The Bible in Afrikaans

Portions of the Bible were translated into Afrikaans for the first time by CP Hoogenhout, A Pannevis and SJ du Toit since 1878. The first complete Bible was, however, only published in 1933. A revised version was published in 1953. Today, the translation is known as the 1933/1953 translation and is still a very popular, traditional translation, translated from the Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic source texts.

On 5 July 1968, during a seminar for translators of the Afrikaans Bible and other interested parties, a unanimous decision was taken to request that the Bible Society of South Africa begin with a new translation in Afrikaans. The translation had to take the development of the Afrikaans language into account and be as faithful a rendering of the Hebrew, Greek and Aramaic source texts as possible.

On 2 December 1983, ‘Die Bybel: Nuwe Vertaling’ was launched in Cape Town. The translation is meaning-based, more so than the 1933/1953 translation, and exceeded in its goal to address Afrikaans-speaking people within and outside the church in a contemporary yet proper Afrikaans.

‘Die Bybel vir almal’ was originally published by the Bible Society of South Africa as the Bible for the Deaf. It was translated from the source texts in an easily readable Afrikaans without losing the crux of the original text.

This Bible is printed in large print and that makes it easy to read. The large variety of footnotes provide explanations of words, concepts and interesting information.

The Afrikaans 2020 translation of the Bible was started by the Bible Society at the request of the Afrikaans speaking churches. They recognised that there was a need for a Bible translation that was better aligned to the source texts (Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek) than the existing translations. Many believers had a need for a Bible that was a faithful rendering of the source text, but that was still easy to understand.

The translation brief, therefore, was to create an easily understandable, source-text orientated Afrikaans translation of the Bible, which would be suitable for public reading and use in worship services, as well as for Sunday school instruction, Bible Study and personal use.

Click here to read the Introduction and Preface of the Afrikaans 2020 translation.