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Throughout my career, sharing the gospel with audiences in the Arab World required extensive infrastructure, including a cutting-edge recording studio, cassette tape production, printing presses, a mailroom, and several high-power radio stations across Africa, Europe, and the Caribbean. This infrastructure relied on support from both the Christian Reformed denomination and several generous congregations.

In 1958, I began my missionary work with The Back to God Hour’s Arabic Broadcast, working alongside Dr. Peter Eldersveld until his passing in 1965, and then with Dr. Joel Nederhood until I retired in 1994. By that time, the widespread availability of the internet had opened opportunities for global outreach, allowing other organizations to reuse Arabic tapes and pamphlets created throughout my career, and enabling me to share the lessons I learned. I share insights in English, posting articles on my website (unashamedofthegospel.org) and on Academia.edu, a platform for sharing academic research. I receive daily reports on the articles read, along with brief information about the readers.

The lessons learned cover a range of topics: scriptural themes that need more emphasis, the use of technology in missions, current events in the Middle East, and linguistics.

A key topic in missions is the redemptive work of the Lord Jesus Christ, which I discussed in an article titled “The Centrality of the Cross in the Missiology of Samuel M. Zwemer.” Another important subject is making Protestant systematic theology available in Arabic. I oversaw the translation of Herman Bavinck’s book, Our Reasonable Faith, into Arabic, translated by Professor Henry Zylstra. The four-volume Arabic translation is available online for Arabic-speaking readers.

In a paper titled “Utilizing Technology to Spread God’s Word,” I discussed how technology has not only supported my mission work but also helped fulfill the Great Commission since the first century AD.

The American news media offers a shallow view of current events in the Middle East. To broaden this perspective, I share personal experiences from my upbringing there and news I’ve gathered from Arab and French media and social platforms. Some of my recent articles include: “Reflections on the Arab Israeli Conflict” and “Recent Reports on a Vision for Domestic Regime Change.”

Since communication is a vital part of missions and living in one part of the world while preaching in another was especially challenging, I carefully kept up with the latest Arabic vocabulary and usage. I shared reflections on these insights in an article, “Conversational Arabic: A New Stage in the Language's Evolution.”

As Jesus said in Matthew 9:37-38, “…The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore, pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” I feel called to keep helping in the harvest, even long after retiring.

Like any major language, Arabic is fascinating, complex, and constantly evolving. Many factors influence how languages develop, including cultural exchanges, technological advancements in communication, and overall modernization. With the rise of social media, we observe a new form of Arabic, which we call “Conversational Arabic.” This version is often used in interviews, book reviews, and discussions of current events by political leaders and influencers.

Arabic is a Semitic language that originated in the Arabian Peninsula. Many tribes spoke their own dialects for everyday communication. Just before the rise of Islam, a common dialect emerged, enabling Arabic speakers to communicate easily across tribes. This dialect is often called Classical Arabic. Even after adopting Classical Arabic for formal and intertribal communication, speakers continued to use their local dialects, collectively known as Colloquial Arabic. The linguistic phenomenon where community members speak two dialects and choose which one to use based on the situation is called diglossia.

Arabic Dialects and Standards

As Arabic spread throughout the Middle East and North Africa, new local dialects emerged. These dialects are often grouped into categories like Gulf, Iraqi, Levantine (Eastern Mediterranean), Egyptian, and Maghrebi (Western North Africa). Starting during Napoléon's era, Classical Arabic was revised and became known as Modern Standard Arabic (MSA).

Classical Arabic, which served as the lingua franca of the Arab world for over a thousand years, is based on the language of the Quran. Sībawayh (Sībūya) Bayżāwī formalized the language in a work called “al-Ketāb” (The Book) in the late 8th century. Interestingly, this leading scholar of Classical Arabic grammar spoke Persian as his native language. Classical Arabic has complex grammar, is mainly a written language, and was spoken only in formal settings.

Colloquial Arabic varies by region, is almost exclusively a spoken language, and is used in informal settings. Some dialects are easy for other Arabs to understand, while others, especially those that differ more from Classical Arabic, are more difficult to understand.

Modern Standard Arabic is a contemporary version of Classical Arabic that is standardized, universal, and formal. It is the written and spoken language used in news broadcasts, academic settings, and international business. To reach broader audiences, spoken MSA is often simplified further by removing cases or inflections. Nevertheless, this simplified version of MSA still derives from Classical Arabic.

Review of English Grammar

In this section, we review aspects of grammar that English speakers rarely consider. According to Merriam-Webster's dictionary, an inflection is “the change of form that words undergo to mark such [grammatical] distinctions as those of case, gender, number, tense, person, mood, or voice.” Examples of inflection in English nouns include appending an “s” or “es” to most nouns to indicate plural forms or changing a “y” to “ies” for nouns ending in “y.” Inflections of nouns, pronouns, and adjectives are usually called declensions.

