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Some of you may be aware that the Book of Mormon appeared in Hebrew and then was withdrawn for political reasons. (Relationships between Mormons and Jews have not always been the best.) However, while the church does not give it official recognition, translations are still doing the rounds – http://www.vibrationdata.com/Book_of_Mormon_Hebrew.htm Well it seems that the Book of Mormon, or part of it, in Esperanto is languishing somewhere in SLC.
http://poresperantamormonaro.weebly.com/la-unua-presita-libro-de-mormon.html Quote:A historic milestone was reached in December 2012, with the creation of the first printing of the Book of Mormon in the International Language Esperanto. The book was custom printed by Transient Books, a small family-run bookbinding business, located in Cordoba Argentina. While the printing was only the “Selections from the Book of Mormon” in Esperanto, it is still an important step in helping the rest of the work to come forth.
As I understand, the Book of Mormon has been fully translated into Esperanto since before 1983, and whose transcripts have patiently been waiting at the Church History Library, in Salt Lake City Utah.This translation may need to be revised and updated, but the fact that a full translation already exists points to the realization that the time for the Book of Mormon to officially be published in Esperanto is long overdue. In the meantime the Esperanto Selections of the Book of Mormon have recently been made available online by the group Por-Esperanta Mormonaro. For those who have never heard of Esperanto before, they may be surprised to hear about the growing and thriving international community that uses it and the rich history that surrounds it. While Esperanto is a small language community spread over the world, it does make me wonder why the church can’t put decades old translations online, saving the issue of printing. Elsewhere on the website, it mentions an Ensign article giving phrases in Esperanto, and how over two hundred speakers had been referred to missions.
The website above has gone and printed its own selections from the BoM in Argentina.
The church does at least publish the Welsh translation, although some of the translation is a bit suspect, according to a Welsh missionary I spoke to.
In the meantime it doesn’t look as if the BoM will be in Irish any time soon.
As another curiosity, the BoM is available in Catalan but not in Basque. Both are significant languages spoken in the Spanish and French states, but Basque is a tougher language IMHO.
Esperanto is an interesting language. Does anyone speak Esperanto as their first language? Meaning there may be less of a need for an Esperanto BoM because people can just go with a copy of the BoM in their native language. Still, if they’ve already put in the work, might as well.
Yes, there are a handful of people who speak Esperanto as their first language – the businessman George Soros is the best known. (His surname is Esperanto, and his father raised him in it.) It is the only translation done in an artificial language, but obviously there must be many people who use the English, Spanish etc translations who DON’T have English, Spanish etc as their first language. I have used the English version with many people who didn’t speak it as a first language. While I can see why it would not make much sense to print masses of hard copies of the BoM in Esperanto, I can’t see why it isn’t put online for those that want it.
AFAIK, there are TWO translations of the BoM. The official one, done before 1983, which is in files somewhere (probably lost!) and the unofficial one, which can be downloaded from the internet. The latter appears to be a full translation.
The Hebrew one also appears to be online, but I think the official one was withdrawn after Israeli politicians and activists complained about the conversion of Jews.
SamBee, you must be in a University somewhere. Or a PhD candidate? You flatter me Mike, but at best I’m an idiot savant with an interest in languages. : I’d like to have spent longer in university, but unfortunately it hasn’t helped my career much, because depression and shyness don’t disappear with schooling.
Another LDS member’s site in Esperanto
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