Danger: AI in Bible Translation

[John of Japan]

Just for the record, the Bible translator who lectured on the dangers of AI Bible translation is one of the top two Bible translators I've ever known. He was the lead translator for the Mongolian Bible, and currently is a consultant on up to ten missionary Bible translation projects. He learned his Hebrew by living in Israel, and his Greek is better than mine, and I have taught it for years in both Japanese and English. He speaks five languages (I think it is) fluently, and can speak others to a lesser degree.

This all is to say that I can safely ignore any "wannabe" about this issue and stick with what he taught in his lecture.

P. S. Oh, and by the way, the lecturer is not an academic, but a hands on Bible translator and mission head. In fact, the whole conference was about hands on Bible translating, with about 12 current missionary translators there. My son and I are academics, but I'm actually not sure if any other professors were there. "Just us Bible translators, boss!"

 

[Armchair Apologist]

Perhaps, but not in Bible translation, because that is obedience to Matthew's Great Commission, and AI cannot obey God.

Google translate can use AI to produce a Bible document, but it does this by analyzing the syntax, the semantics, and places on the Internet where the passage has previously been translated. It's a different set of steps than a search engine, though it may use that tool.

Translating the Bible for a people group with no written language, or with a written language but very little literature. AI has no thinking ability to do that correctly without extensive human input, though last week I learned that there are efforts in that direction, unfortunately.

Yeah, I was just wondering if AI could perhaps help with some of the initial work and save some time. I wasn't saying we could (or should) depend on AI to make a complete translation of the scriptures with little to no human input Perhaps it would provide a rough "first pass" from which you could tweak and refine as necessary for accuracy and readability? In other words, would it save any time and help to streamline the process?

I am fairly convinced that God has not called me to translation work. I simply haven't the "gift" for it! My ADHD would literally drive me off the rails but I am certainly greatful to those whom God has called to such work!

The great commission is the proclamation of the Gospel and translation of the scriptures into native tongues enables this.

I have a good number of tools at my disposal in which I could rely upon in order to save time in sermon preparation but I believe that it is far better to manually dig through and do the work yourself so that God will first speak to you through his word and from there, you will have something of value for your congregation.