hebrew and Greek words for heart, as well. But that could be difficult to prove just by the NASB and ESV renderings for the Hebrew and Greek words that have as their most common definition and translation kidneys. NASB

ESV

Hebrew

heart minds mind

heart hearts heart

kidneys kidneys kidneys

26:2 73:21 139:13

mind within inward parts

heart heart inward parts

kidneys kidneys kidneys

Prov. 23:16 Jer. 11:20 12:2 17:10 20:12 Lam. 3:13

inmost being feelings mind mind mind inward parts

inmost being heart heart mind mind kidneys

kidneys kidneys kidneys kidneys kidneys kidneys

NASB

ESV

Greek

minds

mind

kidneys

Job 19:27 Psalm 7:9 16:7

Rev. 2:23

So, as a translator, as Im pressing forward, Im having to ask myself, Are literal versions actually literal? And why did the literal versions set aside their goal of literalness so frequently, even in places where they really didnt have to? And how is the average reader of a literal English version supposed to know which verses are literal and which ones arent? What about word-for-word translation? There are a lot of terms that are used to describe the various Bible versions, and one of the most unfortunate terms that I think has ever been used in talking about Bible translations is the term word-for-word. It really is a misleading term. Now, Im not saying that anyone is intentionally trying to mislead anyone. But when Bible scholars talk about word-for-word translation, they know that does not mean that every word from the source text will be represented by a word in English. It also does not mean that every word in our English versions represents a word from the source text. But when the average English-speaking Bible reader who does not have direct access to the Hebrew and Greek hears the term word-for-word, I believe it implies to them a degree of correspondence with the original that does not exist in any English version. So, if were going to use the term word-forword, we need to qualify it. First of all, the Hebrew word ntan, which is most commonly defined as to give, is variously translated in the King James Version as deliver up, direct, distribute, fasten, give up, grant, lay up, leave, to name a few. Robert Young also has identified seventeen additional

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idiomatic renderings for a total of eighty-four different English renditions of this particular Hebrew term.2 Similarly, the Hebrew word tb, which is generally defined as good, is translated in a variety of ways in the King James. This list of renderings includes nouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs, single words, and multiple-word phrases. So, if were going to say we embrace a philosophy of word-for-word translation, we first have to qualify that by noting that word-forword translation does mean that a single word from the source text could be translated dozens of different ways in English, and it could be changed into a noun, a verb, an adjective, an adverb, or a multiple-word phrase. But it goes the other direction, too. Anytime you see the word destroyed in the King James Old Testament, it is one of at least forty Hebrew words, and you are not going to know which one it is unless you look it up, or unless you have the Hebrew Old Testament memorized. So, a single word in the source text could be translated dozens of different ways in English and changed into a noun, a verb, an adjective, an adverb, or a multiple-word phrase. This is what word-for-word translation allows. It also allows that a word in our English version could represent dozens of different words from the source text.

One word in Source Text One word in English One word in Source Text

=

Many words in English Many words in Source Text

But it also means that a word in the source text sometimes is not translated or represented at all in some of our word-for-word versions. Again, I am not picking on the NASB, but since it calls itself the most literal, and since the NASB sometimes allows words to drop out, the rest of the versions probably do so even more frequently. For example, in Ezekiel 1:7, the translators Robert Young, Preface, Youngs Literal Translation of the Holy Bible, 3rd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1898). According to Brunn, Young compiled these renderings because he felt the King James Version was too free, and that the KJV did not try nearly hard enough to be literal. 2

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weighed their options regarding the difference between the soles of their feet or simply their feet. If you look at the context of this passage, youll see why I would say I prefer the NASBs rendering, because the passage is talking about a calf. Its saying that their feet were like the soles of a calf s foot, which is what these versions say. And Im not sure that I would describe a calf s hoof as a foot, nor as having a sole.

Omissions in the Most Literal Version Ezekiel 1:7 Hebrew: the soles of their feet NKJV: the soles of their feet ESV: the soles of their feet NASB: -their feet Likewise, with Ezekiel 1:13, the NASB translators had to determine the difference between saying something looked like torches or like the appearance of torches. I guess there isnt really a difference, so the NASB translatorsIm not saying they did something wrong here; I dont think they diddecided that word-for-word translation allows us to let some of the words drop out. We dont necessarily have to reflect every single word. When they did this, Im positive they did it with full assurance in their hearts that they were not violating the profound wording in Revelation 22:1819 against adding to or taking away from the words, the logos, of Scripture.

Omissions in the Most Literal Version Ezekiel 1:13 Hebrew: like the appearance of torches NKJV: like the appearance of torches ESV: like the appearance of torches NASB: -torches

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The ESV does something similar. Whats the difference in Genesis 34:26 between Shechems being killed with the edge of the sword and his being killed with the sword? While this represents a single word in Hebrew, the ESV translators decided that they did not necessarily have to translate and reflect every single word and still call their translation a word-for-word translation. Again, I am not putting down these versions. I hope every one of you owns a copy of the NASB and the ESV. But I hope you also own the NIV, the New Living Translation, and some of these other versions as well.

Omissions in the ESV Genesis 34:26 Hebrew: Shechem...they killed with the edge of the sword NASB: They killed...Shechem with the edge of the sword NKJV: They killed...Shechem with the edge of the sword ESV: They killed...Shechem with -the sword Similarly, in Micah 2:7, the ESV translators determined that the word spirit was really being used figuratively. Though the Hebrew reads, Has the spirit of the LORD grown short? the ESV translators decided that this simply means that the LORD in the case was impatient. So they decided that they did not have to literally translate every word. We can let the word spirit drop out, because its figurative; its not intended to be literal. The NLT, however, does include a literal rendering of spirit. So this is another case where the NLT in this sense is more literal than the ESV.

Omissions in the ESV Micah 2:7 Hebrew: Has the spirit of the LORD grown short? NASB: Is the Spirit of the LORD impatient? HCSB: Is the Spirit of the LORD impatient? NLT: Will the LORDs Spirit have patience? ESV: Has -- the LORD grown impatient?

