How EasyBibles began and grew.
November 1 1998 – Revd Martin Lloyd was asked to co-ordinate easyEnglish for Wycliffe Associates, UK. A small team had translated about 10 psalms at level A (1200 words). Several Bible Commentaries without Bible texts at the same reading level were also being produced. This team grew to 60 to 80 people writing, checking and field-testing EE, including Accessible EE (now called ‘veryeasy’ English by Martin) which began in 2000. EE may be downloaded from www.easyEnglish.info .
November 26 2003 – in travelling to promote EE, Martin reached Kampala, Uganda – where he was asked by the Bible Society of Uganda to start easySwahili – on his return to Tanzania. This was the first ‘easyBibles’ language.
2004 and 2005 – easyBibles spread to South and West Africa (Zulu and Fulani) as well as rapidly through East Africa. There, David Angango, Programmes Manager or TransWorld Radio soon became a friend of the project. He initiated work in Swahili for Kenya, Dholuo, Masaai, Luganda (for Uganda), Gikuyu, Kimeru, French and Kirundi (for Birundi), Amharic (for Ethiopia), Juba Arabic & Nuer (for Sudan).
2004 – Martin made his second visit to India – this time to promote EB; easyTelugu (without translated Bible text) started plus easyBengali in Bangladesh. Then Martin went to Hong Kong and up north, by train, to Hunan Province to ask “What Bibles do you have?” and “Who can read them?” So Martin was led to meet Mr Ma’s team in Zhoukou, Henan Province – by phone – with David Wang as the messenger.
2005 – Martin & Jenny went to Shanghai and met Mr Ma, who told them that easyChinese had already started. On returning to the UK, easyWelsh began. Veryeasy Portuguese began by email with Catholic Professor Carlos Gohn in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. Soon Martin in Lima, Peru was able to initiate easySpanish.
April 2006 – Martin handed back to Wycliffe Associates UK the leadership of EE as the combined workload with also initiating and encouraging EB too was proving unnecessarily large. It also meant that Martin now travels to Africa and Asia without any Western labels attached.
In October, while Jenny and Martin had a holiday with friends in Seattle, Martin went to LA to the International Theological Seminary and met Dr Joel Robertson and several African and Asian students.
Also in 2006, Martin revisited the Chinese Overseas Christian Mission in Milton Keynes and their Bible College Dean, Dr Jason Lim – who has since met the easyChinese team three times inside China.
2007 – the ministry of EB spread steadily to many new languages – including Polish, Shona for Zimbabwe, Nepali, French and Lingala from the DRC, Yoruba from Lagos, Fanti from Ghana, Indonesian, Russian from Ukraine and Gita from Tanzania.
Martin met several deaf churches and their leaders in UK, Kenya and the Philippines to see if the ‘veryeasy’ versions can support their main communication, which is by the use of signing.
‘Veryeasy’ languages are becoming increasingly relevant to prison ministries.
2008 – in the period May to July, Martin went to some of the poorest countries in the world. So easy and veryeasy languages began in :
Ethiopia – Oromo and Amharic
Malawi – Chichewa and Tumbuka
Mozambique – Portuguese and Yao
Zambia – Bemba
He also visited India (where the Friends’ Missionary Prayer Band have started easy languages for North India) and Thailand.
Throughout 2008 the work has been developing strongly in Pakistan – Urdu, Punjabi, Farsi and Seraiki and soon Sindhi. EasyBisaya(Cebuano) and Subanon from the Philippines have started; also easyHebrew from Israel.
2009- Martin visited Malaysia, Cambodia, Singapore and India.
Jan 2010 – We changed our financial policy to work only volunteers. Nobody will be paid to write or translate or check Bible texts.
Feb 2010 – Ian started printing veryeasy and easy gospel booklets.