Islamic militants mercilessly murdered four defenceless Wycliffe Bible translators in the Middle East this week, the Bible translating ministry reported.

The Wycliffe report said the militants barged into the translator's office, immediately shooting and killing two of the translators.

In a heroic effort to save the lead Bible translator, two workers laid on top of him, using their bodies as shield, CBN News reported. The two workers were killed, the report said, leaving unclear whether the lead translator survived the attack.

After killing the translators, the attackers destroyed most of the equipment in the office and burned all the books and other translation materials that they could get hold of.

Despite the gruesome killings, Wycliffe Associates is thanking God that the computer hard drives containing the translation work for eight language projects were not destroyed.

"The remaining translation team has decided to re-double their efforts to translate, publish, and print God's Word for these eight language communities," the ministry said in a statement.

The ministry requested prayer for the families of the murdered translators.

"Please ask the Lord to mend the hearts and wounds of the translation team who have gone through this horrible ordeal," Mae Greenleaf, a prayer coordinator said in a statement.

Although lives lost cannot be replaced, she said the ministry will replace the lost equipment and continue its work of propagating God's Word in the Middle East.

"Pray with me for the killers too," she said. "Pray for these whose hearts are so hard. Pray the Lord will open their eyes to what they have done. Please ask the Lord to meet them, each one, right where they are. Pray that He will show Himself merciful, that they will know His forgiveness, His love, and His peace."

Earlier, controversy hit Wycliffe Associates when a dispute over the "literal common language for Father and Son of God" led the ministry to part ways with a group of translators, the Blaze reported.

Wycliffe Associates announced this month that it would not be renewing its affiliation with Wycliffe Global Alliance, an international organisation of more than 100 translators that was formed back in 1991.

In a statement, Bruce Smith, president of Wycliffe Associates, said the split was triggered by a dispute over the language used to describe Jesus and God.

"For Wycliffe Associates, literal translation of Father and Son of God is not negotiable," Smith said.

The controversy stemmed from the way Wycliffe Global Alliance presented the biblical Trinity to Muslims.

Some translations attempted to "soften" the language describing the relationship between Jesus and God so as to not confuse adherents of Islam who might incorrectly believe as a result of certain phrasing that God and Mary — Jesus' mother — had sexual relations, Christianity Today reported.