Louis Segond was a Swiss theologian who translated the Bible

Bible

The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...

 into French

French language

French is a Romance language spoken as a first language in France, the Romandy region in Switzerland, Wallonia and Brussels in Belgium, Monaco, the regions of Quebec and Acadia in Canada, and by various communities elsewhere. Second-language speakers of French are distributed throughout many parts...

 from the original texts in Hebrew

Hebrew language

Hebrew is a Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Culturally, is it considered by Jews and other religious groups as the language of the Jewish people, though other Jewish languages had originated among diaspora Jews, and the Hebrew language is also used by non-Jewish groups, such...

 and Greek

Greek language

Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages. Native to the southern Balkans, it has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning 34 centuries of written records. Its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the majority of its history;...

.

He was born in Plainpalais, near Geneva. After studying theology in Geneva

Geneva

Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...

, Strasbourg

Strasbourg

Strasbourg is the capital and principal city of the Alsace region in eastern France and is the official seat of the European Parliament. Located close to the border with Germany, it is the capital of the Bas-Rhin département. The city and the region of Alsace are historically German-speaking,...

 and Bonn

Bonn

Bonn is the 19th largest city in Germany. Located in the Cologne/Bonn Region, about 25 kilometres south of Cologne on the river Rhine in the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, it was the capital of West Germany from 1949 to 1990 and the official seat of government of united Germany from 1990 to 1999....

, he was pastor

Pastor

The word pastor usually refers to an ordained leader of a Christian congregation. When used as an ecclesiastical styling or title, this role may be abbreviated to "Pr." or often "Ps"....

 of the Geneva National Church in Chêne-Bougeries

Chêne-Bougeries

Chêne-Bougeries is a municipality in the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland. It recently crossed the symbolic barrier of 10,000 inhabitants and thus became officially a city.-History:Chêne-Bougeries is first mentioned in 1270 as Quercus...

, then from 1872, Professor of Old Testament in Geneva.

The translation of the Old Testament

Old Testament

The Old Testament, of which Christians hold different views, is a Christian term for the religious writings of ancient Israel held sacred and inspired by Christians which overlaps with the 24-book canon of the Masoretic Text of Judaism...

, commissioned by the Vénérable Compagnie des Pasteurs de Genève, was published in two volumes in 1871 (Meusel has 1874 as the publication date), followed by the New Testament

New Testament

The New Testament is the second major division of the Christian biblical canon, the first such division being the much longer Old Testament....

, translated as a private venture, in 1880.

The text was then reviewed by experts. The result is the 1910 revision
that is now freely available on Internet.

External links

• Unabridged book-by-book 1910 revision of Segond's translation of the Bible vargenau.free.fr
• Various options for downloading or searching www.awmach.org
• Free audiobook of Louis Segond's Version at www.bibvoice.org