There are 3500 deaf people living in Armenia. They do not get spiritual knowledge: they have no opportunity to participate in the church ceremonies simply because they do not understand them.
The deaf youth has difficulties with using spiritual literature and studying the Bible on their own.
From 2010, the BS of Armenia has been taking part in the events held by the deaf community, supporting them and organizing Bible studies in the Holy Trinity Church in Yerevan.
2016 saw the release of DVDs of Bible books in sign language. DVD production and distribution is ongoing with the following outcome so far:
- Children’s Bible, 365 stories, Old Testament, in sign language, Yerevan 2016
- Children’s Bible, 365 stories, New Testament, in sign language, Yerevan 2017
- Gospel According to Luke, in sign language, Yerevan 2018
- The Prophets of the Bible, in sign language, Yerevan 2019
- The Twelve, the Apostles of the Lord, in sign language, Yerevan 2020
"Children of the Bible", Yerevan, 2021.
In 2021, we have developed a mobile application that presents selected Bible stories in sign language. Thus:
1․ The stories will be presented in sign language,
2․ the same text will be on the screen at the same time.
This will be a special bilingual (speech and sign) study method, which will make the material available and comprehensible particularly for the deaf. Reading each story and showing in signs will be accompanied with corresponding images on the screen. This will make easier understanding and studying the Bible.
Thus the Bible will fully be available for the deaf, and each will have his/her own Bible.
“Thanks to these amazing children and good team work we achieved our crucial goal: we learned the stories of the 12 Apostles. More generations will study these stories. It was a pleasure to work with this team. It was a difficult task but the children were persistent. We could feel the presence of the Holy Spirit and the glory of God in each story. I am thankful to all those who had an important role and participation in this project and trusted us with fulfilling this important task. I am very much surprised at the understanding, comprehension of these children. It is hard to translate the names. They have created symbols related to the lives of the Apostles to translate their names. For example to translate Peter’s name they were using the sign of the key. It comes from their understanding of the Bible.”
Zubeyda Melikyan, translation supervisor
“My story was about Simon the Zealot. The NT contains little information of him, but that little piece covers huge wisdom. Being a nationalistic he put aside his worldly perspectives and followed God in words and in deeds. I translated this story with big love hoping that deaf children will learn a lot from this apostle choosing the strong and true path of faith. I am grateful to all those who arranged such a project for us. In the future, just like in the past, I am ready to participate again in this kind of mission of Bible translation.”
Lusine Holikyan, 18
