Addressing Reluctant Responses to the New Luba-Katanga Bible

This paper addresses reluctance to adopt the new translation of the Bible into Luba Katanga language. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Luba community is predominantely found in the former province of Katanga, with a negligible minority in Kasai. In Zambia, the local Luba dialect was also recently designated as one of the country’s official languages. In the early 1950s, the first translation of the Bible for this population (MUKANDA UKOLA WA MWINE LEZA) was published. It was the only Bible the natives knew and read for nearly sixty years, allowing it to permeate their consciousness. Nonetheless, it had significant inconsistencies that needed to be addressed, hence the significance of the 2008 revision (DIBUKU DIJILA). In fact, almost all non lexicalized words pertaining to animals, birds, trees, measurement units, and other non-Luba objects, which were incorrectly translated in the first edition, were handled better than in the first edition. Despite these efforts, the population continues to request reprints of the original translation. This paper investigates the root causes of these reluctances and proposes potential remedies.