“Church Publishes LDS Edition of the Holy Bible in Spanish,” Liahona, Sept. 2009, N3–N4
Church Publishes LDS Edition of the Holy Bible in Spanish
With the new Latter-day Saint edition of the Holy Bible in Spanish becoming available on September 1, the First Presidency has invited Spanish-speaking members of the Church to attend a special 25-minute orientation about the new edition of the Bible. The orientation will be broadcast via satellite between the morning and afternoon sessions on both Saturday and Sunday of the upcoming October general conference.
The broadcast will include messages about the coming forth of the LDS edition of the Spanish Bible and the effective use and benefits of it, along with a special message from President Thomas S. Monson. Information will be sent to units on how to access the orientation, which will be broadcast in both Spanish and English. Units are encouraged to record the broadcast to allow members to access it later.
The orientation will also be available online for members viewing general conference outside of a meetinghouse.
This new edition of the Bible will be available in September in print, electronic, and audio formats. More than 800,000 copies are being printed at the Church’s printing center in Salt Lake City and will be sent to Church distribution centers all over the world. The printed versions are available in paperback and hardcover as well as bonded leather. This new edition is also available in Braille and an oversized print format. A quadruple combination is not available at this time.
The electronic text of this new edition, including the study helps, will be available at Escrituras.lds.org, allowing members with Internet access to perform keyword searches. The audio recordings of the Bible and the triple combination are available on CD sets (50021 002 Old Testament and 50022 002 New Testament) through Church distribution centers or as MP3 files at Escrituras.lds.org.
Under the direction of the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles, a team of translators prepared and reviewed the new edition. They were aided by General Authorities, Area Seventies, professional linguists, and Church members. The LDS edition of the Holy Bible in Spanish is based on the 1909 Reina-Valera edition of the Bible, an earlier version of what Spanish-speaking members have used until now.
The dignified language of the 1909 Reina-Valera Spanish Bible, comparable to that of the King James Bible, has been conservatively modernized by replacing some of the outdated grammatical constructions and vocabulary whose meaning and acceptability have shifted.
New chapter headings, footnotes, cross-references to all the standard works of the Church, maps, and other study aids included in the back pages of the publication will make the scriptures more helpful to Spanish-speaking Saints. The new edition, similar to the 1979 English LDS edition of the King James Bible, will be titled “Santa Biblia: Reina-Valera 2009.”
“We encourage members to obtain their own copies of this new edition of the Bible and to use it in regular personal and family study and in Church meetings and assignments,” a letter from the First Presidency reads. “As members prayerfully learn and teach from the scriptures, their testimonies will grow and they will receive greater direction in their daily lives.”
Additional information is available in Spanish and English at SantaBiblia.lds.org.
A broadcast about the new LDS edition of the Holy Bible in Spanish will be shown between sessions of October general conference.