Korean Bible Translation

Background

In the late nineteenth century, the Joseon government did not permit Protestant missionaries to enter the country or to evangelize. As a result, the first Korean Bibles were produced abroad. The translation work was undertaken by missionaries who had come into contact with Koreans and by the Koreans who assisted them. It proceeded along two separate lines: one led by Scottish Presbyterian missionaries in Manchuria, and the other by Yi Su-jeong, a Korean living in Japan.

Development

The Ross Version in Manchuria

John Ross (1842–1915), a missionary of the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland, met Korean merchants in Manchuria and learned Korean from one of them, Yi Eung-chan. He began translating around 1877. His fellow missionary John MacIntyre took part in the work, as did several Koreans, including Yi Eung-chan, Baek Hong-jun, Kim Jin-gi, and Seo Sang-ryun. In March 1882 the Mungwang Seowon press in Shenyang published Yesu Syeonggyo Nugabogeum Jeonseo (The Gospel of Luke of the Holy Religion of Jesus), the first portion of the Bible ever printed in Korean. The Gospel of John appeared the same year, and other books followed one at a time. In 1887 Yesu Syeonggyo Jeonseo, containing the entire New Testament, was completed. These Bibles were carried into Korea by Korean colporteurs, who sold and distributed the Scriptures.

The Yi Su-jeong Version in Japan

Yi Su-jeong (1842–1886) traveled to Japan in 1882 as a member of an official Korean diplomatic mission and was baptized in 1883. At the urging of Henry Loomis, an American Bible Society missionary stationed in Yokohama, he took up the work of translation. In 1884 he published Hyeonto Hanhan Sinyak Jeonseo, a Classical Chinese New Testament annotated with Korean grammatical particles. In February 1885 he published Sinyak Magajeon Bogeumseo Eonhae (The Gospel of Mark), written in a mixture of hangul and Chinese characters. When Horace Underwood and Henry Appenzeller entered Korea in April 1885, they brought this Gospel of Mark with them. The two missionaries later revised it and published a revised edition in 1887.

Translation within Korea and the Syeonggyeong Jeonseo

After the missionaries had established themselves in Korea, a Board of Bible Translators was formed. The board began by revising Yi Su-jeong's Gospel of Mark and the Ross Version's Luke and Romans, work that laid the foundation for a standardized orthography. The New Testament books were then issued one by one, from Matthew in 1892 to Revelation in 1900. The complete New Testament first appeared in 1900 and was revised and reissued several times thereafter. Among the Old Testament books, Genesis and Psalms were published first. From 1908 onward, the missionary William D. Reynolds (Korean name Yi Nul-seo) worked alongside the Korean translators Yi Seung-du and Kim Jeong-sam. The Old Testament translation was completed in 1910. With the publication of the Guyak Jeonseo (Old Testament) in 1911, the Syeonggyeong Jeonseo, the first complete Korean Bible containing both the Old and New Testaments, was finally in place.

Results and Influence

The 1911 edition later came to be known as the "Old Translation" (Guyeok). Revision work began in September of that same year, and the Syeonggyeong Gaeyeok (Revised Version) was published in 1938. The Korean Revised Version, which brought the Revised Version into conformity with the Unified Korean Orthography, first appeared in 1952, and its definitive edition was published in 1961. The New Korean Revised Version, a further revision of the Korean Revised Version, was published in 1998 and is used by many churches today. In addition to the Revised Version line, the Korean Bible Society publishes the New Korean Standard Version and the Common Translation.

Assessment

• Yesu Syeonggyo Nugabogeum Jeonseo and Sinyak Magajeon Bogeumseo Eonhae were designated Registered Cultural Heritage items in 2016. The Gospel of Luke was recognized both as the first Korean Bible and as the work that led to subsequent translations.
• The Ross Version, written entirely in hangul, was aimed at ordinary people. The Yi Su-jeong Version, written in a mixture of hangul and Chinese characters, is regarded as a translation intended for the educated yangban elite. The Yi Su-jeong Version is also valued as a source for Korean linguistics because it documents the Korean language of the late nineteenth century.
• Ross is known as the first person to introduce word spacing into written Korean.
• Readers of the Ross Version formed communities of faith on their own before missionaries arrived. On this basis, it has been argued that the Korean church began with the translated Bible.
• The early translations drew heavily on Chinese and English Bibles in addition to the original-language texts. Debates over translation style and the underlying base texts are covered in the article Bible translation controversies.