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Sometimes, words and phrases have been allowed to drop out for the sake of appropriateness. According to Louw and Nida, for instance,[i]n some languages . . . a reference to a toilet may seem inappropriate for the Scriptures . . .3 The word for toilet in Greek occurs two times in the New Testament, once in Matthew 15:17 and once in Mark 7:19. Do you know how many times it occurs in some of our most literal versions? Zero. They decided just to let it drop out. You know the context. Food goes into the stomach, it is eliminated, and you get the rest. You dont have to say it. So the NASB, the NKJV, the HCSB, and the ESV decided, appropriately, I believe, that this two-word Greek phrase, eis aphedrna, could simply be allowed to drop out. We dont have to literally translate every single word. Some versions, however, decided that they would go ahead and translate it. So its really a judgment call: either you include it or you dont. Both are acceptable. Interestingly, in this case, one of the versions that does represent this Greek phrase is the NLT. They translated it into the sewer. So this is yet another case where the NLT is actually more literal than the NKJV, HCSB, NASB, or ESV. Of course, along with allowing words to drop out, every version adds words that have no counterpart in the Greek or the Hebrew. For example, in Matthew 1:6, the NASB adds a four-word phrase Bathsheba who had been to the literal Greek phrase . . . the father of Solomon by . . . the wife of Uriah to yield the longer phrase . . . the father of Solomon by Bathsheba who had been the wife of Uriah. . . The name Bathsheba does not occur anywhere in the Greek New Testament; you will not find it once. But it does occur in Matthew 1:6 of the NASB. Along with adding the name Bathsheba, the NASB translators decided to add the three-word phrase who had been to make it clear that even though Bathsheba had previously been Uriahs wife, she wasnt still his wife at the time that David became the father of Solomon. That would mean that Solomon was conceived in an adulterous relationship. We know that the baby that was conceived in adultery died when he was just a few days old, but that was not Solomon. In many more places, whether for clarity or naturalness, the NASB frequently does what the rest of the literal versions do even more frequently. Now there seems to be an important factor in all of this that I think maybe a lot of people dont think about very much. Or maybe they dont even know. And that is, when it comes to New Testament translation, English and Koine Greek are both Indo-European languages. So the degree of literalism you have in some of our English New Testaments is largely due to the fact that the translators just started translating from one Indo-European language into a distantly related language. In Papua New Guinea, we dont talk a lot about word-for-word translation. Do you want to know why? Well, the translator of the Simbari language shared this example with me. This is the longest word they have found so far46 lettersmabomollurolovonekumokalokwowojujukomnojuki. It means had he not delivered us. Well, Ill tell you, you cannot break this word down at allall of the markers, the prefixes, the suffixes, they all have to be there in exactly that order or else you havent communicated meaning. Now, clearly if we spoke a language like Simbari, with characteristically much longer words than what we have, I dont think there would be nearly as much discussion about word-for-word translation.

Johannes P. Louw and Eugene A Nida, eds., Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament based on Semantic Domains (New York: UBS, 1989), item 7.72. 3

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According to the current edition of the Ethnologue, there are 7,106 known living languages. Of those, 445 are classified as Indo European, so that means that ninety-four percent of the languages spoken around the world today are not related to Greek in the way that English is. So if I base my entire understanding of New Testament translation on what it takes to translate from Koine Greek into its distant cousin English, I am really looking at an extremely narrow slice of the pie. Now for me, working on a translation in a radically dissimilar language in Papua New Guinea, I faced some challenges that those translating our English versions would not even imagine. Im sure that many of you have had the opportunity to study Greek, so if you havent and if youre a pastor, you probably have sometimes mentioned a Greek word and said, Well, thats the word from which we get our English wordand then you say a word that sounds a little bit like it. Can you guess how many times I said that while teaching in Lamogai? Zero! Every translator has to deal with ambiguity. Im sure youve all seen this one in Matthew 6:13. These verses are pretty much right down the middle. Some of them will have deliver us from evil or from the evil one, or vice versa. Some of them will have a footnote at the bottom. Those of you who have studied this know that this is not a textual issue; this is a genuine ambiguity in the Greek text, and I would like to say that the translators of all of these versions weighed the options. Hopefully they prayed about it. But guess what? They didnt come to the same conclusion.

Ambiguities in NT Greek

KJV NASB RSV ESV

Matthew 6:13

deliver us from evil. NKJV deliver us from the evil one. deliver us from evil. ASV deliver us from the evil one. deliver us from evil. NRSV rescue us from the evil one. deliver us from evil. HCSB deliver us from the evil one.

Well, as a translator translating into Lamogai I had to deal with this ambiguity, but I had to deal with a lot of ambiguities that the translators translating into English never had to even think about. One area is with the Greek genitive, which is ambiguous, as it is often translated into the English when it is not communicating pure possession. For example, what is the meaning of steadfastness of hope in 1 Thessalonians 1:3? Well, it could mean that they were steadfast in continuing to hope for Jesus Christ, or it could mean that they were steadfast in their Christian walk because of their hope in Jesus Christ. Either it means their hope was

