When Ancient Texts Meet High Tech, Behold, Will We Get Near-Instant Bibles?
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(OPINION) The Religion Guy has touted the investigative chops of the Ministry Watch website and its usefulness as a story source for journalists. Let’s re-up that message.
Along with assorted financial and moral scandals, President Warren Cole Smith has been examining what he calls the “Bible translation industry” — which prefers to call itself a “ministry.” This is a very popular cause among U.S. Protestants, with revenues of around $500 million a year. The biggest group, Wycliffe Bible Translators, took in $227 million in 2020.
In “Outsourcing Bible Translation?” “Translation Service Providers Could Be Paradigm-Changing For Bible Translation Industry” and finally “Just How Broken Is the Bible Translation Industry?” Smith has criticized translation groups for taking so long and spending so much money to produce a Bible translation in a new language when the need is so great.
To force a massive speedup, Smith promotes the fascinating idea of applying the technology used widely by businesses and governments for necessary rapid translations of contracts, diplomatic exchanges, scientific articles, movie scripts and the like. Such biblical projects are already under way, and that provides a solid feature idea for reporters to pursue.
A consortium of traditional Bible translation organizations, illumiNations, figures the planet has around 7,000 languages currently being spoken, of which 3,700 have little or no Scripture. It seeks to fill that gap by 2033 and states that it typically takes seven years to render the New Testament and 16 years for a complete Bible. At the present rate, Smith comments, the task will take till at least 2150.
As a former business executive, Smith argues that Christian donors should reasonably expect 10 times the new Bibles than are actually being produced and — while chiding groups for lack of financial transparency — estimates it takes not only many years but many millions of dollars to produce a new translation. He says the current experimental phase of the new high-tech scheme indicates radically shortened time frames are possible at a cost of a mere $350,000 per new Bible.
Big, if true. That’s a news story.
The story involves Strategic Resource Group, a fund that aggregates giving by “high-capacity” donors who have provided major support for Bible translations but have discussed whether a radical new approach is needed. The new design taps the skills of the large and sophisticated field of secular “translation service providers.” SRG has hired one such firm, LinguaLinx, and is in discussions with four others in the field.
These companies turn out translations using computers. But the Bible is not any old book but Holy Scripture, with each word potentially open to delicate disputes. So the first draft concocted by computer is then reviewed and revised by experts in language and theology, as well as everyday speakers of the language in question. The Paratext translation tool employed by traditional translation organizations helps out.
SRG’s first focus is 31 language groups in the Middle East and northern Africa that lack a modern full Bible, starting with two languages in Saudi Arabia and one in Pakistan — where distribution will pose obvious problems. Despite COVID-19 pandemic challenges, the project has completed five New Testament books, the four Gospels and Acts. Jane Schoen, project coordinator with SRG, told Smith three of the drafts were “superb” while two need more work.
Schoen thinks efforts so far show “the concept is totally validated,” though “it’s too early to claim victory on the entire Bible.” SRG hopes to complete those 31 new Bibles within five years. Smith figures the project should be able to produce the first three new Bibles within a couple years at a cost of $1.5 million, a dramatic and economical speedup. Significantly, Schoen reports that in December, the traditionalist illumiNations group has expressed favorable interest in the concept. Eventually, SRG hopes to supplement these Bibles with educational and worship materials.
Sources: Smith — info@wallwatchers.org or 866-364-9980) — can answer questions raised by his articles and put you in touch with participants in the new experiments. LinguaLinx is in Troy, New York — 518-388-9800. Wycliffe Bible Translators President John Chesnut and communications chief Vicky Mixson are in Orlando — 800-WYCLIFFE or info_USA@wycliffe.org. Douglas Moo of Wheaton (Ill.) College (630-752-5273) chaired the New International Version revision committee and is among many scholarly sources who’ve used the old-fashioned processes.
Richard Ostling is a former religion reporter for The Associated Press and former correspondent for TIME Magazine. This piece first appeared at Get Religion.