Faith on Screen: Christian Drama Shatters Guinness World Record

The Chosen, the hit Christian drama series about the life of Jesus, has just made history. The show, created and directed by Dallas Jenkins, has earned a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records for being the most translated season of a streaming series ever.

Its fifth season is now available in 50 different languages, a milestone that marks a huge step for the project’s global reach.

The series has already been a cultural phenomenon since it first launched in 2019. Unlike traditional single-season Bible projects, The Chosen is designed as a multi-season story about the life and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth, set in first-century Judaea and Galilee.

Jonathan Roumie plays Jesus, with Shahar Isaac, Elizabeth Tabish, Paras Patel, Noah James, and George H. Xanthis among the ensemble cast. What makes it unique is that the story is told through the eyes of the people who met and followed Jesus—his disciples, religious leaders, Roman officials, and ordinary villagers.

The show’s distribution has been just as unusual as its storytelling. The first season was funded entirely by crowdfunding, becoming the most successful crowdfunded TV series in history.

At first, it streamed on the VidAngel platform, but when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the producers decided to make it free to watch. That bold move ended up boosting revenue instead of hurting it, and from that point forward, The Chosen committed to offering free access while still experimenting with theaters and streaming platforms.

Seasons 3 and 4 even premiered in cinemas before landing on platforms like Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, YouTube, and Facebook.

The fifth season’s translation breakthrough was announced in 2025, just after its release on The Chosen App. While Prime Video only offers some language options, the app features all 36 dubbed languages and 50 subtitled versions, from Hindi and Italian to Greek, Albanian, and Thai.

The Come and See Foundation, which has been supporting the translation project, sees this achievement as only the beginning.

Mike Kennedy, the foundation’s vice president of marketing, celebrated the news by saying, “It’s always nice to celebrate these milestones when you’re on a journey to a pretty big God-sized vision… For Come and See, our mission is to make the authentic Jesus accessible to everyone around the world through The Chosen. So for us to be able to do this, this is a great milestone for us to be able to hit. We’re just thrilled about this.”

Kennedy explained that the goal is much bigger than 50 languages. The long-term plan is to reach 600, which would make the series accessible to 95 percent of the world’s population.

The idea of authenticity has been central to the project from the start. Dallas Jenkins himself has said, “In 2017, I gathered my two co-writers to work on ideas for the show, and I wrote one word in big letters on a big sheet of white paper: AUTHENTIC. We weren’t going to chase stardom or ideas that we thought would result in more ‘success.’ Our job was to be faithful to the character and intentions of Jesus and the Gospels and make the most authentic show we could. Nothing else mattered.”

The Chosen has already been watched by more than 280 million people around the world, with about a third of viewers identifying as non-religious.

It has won multiple awards, inspired graphic novels, study guides, and even spin-off projects, and its theatrical releases have grossed more than 120 million dollars. Now, with this Guinness World Record under its belt, the series has proven it’s not only reaching audiences but also crossing cultures and languages in a way few shows ever have.

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