Working for the Word - a Bible translation podcast

In my vast array of interactions with intelligent people working in Bible translation, I have learned something: most approach the issue of copyright out of complete ignorance, and sometimes with a great deal of pride and irrationality. I used to be one of those people. So I'm doing my best to share what I've learned. "For nearly a century, copyright legislation has been subtly but effectively applied, misused and abused in regard to the Word of God in order to chain the Bible to a new pulpit, differing in kind but not in essence from the restrictive practice so loudly decried in the Middle Ages. While the contemporary difference can be described in terms of dollars and cents, the net effect is identical: the free and unhindered access by God’s people to the revealed truth of his Word is restricted once more, this time not by the ecclesiastical hierarchy, but by the chains of copyright and financial ransom as demanded by the proprietary publishers. Has God’s Word suddenly ceased to be the “intellectual property” of God’s people? Must it now remain under the peculiar control of executives, scholars, and lawyers?" This is a paper presented at the Evangelical Theological Society in 1996 by Dr. Maurice Robinson. Dr. Robinson is a professor of New Testament and Greek, with expertise in NT textual criticism. Links: How the Jesus Trade Harms the World (video documentary) How the Jesus Trade Harms the World (audio only) Against Intellectual Monopoly Books and articles about copyright on SellingJesus.org Music: "Hidden Beauty" by Liborio Conti, https://www.no-copyright-music.com

As I said in the last episode, I’ve been working on the Selling Jesus project, which is now well underway with a ton of content. Please check out the website sellingJesus.org and you’ll find enough reading material to keep you busy all Christmas vacation. Also, it would mean the world to me if you would help boost the views of the first Selling Jesus video on YouTube, which is on the homepage of sellingJesus.org, and share it around. I’ll be releasing the next long video in the series soon, so make sure you’re subscribed to the YouTube channel. Selling Jesus is also a podcast, so if you’d rather listen to the articles on the website, you can do that on the podcast. There’s already a lot of content on there, and we post more every week. In this episode I’m highlighting the ministry of Pioneer Bible Translators, and I’m joined by Tim MacSaveny who was kind enough to share the ins and outs of his organization. My hope is that this will be helpful for those who don’t know much about PBT and want to find out more, especially those who are trying to navigate the differences between all the BT orgs and decide who to join. Tim is married to Erin, they have four kids, and they’ve served with PBT since 2008. Currently they live in Louisville, KY. Tim and Erin facilitate Bible translation for two projects in two different countries. The first is a people group living in southeastern Tanzania. Tim travels to Tanzania three times a year to meet face-to-face with the translation team, while working remotely throughout the year. The second project involves a diaspora group who have experienced significant tribal and political attacks in their home area of eastern Congo. Many of them now live in the US. This project is currently being hosted at Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, Kentucky, where the MacSavenys now live. Tim and Erin, along with their children Rose, Everett, Julian, and Lucy, have served with Pioneer Bible Translators since 2008. tim.macsaveny@pbti.org Visit https://pioneerbible.org/ to find out more. workingfortheword.com⁠ | ⁠my books⁠ | ⁠twitter⁠ |⁠ music⁠ |⁠ ⁠⁠Hebrew ⁠| ⁠academic articles⁠ | ⁠facebook⁠ | ⁠contact⁠ | ⁠download all episodes for offline

MA in Bible Translation from Nida Institute: https://www.nidaschool.org/ma-bible-translation Seed Company Residency Program: https://seedcompany.com/residency/ Wycliffe's convergence program for training consultants: https://www.wycliffe.org/blog/posts/6-ways-convergence-will-prepare-you-to-become-a-translation-consultant Word for the World's training programs: https://training.twftw.org/ Mekane Yesus Seminary: https://mekaneyesusseminary.org/ SIL Translation CiT Funding Guidelines: Is a current SIL staff member Is already an approved Translation CiT with their OU – have a mentor, a growth plan, and have begun their mentored checking training Is within their last two years of their Translation CiT program – ie, within two years of starting this program they will become approved as a Translation Consultant Have approval to enter this program from their OU Administration (supervisor) and their OU Translation Coordinator Upon becoming a Translation Consultant, they commit to working 0.5 FTE (50%) of their time as a Translation Consultant for at least five years Authors/ contributors are needed for two Translation Resources projects currently underway - Bamboo TN (Translator's Notes) and KTOT (Key Terms of the Old Testament). If you are interested in working part-time with either of these projects, email Brian Migliazza for further information. Contact Phil King: phil_king@sil.org Contact Brian Migliazza: brian_migliazza@sil.org News from Jerusalem about John Mark's lawsuits by Don Lowe. workingfortheword.com | my books | twitter | music | Hebrew | academic articles | facebook | contact | download all episodes for offline

