Supporting local translators
Wycliffe Today Autumn 2026
by Lachlan Webb
When I tell people that I’m working on the Tiwi translation of the Bible, a common question people ask is, ‘When will you learn Tiwi? How can you help translate if you don’t know the language itself?’ Tiwi is considered a very difficult language. You can say a great deal in a single word, albeit a word that may have more letters than the average alphabet. Add to that many thousands of years of cultural practices and it is unfortunately easy to misunderstand something, even if you have a dictionary in hand!
So then, who does the translation? People who have used Tiwi all their lives – those from the Tiwi Islands, just 80 kilometres north of Darwin. There is a great need for Tiwi translators. The Tiwi people have a strong church, and a strong language. They should be the ones with the opportunity to bring the Bible into their language. It is here that my role as a translation advisor, and a translation teacher, fits in.
Wycliffe Australia helps empower local translators through its partner organisations, including the Australian Society for Indigenous Languages (AuSIL) and Nungalinya College. AuSIL serves as the primary translation arm of the Summer Institute of Linguistics (SIL) in Australia. Nungalinya College is an Indigenous training college for equipping Indigenous Christians. Nungalinya provides training in a number of TAFE-level certificates, up to a Cert. IV in Ministry and Theology.
I’m currently teaching the Cert. II in Indigenous Translating to a cohort of Tiwi translators. There are currently around 16 Tiwi students who started the three-year course in 2025. I feel for the students as we slog through grammar and morphology but seeing them come to life when we dig into translation work is inspiring. The classroom shifts from the quiet murmur of grinding intellectual work to a vibrant, noisy and animated discussion. During a class last year, I discovered that the cohort had gathered over the weekend to complete a translation of a song we’d been learning in class. That’s enthusiasm!
When the students have finished their course, and even before that, some will go on to be Bible translators. At the moment, they have started a translation club at church, such is their desire for a Tiwi Bible. To have the opportunity to work with them day to day to achieve their goals is amazing, and Wycliffe Australia is supporting them in every step of the process.
Training future gospel workers
Alan Rogers is a storyteller. As a member of the Australian Society for Indigenous Languages (AuSIL), he connects with a range of different language groups in the Northern Territory and throughout the Top End. Alan has a passion for seeing Indigenous people connect with Jesus’ story through God’s Word. As many Indigenous people are from cultures that pass on stories orally, Alan and his wife Lucy have been helping them to record Scripture and worship songs in their own languages. Over 650 albums have been created so far. Some of the albums Alan has recorded have some incredible stories behind them.
Something that Alan and his team are passionate about is encouraging the use of Indigenous language in churches to help raise a new generation of gospel workers. There are 21 different translation programs in progress throughout Australia with a new inititiative, SAIL (Scripture for Australian Indigenous Languages), coordinating efforts from a number of interested organisations. Alan says that the best way to move forward with these projects is to train Indigenous translators in biblical studies:
We need to have more Aboriginal people trained in how to look for parallels in Bible passages to help make explicit that which is implied—otherwise, the people are just listening to a story. Nungalinya College currently has several cohorts of Indigenous students studying the Diploma in Translation. I think this course will be instrumental in training Bible translators who can connect with Scripture on a level that non-Indigenous people would not be able to.
Greg Anderson, Anglican Bishop of the Northern Territory, agrees that ‘the best clergy we have here are people who used to be Bible translators’. The full revised Kriol Bible (2019) involved Indigenous people with a heart for keeping their language, culture and faith alive for future generations. Alan shares, ‘If we can inspire a new generation of translators, we can achieve similar results in other languages.’
In 2023 and 2024, many Indigenous translators were brought together from all over Australia to hone their skills in Bible translation workshops. Some are experienced, and some have less experience, but all cooperate in the task of translation. Our team at AuSIL joined with the Bible Society, Coordinate, and senior translators to work with our Indigenous brethren on selected Bible passages. They produced posters, booklets and videos of the material they translated. “The harmony of such people—distantly situated but with common goals—is a delight to see.”
Click here to help fund training for more Aboriginal translators
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