# Wycliffe pledges to comply - controversial Bible translations among Muslims



## Pergamum

Message Received: Wycliffe Translations and the Insider Movement

Good news for Bible translations among Muslims. 

Thank God for the pressure exerted by the PCA and others who have raised awareness of this issue and pushed for corrective measures.

Now pray the the missionary organization, Frontiers, will abide by these recommendations as well. 



> After a year’s work, a World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) panel has released its report on the Muslim-context translation practices of Wycliffe Bible Translators and its partner SIL International. Wycliffe requested the audit of its policies after controversy erupted last year over the world’s premier translator supporting translations that altered the phrases “Son of God” and “God the Father” in Muslim contexts.
> 
> Western mission agencies have been concerned about literal translations of “God the Father” and “Son of God” in Muslim contexts because the terms imply God had sexual relations with Mary. One SIL-supported translation of Matthew in Turkey rendered “God the Father” something along the lines of “the great protector,” according to locals.
> 
> ...
> 
> The report notes “the centrality of the word for “son” in the biblical presentation of salvation,” and says the centrality “demands that translators render the word with the most direct equivalent possible.”
> 
> The report also recommends standards for local involvement in translations and urged Wycliffe to set up a process for handling controversies over the familial terms. The panel says Wycliffe should be transparent about the translation decisions it makes.
> 
> Wycliffe embraced the report, and its president, Bob Creson, said in a statement that the organization would move “to implement these recommendations as soon as possible.”
> 
> “Wycliffe USA is committed to maintaining the integrity of God’s Word through accurate, clear, and natural translation,” Creson said.
> 
> Wycliffe had suspended the controversial translations while the review moved forward. A Wycliffe spokesman said that all the suspended translations (and all future translations) would meet these new standards prior to publication.
> 
> Critics of Wycliffe’s translation practices were cautious about embracing the report until they had studied it more fully...


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## Pergamum

Here is the link to the full report:

http://www.worldea.org/images/wimg/files/2013_0429-Final%20Report%20of%20the%20WEA%20Independent%20Bible%20Translation%20Review%20Panel.pdf



