This article explores the path of the National Bible Society of Scotland (NBSS) to publishing its annotated edition of Proverbs in the Mandarin Union Version in China during the Republican era. After providing an overview of how the NBSS became the first Bible society to publish annotated Chinese Gospels and Acts in the 1890s, this article examines why it took more than three decades thereafter for the NBSS to publish an annotated edition of another biblical book. It argues that one of the main reasons was that the NBSS had difficulty securing reputable scholarly Protestant missionaries’ services to prepare the necessary annotations. Moreover, this article suggests that the familiarity of the Chinese people with short and pithy sayings was a condition favourable for the reception of Proverbs in China. This, together with the status of the Mandarin Union Version as the standard biblical text for Chinese Protestants, helps explain why the NBSS eventually published an annotated edition of Proverbs in the Mandarin Union Version. Annotations in that edition of Proverbs are analysed to understand how they could help bridge the gaps between Proverbs and its Chinese readers, so as to shed light on why such an edition of Proverbs was well-received as an evangelistic tool.

This article explores the continuing linguistic impact of the Mandarin Union Version by investigating and contrasting two Chinese translations of William Paul Young's global bestseller The Shack (2007): the Traditional Chinese version Xiaowu (《小屋》, 2009) and the Simplified Chinese version Pengwu (《棚屋》, 2010). Ever since its publication, the Mandarin Union Version has served as the predominant Bible within Mandarin-speaking Protestant communities across the world. This has brought about the standardisation of terminology in Chinese Protestantism. The Shack, though widely marked as a Christian novel, is also known for its unconventional fictional representations of Christianity that some Christians think depart from orthodoxy. Both Xiaowu and Pengwu were published by non-Christian publishing houses for a general readership. However, Xiaowu, translated by a Christian, exhibits a significant number of phrases that specifically belong to Chinese Christian terminology shaped by the Mandarin Union Version. Pengwu is a contrast in this regard. By comparing extracts from these two Chinese versions, this article highlights how far the Mandarin Union Version has contributed to the formation of the linguistic repertoire of Mandarin-speaking Christian translators as well as linguistic norms for translated Christian-themed texts into Chinese.