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steadfast or their hope causes steadfastness. As I look at the more idiomatic versions, theyre split about fifty-fifty on this interpretation. Interestingly, I looked up several commentaries and Bible teachers, and the vast majority of them will advocate for one of the interpretations, but fail to acknowledge the existence of the other interpretation. Im not faulting them for choosing one interpretation. It was impossible to translate this into Lamogai without choosing one of these interpretations. And I didnt do it arbitrarily. I didnt flip a coin. I looked at the context. Yet when I see Bible teachers and commentators choosing one and not even mentioning that another one exists, that seems to call into question the value of retaining ambiguity in translation. The reason we do that is so we dont rule out other possible interpretations. Now another area that we had to seriously consider in Lamogai is abstract nouns. Greek has many abstract nouns, and English also has many abstract nouns, so most abstract nouns from Greek can be translated quite literally in English without sacrificing meaning, or even naturalness. But there are many of these concepts that simply do not exist in the noun form in Lamogai or many other languages. We use nouns that you can see and touch, or that you can carry on a conversation with. So with all of these nouns, we have to figure out a verb phrase or some other form to translate it. The thing that we dont realize as English speakers is that we are really very odd in this sense. We think its very normal to have a noun-centered language. What we dont realize is that most languages around the world are verb-centered. We are really odd, and it just so happens that Greek is odd in the same way, so most of us are totally unaware of it. Take the the word love, for example. In Lamogai, love is always a verb. But to make it even a little more complicated, the only way to actually communicate any meaning is to explicity say who is loving whom. So with that in mind, how would you suggest translating that simple little clause in 1 Cor. 13:4, Love is patient? Remember that love must be a verb, and you must state who is loving whom. First, were going to look at the context. So it could be talking about God loving people, people loving God, or people loving people. It might be talking about all three, but thats not an option in Lamogai. Well have to choose which one is primarily the focus here. The others would have to be taught by extension and application. We look at the context. Paul says If I speak in the tongue of angels. I, I, I. Paul is including himself in this exhortation so it seems that 1 Cor. 13 is primarily talking about people expressing love. But to whom? Again, we look at the context: Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. It is not rude. So in what context are people generally patient, kind, envious, vulnerable, proud, and rude? With other people. So 1 Cor. 13 is primarily talking about people loving people. With that in mind, the only way to translate this into Lamogai such that the translation carries any kind of meaning is something like, The person who loves people acts patiently for people. Now, Im open to suggestions, but I refuse to translate this verse or any other verse in a way that would come through as pure nonsense to the Lamogai speakers and Lamogai readers. There are other places where love is a noun, but few may be more difficult to translate than 1 Cor. 13:4. What are you going to do with 1 John 4:7, God is love? Remember, love must be a verb, and you must state who is loving whom. A literal rendering of this in Lamogai would sound something like this: God is his inside loving toward. Guess what? It sounds just as ridiculous in Lamogai as in does in English. The thing that I had to keep in mind is that God is sovereign. God is the One who inspired words and phrases and clauses like God is love

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and love is patient, and the He is the very same God who created the Lamogai language and many other languages around the world in such a form that it is actually impossible for them to come anywhere close to reflecting this literally. So if literal translation is Gods universal standard for translation, then Im sorry: Lamogai and many other languages are automatically disqualified from ever having a faithful or accurate translation. So, of course we realize that the idiomatic versions include more interpretation than the literal versions. I am not willing to defend every interpretative choice of some of the versions that I mentioned, by the way. I mentioned the NIV and the NLT, but I dont agree with everything that theyve done in every verse, nor do I agree with everything that any version has done. As a career translator, I probably read English Bible versions a bit more critically than most people. If I threw a version out just because I didnt like something in it, I wouldnt have any Bibles left to read. Ive never found a version I agree with one hundred percent. But Ive never found one I disagree with one hundred percent With interpretation, how much is ok? Maybe when its only absolutely necessary. You dont have to look very far to realize that every version interprets in many contexts when it was not absolutely necessary. I mean, we could say that its okay to interpret in Matthew 6:13 in English because every version has to. We have no choice. And in Lamogai, its fine to choose one of these two, because you just have to. But in English, lets not do that interpretation. Or in 1 Cor. 13:4, its alright to interpret it in Lamogai because you have to but, like I said, every English version interprets in many places where it was just a judgment call on the part of the translator that they didnt really have to. It wasnt absolutely necessary.

How Much Interpretation Is Okay? Only when absolutely necessary? Matthew 6:13 deliver us from evil deliver us from the evil one

1 Cor. 13:4 love is patient the person who loves people acts patiently toward people Heres an interesting example of that in 1 Sam 14:14. The Hebrew reads half a yoke, which, figuratively speaking, is half an acre, since apparently an acre is what a single pair of oxen could plow in one day. So many versions have half an acre, but in this case the KJV

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translates it an half acre of land, which a yoke of oxen might plow. It sounds more like The Message in this case. One more interesting example is Daniel 11:4, which literally reads four winds of the heavens. Many versions translated it that way, including the ESV, NIV, and The Voice. But interestingly enough, the NASB decided to translate it the four points of the compass, even though the compass as a navigational tool wasnt invented until centuries after the book of Daniel was written. Ill say that this is within allowable limits, but its certainly not literal, and this level of interpretation certainly was not absolutely necessary.

Conclusion As English speakers, we are incredibly blessed to have a wide variety of English versions. Sometimes, however, rather than recognizing this as a blessing, I think it ends up becoming a curse, and we want to clobber people over the head with our favorite version and say, Your version is no good. Well, I think it is perfectly acceptable and appropriate for everyone to have a favorite version. You may read my book and not change what your favorite version is. That is fine with me. What I dont think is fine is to criticize and condemn other versions that are not your favorite, because for almost everything you would criticize in other versions I can show you places where your favorite version many times does the same thing in other contexts. So I recommend that we as English speakers move beyond the argument of which version is better. I think as English-speaking Christians, we should regularly use a variety of versions. Dont choose to use only one Bible version. Those who use only one version are limiting the potential that is available to them. The Lamogai people wouldnt understand this argument about competing translation philosophies. They dont fight over which version to use. They only have one. Theyre stuck with the one that I helped translate. I know its not perfect. No translation is perfect. But they are very thankful to have Gods Word in their own language, because many language groups around the world do not have Gods Word in their language.

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Translation as Transmission Bryan Harmelink, Ph.D. Bryan Harmelink is Global Consultant for Bible Translation & Collboration at Wycliffe Global Alliance, United States.

Introduction

ne of the questions that motivated me to write this essay is: why are there still so many languages without any Scripture whatsoever? Doesnt God want His people to have His word? This is one of the mysteries of life, but I firmly stand on the sovereign purposes of God. I will never have an adequate answer to why one part of the body of Christ has such an abundance of translations and different versions while other parts of the body have virtually none. As I have searched for a possible response to this question, it is encouraging to reflect on how the global Bible translation movement is part of what God has been doing since the beginning of time. The first instance of translation was divine-human communication: God communicating with Adam and Eve. But it is also important to realize that Bible translation is just one part of what God is doing. Gods mission in this world is not all about Bible translation. We have been very encouraged by the writings of Philip Jenkins, Lamin Sanneh, and Andrew Walls that have underscored the importance of Scripture translation, but this is not the ultimate purpose of God. His purpose is the reconciliation of all things, the restoration of shalomthat everything be as it should be. Bible translation, of course, plays a part in this.

