Kriol Baibul achieves major milestone

Aboriginal church leaders have welcomed the completion of the first full translation of both the Old and New Testaments into an Aboriginal language.

The rector of Northern Territory church, St Matthew’s, Ngukurr, the Rev Canon Gumbuli Wurramara, is thankful that the Bible has been translated in its entirety into a language that is spoken by an estimated 30,000 people across the Northern Territory, Western Australia and North West Queensland.

“It’s the main language of many Aboriginal people. By putting the Bible into Kriol many people will come to understand God by reading his word,” Canon Wurramara says.

After almost 30 years of translation work, the Kriol Baibul was launched at the 40th Katherine Christian Convention on May 5 with over 2000 people present.

Canon Wurramara says he has already found the translation immensely useful.

“I use it every Sunday now. It’s been useful for reaching a number of Aboriginal settlements,” he says.

CMS missionaries Lance and Gwen Tremlett have worked alongside Margaret Mickan from the Summer Institute of Linguistics in North Australia, overseeing a team of translators preparing the new Kriol Baibul for publication.

Lance says this achievement is a milestone as it allows another language group to have the complete word of God in their mother tongue.

“People understand things far better in their heart language than in a second language,” Lance says.

Lance says churches in communities like Ngukurr, Minyerri and Barunga who have been instrumental in assisting the translation process almost exclusively use the Kriol Baibul.

“These churches will use no other Bible and have been using the present edition until now,” he says.

Nungalinya College in Darwin also uses the Kriol Baibul. CMS-NSW Mission Education Secretary, the Rev Mark Fairhurst says the next step is to continue to support Bible translation into other Aboriginal languages. 

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