> *Recommendations*
> 
> 1. The WEA Panel (hereafter referred to as “Panel”) recommends that when the words for
> “father” and “son” refer to God the Father and to the Son of God, these words always
> be translated with the most directly equivalent familial words within the given linguistic
> and cultural context of the recipients...
> 
> 
> 2. The Panel recognizes that there is significant potential for misunderstanding of the
> words for “father” and “son” when applied to God, and that in languages shaped by
> Islamic cultures, the potential is especially acute and the misunderstandings likely to
> prove especially harmful to the reader’s comprehension of the gospel. Therefore, in
> case of difficulties, the Panel recommends that translators consider the addition of
> qualifying words and/or phrases (explanatory adjectives, relative clauses, prepositional
> phrases, or similar modifiers) to the directly-translated words for “father” and “son,” in
> order to avoid misunderstanding. For example, as the biblical context allows, the word
> for “father” might be rendered with the equivalent of “heavenly Father” when referring
> to God, and the word for “son” might be rendered with the equivalent of “divine Son,”
> “eternal Son,” or “heavenly Son” when referring to Jesus. The Panel also encourages
> translators to use paratextual material to clarify and avoid misunderstanding in these
> cases. (This recommendation pertains to the SIL Best Practices statement 1.5.4, 3.2.)
> 
> 3. The Panel recognizes that the phrase for “Son of God” has varied nuances in its different
> New Testament contexts, especially in light of the Old Testament background to those
> contexts. In the case of most languages, the biblical context should enable the reader to
> discern the nuances of the phrase for “Son of God,” and translators need not make
> adjustments to the translated text, although they may want to indicate nuances of
> meaning in paratextual material. But, when and if necessary, the Panel recommends 7
> that translators convey nuances of meaning from the biblical context in the translation
> through the addition of qualifying words and/or phrases (explanatory adjectives,
> relative clauses, or prepositional phrases). For example, the phrase for “Son of God” in a
> context of Messianic kingship might be rendered with the equivalent of “anointed Son
> of God” or “royal Son of God.” (This recommendation pertains to the SIL Best Practices
> statement 0.4, 0.7, 1.1, 1.5.4, 3.2.)
> 
> 4. The panel recognizes that some of the disagreement over the translation of the word for
> “father” and the phrase for “Son of God” has resulted from overloading the translation
> by attempting to address too many possible meanings and misunderstandings. The
> panel recommends that in addition to translating Scripture, translators consider
> additional ways of communicating the message of Jesus to Muslim audiences. These
> can include such literary genres as tafsir (commentary), qusas al-anbiya (stories of the
> prophets), and sirah (life stories)...
> 
> 5. The Panel recommends that Wycliffe/SIL incorporate into the Best Practices statement
> guidelines related to ensuring that translators determine what context should serve as
> the controlling principle for the translation of divine familial terms, including:
> 
> a. Local testing of peoples’ reactions to a translation...
> b. Enabling translation teams to account not only for the particular audience for
> whom the translation is being prepared, but also how to consider the impact on
> local groups with secondary exposure to the translation...
> 
> 6. The Panel recommends that SIL incorporate into the Best Practices statement guidelines
> for the translation team on differentiating the translation of divine familial passages
> when the primary audience of the Bible translation is local believers versus when the
> primary audience is local unbelievers (including how to determine when this is
> necessary and how to accomplish it when it is deemed necessary)...
> 
> 7. The Panel recommends that SIL incorporate into the Best Practices statement guidelines
> on a process by which likely divine familial language controversies are to be handled and
> personnel held accountable for those translations where Wycliffe and/or SIL has a major
> stake. Especially for translations over which controversy is likely to ensue, the guidelines
> should:
> a. Give the translation team a process to determine when Wycliffe and/or SIL might
> institute some type of “familial language audit group” (or other appropriate title)
> utilizing both internal (local believers/informed culture bearers who may or may
> not be Christians) and external (translation experts) resources...
> b. Address such things as the composition, task/limitations, and process of the
> “familial language audit group”:
> i. Composition: The Panel recommends that whenever possible the group
> should include local believers from a variety of perspectives and
> disciplines and also local experts who may not be believers but know the
> cultural and linguistic nuances of their mother tongue. (This
> recommendation pertains to the SIL Best Practices statement 1.6, 2.1.)9
> ii. Task/limitations: For example, the “familial language audit group” would
> focus their audit on the controversial familial language passages of the
> translation.
> iii. Process: This would include how such audit groups might be constituted,
> how they determine their decisions, how they communicate the decision,
> Wycliffe and SIL policies on the public/confidential nature of any audit
> reports that are generated, and so on.
> 
> 8. The Panel recommends that SIL incorporate into the Best Practices statement guidelines
> related to “ownership” of the translation. The Panel recognizes that each project is
> different and needs to be evaluated independently. Therefore the Panel recommends
> that Wycliffe and SIL add guidelines in these areas:
> a. Negotiating the interests and demands of a) the end-users, b) believers in local
> contexts, c) scholarly and other relevant hermeneutical communities (including
> existing local church resources), d) patron donors behind the translation. (This
> recommendation pertains to the SIL Best Practices statement 0.4.)
> b. The role(s) that foreign translators, missionaries and experts take in the process
> and choices made in translating familial language in the project.
> c. Handling situations in which different groups in a single locality have different
> opinions on the familial language translation choices and determining the local
> hermeneutical community that best represents the target audience. (This
> recommendation pertains to the SIL Best Practices statement 0.7, 1.1, 1.6.)
> d. Guide translation teams on handling questions concerning the relationship
> between foreign funding of translations and resulting demands on translation
> decisions and practices.
> e. Establishing procedures that will ensure that the research on reception of the
> familial language translation actually reflects local understandings and asks the
> kinds of questions that will not skew the data towards researcher or patron 10
> community bias. (This recommendation pertains to the SIL Best Practices
> statement 0.4, 0.7, 1.1, 1.6.)
> 
> 9. The Panel recommends that Wycliffe and SIL consider how to better publicly disclose
> translation decisions and considerations, including appropriate means of publicizing:
> a. What Wycliffe and/or SIL has done regarding those translations for which
> Wycliffe and/or SIL was responsible but which have not followed the Best
> Practices and the Panel’s recommendations. (This recommendation pertains to
> the SIL Best Practices statement 6.1.)
> b. How Wycliffe/SIL will monitor compliance with the Best Practices statement and
> the Panel’s recommendations. (This recommendation pertains to the
> Wycliffe/SIL Best Practices statement 6.1.)
> 
> 10. The Panel recommends that Wycliffe and SIL work with an external group or agency
> (such as WEA) to establish policies and procedures of accountability related to the Best
> Practices statement and the Panel’s recommendations including review by an external
> group or agency...


