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Frequently Asked Questions
Learn about the ETEN Innovation Lab’s role as a catalyst for innovation in Bible translation.
ETEN Innovation Lab
The ETEN Innovation Lab is a catalyst within the Every Tribe Every Nation (ETEN) collective impact alliance. The ETEN Steering Committee has commissioned the Lab to help accelerate progress toward the All Access Goals by exploring, testing, and collaborating with partners to equip the scaling of emerging methods in Bible translation, with particular attention to All Access Goal (AAG) languages at risk.
The Lab takes strategic risks to test what is untested, equip the unequipped, and advance efforts that require focused attention and intentionality. Rooted in collaboration, the Innovation Lab works alongside ETEN and non-ETEN partners to identify barriers and experiment with new solutions, with the goal of accelerating trustworthy Bible translation.
The Innovation Lab is part of the Every Tribe Every Nation (ETEN) collective impact alliance, functioning as an experimental hub rather than an implementing agency. ETEN implementing partners carry out translation projects and related operational elements of Bible translation, exercising as much innovation capacity as aligns with their respective board mandates and organizational calling.
The Lab is a designated space to catalyze exploration and testing, with the intent of enabling the utilization and scaling of proven innovations across ETEN implementing partners and others in pursuit of the shared 2033 All Access Goals. The Lab works in close collaboration with implementing partners to broaden involvement and accelerate progress through the use of advanced technologies and open, accessible resources.
The Innovation Lab’s primary goal is to accelerate global Bible translation efforts to meet ETEN’s 2033 All Access Goals, with particular focus on languages where progress toward those goals is most at risk. In collaboration with ETEN implementing partners and Bible translation organizations beyond ETEN, the Lab guides and models the activation and adoption of ETEN’s Strategy to Address the All Access Goals at Risk.
Through this work, the Lab explores and tests new approaches to strengthen Bible translation, including multimodal and oral-first approaches, church-based translation processes, and the use of assisted translation technologies.
ETEN’s All Access Goals aim to ensure that by 2033, all people have access to God’s Word in a language they can clearly understand. The goals include:
● 95% of the world’s population having access to a full Bible
● 99.96% having access to the New Testament or an equivalent portion of Scripture
● 100% having access to at least some portion of Scripture
● 2 full Bible translations in the world’s 100 most strategic written languages
These goals are big, and if we stay at the current pace of Bible translation the projected timeline of hitting these goals misses the mark. The forecast currently shows we’d be done in 2041. This means change and innovation is required, but the challenges are real. Challenges include reaching languages where translation progress remains slow or stalled, working in communities where translation is difficult because of political/religious persecution, overcoming barriers created by text-dominant translation models in oral contexts, integrating emerging technologies into translation workflows in trustworthy ways, and strengthening local church and community participation in translation efforts.
Emerging BT Approaches and Technologies
The remaining communities without access to Scripture face ongoing challenges that require new approaches and collaboration across the Bible translation community. In some language groups, the current pace of translation is not sufficient to meet the 2033 All Access Goals without exploring additional methods.
Testing emerging approaches helps address these challenges. This includes multimodal translation, church-based processes, and the integration of advanced technologies. Through this experimentation, the Bible translation community can identify solutions that remove barriers and support sustainable progress.
The Innovation Lab serves as a catalyst for this work so that new ideas can move from early ideating stages into experimentation, utilization, and scaling across the wider Bible translation movement.
The Stages of Exploration describe how emerging approaches in Bible translation develop over time. They provide a framework for moving from early concepts to solutions that can be used across the translation movement. At each stage, ideas are refined, tested for effectiveness, and evaluated for broader use readiness.
Not every idea progresses through every stage. Some approaches may pause or conclude during exploration if they prove less effective than expected. When an approach demonstrates meaningful value, it can move into the utilizing stage, where it is used in real translation contexts. From there, proven solutions may scale as partners adopt them more widely across the Bible translation movement.
The local church is the expert in the use of its language and how to communicate within its culture, so local church involvement can significantly accelerate translation pace. Church-Based Bible Translation (CBBT) is a model where the local church leads every stage of the translation process, owning decisions and resourcing in culturally relevant ways and ensuring quality of the translation.
Typically, the work follows three essential stages: Understand, Translate, and Refine. The process often involves multilingual engagement with Scripture and strengthens the church’s capacity through stage-appropriate learning, practical technology tools, and openly shared resources.
Church-Based Bible Translation follows the same essential stages found in other translation efforts. Translation teams work to understand the meaning of Scripture, faithfully express that meaning in the local language, and continually refine the translation through review and feedback.
Quality assurance is an ongoing and collaborative process. Churches often work together across denominations and invite input from translation experts and the wider language community. Translation teams are also supported by openly-licensed biblical resources, practical technology tools, and stage-appropriate training that strengthens the church’s capacity throughout the process. Together, these elements help ensure that translations faithfully communicate the meaning of Scripture and are trustworthy, understandable, appropriate, and appealing for their language community.
