The First Sunday in March is Bible Sunday

Bible translation

The revised Hungarian translation of the Bible was published in 2014. After the publication, demand increased for the creation of a Study Bible version of the new translation. The Study Bible, which originally came out in 1996, is actually the translation of the Stuttgart Study Bible. In the meantime, the original version of the German text has been revised and republished, so it is relevant and timely for the Hungarian Bible Society Foundation (MBTA) to also renew this tool which is really important for our pastors and congregation members who are curious about the secrets of the Bible. The publishing edition is on-going; according to our plans, the new Study Bible will be come out at the end of 2016 or at the beginning of 2017.

The Revised Károli Bible of 1908 – written in the modern Hungarian language style

We started to set the Revised Károli Bible to the modern Hungarian language style in 2014. The Károli text that is currently available reflects the 19th-20th century’s language style, which makes reading it a little bit difficult. We don’t want to make changes in the original translation; what we want to do is to keep the most popular and most beloved Bible translation up-to-date, since its former version was the Bible used at the time of the Hungarian Reformation.

No notes or comments

At the beginning of the Bible Society movement in the early 1800’s, there was a rule which said that Bibles had to be published without any notes or comments. On one hand it guaranteed that all Christian churches, regardless of their denomination, could use the Bible and on the other hand it was a reference to the principle of ’Sola Scriptura’, that the Bible  itself is enough for belief and salvation. In the last decades this principle has changed; now Bibles can be published with study notes to help readers who are not familiar with the Bible itself, so long as they do not include any specific denominational doctrine.

Sign language-Bible

In 2014, the Hungarian Baptist Church took the initiative to make a new translation of the sign language-Bible for those who are deaf or hard of hearing. The Ecumenical Council of Churches in Hungary stood by this idea, and naturally the Hungarian Bible Society Foundation supported the action as well, not just financially but professionally too; the Committee for the Care of the Text delegated two professors – one Old-Testament and one New-Testament expert – to reach bigger success in this project. The group of interpreters has now finished with the Gospel of Mark’s text; according to their plans, the DVD will be released in the middle of 2016.

Bible and Reformation exhibition

Among several important programs, we are preparing a travelling exhibition about the connections between the Bible and the Reformation for the year 2017. The exhibition will be presented jointly with the Romanian Bible Society at various settlements through the Carpathian Basin.

Spreading the Word

In 2015, most of our member churches were involved in a buy-one-get-one promotional program, which came to fruition thanks to the generous sponsorship of the 120-year old Korean Bible Society. With this assistance, congregations were able to purchase discount soft-covered Bibles for church events like community Bible promotions or for a confirmation. Our common Bible promotion with the General Convent, which has been operating for several years, also still continues. In the autumn of 2014 and at the beginning of 2015, five thousand Bibles were sent to Hungarian high school freshmen within and beyond the border; out of this donation, thousand five hundred Bibles were the presents of the Hungarian Bible Society Foundation.  

Programs

In 2015 we organized our traditional open-aired Bible reading event at Pentecost on the stairs of the Reformed Church at Calvin Square, Budapest. The central message was to take solidarity with our persecuted Christian brothers and sisters. The common Bible reading was followed by an organ concert and an ecumenical worship.

Among the refugees –with a Bible

In the summer of 2015, a large refugee wave reached the European Union’s countries, the size of which had never been seen before, including in our country too. We wanted to participate in creating better living conditions for those who had to temporarily stay in Budapest. With the helping hands of volunteers, we handed out toiletry packages at train stations and at St. Columba’s Scottish Mission in Budapest, where an overnight shelter for families with young children was set up. Every package contained one copy of the “On the Road” booklet, which tells more about refugees in the Bible and in our days, and presents current readers with practical advice and personal testimonies of refugees. We provided the booklet in English, French, Arabic and Farsi. After the closing of the Hungarian-Serbian border, the refugees weren't able to reach Budapest, so we gave several ecclesiastical and civil organizations, as well as private people, booklet about the refugees or a foreign language New-Testament to hand out to those who were waiting at the Slovenian-Croatian border trying to travel to Austria or Germany by bus. Naturally, in these months, our ’Refugees in the Bible’ travelling exhibition, which we made in 2013, became the focus of interest.

The Hungarian Bible Society and the Reformed Mission Centre have prepared the exhibition that urges us to see the vulnerability of refugees and highlights our relations to them. See here the online version of the travelling exhibition with the title of “I was a stranger and you invited me in…” (Matthew 25:35). 

Assistance for Iraqi Christians

The Hungarian Bible Society’s supporters could join a world-wide assistance program in 2015. Alongside the Danish, Australian, Scottish and American Bible Societies, we also took part in a mission that supported the Iraqi Bible Society to distribute aid packages worth $104,000 USD in the Kurdish Republic of Ararat, among the forty thousand Christians who are living in tents in the town of Erbil.

When did the RCH begin celebrating Bible Sunday?

Traditionally, the first Sunday of March is Bible Sunday in our Reformed Church. It is interesting that the Daily Devotion in 1965 refers to 12 September as Bible Sunday, while the Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Hungary still celebrates it on the last Sunday of October, closer to Reformation Day.
The British and Foreign Bible Society’s 100th anniversary had a great role in the introduction of Bible Sunday in Hungary. We read in Rev László Csiky’s sermon on 6 March, 1904, appropriately titled “At the Bible Sunday,” that, “... my Christian brothers and sisters, tomorrow will be the 100th anniversary, that the British and Foreign Bible Society was established on 7 March, 1804, on Wednesday in London. The whole Christian Protestant World, including us, the Hungarian Evangelical Reformed Church, celebrates the one hundred year old memory of this glorious milestone of the charity’s history, which made the greatest impression on Christian’s spirits; when this enormous Bible Society was established.”
We also know from the Protestant Ecclesiastical and Educational Journal that the leadership of the Hungarian Reformed and Evangelical-Lutheran Churches decided that, on 6 March, 1904 in every congregation the pastors should, “commemorate during worship the importance of the Bible and the British and Foreign Bible Society, which gained great merits globally in the promotion of the Bible.”
After the commemoration in March, 1904, the demand was so high that our Church’s Convent designated the first Sunday of March “Bible Sunday”. The exact date of Bible Sunday changes year to year, but from 1967 we commemorate this event on the first Sunday in March.

Based on the work of Ferenc Pap

Publication of a Ukrainian-Hungarian New Testament

We helped the mission and pastoral care of the church in Sub-Carpathia and the Hungariansliving there, with our bi-lingual New Testaments, which have been issued since 1990. Our latest fundraising program aims to publish a Ukrainian-Hungarian New Testament. This has been a long-awaited program for the Hungarian population of Sub-Carpathia due to their native language, their poor social situation, and minority status. The Ukrainian Bible Society will be our partner in this mission as well.

Originally published in Reformátusok Lapja, 2016/3.

Translation by Lilla László