Executive Summary

Why it matters

Romans is the theological backbone of the New Testament, and Bodo presents a risk profile this pipeline has not seen before: it is not a case of an existing wrong word (as in Hindi’s मोक्ष/मुक्ति for salvation) but of a genuine conceptual gap. Traditional Bathouism, the indigenous animist nature-religion practiced by most Bodo people, has no developed eschatological salvation category at all — its ritual life, centered on the aniconic Bathoubwrai and expressed through the Kherai puja festival, targets protection, prosperity, and household harmony in this life. A second current, the 1912 Sanskritized reform movement Brahma Dharma, then overlaid Hindu-derived moksha and karma language onto Bodo religious identity. Getting this wrong means either importing a foreign liberation concept or leaving “salvation” as an empty foreign word with no doctrinal weight.

Key findings

• The registry tracks 40 doctrines across Romans 1-16; 28 require mandatory human theologian review before any translated segment ships (8 Critical, 20 High).
• Salvation, incarnation, and the deity/sonship/lordship/resurrection cluster are Critical-risk for two distinct reasons in Bodo: salvation because the concept itself must be taught from scratch, and incarnation/resurrection because they must be sharply distinguished from the Kherai puja’s doudini trance-possession and from Brahma Dharma’s imported rebirth language, respectively.
• The choice of ईश्वर (Isor, a Sanskrit/Assamese loan) over बाथौबुरै (Bathoubwrai, the native high god) for “God” is a deliberate, load-bearing decision documented in this registry, not an incidental stylistic preference.
• Only 3 of 40 doctrines (Thanksgiving, Mutual Edification, Christian Fellowship) are Low-risk and clear for automated review alone.

Risks

• Conceptual-gap risk, not just wrong-word risk: because Bathouism lacks a native salvation category, translators may be tempted to borrow Brahma Dharma’s Hindu-derived vocabulary (मोक्ष-style liberation) simply because it is “available” and fluent-sounding, even though it was never native to the tradition.
• Possession-language confusion: the Kherai puja’s doudini trance medium creates a real risk that incarnation and Spirit-filling language will be heard as describing a similar temporary possession event rather than the Son’s permanent human nature and the Spirit’s personal indwelling.
• Ethnic-territorial overlay: Bodo identity in contemporary Assam is closely tied to the Bodoland Territorial Region; “kingdom,” “nation,” and unity language in Romans 9-11 risks being reheard through that contemporary political lens rather than Paul’s argument.

Opportunities

• Bodo already has a full Bible published by the Bible Society of India, giving this Language Package a real foundation to build doctrinal-study vocabulary on top of, unlike languages starting from nothing.
• The strong Bodo cultural value placed on clan (afad) lineage gives “seed of David” and inheritance-based adoption language in Romans 8-9 a genuine point of natural resonance to build from.

Recommended actions

• Route every Critical and High risk segment (28 of 40 doctrines) through human theologian review before publication; do not allow automated-only review to touch these terms.
• Brief native-speaker reviewers specifically on the Bathouism/Brahma Dharma distinction, since generic “Hindu-context” reviewer training will miss Bodo-specific risks like doudini possession-language confusion.
• Reuse this Language Package’s translation_memory.json for every Romans lesson in Bodo rather than re-deriving terms per document, per the two-phase pipeline design.