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## Pergamum

Here is another news article about this panel:

Wycliffe Bible Translators Accept Panel Report Over Controversial Muslim Context Translation


But here are several blog posts critical of the panel itself:

The WEA Cover-up for Wycliffe/SIL is Complete-Report Mirrors Current Translation Policy | Cracks in the Crescent

Wycliffe/SIL and the WEA’s Missteps Raise integrity Questions | Cracks in the Crescent

Wycliffe/SIL Stacking the Deck of Independent WEA Review? | Cracks in the Crescent



> Though the review bears the WEA name, Wycliffe/SIL is the sponsor.
> 
> Wycliffe/SIL is not just paying the bills; a Wycliffe/SIL source with knowledge of the deliberations says Muslim Idiom Translations (MIT) proponents have had access to deliberations of the WEA panel members, urging them to support Wycliffe/SIL position on Muslim Idiom Translations (MIT), while Wycliffe/SIL personnel who oppose MIT have not had a chance to speak with the WEA panel. It is troubling, especially when Wycliffe/SIL had claimed the review would be “independent.” Wycliffe and SIL had recommended Dr. Robert E. Cooley to the panel, and per Wycliffe/SIL document, he would “participate from a position supportive of” Wycliffe/SIL current translation policy, but I didn’t know non-panel members who are also proponents of MITs would be the only voice in these deliberations.
> 
> 
> Finally, the WEA has broken a promise. A big one. The initial WEA press statement about the global review panel stated “followers of Christ from Muslim backgrounds” would be included in the panel.
> 
> That hasn’t been the case.
> 
> There are hundreds of thousands of Christians from Muslim background. The WEA claims to represent “650 million Christians” worldwide and surprisingly it could not come up with one believer from Muslim background to sit on its panel. Did Wycliffe/SIL nix this promise because it was too risky for its integrity? I would like to know. None of Muslim background believers I have met agrees the title, “Messiah,”which in Islam is a created being, and “Beloved of God,” a term Muslims exclusively use for Prophet Muhammad, are terms suitable for translating “Son of God.”



Underline and re-positioning of text for easier reading is mine


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## Pergamum

Here is another news article about this panel:

Wycliffe Bible Translators Accept Panel Report Over Controversial Muslim Context Translation


But here are several blog posts critical of the panel itself:

The WEA Cover-up for Wycliffe/SIL is Complete-Report Mirrors Current Translation Policy | Cracks in the Crescent

Wycliffe/SIL and the WEA’s Missteps Raise integrity Questions | Cracks in the Crescent

Wycliffe/SIL Stacking the Deck of Independent WEA Review? | Cracks in the Crescent



> Though the review bears the WEA name, Wycliffe/SIL is the sponsor.
> 
> Wycliffe/SIL is not just paying the bills; a Wycliffe/SIL source with knowledge of the deliberations says Muslim Idiom Translations (MIT) proponents have had access to deliberations of the WEA panel members, urging them to support Wycliffe/SIL position on Muslim Idiom Translations (MIT), while Wycliffe/SIL personnel who oppose MIT have not had a chance to speak with the WEA panel. It is troubling, especially when Wycliffe/SIL had claimed the review would be “independent.” Wycliffe and SIL had recommended Dr. Robert E. Cooley to the panel, and per Wycliffe/SIL document, he would “participate from a position supportive of” Wycliffe/SIL current translation policy, but I didn’t know non-panel members who are also proponents of MITs would be the only voice in these deliberations.
> 
> 
> Finally, the WEA has broken a promise. A big one. The initial WEA press statement about the global review panel stated “followers of Christ from Muslim backgrounds” would be included in the panel.
> 
> That hasn’t been the case.
> 
> There are hundreds of thousands of Christians from Muslim background. The WEA claims to represent “650 million Christians” worldwide and surprisingly it could not come up with one believer from Muslim background to sit on its panel. Did Wycliffe/SIL nix this promise because it was too risky for its integrity? I would like to know. None of Muslim background believers I have met agrees the title, “Messiah,”which in Islam is a created being, and “Beloved of God,” a term Muslims exclusively use for Prophet Muhammad, are terms suitable for translating “Son of God.”



Underline and re-positioning of text for easier reading is mine


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## Scott1

The PCA will be releasing the second part of its study report on "Insider Movement" this General Assembly (June). This will be a substantial report with a series of affirmations and declarations at the end.


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## Pergamum

I just wrote an article on these trends for our small local magazine, The Sovereign Grace Messenger, that is distributed among some Sov. Grace Baptist Churches. Maybe I might post it here, too.


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## DMcFadden

What about the Frontiers organization? Are they still pushing insider movement ideology?


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## Pergamum

It seems like it. On their website, under "Stories from the Field" is a sub-heading entitled, "Muslims Serving Jesus." This needs to be qualified further.

Here is also an article link quoting Bob Blincoe, the head of Frontiers currently: http://www.worldmag.com/2012/02/the_battle_for_accurate_bible_translation_in_asia



> The translators emphasize their desire to promote evangelism. Bob Blincoe, the U.S. director of Frontiers, cited in an email lack of growth as one reason for the translation: "The big problem is that church planting among the tens of millions of religious Muslims in Turkey has not been successful; it has not even begun." Turkey is 99.8 percent Muslim, according to the CIA World Factbook. Turks estimate that their country has about 5,000 Christians now, but when Bocek became a Christian in 1988, he was one of a total of 80 Protestants in the country. "One significant barrier may be the existing translation of the Bible," Blincoe wrote in an email: "These are paraphrases that help a conservative Sunni Muslim audience know what the Bible really says."




