Omaha daily bee., 1908-06-07
HEATHENS USE MANY BIBLES
More All Told Distributed Than Are
in Christian England.
FIVE MILLION COPIES ANNUALLY
Many Camel Loads OF Scripture
sent Into the Heart of Abyss
aInia-over million for
China.

LONDON, June 6.-(special)-In a single
year over 100000 Bibles have been dis
tributed throughout China and $4,000 in
Japan, according to the advance summary
OF the British and Foreign Bible society's
l04th annual report. while In England and
Wales. where the years demand has fallen
off, only 1,1O5, 900 have been sold.
Three additions have been added to the
society's lorg list. In South America,
where Lengua is spoken by the Indians
Of the Paraguayan Chaco. a version Of
St. Marks gospel has been printed in this
tongue; in the heart Of Africa st. Mat
thew's gospel has been printed for a
Uganda tribe speaking a language called
L~uNyankole; in India two gospels are be-
ing published in Hindu-Sindhi. In six other
languages versions are almost ready. The
publication Of the c~anonical books Of the
Bible has been completed in two additional
l~anguages-in Giryama, for British East
Africa. and in Nguna-Efate, a combination
OF the dialects of two islands in the New
Hebrides. with these the number of COM
plete Bibles is now 1O5. The New Testa-
ment has been completed In Baffin's Land
Eskimo and in the Mombasa form Of
Swahili. These raise the number of New
Testaments to ninety-nine. While 20S other
languages. in which only some part of the
Testament has been issued, make up the
total to 412 different languages I'm which
the British and Foreign Bible society has
promoted the translation. printing or dis
tribution Of at least some part of Gods
book
Revising the Bible.
Important progress has also been made
in revising versions whose quality requires
Improvement. Here we can mention only
the two dominant languages Of the far
east. In Japan a representative body of
Japanese scholars and foreign missionaries
has recently agreed upon a joint plan for
revising the Japanese Bible. In China the
missionary conference at Shanghai in 1899
arranged for union versions Of the Chi
nese Bible in High wenli and in Man
DARN. The task has been successfully full
, filled in all three cases, so far as concerns
the New Testament.
The rapid influx into North America of
immigrants from Europe has increased the
demand for digot T~estaments, in which
English is printed side by side with one
or other of a dozen continental versions. A
new edition of the English Bible in Braille
(raised) type for the blind is in prepara-
ton. Thus In divers portions and in
divers Manners in the hands OF the Eng
fish and among far-away folk Of foreign
speech under alien stars, Gods book car
ries its own eternal message to the human
heart.
The years issues amount altogether to
5,6sS, 3S1 volumes, a total of 272,00 copies
above the output in the previous year.
though still $4,000 below the record total
amount two years ago.
The issues from the Bible House in Lon
don for the last year were 1855, t2s1 copies,
an increase OF 5000 on the previous year.
The growth here, however, has been in
foreign versions sent out from London.
The issues in English and Welsh amounted
to 1,105.0OO copies. a falling off of $4,000
from the previous year. which again was
l LOCO below the year before. OF the So
ciety's issues a smaller proportion are Eng
lish and Welsh scriptures than was the
case ten years ago; then 1t was over 30 per
cent, now 1t is under 20 per- cent of the
total. For this, however, there may be a
twofold explanation. On one hand, people
today who can afford them prefer more
expensive editions, often with notes or
helps, which they procure elsewhere than
from the Bible house. On the other hand,
some extremely cheap English editions
have been put on the market by other pub
fishers.
The Bible society maintains depots and
distributing machinery in nearly 100 of the