Very few people have heard of Katherine Barnwell, also known as Katy Barnwell, yet she’s one of the most influential Christians in modern history.
While Billy Graham and Mother Teresa are legends for their service to God, this woman who changed hundreds of millions of lives doesn’t even rate a Wikipedia page.
Her biographer Jordan Monson told CBN News: “She sort of slipped away from the limelight, or she was never noticed.”
“But if you look at the number of people in the world who have become Christians, largely because of her work, there is a very real claim to her having more than 100 times the influence of Billy Graham. [It’s] just incredible.”
DR KATY BARNWELL IS A LEGEND IN BIBLE TRANSLATION
Within the business of Bible translation, Dr. Katy Barnwell is a legend.
“By some estimates, about 3,000 completed or in-process Bible translations swim directly downstream of her work,” says the publicity for a forthcoming book about her highly productive faith-filled life.
Since she rebuilt The Jesus Film Project’s methods against all odds, more than 300 million viewers of the film around the world have become followers of Jesus.
And it’s never been easy.
KATY BARNWELL WAS MUCH MORE THAN A HUMBLE BIBLE TRANSLATOR
Most of her early translation work took place in Nigeria where she was robbed at gunpoint multiple times, repeatedly caught malaria, faced a constant threat from Islamic terrorists, and was even forced out of the country.
But she showed incredible resilience and dedication to her work, while always putting others first.
The devout Christian with a PhD in linguistics would sleep on floors and share her food, even when it was scarce.
She has also worked in countries such as Madagascar and directed translations in numerous nations from Pakistan to Peru to Papua New Guinea.
CHRISTIAN ACADEMIC WHO BROUGHT HER STORY TO THE WORLD
Jordan K Monson who’s Professor of Missions and Old Testament at Indiana’s Christian Huntington University has been researching Katy Barnwell’s work for more than a decade.
He wrote an award-winning 7,200-word, 13-page article for Christianity Today titled The Linguist: The Woman Who Gave the World a Thousand Names for God.
Despite the length of his essay, he barely covered the amazing life of this humble Bible translator, so a Christian publisher commissioned him to write a book.
It is titled simply Katherine Barnwell with the much longer subtitle: How One Woman Revolutionized Bible Translation and Became the Mother of Modern Missions.
It will be released next week.
SHE HELPED HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS READ THE BIBLE IN THEIR OWN LANGUAGE
The promotional blurb writes: “Her Kingdom labour reveals that God is still in the business of raising up contemporary “greats” who are willing to face danger, go the distance, lift up God’s Word in unprecedented ways, and see the lost turn to Christ in droves.”
“In fact, there may be no “great” in all of church history who matches Katy Barnwell’s level of influence.”
“All around the world, hundreds of millions of new believers read and hear Scripture in their own language because of her work, books, and language training.”
Jordan Monson explained to CBN News: “Katy Barnwell trained the world to translate the Scriptures for themselves.”
The 87-year-old is the pioneer of the “mother-tongue” translation method of the Bible.
THE BARNWELL TRANSLATION METHOD
Partly for political reasons decades ago when it was feared Bible translators were spies, she centred her work on establishing a system for communities to access the Old and New Testaments in their heart languages by training local translators.
Her technique, now known as the Barnwell Translation Method, is used extensively and mostly, as it was designed, by non-professional local translators.
The goal of the system is threefold:
- To accurately communicate Biblical meaning
- To employ natural and clearly understood language
- To remain steadfastly faithful to the intent of the original text.
With a team of community translators, Katy Barnwell’s method relies on the source text’s original languages (mostly Greek and Hebrew) and focuses on meaning- and ideas-based translation (as opposed to word-for-word translation).
HER BOOK REMAINS THE GOLD STANDARD FOR TRAINING TRANSLATORS
To shore up the precision of the translation it is mandated that drafts be back-translated into major languages (like English or French).
The system also features exhaustive linguistic and exegetical workshops to equip local translators with the skills and tools they need to achieve their goal.
In 1975, Dr. Barnwell published Bible Translation: An Introductory Course in Translation Principles.
Nearly half a century and four editions later, that book is still the gold-standard manual for training first-language translators (formerly called mother-tongue translators) the world over.
“MOST HUMBLE PERSON I’VE EVER MET”
Despite her unprecedented success and indisputable contribution to Bible translation, Professor Monson described Katy Barnwell, as “maybe the most humble person I’ve ever met.”
He recalled her being bothered by seeing her face on the cover of her biography.
“She just works tirelessly for the good of people around the world and thinks so little about herself that she’s almost offended when she’s remembered,” her biographer told CBN News.
“She kept insisting the whole time, ‘Everything I did, I did on teams; I don’t know why this whole book is just about me.’”
HOW KATY BARNWELL INSPIRED HER BIOGRAPHER
That counter-intuitive humility has served as a deep encouragement to Jordan Monson.
“What does it look like to be laser-focused on the Kingdom, laser-focused on the spreading of the Good News of Jesus — while having a complete self-forgetfulness about your own person?” he reflected.
The publicity for the biography points out: “Those who know her best, report sweet surprise at how warm, endearing, patient, and feisty she is.”
“Her African colleagues call her Mama Katy.”
“She is truly the mother of modern Bible translation and the mother of 21st-century missions.”
TRANSLATING LEGEND “IS COMPLETING THE GREAT COMMISSION”
Her biographer observed she shows that God is completing his Great Commission.
Katy Barnwell now conducts most of her work over Zoom from her home in England.
When asked if she would retire, she responded “What else would I do?” Would I just sit and twiddle my thumbs?”
“I enjoy my work, and I’m glad that I can still do it. And I’m very thankful that the physical problems of old age are not in my head so much as in my legs.”
