There are more than six thousand languages in use. Over 400 of those languages have full translations of the Bible; over 1000 have the New Testament, and many more have at least some portion of the Bible.
In terms of language learning: if you're learning a language, you can probably find a copy of the Bible in both it and your native language. It'll help if you're familiar with the Bible, but even if you aren't it's a good reading exercise.
When I started French, I found my mom's copy of the French Bible; I made it my goal to read a bit every night, whether I understood it or not. And you know what? It really helped my reading comprehension, and quite possibly my pronunciation, too. I've been doing the same thing with Arabic, and while it's been slow going (even with pronunciation help), I know it's been good for me.
And if there isn't a translation? Wycliffe Bible Translators plans to have a project in every language that needs it by 2025. And yes, there are translations in Klingon and Esperanto.
Main source: http://www.wycliffe.org/about/statistics.aspx
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I've never tried reading Bibles in foreign languages but I can see the advantages to doing so. It'll throw up idioms well as well, and since there are many sayings in English that derive from Bible verses it would be interesting to see if they're used as commonly in other languages.
ReplyDeleteI've always prefered books of cartoons, though they usually require a good grasp of vocabulary first -- the jokes often play on words.