Table: Clips to subtitle-Introduction to BG

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108+ Introductions to Bhagavad-gita As It Is - a call to mission

Call for Mission PDF
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A Call For Mission

On 20 February 2018 devotees will be celebrating the 52nd anniversary of Śrīla Prabhupāda speaking his Introduction to Bhagavad-gītā As It Is.

Vanipedia is organizing the ideal gift to offer Śrīla Prabhupāda on this special day and requests your participation. We want to translate Śrīla Prabhupāda’s Introduction to Bhagavad-gītā As It Is into 108+ languages.

Śrīla Prabhupāda is a great strategist determined to spread Krishna consciousness all over the world. His strategy is clearly centered on the translations and distribution of his books. He had full faith that his teachings could bring about a spiritual revolution in the hearts of people from all lands and thus he instructed his devotees to translate his books into all languages. Our lives brighten up and take on real meaning when we assist him in this work. We hanker to experience Śrīla Prabhupāda’s oceanic smile expressing his gratitude to us for continuing his mission.

Śrīla Prabhupāda wrote in a letter to one of his GBC men: Please print as many books as possible, this is my real pleasure. By printing these books of our Krsna Conscious philosophy in so many different languages we can actually inject our movement into the masses of persons all over the world, especially there in the western countries and we can literally turn whole nations into Krsna Conscious nations. (Letter to Hrdayananda Maharaj on 21st December 1974)

To a devotee who was helping him to translate the 1st canto of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam into Spanish Śrīla Prabhupāda wrote: I am in due receipt of the Spanish edition of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam first Canto, Chapters 12-15, and I thank you very much. These books are the life of human society. Others may be disturbed, but they cannot disturb this Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam. Let any man come, but here they cannot touch. We are putting these books for deliberation before the topmost thinkers of human society. Therefore, I have to see that in all languages all of our books are published. If we strain, and if he takes one book home, someday people will come to understand what valuable knowledge they have received. It is transcendental literature. Nobody can challenge it. It is done so nicely, without any spot, the spotless Purana. Please continue like this to print books in all the languages for the benefit of suffering, misdirected humanity. (Letter to Puranjana dasa on 4th May 1976)

Just a few months before Śrīla Prabhupāda physically left this world he stated: So now you all GBC make a plan how to introduce the books in every home. The same policy in other languages also. America is English language. Similarly, we can do here also in Hindi language, in Oriya language, or in Europe. So we have got much work ahead. Don't think our business is finished. No. Simply very intelligent we have to do it. (Conversation in Bhuvansevara on 29th of January 1977)

A little while later Śrīla Prabhupāda said: Every house should have our books, every gentleman, in any language. It doesn’t matter. That is our propaganda. Now you are getting all languages, so we can capture the whole world. (Conversation in Mayapur on the 16th February of 1977)

And just after that, while discussing the GBC resolutions Śrīla Prabhupāda remarked: Printing and translation must continue. That is our main business. It cannot be stopped. Must go on. Just like persisting, now we have got so many Hindi literatures. (laughing) I was simply persisting, “Where is Hindi?" So it has come to some tangible form. (Conversation in Mayapur on 1st of March 1977)

Śrīla Prabhupāda left this world before his work was finished and still today, after 4 decades, our master’s work is not completed. While dedicated devotees have translated Śrīla Prabhupāda’s Bhagavad-gītā As It Is into 60 languages, compared to the Bible’s 636 languages, we see that there is still a lot of scope for our expansion. To stimulate an increase in the number of languages, Vanipedia has initiated a groundbreaking project to translate the Introduction to Bhagavad-gītā As It Is into 108+ languages by February 2018, coinciding with the 52nd anniversary of Śrīla Prabhupāda first recording it. During the past 4 years we developed a streamlined process for translating and have so far engaged over 570 devotees from 90 different languages to subtitle 1,080 short YouTube video clips of Śrīla Prabhupāda’s lectures more than 30,800 times. Recently we created 24 video clips of the 3 hours & 12 minutes recording of the Introduction to Bhagavad-gītā As It Is - each 8 minutes long. The English subtitles are already done and translations have begun in some languages. It takes only 24 hours to complete one language.

As this project develops, not only will people be able to read the Introduction in their own language, but they will also be able to hear Śrīla Prabhupāda’s voice in these short YouTube clips. This will surely stimulate greater interest in Śrīla Prabhupāda, the Bhagavad-gītā philosophy and dedication to translate the full book into more languages. We invite devotees to bless this noble effort and participate by translating in your own language. If you are interested, please contact Visnu Murti by email: [email protected]

  • A list of over 150 languages with the number of speakers and geographical location can be seen here.

Progress Report as of May 2022

65 Languages with the 24 Videos Completed

  • Afrikaans, Amharic, Arabic, Azerbaijani, Bengali, Bhojpuri, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese-simplified, Chinese-traditional, Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Esperanto, Fanti, Finnish, French, Georgian, German, Greek, Gujarati, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Javanese, Kannada, Kazakh, Latvian, Lithuanian, Macedonian, Malay, Marathi, Moldovan, Nepali, Newari, Oriya, Papiamentu (Papiamento), Persian, Polish, Portuguese(Pt), Portuguese(Br), Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Serbo-Croatian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Tamil, Telugu, Thai, Turkmen, Turkish, Ukrainian Vietnamese and Yoruba.

10 Languages in Progress

  • Akan, Creole (Mauritian), Estonian, Kurdish, Magar, Maithili, Mongolian, Punjabi, Tagalog, and Welsh.

Video Clips (24) to subtitle of the Introduction to BG recorded on 19-20 February 1966 in New York

  • Clip No. = A unique number allotted to each file and linkable to the Results table; DotSub Links = The link to the Dotsub video ready to be translated by you in your language; Clip Name By Date = The audio clip sortable by date, the first 2 numbers equals the year, then month, then day; Vaniquotes Page With Audio Clip = The text and audio clip as presented in Vaniquotes for hearing and reading.; YouTube Links = The link to the Video on YouTube; (mm:ss) = The duration of the audio clip; Location = The place where Srila Prabhupada gave the lecture; Description = The scripture and verse that Srila Prabhupada is lecturing on, i.e. BG = Bhagavad-gītā; CC = Śrī Caitanya-caritāmṛta; SB = Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam; ISO = Śrī ĪŚopaniṣad; NOD = Nectar of Devotion
Clip No. DotSub Links Clip Name By Date Vaniquotes Page With Audio Clip YouTube Links (mm:ss) Location Description

Tables Relating to the Project

  • In these tables - with sortable columns - is information relating to the Multi-language subtitle project of Vanimedia.

Multi-language Subtitle Results -- Translating Teams -- Languages to Subtitle -- YouTube Videos With Themes -- Spreadsheet of Results -- Vaniquotes Pages