Transmission Throughout the history of God making Himself known in this world, there is a process we often refer to as transmission. Transmission is sometimes conceived of in a rather simplistic way. Perhaps we imagine a solitary scribe copying ancient biblical texts, but the process involves much more than copying. Consider the earliest texts of the Hebrew Bible that would have been written in a very different paleo-Hebrew script. This script is not what we see in our copies of BHS or BHQ. According to Wegner: The change from paleo-Hebrew to Square script probably took place between the fifth and third centuries bc and would probably have been hastened by the Jews who returned from the exile, for their lingua franca, or trade language, in Babylon was Aramaic.1 Paul D. Wegner, The Journey from Texts to Translations: The Origin and Development of the Bible (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2005), 165. 1

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How does this happen, that one script takes over another? But this is exactly what we see: a Hebrew text written in Aramaic script. This is part of the history of transmission, and it was motivated by the Spirit of God for the interests of the people of Godnamely, for them to have understandable Scriptures. This required updating, editing, and changing the form of the biblical text. As Angel Senz-Badillos expresses, The preservation of classical Hebrew is inseparably connected with how the text of the Bible was transmitted down the centuries. After a long period of formation in which the various texts were expanded, modified, and, after the exile, adjusted in a variety of ways, and in which the paleo-Hebrew script gave way to Aramaic square characters, the text of each book began to stabilize.2

Some might find it unsettling to discuss modifications and adjustments to the text, but it is important to affirm that our trust and faith is not in the text, but in God Himself who has sovereignly overseen the transmission of His word through the centuries.

Transmission through Translation What if we were to consider a kind of word play here: transmission through translation? The pages of Scripture are full of examples of translation. We often read past these examples without realizing what must have taken place. For example, Isaac sent Jacob to Paddan-Aram (Gen 28:15). Aramaic was spoken very early in what we tend to conceive of as the Hebrewspeaking world in which the Hebrew text was written. So, how did Jacob communicate with these Aramaic-speaking people? Was he already bilingual or did he have to learn Aramaic? And later on, what about Joseph in Egypt? When his brothers were received by him, he spoke to them in Egyptian, through an interpreter (Genesis 42:23). It was only when Joseph was overcome by emotion and sent everyone out of the room except his brothers that he spoke to them in Hebrew, revealing his true identity (Genesis 45). But we see no traces of Egyptian in the pages of Genesis! This is an example of transmission through translation. Translation is very much a part of Scripture as it comes to us. Consider also the book of Proverbs. The inclusion of Egyptian proverbs is another classic example of transmission through translation. As Arnold and Beyer note, The relationship between the Egyptian proverbs and this section of the biblical book (especially 22:1723:14) is too close to be coincidental. Some scholars have argued that the Egyptian text was translated from an older Hebrew version. But most agree that the Hebrew proverbs were modeled on an Egyptian original. Indeed, the Hebrew text tends to clarify its Egyptian counterpart in places. Any doubt about the direction of borrowing was resolved by recent findings that require a new date of composition for the Egyptian text. It is now virtually certain that the Instruction of Amenemope came from around 1200 bc, over two hundred years before Solomon.3 Angel Senz-Badillos, A History of the Hebrew Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996), 76. 3 Bill T. Arnold and Brian E. Beyer, Encountering the Old Testament: A Christian Survey (Grand Rapids: 2

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These proverbs would have originally been in some variety of Egyptian, but we do not have Egyptian in our Hebrew Bibles. Again, this is an example of transmission through translation. And much to the delight of many seminary students, Daniel and Ezra are in both Hebrew and Aramaic, which forces us to study both of these languages. Here again we see evidence of the multilingual environment of the world out of which the Scriptures came. We could also consider the different theories about the Aramaic or Hebraic world out of which the New Testament in Greek emerged. Once again, this illustrates the principle of transmission through translation. I will not dwell on each of these, but as we consider what we call the Bible, there is a multiplicity, a diversity, of textual traditions. Consider the Septuagint, or rather the Septuagintal traditions, because there is not one unitary Septuagint. There are also the Greek texts attributed to Symmachus and Theodotian, as well as Origens Hexapla. It is fascinating to consider the Hexapla, the six-version Old Testament text. What an extraordinary feat this was, even before MacBooks were available. If you ever have a chance to open a copy of the Hexapla, just try to absorb the amazing scholarship and the concern that Origen had for the biblical text. We can also consider the Aramaic Targums. The best examples are Targum Onkelos of the Pentateuch and Targum of the Prophets. What motivated the development of the targums? The people of God and their desire to understand. Language use was changing. People were speaking Aramaic more than Hebrew in many places, which reflects a process of transmission through translation. Consider also the conversation Jesus had with the two disciples on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24:1335). Jesus explained how the Scriptures spoke of Him; in this way, Jesus was involved in the process of transmission. We can also consider the instructions of Paul to Timothy to teach these truths to trustworthy people who will be able to pass them on to others (2 Tim 2:2)in other words, to be involved in the process of transmission. These are examples of transmission directly from the pages of Scripture.

Ancient Versions One of the things we find throughout history is the incredible diversity of the contexts into which the transmission of the biblical text through translation has occurred. We often work with rather simple definitions of translation, but it is rather complex to adequately explain the phenomenon of translation. I would like to suggest that the ancient versions, which are typically studied as textual witnesses to what we refer to as the original text, have value in and of themselves as evidence of the rich history of the transmission and translation of the sacred text. Consider the following list of translations:

Baker Academic, 2008), 319.

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Syriac: mid-second century Latin: late second century Coptic: third century Gothic: fourth century Armenian: early fifth century Georgian: mid-fifth century Geez or Ethiopic: late fifth century Nubian: sixth century Arabic: eighth century Sogdian: ninth century These ancient versions represent fascinating chapters in the history of Bible translation. It is important, however, to avoid evaluating this history by modern standards or current statistics of translation progress. Consider the following citation from Robert Wilkens The First Thousand Years: Though Nicholas had supported the Western mission in the Balkans, he was nevertheless very interested in the work of Cyril and Methodius. In 867 he invited the two brothers to Rome, and on their way they stopped in Venice, where they met stiff opposition to the use of Slavonic in the liturgy. The local bishops and clergy informed the two brothers that there were only three sacred languages: Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. Cyril would have nothing of their linguistic imperiousness.4

