Dr. George Mak (Hong Kong Baptist University)

Established by an amalgamation of the China agencies of the British and Foreign Bible Society and the American Bible Society in 1937, the China Bible House (中華聖經會) was the first national Bible Society in China, specializing in Bible translation, publishing and distribution. Its formation was immediately followed by the Second Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945), which hindered its development from a foreign-dominated organization into a self-supporting, self-governing one. Drawing on findings from my preliminary archival research on the China Bible House’s work during the war, I will argue in this talk that the China Bible House’s sustained connection with the two foreign Bible societies was instrumental in enabling it to publish and distribute more than twenty-two million copies of complete Bibles, Testaments and biblical portions over the course of the war.