All 27 New Testament Book Packages Complete
It used to take western experts at least 20 years to translate the New Testament into a Bible-less language. Now, every bilingual church-planting network has access to the open-license English tools they need to translate everything from Matthew to Revelation quickly and accurately.
Translating the Bible is an intimidating task for people groups with minimal linguistic and theological education. unfoldingWord created the Book Package system to empower national translators. It lowers the intimidation level while ensuring quality and increasing translation speed. unfoldingWord’s content team began working on the Book Package system in 2019; and completed the full New Testament set in February 2023. The team is now dedicating itself to the equally urgent need to complete all the Old Testament Book Packages.
What is a Book Package and how do they help Bible translators? We asked Dr. Perry Oakes, leader of the team that creates unfoldingWord’s open-licensed Bible translation resources, to explain.
“A Book Package is the set of Bible translation resources that we consider essential for excellence in Bible translation. Our target audience is national translators who are translating the Bible into their own languages. The Book Package contains a literal translation as close to the original as English allows, enabling the translator to see how the original text in Greek and Hebrew said things. Alongside the literal English translation, we provide a simplified translation that presents the meaning of the original as clearly and simply as possible. The software shows the translator how both translations align with the original texts at every point. The Book Package also contains a set of very helpful verse-by-verse translation notes that alert the translator to each translation difficulty as it arises, and offers suggestions for what to do about it. The package contains a dictionary of key terms and difficult words in the Bible, linked to where each word occurs. Finally, there is a set of questions and expected answers for the translation team to use to check their translation’s comprehension among language community members. All of this is packaged into software for drafting and checking Scripture, and everything is open-licensed and available for free. We have many church partners around the globe who are translating these Book Packages into the world’s major languages for their regions of the world. We praise God for allowing us to create this unprecedented resource as a blessing to His church.” The Church is on the move!
Join the Movement
Your investment will help empower church networks worldwide to translate the whole Bible into their ethnic languages for the very first time.
Give NowIn the News
Stories From the Field
New Believers in Iran
- April 08, 2024
Thanks to the first-ever translation of unfoldingWord® Open Bible Stories into another Iranian language, twenty people have come to Christ, and a new house church has been launched in Iran. While help...
Hope in harrowing times
- April 08, 2024
As the world worries over the horrific events in Israel and mullahs call for global jihad, a hopeful fact remains. The more Islamists promote jihad, the more average Muslims are open to the gospel. In...
Trust God and Get Going
- September 11, 2023
“God, this is your journey, your work. Please help us get out of here.” Let’s imagine that your family and close friends have a passing acquaintance with the message of Jesus, and some might even be b...
Critical Tools for Courageous Translators
- August 03, 2023
The global demand for Bible translation far exceeds the capacity of existing Bible translation agencies. Doing translation in dangerous places makes it doubly difficult. That’s why members of the illu...
Meesha's Story
- July 03, 2023
In the Republic of Iran, for the church to be planted, discipled, and grown, more than 60 people groups need a Bible translation in their own language. May was Iran’s bloodiest month in the last five...
UKRAINE: Bomb Shelter Bible Translation
- July 03, 2023
Ukrainian Great Commission partners are translating unfoldingWord’s suite of Bible translation tools to make God’s Word accessible to more than 540 languages spoken across the countries of the former ...
All 27 New Testament Book Packages Complete
- August 08, 2023
It used to take western experts at least 20 years to translate the New Testament into a Bible-less language. Now, every bilingual church-planting network has access to the open-license English tools t...
Making God's Word Accessible to Ordinary People
- September 11, 2023
Sofia Ivanov speaks on the impact of unfoldingWord’s Bible Translation tools Editor’s Note: Sofia Ivanov* is a project manager for unfoldingWord’s Eurasian Whole Bible, Whole Nation partner. Her thou...
Saved While Escaping
- October 02, 2023
“I was a terrible husband for the first fifteen years of our marriage. Every weekend, I would get drunk, abuse my wife, and ridicule her. We mistreated each other terribly,” said Siroos. “But God amaz...
Man on the Run
- July 03, 2023
Asim* serves on the Bible translation audio-video team for unfoldingWord’s Whole Bible, Whole Nation partner in Sudan. They use Bible translation as part of their church-planting strategy for 133 unre...
Ten Times Faster
- March 14, 2023
Imagine you are ordering a new internet connection or cable TV or maybe something new from Amazon and you get the message saying, “Your town is too remote and we can’t serve your area at this time. We...
Meet Amy & Priscilla
- March 14, 2023
unfoldingWord operates as a catalyst for the Church-Centric Bible Translation movement. We collaborate as part of the body of Christ to develop and implement strategies and unrestricted biblical resou...
Jeremiah and the Occult King
- May 04, 2023
When Jeremiah* first heard that his Chadian church-planting network needed his help translating unfoldingWord® Open Bible Stories (OBS), he was skeptical. “I thought Bible stories were for children, l...
The Exponential Journey
- April 10, 2023
Khartoum, Sudan, April 2021. I was sitting in a small hotel conference room with the leaders of Greater Reach Alliance and half a dozen representatives of unreached Sudanese people groups. We were ta...
Chad's Unreached Receive the Gospel with Joy!
- June 05, 2023
“Giving Jesus to any human being is the best gift you can give to that person. Only the gospel can change the ugliness of man,” says Jeremiah,* one of the Chadian leaders of CCGP,* unfoldingWord’s chu...
Iran: Bibles in every language
...
Escape from Kharkiv
- June 13, 2022
BAM! A rocket penetrates a building, shattering windows and shaking foundations. Clatter! Bomb debris splatters cars, building façades, and adjacent roofs. Bang-Bang-Bang! The jackhammer staccato of A...
Innovation in Bible Translation
- March 13, 2023
unfoldingWord catalyzes innovation in Bible translation. Your gifts and prayers are enabling remarkable new developments! One of those is happening in a state in Asia. It began with translationCore. ...
Breakthrough in Chad
- July 04, 2022
Three churches were birthed when a local chieftain, who formerly combined Islam and the occult, came to Christ. In the another community, new believers were baptized, and two new churches were planted...
OVERCOMING the ODDS for 300,000 PEOPLE
- April 06, 2022
The challenge Pastor Manish was facing seemed insurmountable. His 300,000-member South Asian mountain people group desperately needs Scripture in the language they understand best. Pastor Manish, an e...
