This past week I finished my final read through of 1-2 Thessalonians in the Enga New Testament, and for all intents and purposes those two books are now completely finished! And it shouldn't be long before we add a number of other books to that category. It feels so good that we are now starting to finish the Enga New Testament!
Sometimes Bible translation work can feel like a never-ending series of revisions. No matter how much editing you've done, it always feels like there is more to do. The translation team and I have written countless project notes, suggesting potential improvements or corrections to the translation. Actually, it is inaccurate to say countless, because I just checked, and the total number of project notes that we have written thus far is 30,359. Of that number we have only 189 that are left to resolve (although I have no doubt that we will write even more project notes in the coming weeks and months). To put that number of 30,359 in perspective, consider the fact that there are about 7,957 verses in the New Testament (depending on which version you look at). That means that on average we have written and processed nearly four project notes for every verse of the New Testament!
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| Enga translators Reuben, Nete, and Frank reviewing project notes at the Enga Cultural Center |
Not only that, but this month we finished the last work of major revision. Inevitably, as a team develops in their aptitude for translation, they return to the first books they translated and realize that they need major revision. That has certainly been the case with Enga. We had already done a major revision of Matthew and Mark, and the last book standing in our way was Luke. Now, the average chapter of a New Testament book has 30 verses, but the average chapter in Luke has 48 verses. Not only that but in terms of total verses and total word count, Luke is the longest book in the New Testament. And as I worked my way through each verse, I found that a large number of verses needed major adjustment. So it was with a great sense of joy and accomplishment that I wrote my last project note in Luke on April 15, and it is with even greater joy that I tell you that all but two of the 4,644 project notes written in Luke have now been resolved!
It feels like everything is starting to come together now and we are really starting to get close to the finish line. However, although we are starting to finish the Enga New Testament, the Coronavirus pandemic is Papua New Guinea is not starting to finish. Rather, it seems like it is just getting started: this month and last month the government issued new restrictions. One of the restrictions currently in place bans inter-provincial travel, and so we cannot complete the face-to-face portion of the consultant checking process for the remaining eight books that need it until that restriction is lifted. So please pray that the current surge in the Coronavirus pandemic here in Papua New Guinea would reverse course and pray that those restrictions can soon be lifted so that we can not only start finishing the Enga New Testament but finish finishing it.