Verb inflections are called conjugations. In English, examples of verb conjugations include:

• forming the third-person singular present tense by appending “s” or “es,”
• creating the past tense or past participle by appending “ed,”
• forming the present participle by appending “ing,” and
• making the infinitive by placing the word “to” before the verb.

Passive voice is indicated by using a form of the verb “to be” combined with the past participle, as in “I was helped by them” versus the active voice in “They helped me.”

In many languages, inflections can gradually become simpler. For example, in the English of Shakespeare or the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible, the third-person singular present tense was formed by appending “eth,” as in Psalm 23:2, “He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.”

English nouns and adjectives do not have grammatical gender or case, so they do not undergo declensions related to those concepts. A rare exception is when phrases are borrowed from more inflected languages like Latin. For example, see declensions of the Latin word “bonus” (good), “pro bono,” “cui bono,” “bona fides,” and “summum bonum.”

Compared to English nouns, English personal pronouns are highly inflected to indicate:

• gender (male, female, and neuter, such as “he,” “she,” and “it”),
• person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd, as in “I,” “you,” & “he/she/it,” or “we,” “you,” & “they”),
• number (singular or plural, like “I” and “we,” as well as “he/she/it” and “they”), and
• case (subjective or nominative, objective or accusative, reflexive, and possessive or genitive).

In the KJV, second-person singular pronouns also expressed formality, The familiar forms, subjective “thou,” objective “thee,” reflexive “thyself,” and possessive “thine” and “thy/thine,” have now been replaced by the originally respectful forms “you,” “you,” “yourself,” “yours,” and “your”.

Review of Arabic Grammar

Unlike English, both MSA nouns and adjectives have declensions based on number, case, and gender. Besides singular and plural forms, MSA also includes a dual form. MSA uses three main cases: nominative, accusative, and genitive. The subject of a phrase takes the nominative case, the object of a verb takes the accusative case, and the genitive case indicates possession. MSA uses two genders: masculine and feminine.

In MSA, verbs conjugate for number, tense, and voice. Like declensions for nouns and adjectives, verbal conjugations show singular, dual, and plural forms. Tenses include present, past, and future. Voices include active and passive.

The Arabic term for inflections in Classical Arabic is ʾIʿrab. Languages that have inflected nouns, adjectives, and verbs, like Classical Arabic, tend to have flexible word order.

Conversational Arabic

Unlike MSA, Conversational Arabic is based on a native speaker’s dialect of Colloquial Arabic. These speakers use the informal grammar of their dialect but freely borrow from MSA’s extensive and constantly growing vocabulary. In Colloquial Arabic, nouns and adjectives do not have case declensions, which simplifies sentences but also makes word order more important.

The following is a translation of Matthew 2:1, “When Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea, in the days of King Herod…” into (1) Arabic script, (2) a transliteration of Classical Arabic using Latin characters, and (3) a transliteration of Colloquial Arabic using Latin characters:

1. وَلَمَّا وُلِدَ يَسُوعُ فِي بَيْتِ لَحْمِ الْيَهُودِيَّةِ، فِي أَيَّامِ هِيرُودُسَ الْمَلِكِ
2. Walamma wulida Yasu’u fi Bayti Lahmi fi ayyami Herodusa al-Malaki…
3. Lamma wulid Yasu’ fi Bayt Lahm fi ayyam Herodos l’Malek…

Notice how nearly every word, except for a few prepositions, has an extra syllable in Classical Arabic. Also, observe that when translating a document from a foreign language, in this case New Testament Greek, into Arabic, all colloquial dialects may use the same vocabulary.

In sharp contrast, everyday phrases, such as “I want to eat something now,” differ greatly among dialects. The following shows the diversity among the Colloquial Arabic dialects:

• Egyptian: أنا عايز آكل حاجة دلوقتي (Ana ‘ayez aakol haga dilwa’ti) I want to eat right away
• Iraqi: أريد أكل شي هسة (Areed akol shi hissa) I wanna eat something now
• Moroccan: بغيت ناكل شي حاجة دابا (bghiit nakul shi haja daba) I would like to eats something right now

Examples of Conversational Arabic

Here are some examples from a rapidly growing list of social media episodes where Conversational Arabic is used:

• An interview with Mar Beshara Butros al-Rai, Patriarch of the Maronite Church
• An interview with Joe Saddy, the Lebanese Minister of Energy
• The Lebanese Foreign Minister’s statement on ending Iran's role in Lebanon
• Al-Hadath interview with Sami Gemayel, the head of the Lebanese Kataeb Party
• Assaad Taha, on the failure of Muslims' experience in Germany

Note that the interviewees or speakers come from diverse professions, including top religious and political leaders as well as government ministers. Many or all of them may feel comfortable using their MSA skills at work; however, they have chosen to use Conversational Arabic during these interviews and statements.

