INTRODUCTION
It’s been a long time since I stood before you --- Sitting behind the piano, I must admit has its comfort. I am behind the piano. Although being behind the piano has it’s disadvantages --- usually, I get to be an afterthought during Communion Service, and seldom do people come over behind the piano to greet me during “Passing of Peace.”
Setting that aside, sitting behind the piano gives me a different perspective of ministry and worship. I can say, that, many can preach, but very few can play the piano. As you may have known, mas sikat ako ngayon as pianist than as pastor. Pinag-aagawan ako ngayon. So that I have come to accept that I am tasked to do something that very few people could do… and that is play the piano. So much so, that every time I am asked to play the piano, I try to make it a point to encourage the church to develop its own church musician, and/ or encourage the larger church to be more intentional in its program in developing church musicians. If the church intentionally on a look out for prospective pastors, then the church should also be more intentional in sending prospective church musicians. Sadly, there are very few candidates for this area --- not only does it requires musical talent and ability, music requires more discipline. Therefore, I ask the church to take care of its church musicians.
But Pastor Connie did not ask me to talk about church music --- today we are celebrating Bible Sunday. Although there are more qualified scholars among us here to talk about the Bible, my unique contribution into the discussion on Bible would be in translation.
For the past years, I have surprisingly been involved in the translation work, first as translator of Bible Study materials including the Franklin Graham My Hope Philippines Manuals and Bible Study Notes, and now, as member of the Team that translates the Children’s Bible and the Full Life Study Bible.
Bakit ba daw, I was asked, “wala pa bang Cebuano Bible?” I said, meron na. Then why is still there a need to translate the Bible in Cebuano?
The Importance of Translation
Why indeed? In fact, if you go to Christian Bookstores, whether OMF, Christian Literature Crusade or Philippine Bible Society Bookstore , Bibles are also sold in National Book Store, you will find different versions of the Bible in any languages. So why are there so many versions of the Bible?
The different versions of the Bible are attempts to bring the Bible to the people in the language and form most easily understandable.
I’m sure if I ask you to recite the Lord’s Prayer, many of us will recite it in the King James Version, ‘Our Father who Art in Heaven… hallowed be Thy Name…” But then who uses “art thou” these days in their English conversation? Do you ask somebody you meet, “Where art thou goest?” The joke going around is that even the English people in London would have a hard time understanding the King James Version of the English Bible. E lalo na, who can read the Bible in the original language in which the Bible was written: Hebrew for Old Testament, Greek for New Testament and parts of Hebrew and Intertestamental books in Aramaic. Among Bible scholars nga, although Hebrew and Greek used to be a required course in the seminary, very, very, very few can read the Bible in its original language and understanding it readily.
So efforts have been made to translate the Bible into a language easily understood by the people. Even as early as the Babylonian exile, the Hebrew Writings where already translated into Aramaic, which was the lingua franca of that time.
Since then and until now, Bible has been translated to different languages
The United Bible Society announced, that as of 31 December 2007, The Bible, with deuterocanonical material was available in 123 languages. The Tanakh and New Testament were available in 438 languages. The New Testament was available in 1168 languages, and portions of the Bible were available in 848 languages, for a total of 2,454 languages.
Appreciating the work of translation
Untold effort and sacrifices had been place into making the Bible more understandable to the people in all possible languages and formats:
• Presentation of the different format of the Bible
So what do these different formats of the Bible tell us?
1. From the most basic, the Bible is the most popular book there is as of now. Is there any book in the entire human and literary history that has been translated and presented in so many languages and format?
2. But more importantly, hopefully, the Bible is that prominent and so important that people should never have any reason not to be able to read the Bible.
But the more serious question is how important and prominent is the Bible in our lives as individual and as a community of faith?
Biblical History and human history tell us that at any point in the history of the people when the Bible was hidden, obscured and unavailable, the nation slid in darkest moment: From the Hebrew history, when the Jewish kings forsook the reading of the Scripture, wickedness described the nation: there was corruption in the government, oppression and exploitation of the people, moral decline. It was the darkest time in their history.
In Biblical history, revival, reform and restoration coincided with the reading of the scripture. After the many years of exile from Babylon to Persia, Ezra and Nehemiah led the Jewish people in their return to their homeland. After Ezra rebuilt the temple and Nehemiah the walls of Jerusalem, the next thing that they reinstituted is the public reading of the Word of God. As accounted in Nehemiah Chapter 8, “Ezra read the Book of Law” The Torah, aloud from daybreak till noon… and the people listened attentively to the Book of Law. Immediately, there was revival amongst the people.
Amazingly, when the Holy Spirit manifested Herself, at Pentecost, she did not come in thunder or lightning, nor in miraculous sights, apparitions or miraculous acts. The Holy Spirit came… in languages that the people understood…. People who were present not only in the meeting, but even by those who were around them, listening, watching them. The WORD of God should never be obscured by language that cannot be understood.
So how important and prominent is the Bible to us?
1. Liturgically, it’s prominence is shown in the way we place the Bible in our worship area and act. The Bible is placed high so that people will symbolically look up to it. The Roman Catholic and the Orthodox Church even parade the Bible at its procession, high above the head to point to its prominence in the life of the church.
2. But in our personal, private and communal life, do we look up to the Bible for God’s guidance? The Bible is translated in a format and language you can understand so that you and I can read the Word of God and understand it. Then, we no longer have to depend solely on the reading and interpretation of the Word from pastors, Rick Warren and any other media personalities who interpret the Bible for us.
a. This encourages us to read the Bible in a personal level… study
b. This also challenges us to take the Bible Study and Sunday School offered by the church seriously. If the Bible is indeed, prominent and important then we should read it, study it. All efforts to translate the Bible in a language that we can understand will be of naught if we don’t avail of the Book… if we just delegate the study of the Bible to pastors and Bible study leaders.
3. The challenge of translating the Bible into our daily lives. The importance of the Bible is in its translation into our daily lives. When the Bible is seriously read and listened to, as proven by history, revival follows. In human history, Biblical interpretation has never been so obscure as during the Dark Ages. But when study and interpretation of Bible surfaced, human history came out of the Dark into Revival and Renaissance.
I have been privileged to be part of the work of translating the Word of God into a language closer to my heart, the Cebuano language. Efforts are made into making the Bible available in other Filipino languages. Today, the PBS and the Catholic Bishop’s Conference are joining forces for a Bible Distribution project called, “May They Be One” which aims at making the Bible available to every Filipino household, with the prayer that the Bible will unite the Filipinos. Again, I am privileged to be one of the writers in this project.
But I guess, the greatest challenge for us, for each one of us, not only for those who are in the seminary and are tasked to study the Bible, but to each one of us who takes seriously our faith in God to study the Bible, and be a living Bible, whose Word is translated in our daily lives. Amen.
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