May 2025 - Home for Bible Translators

Dear Friends,
We are glad to share our February newsletter with you! This month we will share:

An update from Executive Director Bob Carter
An article about the Hebrew language by Co-Founder Mirja Ronning
A testimony from JCBT alum Bethany Case

Bob Carter, Executive Director:

Shalom again from North Carolina! What notable developments we have seen in Israel since we last wrote. Hostages are being returned to their families, military conflict is much reduced, and hope for Israelis and Palestinians is renewed that perhaps the War will end soon. May God continue to work in this very difficult situation to turn hearts to Him. We also pray that our students will be secure and unhindered in their studies as they will arrive for our upcoming Semester in less than four weeks. Please also pray that all the students will receive their visas in plenty of time.

We’ve received reports from our Hebrew teachers that our four-month Living Biblical Hebrew preparation course, taught by our partners from Hebrew for the Nations, has gone well. Our Academic Director, Reinier de Blois, is happy with their progress, and we’re anticipating that all nine of our students will be arriving around March 1st to begin the very intensive three-week Level 2 course to complete their preparation for our technical courses. This year we’ll have Itai Kagan from Hebrew University teaching Textual Criticism, Dr. Reinier de Blois teaching Semantics of Bible Hebrew, Dr. Lénart de Regt teaching Discourse Analysis of Bible Hebrew, and Dr. Ernst Wendland and Manuel Calaza teaching Biblical Hebrew Poetry. In addition to these high-level Hebrew courses, I’ll be leading the Historical Geography of the Land of Israel course. Please pray for the students and the teachers.

We’d also like to give praise to God that we have received special gifts for scholarships. Some of our students come from organizations that have a great need to send their people for this unique training but do not have adequate funds to cover the cost. It’s been our desire to help these people, but we have also not had a scholarship fund. In recent months, we have received a number of special gifts, and we anticipate that we’ll be able to help the students who really need it. It looks like this will be an ongoing need in the years to come, so please pray that God, through His people, will continue to supply this need and also our need for ongoing operational costs.

Finally, I’d like to ask you to pray for me as I will be leaving for South Asia next week for an intensive month of translation checking and workshop training with mother-tongue translators. Then on March 15th I’ll fly directly to Israel to join the Semester program where Amy join me. May we be keenly aware of God’s presence in all of this, and may He gain great glory through the work He has given us to do.

In Him,

Mirja Ronning, Co-Founder:

Dear friends!

Hebrew, the language of God’s revelation to mankind

The focus of the JCBT program is Hebrew, the language through which God gave His word to His people Israel. The Hebrew Old Testament scrolls were Jesus’ Bible, he knew the text and often quoted it, referring to the scriptures. After the Resurrection, Jesus explained to the disciples what had been written about Him in the Law, the Prophets, and Psalms, and He invited them to preach His message to all nations (Lk. 24:44, 47). This is exactly what Bible translators do for the nations.

It is a big task. More than 7100 languages are spoken in the world (source: SIL Ethnologue). The largest national language is Chinese, but the most widely used language is English. Hebrew, on the other hand, is one of the smallest languages in the world, but it has the greatest impact on nations through translations of God’s Word.

According to the latest information, the entire Bible has been translated into 756 languages and the New Testament into 1726 languages. As a result, Christianity is the largest religion in the world.

Another cause for wonder is God’s small possession, the Jews, and the small, dry, and unsafe land of the Bible, between Egypt and the great peoples of Mesopotamia. Since the late 1800s, these people, expelled from their country a couple of thousand years ago, have slowly begun to return to their land.

Jesus’ Great Commission in Hebrew

How did this comeback begin? It took two powerful, utopian visions. The return movement to the land was provoked by Theodor Herzl’s vision of the Jews returning to their old homeland of Zion as a solution to persecution. Another even more elusive vision was to have a common renewed Hebrew language for those returning to Zion from different countries. This task was taken up by the Russian-Jewish linguist Eliezer Ben-Yehuda (1885–1922). His home language was Yiddish. Ben-Yehuda moved to Jerusalem in 1881 with the first pioneers and immediately began working to reform Hebrew from the language of the Bible into a living colloquial language suitable for everyday life. He created hundreds of new words through the Biblical Hebrew root letter system or based on other Semitic languages, Aramaic, and Arabic.

Ben-Yehuda succeeded. He compiled the first modern Hebrew dictionary and founded the Hebrew Academy. It continues to operate in Jerusalem and develops words for new concepts, e.g., information technology terms. Modern Hebrew is estimated to have between 75,000-80,000 words. The language is spoken by nine million people, for five million, it is the only language. This year, Israel celebrated National Hebrew Day on January 21st.

Israel’s most important university was founded in 1925 and named the Hebrew University. Its language of instruction was modern Hebrew, a great achievement for a language that was only twenty years old.

God’s plans are revealed in the small and modest: a small nation, a small country, a small language, through which God speaks to the nations of the world.

By the grace of the Lord,

Mirja Ronning

JCBT Semester – A Life-Changing Experience

Bethany Case 2017 Alumna

My time at JCBT’s semester program in 2017 was life-changing. In addition to an amazing language learning experience, seeing the places and the geography in person made the narratives of the Bible come alive, and gave tangible meaning and memories to place names that I had previously glossed over. The homey atmosphere of the log home was wonderful, and I found living and learning alongside brothers and sisters from many different cultures to be tremendously fun and enriching.

Now I’m trying to pass on the precious learning I received to others through our Hebrew course on YouTube, Aleph with Beth, and over seven years later, I’m still drawing heavily on what I learned at JCBT. They started me out with a fluency in reading and interacting in Biblical Hebrew that has proved a solid foundation for further studies and for teaching. I would never have been able to do what I’m doing now without this experience, and it was only possible for me because God’s people gave generously to make it happen, for which I am so grateful. I wish every Bible translator had a chance to attend JCBT’s program because the experience truly opens one’s eyes to see the text in its context!

Bethany’s free Biblical Hebrew course, instructional videos, and homepage can be found at the following links:

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