From this early era of Bible translation, I suggest that the view expressed here of only three sacred languages played a significant role in influencing translation strategies during this time period. Given this notion of sacred languages, it is quite remarkable that so many translations were completed during this era. I will say more about this later. Publications like Philip Jenkinss The Lost History of Christianity have enhanced our understanding of the global character of Christianity in previous centuries. We are not the first to see a global expansion of Christianity. According to Jenkins, By the seventh century, the Nestorians had an elaborate network of provinces and dioceses in Persia and neighboring lands, and they were naturally looking north and east. After all, the Persian Empire then stretched deep into central Asia, into the far western territories of what is now China. Already by the sixth century, Christian missionaries were reaching into the heart of Asia, and from the very beginning they recognized the need for vernacular scriptures, inventing alphabets where necessary. Some bold spirits even translated holy books into the language of the Huns.5

As seen in the list of ancient versions and in this citation from Jenkins, Bible translation was an integral part of the growth and expansion of the church. As stated previously, however, translation strategies were influenced by views of sacred languages. In a similar way, Bible translation strategies in the modern era have been influenced by views of language that come from the modern discipline of descriptive linguistics, namely, that every language needs to be studied Robert Louis Wilken, The First Thousand Years (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012), 349. Philip Jenkins, The Lost History of Christianity: The Thousand-Year Golden Age of the Church in the Middle East, Africa, and Asiaand How It Died (San Francisco: Harper One, 2009), 6263. 4 5

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and described in its own right. In light of this, consider the following citation from Lamin Sanneh: In Bible translation, hitherto taboo ethnic groups and their languages and cultures were effectively destigmatized while, at the same time, superior cultures were stripped of their right to constitute themselves into exclusive standards of access to God. In affirming weak and stigmatized languages and cultures, Bible translation bade fair to Western cultural prerequisites for membership in the human family. Bible translation breathed new life into local languages and equipped local populations for participation in the emerging new world context. This action results from Bible translation being based on the idea that all languages are equal in terms of their value and right in mediating the truth of God; but that, by the same token, they are all equally inadequate in relation to that truth. No language can claim exclusive prerogative on the truth of God, just as, conversely, no language is intrinsically unworthy to be a language of faith and devotion.6

Sanneh has correctly identified the fact that in the modern era languages have been considered equal in terms of their value and right in mediating the truth of God, but this was not always the case. Bible translation, like any human endeavor, is subject to the ebb and flow of history, and has been impacted by the rule of various empires, the era of discovery, as well as the dynamics of colonialism and post colonialism. So, in my attempt to answer the question of why Bible translation is still unfinished, I stand firmly on the sovereign purposes of God. In some mysterious way, God is using the flow of history to accomplish His purposes.

Conclusion In conclusion, I offer two points that emerge from this whirlwind review of the history of transmission and translation. First, consider the sovereign rule of God in human history. All of history (political, philosophical, cultural, etc.) is used by God to accomplish His sovereign purposes. He is the one who designs the flow of history and the interconnectedness of all human endeavors, because God is the master at bringing all things together for His purposes. Second, consider the non-uniformity of human history. To be human is to change. We cannot assume that we could go back, as we are today, to five hundred years before Christ. People were different then, and we cannot assume that history has been uniform. Translation and transmissionor transmission in translationgo where the church goes. It is a clear lesson from the history of the church that transmission and translation go together in a constant desire to have Scripture, the sacred text, in an understandable form wherever the church is found. Transmission and translation follow with the flow of history. The change of empires to nation states, to the modern era of discovery, to the era of globalizationthese are all things that God is using in His purposes to bring His word to His people. Lamin Sanneh, Domesticating the Transcendent. The African Transformation of Christianity: Comparative Reflections on Ethnicity and Religious Mobilization in Africa, in Athalya Brenner-Idan and Jan Willem van Henten, ed. Bible Translation on the Threshold of the Twenty-First Century: Authority, Reception, Culture and Religion (London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002), 72. 6

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Transmission and translation are deeply embedded in culture. There is no process of translation or transmission that is outside of or independent from human culture. This is because both transmission and translation are incarnational. The translation of the divine into humanJesus becoming the fullness of God in human formis an act of translation which is incarnational, so that the text transmitted through translation speaks to our ever-changing contexts in the global mission of the church. If the text and its transmission and translation were not embedded in culture, then it would have no connection to us; it would be alien to us. Instead, it is part of the mystery and the wisdom of God that the whole process is incarnational. It is a privilege to be a part of what God is doing, and to participate in the global movement of Bible translation in this world that is under His sovereign rule.

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Equipping the Global Church to Translate the Bible into Its Own Language Perry Oakes, Ph.D. Perry Oakes is a Bible translator at Wycliffe Associates in Dallas, Texas.

Introduction

e are living in a new age. This is always true, and so we have to continually reexamine our strategies for how we relate to the world. But this statement seems more true now than it has ever been, with the recent advent of the digital age and its enormous advances in the areas of information storage and access. These advances directly affect the field with which this article is concerned, namely, Bible translation and distribution.

The Traditional Approach Soon after the modern Bible translation movement began, a strategy was developed that entailed a linguistically-trained missionary going to a people group, spending a decade or two (or more) learning that groups language, overseeing a translation of the New Testament into that language, then sending the manuscript off for printing and putting the resulting book under strict copyright, usually with a Bible society.

Figure 11 All of the figures in this article were created by Tim Jore. The source for this data is www.ethnologue. com, accessed Novermber 15, 2014. 1

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Now, eighty years later, the world has changed. Yet most Bible translation programs that I am aware of follow basically the same pattern, and most languages still do not have a Bible, let alone a New Testament.2 This is not for lack of effort, but the methods that were necessary eighty years ago to transfer biblical meaning into a new language and distribute it to a people group took a great deal of time and money. The number of linguistically-trained missionaries available for the task was also limited. Because of these constraints, mission agencies had to pick and choose where to allocate their people and resources. Logically, the way to reach the greatest number of people in the least amount of time was to translate the Bible into the languages with the most speakers. Consider Figure 1, where the languages of the world are sorted into groups according to the number of people who speak them. At the top of the chart, we see that there are eighty five languages that have greater than ten million speakers each, making up a total of almost five billion people! It would make a lot of sense to start there, and then move to the next category with almost a billion people, and keep moving down the chart. While Bible translation has been done in languages across this spectrum, the languages nearest to the top have received most of the attention and now have the most biblical resources. The languages at the bottom have received little attention relative to their numbers. Again, this is not due to a lack of effort, but there are so many of them and so many that are difficult to get to that it is hard to make much progress there. These are the small languages, with relatively few speakers, who have been told to wait until we can get to them. They are the linguistically least of these (Matt 25:40).

