Moscow, November 1, 2023
Photo: ibt.org
Among its many projects, the Institute for Bible Translation has been publishing Biblical texts in the Abaza language since 2019. Previous editions include the books of Jonah, Ruth, and Esther, the Gospel Parables, and the Gospel of Matthew.
Now, the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts are available in Abaza in a single edition, the Institute reported last week.
Abaza is a northwestern Caucasian language. According to the 2020 census, there are 43,793 Abazins in Russia today, mainly in the Abazin District of the Karachay-Cherkessia Republic and in the capital city of Cherkessk. Their majority religion has been Sunni Islam since the late 18th century.
The Institute writes of the translation task:
The Gospel of Luke was written in a high-level, literary form of conversational Greek of the 1st century AD. The Abaza translation group set the same task for itself. The translation into the Abaza language, which was verified against the Greek source text and underwent a multi-stage procedure of checks, editing, and approvals, was supposed to maintain exact correspondence to the original while sounding as natural as possible in the modern literary Abaza language.
The new edition includes a parallel Russian translation.
E-versions are available from the Institute’s website.
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