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PEOPLE GROUP PROFILE

The Selim of Sudan

The Selim of Sudan, numbering approximately 85,000 people, are Unengaged and Unreached. They are a tribal subgroup of Baggara Arabs in Sudan's White Nile region. They mostly adhere to Sunni Islam and Sudanese Arabic is their primary language.

Photo by Google. (2026). Image generated by Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite: Selim

Fast Facts:

Affinity Group: Arab Peoples
Country: Sudan
People Cluster: Arab, Shuwa
Primary Language(s): Sudanese Arabic (apd)
Primary Religion(s): Sunni Islam
Population: 85,000
Strategic Progress Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Recent CP Activity
People Group ID: PG042845
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Pray for the Selim of Sudan

Join others around the world in praying for the lost to be saved, the gospel to advance, the global Church to grow, and for laborers to be sent out and sustained in the harvest.

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Dig Deeper (Religion):

Primary Religion: Sunni Islam
Religious Affiliation: Islam

100%
%
Sunni Islam Adherents

Dig Deeper (Language):

Primary Language: Sudanese Arabic
Language Family: Afro-Asiatic

100%
%
Arabic, Sudanese Speakers

Media Resources in Sudanese Arabic:

Films:
TitleLink
JESUSView Film
MagdalenaView Film

2 films

Provided by the Jesus Film Project

View all resources

Bible Resources in Sudanese Arabic:

Bible Name (Translation)VideoAudioText
Sharif (Sudanese) Version✓✓✓

1 entry

Provided by Faith Comes by Hearing

Or check out the Sudanese Arabic bible at Bible.com

Linked from YouVersion

View all resources

Explore Lostness and Next Steps

Unengaged and Unreached

Strategic Priority Index (SPI): Unengaged and Unreached (SPI: 0), which means there are less than 2% evangelical Christian populations among which there are no known efforts focused on establishing self-sustaining churches consistent with evangelical faith and practice.
Lostness Priority Index (LPI): Frontier Unreached People Group, (LPI: 0), < 0.1% Evangelical.
Global Status of Evangelical Christianity (GSEC): Less than 2% Evangelical, No Recent CP Activity (GSEC: 1), this people group is less than 2% evangelical, some evangelical resources are available, but there has been no active church planting among them within the past two years

Next steps for the Selim:
Begin signifcant prayer and fasting for this group
Send cross-cultural teams to discover and research this people group
Begin gospel seed sowing and church planting among this group

Pray specifically for the Selim of Sudan

These have indeed an appearance of wisdom in promoting self- made religion and asceticism and severity to the body, but they are of no value in stopping the indulgence of the flesh.
readColossians 2:23

Pray for those without Christ, that they will see the emptiness of human traditions and turn to the truth and grace found in Jesus.

And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child.
readLuke 2:17

Pray that the lost will receive the good news of salvation in God's Son, have hearts eager to share it with others, and that all who hear will respond with wonder and faith!

The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
read2 Corinthians 9:6

Pray that as people place their faith in Christ, they will remember the principle of sowing and reaping, and be generous in their giving and serving, knowing that they will reap a generous harvest.

But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
read1 Corinthians 15:10–11

Pray that God's people will preach the message of Jesus' death and resurrection and that it will spread among the lost through the selfless witness of believers.

Baggara, Selim Across Countries (ROP3 - 108814) reported in the following countries:

Strategic Progress Index
All

1 people group

PhotoPeople Group IDNameCountryPopulation ▼Strategic Progress IndexLanguageReligion
SelimPG042845SelimSudan85,000Unengaged and UnreachedSudanese ArabicSunni Islam

To download a comprehensive people group list in spreadsheet form, visit our Research Data page.

Peoplegroups.org relies on updates from the field and other organizations for much of our data, so if you have any updates, please contact us. We use various international naming standards. For a list of these standards and fields, visit our Data Standards section.

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