The British and Foreign Bible Society, often known in England and Wales as simply the Bible Society, is a non-denominational Christian Bible society with charity status whose purpose is to make the Bible available throughout the world.[1]
The Society was formed on 7 March 1804 by a group of people including William Wilberforce and Thomas Charles to encourage the "wider circulation and use" of the Scriptures.[2]
Bibles published by the BFBS have on their front page as publisher's name the BFBS's name translated into the text's language, e.g. "Société biblique britannique et étrangère" on Louis Segond's French Bible or "Brita kaj Alilanda Biblia Societo" on the Esperanto bible compiled from L. L. Zamenhof's papers after the latter's death.
History
Gravestone in Wales of Thomas Charles, who helped found the BFBS
The British and Foreign Bible Society dates back to 1804 when a group of Christians, associated with the Religious Tract Society, sought to address the problem of a lack of affordable Bibles in Welsh for Welsh-speaking Christians. Many young girls had walked long distances to Thomas Charles to get copies of the Bible. Later the story was told of one of them – a young girl called Mary Jones who walked over 20 miles to get a Bible in Bala, Gwynedd.
BFBS was not the first Bible Society in the world. The first organisation in Britain to be called "The Bible Society" was founded in 1779: it still exists and is called the Naval & Military Bible Society.[3]
The first BFBS translation project was the Gospel of John into Mohawk for Canada in 1804.[4] In the British Isles BFBS reprinted Bibles in Welsh, Scots Gaelic and Manx Gaelic first produced by the SPCK. The first Romani translation was the Gospel of Luke into the Caló language of Iberia.
A report in the 13 November 1824 edition of the Buffalo Emporium and General Advertiser (NY), stated that the BFBS "since its establishment, has distributed 1,723,251 Bibles, and 2,529,114 Testaments—making a total of 4,252,365."[5]
From the early days, the Society sought to be ecumenical and non-sectarian. The Controversy in 1825–26 about the Apocrypha and the Metrical Psalms resulted in the secession of the Glasgow and Edinburgh Bible Societies, which later formed what is now the Scottish Bible Society.[6] This and another similar 1831 controversy about Unitarians holding significant Society offices resulted in a minority separating to form the Trinitarian Bible Society.
The Bible Society extended its work to England, India, Europe and beyond. Protestant communities in many European countries (such as Croatia and Albania) date back to the work of nineteenth-century BFBS Bible salesmen. Auxiliary branches were set up all over the world, which later became Bible Societies in their own right, and today operate in co-operation as part of the United Bible Societies. The Bible Society is a non-denominational Christian network which works to translate, revise, print, and distribute affordable Bibles in England and Wales.[7]
A newspaper article in the 15 March 1879 edition of The Gazette (Montreal), noted that the total circulation by the BFBS "has been 82,000,000...during the last seventy-five years" (since 1804).[8] By 1909 it had issued 215,000,000 copies of the Bible.[9]
During World War One the Bible Society distributed more than nine million copies of Scripture, in over 80 languages, to combatants and prisoners of war on all sides of the war. The Bible Society managed this despite immense challenges – supply shortages, rising paper costs, paper rationing, submarine blockades and the sinking of merchant shipping.[10]
Even greater than these physical difficulties was the emotional toll – former colleagues suddenly found themselves fighting on opposing sides. Bible salesmen throughout Europe were conscripted or volunteered into their respective armies. The Bible Society responded to the challenge. They printed New Testaments bound in khaki, stamped with a cross, for distribution via the Red Cross among sick and wounded soldiers, sailors and prisoners of war.
On average between 6–7,000 volumes were sent out every working day for fighting men, the sick and wounded, the prisoners of war, exiles and refugees. That's over four copies distributed each minute, day and night, for the duration of the war.[11]
Translation work never stopped – between August 1914 and November 1918, the Bible Society printed Scriptures in 34 new languages and dialects. This meant on average there was one new version every seven weeks during the whole period of war.
For many years the headquarters of the society was in London; in 1972 its address was 146, Queen Victoria Street, E.C.4. By 1972 it had published or distributed whole Bibles or parts of the Bible in 1,431 languages. At that time it was distributing 173 million copies each year.[12]
The Society today
The Society is working to circulate the Scriptures across the world, in the church and through the culture.
The strategy of the Bible Society centres on Bible availability, accessibility and credibility - what it calls the 'lifecycle' of the Bible. These strategic approaches encompass all of its activity: translation, production, distribution, literacy, engagement and advocacy.[13]
Translation: making the Bible available in languages without the Scriptures, and revising existing Bibles to bring the language up-to-date, so that everyone can experience the Scriptures in their mother tongue. Translation is into spoken and signed languages;
Production: printing physical copies of the Bible and producing Scriptures in different formats such as print, audio, and digital forms in order to meet the demands of the millions around the world who want a Bible of their own;
Distribution: taking the Bible to places where it might otherwise be hard to come by, in formats that people can use;
Literacy: helping people to read and to read well, using the Bible as a resource
Engagement: helping people grapple with the Bible, read and respond to it wisely;
Advocacy: giving the wider culture a reason and opportunity to encounter the joys of the Bible.
