While the organization expresses valid general concerns here about posting copies of official publications to the Internet, there are good legal and spiritual reasons for concluding that those concerns do not apply to this particular material, due to its particular nature and purpose:
(tap/click to show additional information)(tap/click to hide additional information)
* Although thumbnails are reduced-size versions of the complete original images or videos, they are considered transformative (a major factor in determining fair use) because their purpose is, not to supersede or replace the original images or videos, but rather to help people to find the original images or videos, so that they can use the original images or videos as they were meant to be used. Similarly, although this material may contain the complete text of the original official Chinese publication, this material can be considered transformative (a major factor in determining fair use) because its purpose is, not to supersede or replace the original official Chinese publication, but rather to help people to find knowledge about and understanding of the language used in the original official Chinese publication, so that they can use the original official Chinese publication as it was meant to be used. ^
The material posted for download below complements the text from the Chinese “God’s Love” book by adding Pīnyīn and English. It is available in both Simplified and Traditional Chinese.
Also, features have been added to the files to improve the user experience when they are used on computers, including mobile devices such as the iPad, the iPhone, and the iPod touch.
[Update 2018-12-17: The text of this 3-line material, which was originally produced several years ago, has been checked against the corresponding text of the current official 2017-02 Mandarin version of the “God’s Love” book on the WOL. The results are indicated in the table below. Additionally, during this checking, some errors were found in the material. The PDF files available for download below have been revised with annotations indicating the errors that were found. (Unfortunately, some less advanced PDF-viewing apps such as Apple’s Books (previously named iBooks) do not fully support PDF annotations, but PDF annotations are well supported in modern PDF-viewing apps such as GoodReader, Documents, Adobe Acrobat Reader, etc.)]
Remember that the material is a complement to the “God’s Love” book, not a replacement for it. If a “God’s Love” book is available, this material should be used along with it, not instead of it. This material is only meant to help publishers working in the Mandarin field, so that they can more quickly become more effective at preaching and teaching the good news to Mandarin-speaking people without being unnecessarily obstructed and delayed by the complex and difficult-to-learn-and-remember Chinese characters. (Also, see the Disclaimer at the top of this page.)
IMPORTANT: Please do not use this material as an excuse or as a crutch to just “get by” or “muddle through” at Mandarin meetings or Bible discussions. By all means, make good use of this material in such settings, but most importantly, use this material to help you really improve your knowledge and understanding of the Mandarin language, so that you can 1) listen with more understanding and 2) speak more effectively from your heart while praising Jehovah and preaching and teaching the good news in the Mandarin field.
The English translation follows these principles:
As noted above, when literal translations do not make sense, or are not understandable enough, then the effective meanings are used instead, surrounded by square brackets, i.e. [ ]. Otherwise, when literal translations should be understandable with a reasonable amount of mental effort, they are used to help provide insight into how words, phrases, sentences, etc. are actually put together in Mandarin.
It’s true that translating Mandarin morphemes literally can result in English translations that don’t follow familiar, traditional English usage patterns. However, the purpose of language-assistive material like this is not necessarily to move the hearts of English-speaking publishers through the use of their mother tongue—the ideal tools for that are the official English publications. Rather, the purpose of language-assistive material like this should be to help publishers to become familiar with Mandarin usage patterns, which of course can be different from English usage patterns. Becoming familiar with Mandarin usage patterns will help publishers to learn to understand and speak Mandarin better, so that they can ultimately better move the hearts of Mandarin-speaking householders through the use of their mother tongue. Those of you who are learning Mandarin to help in the Mandarin field are deeply appreciated, but ultimately, it’s not about you! 😄
While some other recent 3-line material has been released by others without being proofread (which does have the benefit of allowing the material to be released more quickly), this “God’s Love” book material has been carefully translated and proofread. Thus, you can reliably use it to help you master the pronunciations of the Chinese expressions used in it, and to help you gain insight into the meanings of these expressions. Also, since much care was taken to ensure that the English translations are context-appropriate, this material also reliably shows you how the Chinese expressions in it are used in particular contexts.
Of course, the material may still contain errors. If you find any, please email me to let me know.
The files named with “LN-A” (“Link Navigation-Annotation”) have been enriched and fortified with PDF bookmarks, links, and annotation.
PDF bookmarks and links work like web hyperlinks, immediately taking you to the destination linked to when they are clicked or tapped on. This capability makes the files much easier to navigate around in, especially on mobile devices such as the iPad, the iPhone, and the iPod touch. (See the PDF Link Navigation page for more information, including a video screen recording of the PDF bookmarks and links in action.)
PDF annotation is the ability to add highlighting, notes, etc. to PDFs, like the highlighting, notes, etc. many add to paper printouts. (See the PDF Annotation (Commenting) page for more information.)
While the regular files use letter size as the paper size, the files named with “XLP-iPhone-A5” use A5 as the paper size. These files are especially suited for use on devices such as the iPhone, the iPod touch, and other devices with similarly sized screens, such as Android phones. (See the 3-Line Material on the iPhone and the iPod touch page for instructions on how to use these files on an iPhone or an iPod touch.)
The XLP-iPhone-A5 files should also be a good fit on 6" (15.2 cm) screen Kindles and other similarly sized devices, as well as on tablets with 7" (17.8 cm) or so screens, as long as these devices have PDF support. (Note that landscape orientation may work best, as explained on the 3-Line Material on the iPhone and the iPod touch page.) Some may prefer to use these files on larger mobile devices like the iPad as well.
The XLP-iPhone-A5 files may also be printed out on letter size paper, resulting in Extra Large Print material. (See the Printing Extra Large Print 3-Line Material page for instructions.)
The “XLP-iPhone-A5” Complete Text files below are recommended for use on mobile devices like the iPad and the iPhone. This is because their content is more legible on smaller mobile devices, and also because they have PDF Link Navigation and Annotation (LN-A) support, as described above.
To download any of the files using Safari on an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch:
To download the files on a PC or a Mac:
The files are in Portable Document Format (PDF), and can be opened using the Adobe Acrobat Reader program, version 7 or above, although I recommend that you use the latest version. This program is free to download, and it runs on a variety of platforms, including Macs. (macOS’s Preview program may be used as well.) This button links to the download page for Adobe Acrobat Reader:
Check the Links News blog (news feed, Twitter) for news regarding updates to this resource, and also for news regarding other resources prepared by our fellow workers in the Chinese field. You may also find it interesting to check out the tiandi.info blog (news feed, Twitter), which is about various things related to the Chinese field. (Email me if you need login information, and include information on who referred you and/or what group/cong. you are in.)
To follow the Twitter account for the Links News and tiandi.info blogs, click or tap this button:
If you have any questions or comments, email me.
Enjoy using the material. May it help you to serve more effectively and joyfully in the Mandarin field.
“God’s Love” Bk. (Chinese-Pīnyīn-English PDFs) Download Links |
|
---|---|
Letter Size | |
[Update 2018-08-06: To free up time for more forward-facing projects, the Letter Size files are no longer being maintained. The XLP-iPhone-A5 Size files below will work where the Letter Size files worked, and they have Link Navigation functionality that the Letter Size files lacked.] | |
XLP-iPhone-A5 Size (Instructions: iPad, iPhone/iPod touch, Link Navigation, Annotation, Extra Large Print) |
|
Simplified | Traditional |
Complete Text 2018-12-17, with Link Navigation and Annotation |
Complete Text 2018-12-17, with Link Navigation and Annotation |