When people think about starting a translation of the NT, they usually need to decide which Greek text they’re going to use as a source text. Unlike OT translation where everyone defaults to the MT, there are more than one NT source texts to choose from, like the UBS, the Nestle-Aland, the Byzantine text, the Textus-Receptus and others. And some of the modern, popular ones are locked down by copyright. So over the course of the next two episodes I want to introduce you to someone who is innovating in this field, and trying to serve the Church with a transparent critical Greek text that everyone can use without any hindrance. Alan Bunning received his education in New Testament Greek from the Kensington Theological Academy under the tutelage of Dr. David R. Dilling, and received his D.Litt. degree for his work done in textual criticism. Alan’s primary background is in computer science and after working in the industry for many years, he became a college professor working as an Assistant Professor in Computer Information Systems at Ivy Tech Community College and then was a Senior Lecturer in Computer Science at Purdue University. Alan retired from Purdue University in 2020 and now devotes himself to working full time as the Executive Director for the Center for New Testament Restoration. Make sure to read the project overview, especially section 2.2. workingfortheword.com | my books | twitter | music | Hebrew | academic articles | facebook | contact | download all episodes for offline

Raised in the jungles of Venezuela by missionary parents in a vibrant Christian home, Tabitha Price is well-acquainted with the challenges of Christian ministry. Tabitha married her high school sweetheart, Joel, and together they attended New Tribes Bible college in preparation for missionary service. After that, she earned a bachelor degree from Southwest Bible College and Seminary and spent eight years teaching at international mission schools first in Venezuela and later in Florida. She is a graduate of Louisiana Baptist Theological Seminary (Master’s in Ministry), and has completed a doctorate in Executive Leadership. Tabitha has served with Wycliffe Associates since 2009 in a variety of ministries. She was privileged to be part of the first MAST translation event and has since taught translation principals and theory to hundreds of translators in countries all over the world. Today Tabitha serves as the Vice President of Translation Services leading teams who are training our partners in church owned Bible translation. Tabitha and her husband Joel have three children, Marshall, Jaden and Roman. They call Central Florida home. workingfortheword.com | my books | twitter | music | Hebrew | academic articles | facebook | contact | download all episodes for offline

Now that we’ve learned more about internalization from Katie Frost, it’s time to talk about a new tool that recently came out for actually doing oral Bible translation projects. It’s called Audio Project Manager, and it’s a free program that anyone can download and start working with right away. Nathan Payne is going to walk us through what the software does and how it can be leveraged for oral projects.  I’ve worked with Render for a while now and it still has a lot of drawbacks. One of the biggest ones is that it’s not freely available, and you have to jump through a ton of hoops to get access to it. The interface has a lot of annoying quirks, especially for consultants, and it has very little flexibility. This is where Audio Project Manager comes in to give people a better option with much more flexibility and freedom. Nathan Payne who is going to help us understand the software, was born in Peru to missionary Bible translators who worked in the jungle with the Asheninka people. He met his wife, Katy, in high school, and attended Texas A&M university where he studied chemical engineering. He and his wife later studied linguistics after feeling called to Bible translation. After some fieldwork, he moved into a training and consulting role for storying projects. A few years later he became the SIL Americas Area Storying and Orality Coordinator. And in 2020 became the SIL Oral Translation Services coordinator, giving direction to the organization’s involvement in Storying, OBT and other oral strategies. He currently serves as director of the Oral English Bible Translation (Spoken English Bible) and Oral Exegetical Tools project. workingfortheword.com | my books | twitter | music | Hebrew | academic articles | facebook | contact | download all episodes for offline