Phyle New Testament

• Location: South America
• Pseudonym: Phyle (pronounced foo-leh)
• Target Dedication Date: 2025

The Phyle people of South America number about 24,000, with 60% of them professing Christianity and 12% claiming to be evangelical. As an agricultural people, they primarily cultivate cassava and depend on hunting and fishing for their food sources.

When Baptist missionaries arrived in their region in 1974, the Phyle people generously gave the foreigners permission to enter their land and live among them. Six long years passed without any evidence of spiritual fruit, but in 1980, almost an entire village responded to the gospel message. The Pemon churches began growing and reproducing and now number about two dozen.

Expelled from the village by authorities in the 1980s, the missionaries moved to a larger town nearby and began translating the New Testament into the language of the Phyle people. When the missionaries had almost completed translating the Gospel of Matthew, BI senior translation consultant Dr. Henry Osborn performed a quality check on the work. BI adopted the New Testament translation project in December 1997, with consultant Ross Hodsdon working alongside the translators until his death.

Following the completion and checking of each book of the New Testament, the Phyle believers photocopied and bound the manuscript to distribute it among their churches. Despite numerous and various complications, including severe illnesses and the eventual expulsion of missionaries from the country, the translation work is now finished and the first Phyle New Testament translation was dedicated in three villages on December 20, 2025. As the Phyle continue to grow in God’s Word, they are able to share it with those around them. Although neighboring people groups speak different dialects, they are still able to read and understand this translation without difficulty.