The Gateway Language Strategy It is time to ask ourselves if there might be another way that we could reach these people. Is there a different model that we could use, given the tools that we have now? We have moved beyond the printing press: this is the digital age. We have the internet and smart phones. What can we do in this new digital era, and how can we leverage these new digital tools to reach people in ways that were not possible before?

According to www.wycliffe.net/resources/scriptureaccessstatistics/tabid/99/Default.aspx, accessed February 19, 2014. 2

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Figure 2

As an attempt to answer that question, Wycliffe Associates, Distant Shores Media, and others have formed a partnership called unfoldingWord.3 It is a brand and a website that will host a collection of resources under that name that we will provide to the Church for the purpose of Bible translation, free and unrestricted by copyright. One of the problems with the traditional model of Bible translation is that it is a push model. It relies on someone delivering the Bible to each language group in the world. Given that it can take two or three decades to deliver the Bible to each language, and that there are about seven thousand languages in the world, this model requires a lot of time. But what if we changed the model such that we only need to push the biblical content and the information needed for translation to roughly fifty languages? Then, what if we made all of this content freely available for smaller languages to pull for themselves, so that the Church in each language group could be empowered to translate the Bible into their own language, without waiting for someone to deliver it to them? That would speed things up (see Figure 2). In fact, we think that this strategy could allow the Church to have adequate biblical content in every language and for every people group within ten years. How can this be possible? Because of another fact of the modern era: there are no longer any monolingual minority language groups. All language groups, even very small ones, have at least dozens, and probably hundreds, of speakers who are also fluent in one or more languages of wider communication. Remember the eighty five languages at the top of figure 1? We believe that there are speakers of at least one of those languages in every people group in the world. These are the gateway languagesthe languages through which it is possible to reach all of the other languages on earth. We are hopeful that the minimum number of gateway languages is closer to fify, but if we have to push biblical translation content to eighty five languages, then we will do it. Other agencies interested in Bible translation are invited to join. Check us out at https://unfoldingword.org. 3

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This is our vision: to empower the linguistically least to end their own Bible poverty by creating unrestricted biblical content, unrestricted translation training, and unrestricted translation tools that will be freely available in a language they understand well, and that will enable Church networks worldwide to own the process of translating the Bible for themselves.

Door43 How will this work? We will put all of our translation tools translated into the gateway languages, and the gateway language translations of biblical content, on a website called Door43 (from Col 4:3 (NRS), pray for us as well that God will open to us a door for the word). Then the global church can pull the content into their own local languages by going to the website, finding a source language that they understand, clicking on it and then reading and translating from that. We have a list of most of the worlds languages, so then they can just find theirs, click on it, and start translating. This will open the space reserved for each language of the world, ready for someone to start filling in the content translated from a gateway language.4 Their translation will then be listed under that name. If the persons language is not listed, we can easily create a space for it. If the need for additional gateway languages is identified, then we will make sure the full content of the website is translated into each one. For all of this we are counting on the partnership of the global church. We cannot do it without them.

translationStudio The Door43 website works well for those who have a good internet connection. But for many people, internet connections are poor or they can connect only when they go into town. For these people, we have a way of working offline, then uploading content when they have the opportunity. We have created a translation app for tablets and smartphones called translationStudio. Using translationStudio, people can translate right on those devices. To go along with that is another app, translationKeyboard.5 You may be wondering how they would just start typing in their language if their script is completely different than Roman. We have made virtual keyboards available for the scripts used in the major languages of the world so hopefully the person can find a script that they understand and adapt it for their language. If they need more symbols, these can be added. We have a team working on keyboards now and also working on the Keyboard Studio app so that users can create their own keyboards, choosing the symbols that they need out of preexisting Unicode sets.

The index of languages is here: https://door43.org/home?do=index. These apps are available for both Android and Apple environments. Search the iTunes app store or the Google Play store, under translationstudio and translationkeyboard (no spaces). 4 5

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Figure 3

Figure 3 is a picture of a tablet running the translationStudio app. The screen has two main sections: the text of a Bible story or Bible verses in a gateway language on the left, and a blank area on the right that looks like a lined notebook page where a person can translate using translationKeyboard, which slides up from the bottom. A directory of available Bible stories or books slides in from the left, and a panel of verse-specific translation helps and notes slides in from the right. We believe that this makes the best possible use of a small screen, and will allow Bible translation by anyone, anywhere, on devices that are increasingly inexpensive and proliferating throughout the world. In places where the church is persecuted and endangered and does not have freedom to use the internet, they can simply download the app once or pass it around on an SD card and then translate off-line. When someone travels to where there is a more secure environment, they can upload the translation to the website where it will be available for further revision, downloading, and printing.

The Problem of Copyright Restrictions One thing that has become more challenging in the digital age is the problem of copyright. In the traditional model, Bible translators would gather a collection of Bibles and translate from them. But on an internet-based model, this cannot be done. You cannot just put things on the Internet that are copyrighted. That has been a big roadblock. We would like to be able to put everything on the website that we use as resources for translation and say, There you go; now you have everything you need. But we cant do that. It is amazing, but true, that almost every Bible translation, and almost everything written as a help to Bible translation, is copyrighted and cannot be made available on the internet to the global church without permission. Perhaps equally amazing is the reluctance of most copyright-owners to give us permission to make their work freely accessible for Bible translation. Maybe that is because this concept is so new, and it will take some time for the mindset of the print world to catch up to the possibilities of the digital age. So we will continue to ask for those who are willing to license their Bible

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translation material for the use of the Church on our website, under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike license.6 This is the kind of licensing that makes sense for the internet age, and for works that were created for the express purpose of helping the Church to translate the Bible. Fortunately, this idea seems to be gaining traction, and a few different groups are starting to use it. In the meantime, we are creating our own Bible translation helps and training materials that are open-licensed. We are in the process of creating a full suite of tools, including Open Bible Stories, Open Bible Lexicon, Open Bible Maps, Open Bible Notes, etc. We would like to put on a website all of the categories of resources that a Bible translator would like to have so that these resources can be accessed from anywhere there is an internet connection.

