The Schlachter-Bibel is a German

German language

German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....

 translation of the Bible

Bible

The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

 by Franz Eugen Schlachter

Franz Eugen Schlachter

Franz Eugen Schlachter was a revivalist preacher, classical scholar and the translator of the Schlachter Bible....

, first translated from the Greek

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

 and Hebrew text of the Bible in 1905.

At first he published the Book of Job

Book of Job

The Book of Job , commonly referred to simply as Job, is one of the books of the Hebrew Bible. It relates the story of Job, his trials at the hands of Satan, his discussions with friends on the origins and nature of his suffering, his challenge to God, and finally a response from God. The book is a...

 in the year 1893. Later on, the so-called Miniaturbibel

Miniaturbibel

The Miniatur-Bible was the first bible version in the German language in the last century . The translator, Franz Eugen Schlachter, was a preacher of the Evangelische Gesellschaft in Bern, Switzerland.-History:...

 was the first German language Bible version in the twentieth century. The edition was published in the year 1905, the following house-bible in the year 1907 and the hand-bible in the year 1908. The last edition of the original Miniaturbibel was published in the year 1911.

Franz Eugen Schlachter was a preacher of the Evangelische Gesellschaft in Bern, Switzerland and a man of the holiness movement

Holiness movement

The holiness movement refers to a set of beliefs and practices emerging from the Methodist Christian church in the mid 19th century. The movement is distinguished by its emphasis on John Wesley's doctrine of "Christian perfection" - the belief that it is possible to live free of voluntary sin - and...

. The translation was concordant, and at the same time, the language flowed well. The reader could discern the meaning of the original text. By 1911, the year of Schlachter's death, he had completed 13 editions of his Bible.

In 1918, two Swiss pastors named Linder and Kappeler revised the Schlachter bible, and the Genfer Bibelgesellschaft lead a new revision of the translation in 1951, although it was a light revision. The text was faithful to Franz Eugen Schlachter's original and had only been edited slightly. In 2003, the last revision, called the Schlachter Version 2000, was completed. It follows the same approach as the original Miniaturbibel, but is also very accurate to the Greek and Hebrew original. The new edition also includes many references.

All editions of the Schlachter Bible came in three formats: there was a pocket-edition, a hand-edition, and a greater family-edition.

Literature of the Schlachter-Bibel

• Franz Eugen Schlachter, ein Beitrag zur Geschichte und Theologie der Gemeinschaftsbewegung im Kanton Bern – Akzessarbeit von Walter Wieland, evang. theol. Fakultät der Uni Bern, eingereicht bei Prof. Dr. A. Lindt im Sommer-Semester 1982, Edition Neues Leben, Lützelflühstr. CH 3452 Grünenmatt
• Gottfried Wüthrich: Franz Eugen Schlachter - sein Leben und Wirken, Genf, 16. März 2002 Manuskriptdruck
• Karl-Hermann Kauffmann: Franz Eugen Schlachter und die Heiligungsbewegung, Biographie unter Bezugnahme auf das geistliche Umfeld Schlachters und mit einer kurzen Geschichte der Schlachter Bibel, ausführliche Fassung mit 100 Abbildungen. Gedenkschrift zum Jubiläum "100 Jahre Schlachter-Bibel". Eigenverlag Freie Brüdergemeinde Albstadt, 2005
• Karl-Hermann Kauffmann: Franz Eugen Schlachter, ein Bibelübersetzer im Umfeld der Heiligungsbewegung, Verlag Johannis, Lahr, 2007, ISBN 978-3-501-01568-1

External links

• Audio Schlachter-Bibel 2000 online to hear and Download
• Schlachter-Bibel 2000 online
• Schlachter-Bibel 1951 online search
• wap.axios.de/bibel – Schlachter-Bibel for WAP-Browser