As AI gains more and more momentum, I believe that Christians should be compelled to think biblically and carefully about the technology. Are there redemptive uses for it, and what are the dangers? Is it all a doomsday scenario, or are there ways in which it can be used for God’s glory in a responsible way that promotes human flourishing and the spread of the gospel and the edification of the Church? 

In this episode I want to share two things I came across recently that I hope will aid us in cultivating intelligent, humble, clearer thinking about AI from a Christian perspective, especially as it relates to the task of Bible translation. Organizations like Seed Company and SIL are pouring massive amounts of money into the space, each with their own specialized AI department. So what kinds of things are they saying and doing? That’s what this episode is meant to help with. A month ago the ETEN innovation lab posted a panel discussion with four men from different BT orgs talking about AI and how it is currently being used as a tool in more than 300 BT projects around the world. For some reason the video was unlisted, and I got permission from them to post the entirety of the audio in this episode so that more people can benefit from the conversation.

But before that discussion, I want to frame it with an excellent article by Andy Crouch entitled “A Redemptive Thesis for Artificial Intelligence.”

The Spoken English Bible is a new translation of the Bible that is intended to be heard and told, not read. It is being produced from the original languages and is intended to maximize retention while still being faithful to the meaning. The SEB is owned and produced by SIL International, and is licensed under the open CC BY-SA license.

In this episode I’m joined by Josh Frost who is a member of the SEB team and will be giving us an insider’s perspective on the process and development of this new translation. Josh is a graduate of the University of Missouri where he studied linguistics and classical languages.

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Links:

Global Bible Tools Intro

How to Self-Publish a Free Book That Is Truly Freely Given

Video version of the psalm at the end of the episode

The Dark Side of Copyright

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It’s an incredible time to be alive, especially getting to watch the advances of AI in various fields. While I realize that there’s probably a sizeable percentage of this audience that thinks AI is the opposite of progress, I want to introduce you to a tool that you might find useful. It’s called NotebookLM by Google, and it’s free for you to start using today. You can create notebooks and fill them with source material of all kinds: links, videos, PDFs, pasted text, and other docs. The AI will then digest all the material and you’ll be able to interact with it in a chat, ask questions about it, ask it to summarize things, etc. But the most magical and impressive thing about it is that you can ask it to generate an audio conversation, podcast-style, about the material. A man and a woman will have a down to earth, natural sounding discussion about the content, and you can listen to it and learn some of the main points of what you didn’t have time to read. Perhaps there’s a 100-page thesis you don’t have time to read. Drop it into NotebookLM, and then listen to a 15 minute conversation about it while you wash the dishes or go for a run. If you haven’t heard a demo of this, prepare yourself for a level of realism that you’ve never encountered before. While it’s not perfect, and many of you may never use it and think it’s gimmicky, for a nascent technology, it’s an incredible demonstration of what possibilities the future might hold. Keep in mind that this is the worst this tech will ever get. What you’re about to hear is a series of conversations I generated based on source material from my research on the Reina Valera Spanish Bible translation. This was a fun experiment for me during my paternity leave after the birth of our new baby boy.

I co-wrote this article with Conley Owens for sellingJesus.org. It was originally published on the Selling Jesus podcast.

"For we are not, like so many, peddlers of God’s word, but as men of sincerity, as commissioned by God, in the sight of God we speak in Christ" (2 Cor. 2:17, ESV).

This highly technical discussion is not an easy listen, and it's recommended that you complement it with the visuals in the written version of the article.

This matters because there are those who would argue that 2 Corinthians 2:17 does not confront the commercialization of Bible translations, but rather speaks merely of those who make too much profit from selling them. Or they claim that this verse has nothing to do with selling, but rather with "corrupting" God's Word. Is there really a loophole here for Bible publishers who claim ownership of God's Word, lock it down from being spread freely, and enrich themselves in the process? Can this verse be translated in such a way as to help them avoid Paul's condemnation, or does it simply mean: "we are not commercializing God’s Word like so many others"?

An important decision a translator makes is whether or not to domesticate/contextualize/localize the foreign elements of a text. In this episode, we will discuss the concepts of domestication and foreignization in Bible translation, and explore some of the factors that translators should consider when making this decision. As we’ll see, foreignness in translation demands a delicate balance between fidelity to the source text and accessibility to the target audience.

Here's the full text of the article. It's free to read, modify, copy, share, or translate.

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The other day I ran across a fascinating article written by a Cambridge PhD student who memorized the entire book of Job in Hebrew as part of her dissertation research. The article was entitled Learning to love: The surprising joy of memorising Job, and after reading it I knew I wanted to learn more about the process and the insights she gleaned from the experience. So I reached out to her and she kindly agreed to grace us with a nerdy chat on Job.

Ellie Wiener particularly takes joy in studying and communicating how the theological themes and imagery of the Old Testament create the context in which the gospel proclaimed in Jesus Christ is both intelligible and breathtakingly beautiful. 

"Accuracy is often thought to be the main criterion for good translation, but acceptability is just as important."

Drew Maust is a translation consultant and one of the editors of the SIL Journal of Translation. He kindly agreed to read and share a recent article of his on this podcast. A big thanks to Drew for taking the time to record his insights for us to learn from!

Despite the objective advantages of the metric system—such as its simplicity and global adoption—Americans are reluctant to abandon their traditional units due to cultural identity and convenience. This resistance to change is similar to the reception of advances in biblical studies, which often struggle to be accepted by the broader public. Translators face the challenge of balancing tradition with modern scholarship, as changes in Bible translations can be contentious. An example of this is the translation of the term "leprosy" from Hebrew and Greek texts. Historically translated as "leprosy," modern scholars argue that the biblical term refers to a variety of skin diseases, not specifically Hansen's disease. However, translations often retain the traditional term due to familiarity and acceptance by readers. This highlights the complex nature of translation, which must consider accuracy, clarity, naturalness, and acceptability. Translators strive to create versions that resonate with their audience while maintaining scholarly integrity, illustrating the intricate balance between source fidelity and target audience preferences.

Read the article.

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In this episode we have the pleasure of talking to biblical scholar Dr. Drew Longacre. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Birmingham and has recently been a researcher at Cambridge Digital Bible Research on the Psalms: Layer by Layer project, which we did an episode on in the past. From 2016–2021, he was the postdoctoral researcher on the a project called “The Hands that Wrote the Bible: Digital Palaeography and Scribal Culture of the Dead Sea Scrolls”, where he applied the latest advances in radiocarbon dating and digital paleography to the study of the Dead Sea Psalm scrolls. Longacre and Brent Strawn from Duke Divinity School have received an NEH Scholarly Editions grant to complete an eclectic critical edition of Psalms 1–50 for the Hebrew Bible: a Critical Edition series from 2024–2026. A little about this critical edition of the Hebrew Psalter: the project aims to provide the world with the first truly critical edition of the Book of Psalms. It plans to use the full range of the Dead Sea Scrolls, incorporate important Greek papyri, and take advantage of recent methodological advances in textual criticism.

The project website.

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