New Bible Translation Project in Malayalam
വിശുദ്ധ ബൈബിൾ

by Steve Combs

Malayalam (pronounced ma-le-ya-lam) is the major and official language of Kerala State India.  It lies of the southwest tip of the Indian peninsula. In 2020, I received a contact from brother Robinson Thomson, an Indian Christian from Kerala India.  He was visiting churches in the US.  It turned out that he was going to be at a church very close to where I live.  I arranged for Steve Zeinner and myself to meet him at Wellspring Baptist Church, pastored by Sean Patrick.  It was a wonderful meeting.  We challenged him to look closely at the translation he was using by comparing the checklist we have on our Resources page.  He and a friend in India did just that.  The result was that they found many serious errors in the Malayalam translation they were using.  Later, on November 2, 2020, brother Zeinner and I had a Zoom meeting with brother Thomson and several Christian leaders in India.  We discussed the need of a new Bible translation and they a committed themselves to do it.  Immediately following that I sent an assessment to them with instructions on how to organize a project and basic principles of translating and methods to use.  Afterward, brother Thomson discussed the issues with his team, finished his US tour, and returned to India.  In March 2021, we had another Zoom meeting to give them basic training.  Since then they have commenced the translation.  However, conditions have been difficult with Covid in their country. and this has caused some hinderance.  Please pray for them. .