Open Bible Stories What we are aiming for t is the translation of the Bible in all of these language groups. While the Bible is of course the hardest thing to translate, it is also the most crucial, since the Church needs it. Furthermore, we are asking the global church to translate the Bible for themselves, even though they have not been trained to do it. So we want to begin by training them, and part of our training strategy is to encourage people not to start with translating the Bible, but to start with translating Bible stories. So we have created a set of fifty key Bible stories that span from creation to the second coming of Christ. As they are translating these stories, they are being trained in how to translate, and in how to translate the Bible. Each story is broken down into frames, and each frame has a picture and a few sentences of text. As well as being attractive, the picture helps the translator understand the text. In the translationStudio app, on the panel that slides over from the right, are notes about those sentences that alert the translator to potential problems and that give alternate ways of expressing the same meaning. There are also links to definitions of important terms, and links to translation issues that are explained in more depth in the pages of translation training that we are calling translationAcademy. We think that by the time a translator gets through all fifty stories, having read the Notes, definitions, and translationAcademy pages, and having gone through the process of getting feedback from his or her community and making revisions, she will become proficient at translating. By starting with the stories, the translator also feels less intimidated than if she were translating Holy Scripture itself. What often happens with new Bible translators is that they feel that they must translate very literally, word-for-word, out of fear of changing the Bible, and so they produce very stilted, even unreadable translations. By doing so, they have inadvertently changed the Bible into an incoherent text rather than the powerful, clear message that it is meant to be. Translation involves a necessary change of form in order to retain the message that the original form contains. As the translators translate the stories, they learn from the Notes and translationAcademy that the translation must be clear and natural as well as accurate, and they get a lot of practice finding the right forms in their languages for doing that. Then by the This means that we will attribute authorship and share the work freely, and that others who use it must do the same. For more information, go to http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/. 6

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time the translators get to the Bible, they are used to the process of transferring the meaning of the text into the phrases and expressions that are natural in their own language. The stories are valuable for more than just training, however. They are very useful for evangelism and for introducing the major concepts of Scripture into a culture for the first time, and the pictures are attractive to people of all ages.7

Figure 4

unfoldingWord.org Once the translation is finished and approved, whether the work was done online at the Door43 website or offline with the translationStudio app and then uploaded to the Door43 website, it will then be moved to the unfoldingWord.org website. Door43 is the workbench website where the translating is done, and unfoldingWord is where the stories and Bibles will be made publicly available to the global church. When the translation is done, we are also encouraging translators to record audio of the stories. The audio will then be combined with a video of the pictures. The video zooms, pans, and selectively blurs parts of the picture of each frame while the audio of that frame plays. All of this content can be viewed or streamed on the website or downloaded to any mobile device. Figure 4 shows the video playing on a smart phone, with printed copies of the stories in the background. As languages become available, users can select the language that they want and select to download text, audio, and/or audio plus video. Once downloaded, the content can be shared from one device to another. In countries where Christians are persecuted, being able to carry biblical content on an unobtrusive electronic device is important. In other countries where books are useful, we are deploying print-on-demand systems that can cheaply and easily The pictures were created by Sweet Publishing and are licensed under the creative commons attribution-share alike 3.0 license. See http://sweetpublishing.com. 7

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print as many or as few books as are desired. Currently, our system can print the Open Bible Stories book in full color, 368 pages with laminated cover, for around $1.60 for the cost of materials. A New Testament in black and white runs about $1.00.

The Bible After a translation team has completed the fifty Open Bible Stories (OBS), we will invite them to begin translating the Bible. The process will be familiar, using the same tools. Either on the Door43 website or on the translationStudio app, they can select a book and chapter of the Bible from a menu, then the text of that chapter will appear in chunks of a few verses, similar in size to the text of the OBS frames. For context, the translators can read as much of the text as they like before and after the chunk that they are working on, of course. With each chunk of Bible text, there will be translation notes tied to phrases in the text, as well as the familiar links to explanations of important terms. In this way, the information needed to translate each chunk is given along with the text where it applies. The same familiar notebook page and keyboard are available for typing the translation. The main difference between translating OBS and the Bible is that the Bible text will appear in two versions. The translator will see the text of the unfoldingWord Literal Bible (ULB) and the unfoldingWord Dynamic Bible (UDB). As you might guess, the ULB is a translation of the Bible into English that closely follows the form and style of the original languages, making adjustments to keep the text readable in English. Figures of speech and other idioms are retained as much as possible and explained in the notes. In this way, the translator is able to see how the original was put together, including the presentation of ideas and use of figurative language, and then to translate in a similar way if his or her language also contains a similar convention. If, however, the ULB does not make sense to the translator or is in a very different form than the translators language would use, he or she can look at the UDB. The UDB is translated in a dynamic style, that is, it uses forms and logical flow that are normal in modern English. Its overarching goal is to present the meaning clearly. It uses short sentences, tries to avoid verbal or abstract nouns, and translates the figures of speech and idioms with their plain meaning. In this way, the translator can see what the meaning is behind the figurative language and can then use a figure from his or her own language that has that meaning. If some of the meaning is still unclear, the translator has recourse to the explanatory notes. By itself, the ULB can be confusing and, by itself, the UDB can be dull and plain. But by using them together, the translator is encouraged to produce a translation that communicates the correct meaning in a form that is appropriately idiomatic. Having two model translations also discourages translators from following either one too closely, and leads them to think about the form that would be most natural in their language. These two Bibles are currently under development. Copyright owners of English Bibles have been reluctant to license them for an environment where they can be freely copied or modified as the core of our Bible translation tools, so we have a team of Bible scholars and translators

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who are creating our own translations. Another team is writing the notes that accompany the biblical text. As you can imagine, the two teams are in constant dialogue.8 For the ULB, we are updating the 1901 ASV. The ASV is one of very few Bibles in English that is in the Public Domain; all the rest are copyrighted, and we are not allowed to use them. It is a well-respected translation done in a literal style but sorely in need of updating because it is very archaic. On the other end of the spectrum, for the UDB, we are adapting the Translation for Translators. That was done by Ellis Deibler, a long-time translator and international translation consultant with Wycliffe Bible Translators. He has licensed it to us under the Creative Commons license. He did an enormous amount of work putting the Bible into plain, clear English designed to communicate to speakers of English as a second language. We are very grateful to not have to duplicate all of that work, and to be able to put it on a platform for the global church to use. Deibler has led the way, and we would be more than happy to incorporate other Bible translation tools as well if copyright owners would be willing to make them available under an open license.

translationAcademy This is the part of the Door43 website where we will provide multimedia Bible translation training. We are assuming that most of the people who are using the website have not gone through a formal Bible translation program and will need some direction. This will be a series of text- and video-based lessons arranged by translation topics. While a person could go through the lessons one after the other, they are designed so that the translator can access them as they become relevant to the translation task. For example, as a person is translating, he or she may come across a metaphor and not know how to handle it. That person could click on the link in the translation note that discusses the metaphor in the text, or just click on translationAcademy in the sidebar of Door43 and then click on Metaphor. Either method will open a lesson about how to handle those. We want to make this training as useful as possible, which we think is to make it just-in-time learning. That way the person does not have to try to recall when he or she learned about a topic in a training session, but can get the training right then.

