Casket Empty Thai Translation Project Update

Dr. Kaminski at the Siloam Bible Institute in January 2024, wearing a tradtiional Karen garment

Casket Empty Thai Translation Project Update

This January I had the privilege of traveling to Thailand to teach the Old Testament. Casket Empty timelines, maps, study guides, and Bible studies have now all been translated into Thai. This has been a four-year Thai translation project accomplished by International Ministries. Kit Ripley had oversight of the project and she was my gracious host! Throughout the four-year project, she used her administrative gifts faithfully and sacrificially to ensure that the translation project was completed according to schedule and that the training conferences were successful. Khun Lek, former Editor and Manager of the Institute of Christian Studies and Church Development spent years translating all the material. I am grateful for his dedicated service and his meticulous attention to detail to ensure the accuracy of the translation. David Palmer, author of the New Testament portion of Casket Empty, had traveled to Thailand in 2022 to teach the New Testament. With the translation of the Old Testament into Thai now completed, I had the opportunity to teach the Old Testament at two separate training events. An organization called iChurch has produced the Casket Empty timelines, books, and study guides in Thai, and they are now available as hard copies and electronically on their platform (www.casketempty.ichurch.cc). Casket Empty has granted permission to iChurch to produce and sell the material in Thailand, and the income generated will remain in Thailand so that the Thai church can be the beneficiary of this project. I’m grateful for the team of people who worked on this project, including translators, training event organizers, staff from iChurch, and skilled interpreters. What a blessing to partner with such faithful people who clearly love the Lord!

Dr. Kaminski teaching at the Siloam Bible Insititute

The first training event was at the Siloam Bible Institute in Chiang Mia, where students from the Karen people gathered to study the Old Testament. The Karen people have been living in Burma for centuries and have also migrated to Thailand, with many living on the Myanmar-Thai border. You may be familiar with the first Baptist missionaries sent out from Derby Wharf in Salem, Massachusetts in 1812. The story of Adoniram Judson by C. Anderson (To the Golden Shore: The Life of Adoniram Judson), which recounts Judson’s missionary work in Burma, has held a special place in my heart since my husband and I lived in Salem for fifteen years. We lived less than five minutes from the historic Tabernacle Church where the missionaries were commissioned on February 6, 1812, amid a blistering snowstorm. He translated the Bible from Hebrew and Greek into Burmese, and another missionary, Jonathan Wade, worked on a Burmese dictionary and studied the Sgau Karen language. It was an honor for me to teach the Karen people at the Siloam Bible Institute, and you’ll see from the picture above that I wore a woven and beautifully embellished traditional Karen garment that I was given by the Siloam Bible Institute.

The next two-day training was hosted by McGilvary College of Divinity at the Green Lake Resort. I taught through the Old Testament using the Casket Empty banner displayed behind me (in Thai!), and I was assisted by three dedicated and gifted translators, Ajarn Golf and Ajarn Auom (faculty at McGilvary College of Divinity) and Ajarn Thanit (principal and faculty at Chiang Mai Theological Seminary). As you may know, less than one percent of Thailand are  believers in Jesus, and Buddhism is the main religion. As such, there are very limited Christian resources that have been translated into Thai. I’m grateful for the dedicated believers in Thailand and for those who were part of this translation project. I’m thankful for those who contributed financially to enable the project to be completed. My prayer is that God would use the Casket Empty Bible curriculum to equip and bless the Thai church, and that it would bear much fruit in the years to come.