Underline is mine.

The problem is that Blincoe calls these "Muslim-friendly" translations "paraphrases" whereas many others are calling them translations or "God's Word."


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## Pergamum

WORLD | Inside out | Emily Belz | May 7, 2011

Also from the article linked:



> In Minneapolis, Bethlehem Baptist Church, where John Piper is senior pastor, raised the issue in a letter last year to its global partners, posing questions about the extent of cultural contextualization in evangelization.
> 
> Frontiers, a mission agency for the Muslim world that has Bethlehem as one of its prominent sending churches, also is wrestling with the issue. Its top fundraiser, David Harriman, left the organization last fall after working there 18 years because he believed insider thinking had crept into the organization, and he couldn't "sell the product" to donors any longer. "I became increasingly uncomfortable with the way in which we were framing a lot of stuff," he told me. "At the very least, there was profound confusion."



and then,




> The leadership affirmed the organization's commitment to the Bible as the ultimate and inerrant authority for its work, but Harriman said certain practices had changed. Church-planting in Muslim contexts gave way to a more individualistic personal affirmation of faith, he said: "There's a profound need for Frontiers to find clarity."
> 
> Harriman doesn't believe Frontiers was directly involved with any of the Muslim-friendly translations, but said he "facilitated" fundraising for one, The True Meaning of the Gospels and Acts, an Arabic translation by Mazhar Mallouhi (who calls himself a "Muslim follower of Christ") that changes the familial phrases: "Your father who is in heaven" is rendered "God your supreme guardian," for example.
> 
> "If Frontiers was unaware, shame on Frontiers and shame on me for not knowing," Harriman said.
> 
> Bob Blincoe, the U.S. director of Frontiers, said Harriman was "misguided" and that Blincoe had "answered his objections adequately." Blincoe told me that Frontiers would not "play loose with the terms of the Bible." When I asked if Frontiers would use translations that changed the phrase "Son of God," he responded by saying that Wycliffe Bible Translators does translations, not Frontiers. He had spoken to Wycliffe's president Bob Creson about the issue. "They're trying to be faithful to the Scriptures-but helpful," he said. "I do not want to hear anybody say that Frontiers or any other organization that is worthy of the name missionary is compromising the gospel to make it somehow easy or smooth for the gospel to go down in people's hearts."
> 
> One of Wycliffe's translators, Rick Brown (though Wycliffe would not say whether he remains affiliated with the organization because of policy not to disclose personal information about staff or ministry partners), has been a proponent of changing the phrase "Son of God" to "Messiah" in order to remove a stumbling block to Muslims. In the Spring 2000 edition of the International Journal of Frontier Missions, Brown alluded to organizations that objected to such translations: "On the day of judgment, will those who might have heard and believed the Gospel stand up to accuse such Christians of hindering their salvation? Only God knows."


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## SinnerSavedByChrist

Thanks for the comprehensive links Pergamum. Really glad that Wycliffe has not apostasised.

Regarding why such an investigation would EVER have to be made, and the disease that is so rampant in "missions", let me paraphrase Brother Paul Washer:
_
"But you see - men don't want to pray. All these methods and contextualisation and this and that.... For men to be saved, three things are required: The preaching of The Gospel, intercessory prayer and sacrificial love. But men just don't want to pray. Men are too proud." _

Modern Christianity is all about _progress_. All about _results._ And we surmise that "because numbers are not growing, therefore something must be wrong." No. We should be asking ourselves: "What kind of gospel are we preaching? Is it the gospel of the John the Baptist? The gospel of the Lord Jesus? Of the apostles and the multitude of martyrs, of puritans, of Whitefield and Spurgeon? Or is it some stupid Romans road and "Say yes to these 4 truths and let me pray for you".

Next we should be asking ourselves: "Are our knees bleeding and our eyes dry from shedding tears over the lost?" 
And after all that, we still remind ourselves that: God is sovereign. He is the one who will ultimately save, through the faithful preaching of the foolish gospel. 

The whole translation thing really springs out of the theological mess we have concerning conversion, regeneration and The Gospel. Glad to know that those on the Puritanboard have been blessed by God to see through the smog of results-driven false-ianity of the modern church. I myself am struggling particularly with the _intercessory prayer_ and the _sacrificial love_ components of evangelism. May God break me and mould me for Him.


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## Pergamum

Thanks Michael, good thoughts.


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## Pergamum

Here is the Assemblies of God document on retaining the father/Son terminology in translations:

FatherSon.ag.org


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