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In 2025 IBT celebrates the 30th anniversary of its work in Russia. The anniversary celebration was held as part of an international conference called "Linguistic Forum 2025: Bible Translation as a Means of Language Preservation and Development. Traditions and New Approaches," organized by IBT and the Institute of Linguistics (RAS). Read more
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IBT recently held a training seminar in Uzbekistan on translating the Old Testament book of Proverbs into the Turkic languages. Here is what Balkar translator Marziyat reported about this seminar: “Once I heard a lecture on love by Fr. Alexander Menn, who said that when Christ came, it wasn’t as if the world was completely unprepared – the history of humanity given in the Old Testament had actually prepared people for His coming. The Wisdom literature, and Solomon’s Proverbs in particular, were part of this preparation for the Jewish people. But what about for the rest of humankind? The seminar on Proverbs offered us a vivid answer to this question...
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On June 22-26, 2025, the Institute for Bible Translation conducted a seminar for new translators from various Dagestanian languages, including those with no writing system. During this training event, IBT launched several new projects that will be using oral Bible translation (OBT) methodology. New projects have now been launched in the Archi, Botlikh, Murego-Gubden, Tindi, Khvarshin, Tsez and Chirag languages. The seminar, structured as a blend of lectures on theory and practical sessions, marked the beginning of these initiatives.
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The Institute for Bible Translation has published a translation of the Old Testament book of Ruth in the Abkhaz language. Previously, the book of Jonah (2023) and a collection of Gospel Parables (2023) had been published in Abkhaz. This edition was printed in Abkhazia’s capital city, Sukhum (a.k.a. Aqwa).
The Abkhaz language belongs to the Abkhaz-Adyghe branch of the Northwest Caucasian language family. It is one of the official languages of Abkhazia, together with Russian, and is spoken primarily in Abkhazia and Turkey.
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Olga is an Evangelical Christian from the newly formed Yakut Scripture Engagement (SE) team. Since the first seminar on Scripture Engagement in Turkey in March 2024, she has been engaged in this completely new kind of IBT activity with great inspiration and inexhaustible imagination, perhaps greater than in any other IBT project. “I want to share my personal experience,” Olga started her story at another SE seminar, this time in Moscow. "I remember how once we were sitting in the church, and some words in the Yakut language were displayed on the screen. And I remember this moment very clearly: these Yakut words went straight to my heart, not to my eyes and not to my brain...