Quality Control In an ideal world, with unlimited resources and personnel, and no political barriers, we would send a cross-cultural linguist and Bible scholar to every language group to help them translate the Bible. But that is not the world in which we live. There are thousands of language groups that we cannot reach in that way, in this generation or the next. The part of the Bible translation process where the shortage of resources is the most acute is in the area of translation consultantsthe quality-control people. We just do not have enough of them. Hundreds of Bible translations sit on shelves, waiting for a translation consultant to get to them. In the meantime, they are unavailable to the church. So we are pursuing an alternate strategy: emMost of the Bible scholars working on this project are volunteers. If you are a Bible scholar interested in contributing you time and expertise to this project, email jennifer_cunneen@wycliffeassociates.org. 8

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powering the global church to do most of the work of translating the Bible for themselves. This includes managing the quality of the content. As with translation, in the area of quality control we are seeking to provide training, tools, and processes. There will be guidelines on how to check Scripture in translationAcademy. There are also several tools built in to the website and to the process. We have designed our system of quality control to have three levels through which the translation will need to pass in order to be used as a gateway translation source text. At Level One, the translators certify that they did their draft in accordance with the unfoldingWord doctrinal statement and the translation guidelines. They also certify that they used the notes and other translation tools. The translation is then clearly marked as a Level One. If it is a translation of OBS, it can be moved from Door43 over to the unfoldingWord website and made publically available, still clearly marked as Level One. If it is Scripture, it has to pass Level Two before it can be made public. At Level Two, the translators need to certify that they have checked the translation with members of the community for clarity and naturalness. We provide a list of comprehension questions for OBS and for each chapter of the Bible that they can use for this purpose, as well as checking guidelines to follow. They also need to have three pastors or leaders of local church networks check the translation for accuracy who will also sign off on the translation. These should be leaders of different church groups or denominationsthe wider the representation of the church in the language community, the better. At each stage, when a problem is surfaced, the translation needs to be revised. When Scripture passes Level Two, it can be made public on the unfoldingWord website, marked as Level Two. At this point, anyone from the language community can post comments and suggestions. The translation can also be freely downloaded or printed, or turned into audio or video. At Level Three, the translation needs to have been thoroughly reviewed and checked by representatives of three different church networks or denominations, or by one representative of a denomination and someone from a Bible translation entity, such as a professional Bible translation consultant. Those who do Level Three checking need to be other than the people who did Level Two checking. Then it will be marked as Level Three. The personnel who will do the checking will vary with the size of the language community and the size of the church in that community. In communities where there is no church or it is very small, this can be problematic. In that case the translators will need to have recourse to some external church bodies. Even at Level Three, we do not expect the translation to be problem-free. Every Bible translation needs subsequent revision. The language and church community can continue to make suggestions. If the translation committee or church authority structure agrees with the suggestions, the translation can easily be changed multiple times, even continually, at no cost. Thats the beauty of the digital age. Can you imagine going back to your publisher and saying, Throw out that last print run of five thousand copies. We need to reprint. There was an error. The publisher would, of course, refuse, unless you came up with a lot of money. But we can change it digitally and move on with no problem. This happened several times as we were developing OBS. People who were translating them pointed out some problems with

4 comments

ELEd LauberNov 17, 2019, 5:09 AM

I'm not sure that I fully understand the question. In my experience in Africa there are several hindrances keeping global south churches from being fully engaged. One is the circumstances of conflict and poverty they often confront. But others are self-imposed, such as low prestige of mother tongue Bibles and ministry and the expectation that missionaries will do needed translations. Training and capacity are not the core issues.

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ELEd LauberNov 18, 2019, 8:13 PM

I'm not saying that sustained Bible translation as mission is impossible. Not at all. I'm saying that "how" it will happen is by addressing the very real blockages. The Francophone Initiative in Africa is an example of an effective program aimed at changing, from the inside, the theologies and practices that keep the church from engaging the mother tongue and hence Bible translation.

I disagree with the assumption I read in Jim Harries' comment - that the issue is structural or related to money. It's about attitudes toward the mother tongue. We see successful churches in Ghana and Nigeria which engage in various types of mission with their own money and on their own terms, but never in translation.

JCJeremiah ChungNov 19, 2019, 1:54 AM

I have rephrased the question: How would bible translation as mission sustainable partnering with global south and Chinese churches?
Thank you for your reply and for sharing your experience in Africa. Do you mean a sustainable Bible Translation Mission in African is impossible? How did your local friends and ex-pat colleagues develop their expectations of missionaries and Bible translation? If that expectation is not biblical/theological sound, what can we do?

ELEd LauberNov 21, 2019, 3:38 AM

Jim,

Money has a powerful influence and it is related to the power of European languages. So we agree on that. Where we seem to disagree is on the extent of the influence. I see other factors having equal and even greater influence in some contexts. To get back to Jeremiah's question, I think that we will only have sustainable translation in the global south when the churches in the global south shape the missiology, translation processes, goals and use of resources. It's probably very difficult to do that when the money comes almost exclusively from the West and the discussions only happen in English. What we often have now are non-western agencies partnering with Western agencies with all the theology, missiology, means, goals and methods coming from the Western agency making the non-western agency a service delivery vehicle for the Western agency's program/mission. We can't get to what Jeremiah wants with that model. It seems that we know more about what won't work than what will.

Bible Translation as Missions(free PDF) and it's succession in Global South and Asia

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