In Church-Based Bible Translation, external Translation Consultants and agencies play a supportive role. They serve as coaches, offering training and guidance throughout the process. Rather than conducting final checks in isolation, they help build the church’s capacity for quality translation and support ongoing review and revision at the invitation of the local church.
Multimodal Bible translation uses text, audio, video, and visual storytelling to make Scripture more accessible, especially in oral cultures. By starting with natural communication methods such as speech and story, it allows communities to engage with Scripture early and meaningfully and ensures the completed translation is clearly understood and widely used.
A significant number of the language groups that still need Scripture access are oral-first cultures, making multimodal and oral-first approaches key in accelerating progress toward the 2033 All Access Goals.
Assisted Translation Technology (ATT) refers to the use of artificial intelligence, machine learning, and other scalable technologies to support human translators. These tools can assist with drafting and checking translations, as well as streamlining processes. They help translation teams work more efficiently while still relying on human oversight for accuracy and clarity.
AI is being used in Bible translation in several practical ways to support translators and strengthen translation workflows. Used alongside human expertise and community review, AI can strengthen the translation process and accelerate progress toward broader access to Scripture.
● AI-assisted Drafting: AI aids with the creation of draft translations, either through bulk draft generation (e.g., Scripture Forge) or real-time translation suggestions (e.g., Codex).
● AI-assisted Quality Checking: AI tools (e.g., Greek Room and AQuA) support quality review processes and are useful for both consultants and church-based translation teams.
● AI-assisted Research: AI acts as an on-demand research assistant (e.g., BT Servant), offering contextual insights, key-term definitions, cross-references, and linguistic support to help inform translation decisions.
● AI-assisted Coaching: AI engages conversationally to guide translators through structured workflows (e.g., the FIA process), helping them apply methodology step by step and improve decision quality.
No. AI serves as a support tool rather than a replacement. Human translators are essential for understanding the meaning of Scripture, navigating cultural and linguistic nuance, ensuring that translations are accurate and appropriate for the language community, and encouraging Scripture engagement long after a translation project is finished.
AI is being tested to support Oral Bible Translation in several ways. Speech-to-speech and speech-to-text technologies are being explored to help generate early oral drafts of Scripture in languages that may have little or no written form. Researchers are also exploring how AI may assist with oral back-translation and team reviewing of drafts.
AI is also being explored as a way to work with spoken language data. Audio from activities such as Scripture internalization or translation discussions may be converted into structured language data that strengthens translation tools and quality review processes.
These technologies are still in active exploration, but they show strong potential to support oral-first translation workflows and accelerate progress for languages where speech is the primary form of communication.
Like any new innovation, the adoption of Assisted Translation Technology (ATT) involves practical challenges.
AI tools rely on high-quality language data, so many lower-resource languages require a data collection process before these tools can be used effectively. Some communities also face practical barriers like limited technology or high-security environments.
Technological capabilities are also evolving quickly, posing another challenge for adoption. By the time a team is fully trained in a tool or emerging approach, a new industry development may cause healthy disruption. Teams are working on how to find a balance of usability and continuous improvement in this fast-changing environment.
These realities highlight the need for locally relevant solutions, trusted partnerships, and careful implementation when integrating new technologies into Bible translation. The Innovation Lab is committed to thoughtfully engaging these challenges.
For AI to support Bible translation effectively, it needs to be trained on reliable language data. Many “smaller” or lower-resource languages lack the digital content needed to build strong models.
To address this, the Innovation Lab is exploring approaches such as data augmentation, synthetic text generation, and community-led validation to strengthen language datasets and expand the reach of Assisted Translation Technology (ATT) to more language communities.
Free and open resources remove barriers that might otherwise prevent churches from participating in Bible translation. When biblical texts, translation notes, linguistic data, and supporting tools are openly licensed, churches and translation teams can access and use them without legal or financial restrictions.
Open resources also strengthen collaboration and build the church’s capacity for translation. Platforms such as the Aquifer, a curated open-access library of biblical and translation resources, and the Bible Well, a user-friendly application that makes these resources accessible on mobile and desktop, help equip local translators and support broader participation in Bible translation.
Partner Engagement
The All Access Goals require a collective effort that exceeds the capacity of any single entity. Across the Bible translation ecosystem, partners contribute at different stages of exploration, each playing a distinct role in advancing progress toward these goals.
The Lab partners with others to research needs and methods, co-develop technologies, implement and scale the use of translation tools, and lead communities in adopting new ways of accelerating quality Bible translation.
The Innovation Lab partners with those who are qualified, available, and aligned with the Lab’s commissioning. Whether through testing, technology, content, prayer, or other forms of support, we welcome those ready to collaborate in helping every person access God’s Word by 2033.
To find out more about getting involved, please head to the Get Involved Page.
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Reach out with questions or to connect with the Innovation Lab here.
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