To these aims the Society was the original publisher of translations the Bible into several contemporary languages, among which Louis Segond's French Bible (1910) and L. L. Zamenhof's Bible in Esperanto (1926).[14]
The Bible Society has by far the largest collection of Bibles in the world, with about 39,000 items. It includes its Chinese Collection which is the largest collection of Chinese Scriptures anywhere in the world. Since the society's move to Swindon in 1985 the library has been located in the library of the University of Cambridge.[15]
Where the Society works
The Society's mission is global. Its work is organised into two categories: domestic and international.
The Society is part of an international fellowship of over 140 Bible Societies around the world, known as the United Bible Societies. Its entire international programme is delivered on the ground through the close relationship they have with each of their fellow Bible Societies.
↑ "What we do". www.biblesociety.org.uk. Archived from the original on 20 January 2013. Retrieved 8 February 2013.
↑ Zamenhof actually died before finishing the translation; he left his notes to the Society, whose theologians finished it and published it under his name.
T. H. Darlow & Horace Frederick Moule, Historical Catalogue of the Printed Editions of Holy Scripture in the Library of the British and Foreign Bible Society. 2 vols. in 3. London: Bible House, 1903-1911 (commonly cited as Darlow & Moule).
--do.--[reissued:] New York: Kraus Reprint Co., 1963.
Herbert, A. S. Historical Catalogue of Printed Editions of the English Bible 1525–1961. London: British and Foreign Bible Society; New York: American Bible Society, 1968. ISBN0-564-00130-9.
The Great Bible of 1539 was the first authorised edition of the Bible in English, authorised by King Henry VIII of England to be read aloud in the church services of the Church of England. The Great Bible was prepared by Myles Coverdale, working under commission of Thomas Cromwell, Secretary to Henry VIII and Vicar General. In 1538, Cromwell directed the clergy to provide "one book of the Bible of the largest volume in English, and the same set up in some convenient place within the said church that ye have care of, whereas your parishioners may most commodiously resort to the same and read it."
Parts of the Bible have been translated into Welsh since at least the 15th century, but the most widely used translation of the Bible into Welsh for several centuries was the 1588 translation by William Morgan, Y Beibl cyssegr-lan sef Yr Hen Destament, a'r Newydd as revised in 1620. The Beibl Cymraeg Newydd was published in 1988 and revised in 2004. Beibl.net is a translation in colloquial Welsh which was completed in 2013.
A Bible society is a non-profit organization, usually nondenominational in makeup, devoted to translating, publishing, and distributing the Bible at affordable prices. In recent years they also are increasingly involved in advocating its credibility and trustworthiness in contemporary cultural life. Traditionally Bible society editions contain scripture, without any doctrinal notes or comments, although they may include non-sectarian notes on alternate translations of words, or variations in the different available manuscripts.
Colportage is the distribution of publications, books, and religious tracts by carriers called "colporteurs" or "colporters". The term does not necessarily refer to religious book peddling.
Bible Society Australia is an Australian non-profit, non-denominational, Christian organisation. It is part of a worldwide network of Bible Societies. Bible Society Australia maintains that the Bible is a significant historic text which has deeply influenced society and culture and is still relevant today. The organisation is involved in translating, publishing, and distributing the Christian Bible, from print, to audio, to digital versions. Bible Society Australia is also involved in Bible advocacy, the publication of Bible reading materials, and the provision of literacy support, both in Australia and overseas.
The Institute for Bible Translation (IBT) was founded in Stockholm, Sweden in 1973 by the Bosnian-Croatian poet Borislav Arapović, its main task being to publish Bibles for "non-Slavic peoples in Slavic countries," not just Bible translations into the languages of Russia but also Central Asian languages.
Bible Society New Zealand is a Christian organisation dedicated to supplying bibles within New Zealand, and supporting Bible Societies around the world to do the same within their respective countries. They aim to serve the whole Christian community by working closely with churches to serve all denominations. The organisation has approximately 30 paid employees, and around 700 volunteers throughout New Zealand.
Bible translations into French date back to the Medieval era. After a number of French Bible translations in the Middle Ages, the first printed translation of the Bible into French was the work of the French theologian Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples in 1530 in Antwerp. This was substantially revised and improved in 1535 by Pierre Robert Olivétan. This Bible, in turn, became the basis of the first French Catholic Bible, published at Leuven in 1550, the work of Nicholas de Leuze and François de Larben. Finally, the Bible de Port-Royal, prepared by Antoine Lemaistre and his brother Louis Isaac Lemaistre, finished in 1695, achieved broad acceptance among both Catholics and Protestants. Jean-Frédéric Ostervald's version (1744) also enjoyed widespread popularity.