Commentary on Conversational Arabic

Egypt’s history over the past 150 years demonstrates how new media can transform Arab culture and the Arabic language. Compared to other Arab nations, newspapers and theater flourished in Egypt as early as the 1870s. When radio broadcasting was introduced, it was also embraced by speakers of Egyptian Colloquial Arabic. This trend not only shaped modern Egyptian culture but also enabled Arabs worldwide to hear and see conversations in a dialect of Colloquial Arabic that was previously unfamiliar to them.

Social media promotes brief, casual exchanges and tends to favor maximizing audience size. As shown when comparing the transliterations of Matthew 2:1 into Classical and Colloquial Arabic, the informal grammar of the latter leads to more concise expressions. Additionally, since native Arabic speakers use their regional dialect of Colloquial Arabic in all their informal and everyday conversations, it is natural for them to be most fluent when speaking mainly in that dialect.

Although literacy in the Arab world has been improving rapidly, it still varies greatly among countries. The best way for Arabic speakers to reach the widest audience is to use the simplest grammar and the most familiar style of speaking, combined with standardized vocabulary. Therefore, we conclude that the rise of social media has been the catalyst for Conversational Arabic.

Most people familiar with the Bible know that the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, and the New Testament was written in Greek. However, it is less widely known that hundreds of verses in the Old Testament were written in Aramaic, and more than a dozen verses in the New Testament include Aramaic words. Like almost any book that depicts interacting cultures, the Bible also contains words borrowed from other languages, such as Egyptian and Persian.

A well-known example of a borrowed word in the Old Testament is “Pharaoh,” which initially meant “royal palace” in Egyptian and later came to refer to Egyptian kings. The book of Exodus mentions Pharaoh numerous times. The book of Genesis also mentions Abraham, Joseph, and Jacob meeting several Pharaohs. When Abraham lived, Egyptians did not call their king “Pharaoh”; however, they did so when Genesis was written, which was during or after the time of Moses.

An example of a foreign word in the New Testament is the Persian word “Magi,” which is best known for the story of the wise men from the East who visited Jesus. The word carries negative connotations in Acts 8:9 (sorcerer) and 13:8 (magician). It is the root of the English word “magic.”

Before the Babylonian captivity, which started in phases between 605 and 587 BC, the Israelites spoke Hebrew. During their exile, which ended in waves between 538 and 515 BC, they learned to speak Aramaic and mainly used Hebrew in homes and synagogues. In Daniel, the following passages were originally written in Aramaic.

• The Interpretation of Nebuchadnezzar's Dream
• The Fiery Furnace
• Nebuchadnezzar's Second Dream
• The Handwriting on the Wall
• The Lion’s Den
• Daniel’s Vision and Interpretation

The middle part of the book of Ezra was also written in Aramaic. These chapters include letters exchanged between various provincial officials and Persian kings, such as Artaxerxes and Darius, along with the kings’ replies. The letters were attempts to stop the reconstruction of God’s temple in Jerusalem and Darius’s final approval of the Jews’ rebuilding efforts.

Jesus and his contemporaries spoke Hebrew when reading scripture (the Old Testament) and used Aramaic in everyday conversations. Three of the four gospels (Matthew, Mark, and John), the book of Acts, and three of Paul’s epistles (Romans, 1 Corinthians, and Galatians) contain Aramaic words or phrases for emphasis. The most frequently used Aramaic word in the New Testament is “Abba,” which means “Father.” See Mark 14:36, Romans 8:15, and Galatians 4:6. The Aramaic word “Rabboni,” which means “rabbi” or “teacher,” also appears in multiple gospels: Mark 10:51 and John 20:16.

Some of the longest Aramaic phrases in the Bible are exclamations or commands:

• Matthew 27:46: And about the ninth hour Jesus cried out with a loud voice, saying, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
• Mark 5:41: Taking her by the hand he said to her, “Talitha cumi,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise.”

Many schools, churches, and Christian groups are named “Maranatha” in various countries. Because it resembles the Greek word “Marathon,” some may think the name has Greek origins. However, it actually comes from an Aramaic phrase that Paul used to punctuate 1 Corinthians 16:22. Maranatha appears in transliterated form in older English Bible versions like the KJV and ASV. Modern translations have moved maranatha to a footnote and now translate it as: “Our Lord, come!” or “O Lord, come!” According to Bibleinfo.com and BibleHub.com, maranatha is an Aramaic phrase, which could have one or both of the following meanings:

• Marana-tha - “Our Lord, come!” or “O Lord, come!”
• Maran-atha - “Our Lord has come!”

Christians widely used this Aramaic phrase in the first century to express their eager longing for Christ’s return. The last two verses of the Bible include this phrase, though written in Greek rather than Aramaic, as a response to Christ’s promise of his return.