It seems that we are all making the Scripture Engagement the be all and end all of our work. It's right that all Bible translation activity should lead towards SE outcomes (?) and impact (definitely). We still need language development, anthropology and a whole bunch of other disciplines, however. If you read the article I recommended last time called the 'Eight Conditions' you will see that various of the conditions mention language, including 'Appropriate Language, Dialect and Orthography'. It's no accident that this is condition one, as if people can't understand what you're saying what's the point in saying it? This leads me onto one of my hobby-horses. Pastors in many countries spend much of their time translating a LWC (language of wider communication) Bible instead of preaching. If a mother-tongue Bible comes out, or portions of it, they may feel redundant. Why? Because instead of learning to preach mainly exhortation and application they spend their time interpreting from one language to another. So one of the tasks of SE workers in some parts of the world is training pastors in how to engage with the scriptures in a more meaningful way. Probably we all need that. Amen and Amen I hear you say?
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