Lost In Translation

Dan King | 19:00, Saturday 29th March 2014 

The setting: a rural church in sothwest Tanzania.

Visitor to Pastor after the Sunday service: "That was a great sermon, though the congregation were sometimes a bit subdued, I thought; tell me, why did you switch to the local language, instead of using Swahili, when you came to the part where you give the notices?"

Pastor to Visitor: "Because it's important for people to understand the notices."

The above (genuine) conversation represents a situation that is replicated many times over throughout Tanzania. Swahili is the national language and often imposed in churches even in rural areas where people still primarily use their mother tongue and whose understanding of Swahili, while being good for practical business purposes is really inadequate to the spiritual depth required for effective discipleship and evangelism.

Bible Translators in Tanzania are working hard to make it possible for nearly 130 people groups to access God's word in their mother-tongue. Wycliffe UK have a vision to start a Bible Translation project in every remaining language that needs one by the year 2025. The effort in Tanzania is a part of that wider vision.

Simply to translate each word from the Swahili Bible into a similar word in a tribal language would be quick and relatively easy. But we believe under God that they deserve better than this; hence we work hard to achieve three goals in our translations – accuracy (we think carefully through every verse to make sure that every translation reflects what the passage is really trying to say), clarity (we don't want readers to have to work harder than necessary to understand the Word of God), and naturalness (if the language doesn't sound normal to people they will neither understand readily nor be interested in reading or listening to it).

The task is hard and long, but under the Lord's guidance it is achievable. With offices based in Mbeya, we are working on 13 languages spoken by around 3 million people. Many Bible portions have been printed already, with more coming out each year. For example, this summer we shall we printing Luke's Gospel in Safwa, and Acts in Nyakyusa. The first complete New Testaments should be rolling off the press in 2017, God-willing, while 3 languages have only recently been added to the ever-growing project and are still looking for translators. Alongside the translation we have a flourishing ministry in teaching literacy and in providing audio versions of Scripture. Why don't you have a listen. Visit www.vwanjilanguage.com and download an audio version of Mark's Gospel in the Vwanji language.

This is how Philippians 2:6-8 has been translated into the Nyakyusa language: "you should think in the way that Jesus thought, he who is just how God is, though he didn't see that being as God was a thing to clutch onto – he gave it all up to be just how a slave is, he was born like people are, he looked like people do, he was submissive and followed God even in his dying, a dying which was a killing on a cross."