How digital technology is bringing the Welsh Bible to more people

1 March is St David’s Day, the national day of Wales. Ever because the time of St David, the Welsh have engaged with the Bible, and this continues into the digital age. This is the story …

Background

At the time of Dewi Sant (St David), within the sixth century, the Bible was only available in western Europe in Latin. Copies were kept in beautiful, hand-illustrated manuscripts in monasteries. Unless you were a monk or a priest, the overwhelming majority of individuals had to interact with Scripture through sermons, plays, wall paintings, and communal ritual. Wales became very Christian and sent out missionaries across the Celtic world. What is amazing is that they did all this without the Bible in their very own language.

The First Welsh Bible

In 1563, there was an Act of Parliament, under Queen Elizabeth I, which required the bishops of Welsh-speaking dioceses to be sure that the Bible was translated into the “British or Welsh tongue”, with a duplicate to be placed in every parish church. The New Testament was first published within the Welsh language in 1567, and the entire Bible in 1588. These first Bibles were literally chained in parish churches.

Modern Translation

In 1988, 4 hundred years after the primary full Welsh Bible, a contemporary version of the Bible was produced, called Y Beibl Cymraeg Newydd (the New Welsh Bible). This became probably the most widely used Welsh-language Bible. In 2004, this Bible was revised as Y Beibl Cymraeg Newydd Diwygiedig (the Revised New Welsh Bible), which is the edition used today.

beibl.net

In Welsh, there may be a considerable difference between the literary language and the spoken, colloquial language. There is in English too, nevertheless it is bigger in Welsh. As a result, a charity called Gobaith i Gymru (Hope for Wales) began to translate the Bible from the unique Greek and Hebrew into on a regular basis spoken Welsh. It was intended for young people, for those not used to literary forms, for people not brought up in church culture, and for brand new learners. The translation process used the most recent Bible software and was put online on a web site called https://beibl.net/. Having it online enabled the text to be dynamically updated after reviewing feedback.

In 2002, Y Testament Newydd (the New Testament) was accomplished, and in 2013 Y Hen Destament (the Old Testament) was added to finish the Bible. The latest translation got here to be known by the name of the web site, “beibl.net”. It was one in all the primary Bible translations on the earth to be published online before it was published on paper, which didn’t occur until it was printed by the Bible Society in 2015.

ap Beibl

In 2015, the Bible Society decided to launch a cell phone app for the Welsh Bible, based on technology developed by the American Bible Society. Working with Gobaith i Gymru, an app called ap Beibl was launched on the Eisteddfod in August 2015. The name was a little bit of a pun because, in Welsh, “ap” is the spelling of “app”, nevertheless it also means “son of”.

These days there are millions of Bible apps, but in 2015 there have been not many, and Welsh was one in all the primary languages to have its own Bible app. You can download the Welsh Bible app at no cost from any app store by looking for “ap Beibl” or “Welsh Bible”.

Digitisation Project

In 2017, for the 450th anniversary of the 1567 Welsh New Testament, it was decided to digitise the unique and put it online. This was the beginning of a digitisation project to make historic translations of the Bible available.

One concern in Wales was that many Welsh-speaking Bible students and pastors felt they needed to consult with English Bibles, because there was a greater range of versions, study notes, and resources available in English than in Welsh. However, many translations and study notes in Welsh had been produced up to now. The problem was that these resources were sitting in archives, libraries, and collections. It was not that these materials didn’t exist; the problem was that they weren’t easily accessible in the way in which their English equivalents were.

To address this problem, Gobaith i Gymru and the Bible Society created a project to catalogue, locate, and digitise Welsh translations, and so as to add them to ap Beibl and its parallel website, https://cymraeg.global.bible/. The digitisation was carried out by volunteers, including many from MissionAssist. From the three original items on the app in 2015, there at the moment are about forty items. These cover the entire Bible, editions of the New Testament, Gospels, portions, selections, and lots of psalters.

YouVersion

In July 2008, a latest pioneering app called YouVersion was launched, which is now the world’s most downloaded Bible app. Not long after its launch, William Morgan’s Welsh Bible was added in 2011. Beibl Cymraeg Newydd Diwygiedig was added in 2012, and beibl.net in 2015.

Soon, the interface language was translated into Welsh, so users didn’t must access YouVersion via English to read Welsh. More items in Welsh are added online as they’re digitised. There at the moment are so many Welsh items on YouVersion that it’s the language with the second-highest variety of items; only English has more. This reflects the deep Christian heritage of Wales, where many individuals have translated parts of the Bible, in addition to a concerted effort to catalogue and digitise them.

You can access the Welsh Bible on YouVersion by changing the language to “Cymraeg” or “Welsh” within the language list.

Audio

Listening to podcasts and audiobooks is becoming increasingly popular. In 2010, the New Testament of Y Beibl Cymraeg Newydd Diwygiedig was recorded for the Bible Society by Faith Comes by Hearing (FCBH). This was put online with the text in 2017. William Morgan’s Bible was recorded by Cymdeithas Darllen Pethau Da and added in 2019.

In the identical yr, Undeb yr Annibynwyr Cymraeg (Union of Welsh Independents) began a project to record beibl.net read by individuals with different Welsh-speaking accents. There at the moment are eleven New Testament books available in audio online.

Whether you might be using YouVersion or ap Beibl, the text and audio are synchronised if you play the audio, and the app highlights the text being read.

Digital Lectionary

In 1567, when the New Testament was published in Welsh, the Prayer Book and the Psalter were also published. Ever since, the Church in Wales, a part of the Anglican Communion, has had a convention of reading the Bible in Welsh using the lectionary. Using the lectionary, readings are assigned to every day in line with the Church calendar. These form the idea of Sunday readings and sermons, in order that over time the total range of the Bible is engaged with.

The Church in Wales has an energetic bilingual policy, allowing people to access services in English, Welsh, or each. It began a project to make the lectionary available online via a web site. The site is calendar-driven and shows the relevant verses, which pop up if you click on a reference and might be pasted right into a service sheet.

In November 2024, the Church in Wales launched its Llithiadur Digidol (Digital Lectionary) to bring the lectionary into the digital age. You can access it at https://lectionary.churchinwales.org.uk/ and choose English or Cymraeg. It can be become a Progressive Web App on a smartphone.

Accessing the Welsh Bible

The story of the Welsh Bible within the digital age is the story of a language and a people looking for to maintain each their language and their Bible relevant. Embracing the digital age has been particularly essential for younger readers, lots of whom prefer to come across the Bible in audio form or on a screen slightly than in a leather-bound volume.

The result’s that the Welsh Bible is being actively utilized in forms that reflect the digital habits of a latest generation of Welsh speakers, wherever they could be – in Wales, London, or Patagonia.