A team of Wycliffe Bible Translators has developed a keyboard that will help people interact with the Bible in the Mbelime language.
The Mbelime language is a minority language spoken in West Africa by around 100,000 people. Mbelime speakers are largely monotheists, and interest in Christianity has been slowly rising over the last two decades. An estimated 10% of Mbelime speakers now attend a local church.
Johannes Merz, who together with his wife Sharon serves with Wycliffe in Benin, said: ‘In the past few years, smartphones have become an integral part of life for many people in Benin. Many people use them for the same purposes as others may use a computer. For Mbelime speakers, however, there has been a problem. How can you write in Mbelime on your smartphone when you don’t have all the letters and accents available? These people wanted to write messages to each other in their own language… but they were frustrated. Mbelime speakers kept asking: ‘When is there going to be a Mbelime keyboard for our phones?’ It was painful repeatedly saying we didn’t know. Imagine not being able to write your language on your phone!’