The First tome or volume of the Paraphrase of Erasmus upon the new testament or the Paraphrase of Erasmus is the first volume of a book combining an English translation of the New Testament interleaved with an English translation of Desiderius Erasmus's Latin paraphrase of the New Testament. It was edited by Nicholas Udall and first published in January 1548 by Edward Whitchurch. The second volume was published in 1549. Translations were by Nicolas Udall, Catherine Parr, Miles Coverdale, Leonard Coxe, Mary I of England, and others.
Vangjel Meksi (1770–1823) was an Albanian physician, writer, and translator. One-time personal physician to Ali Pasha, the 19th-century Albanian ruler of the Pashalik of Yanina, Meksi produced the first translation of the New Testament into Albanian with the help and sponsorship of the British and Foreign Bible Society (BFBS). Meksi did not live to see his work's publication however, which was supervised by Gregory IV of Athens. As a member of Filiki Etaireia, a secret society whose purpose was to establish an independent Greek state, Meksi joined the Greeks in the Siege of Tripolitsa during their war of independence against the Ottoman Empire and died shortly afterwards.
The complete Bible has been translated into three of the dialects of Inupiat language, the New Testament in two more and portions in another.
The royal Tetraevangelia of Ivan Alexander is an illuminated manuscript Gospel Book in middle Bulgarian, prepared and illustrated in 1355–1356 for Tsar Ivan Alexander of the Second Bulgarian Empire. The manuscript is regarded as one of the most important manuscripts of medieval Bulgarian culture. The manuscript, now in the British Library, contains the text of the Four Gospels illustrated with 366 miniatures and consists of 286 parchment folios, 33 by 24.3 cm in size.
Work on translation of the Bible into the Kazakh language began with the work of Charles Fraser of the Scottish Missionary Society. Fraser's translation of Matthew was published in 1818, and the New Testament in 1820 by the Russian Bible Society. J. M. E. Gottwald, a professor at Kazan University, revised it, and this was published in 1880 by the British and Foreign Bible Society in Kazan, and it was republished in 1887, and 1910. George W. Hunter, of the China Inland Mission in Ürümqi, considered this translation to be "a good translation, into Astrahan-Turki", he does not seem to have considered it to be Kazakh. Darlow and Moule say that it was intended for Kyrgyz in the neighbourhood of Orenburg, and the language was sometimes called "Orenburg Tatar". According to Rev. W. Nicholson of the Royal Asiatic Society in St Petersburg this translation was intended for "The Kirghese hordes—Great, Little, and Middle, as they are called—[who] occupy various regions in Southern Siberia, Central Asia, and west of the Caspian Sea." George A. King says Fraser's translation was into the language of the "Western Kirghiz or Kirghiz-Kazak, though they disown the name Kirghiz".
Bible translations into Persian Languages have been made since the fourth or fifth century, although few early manuscripts survive. There are both Jewish and Christian translations from the Middle Ages. Complete translations of the Hebrew Bible and Greek New Testament from original languages were first made in the 19th century by Protestant missionaries.
The modern Hindi and Urdu standards are highly mutually intelligible in colloquial form, but use different scripts when written, and have lesser mutually intelligibility in literary forms. The history of Bible translations into Hindi and Urdu is closely linked, with the early translators of the Hindustani language simply producing the same version with different scripts: Devanagari and Nastaliq, as well as Roman.
Biblical translations into the indigenous languages of North and South America have been produced since the 16th century.
The New Testament was first published in Scottish Gaelic in 1767 and the whole Bible was first published in 1801. Prior to these, Gaels in Scotland had used translations into Irish.
The Eliot Indian Bible was the first translation of the Christian Bible into an indigenous American language, as well as the first Bible published in British North America. It was prepared by English Puritan missionary John Eliot by translating the Geneva Bible into the Massachusett language. Printed in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the work first appeared in 1661 with only the New Testament. An edition including all 66 books of both the Old and New Testaments was printed in 1663.
Bible translations into Malay include translations of the whole or parts of the Bible into any of the levels and varieties of the Malay language. Publication of early or partial translations began as early as the seventeenth century although there is evidence that the Jesuit missionary, Francis Xavier, translated religious texts that included Bible verses into Malay as early as the sixteenth century.
The Bible Society of Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei was a nondenominational Christian organisation committed to translating and distributing the Bible in Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei. It was the successor organisation to the Bible Society of Malaya, a branch of the National Bible Society of Scotland (NBSS). The Bible Society of Malaya prior to 1948 was a branch of the British and Foreign Bible Society (BFBS).
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
