Last week I gave myself an interesting goal: study a particular chapter of the Bible a little every day and see what I can get out of it. The problem is that most of my Bibles and study materials (some of which appear in the picture at the top of this post from a year and a half ago) are currently in storage because of a move last year. But I do still have a number of resources at my disposal, and I decided to see what I could come up with!
The first day I read the passage from the New Living Translation (which is what my pastor uses during his messages) from my NLT Life Application Study Bible. This gave me a basic overview of the passage, plus some real-world applications. I don't really have a lot of trust for the NLT as a study text (not for inductive study methods, anyway) but it reads easily and it's certainly good enough to give you an idea of what the writer is talking about.
There was something that was puzzling me, hinging around one specific word in the passage, so the next day I fired up the Logos app on my phone. It's kind of a little brother to the Logos/Libronix software you can buy for your computer. It's actually pretty good for doing light Bible study using a phone; the screen can divide into two parts which hold different translations or books, and it can do some simple word study kind of stuff. It's nowhere as good as the desktop version, but I just had my phone handy at the time, and it satisfied my curiosity. I read the passage again using the New American Standard Version on the phone, and it is tied in to the Greek/Hebrew stuff, so it was simple to do my word study.
The next day I fired up MyStudyBible.com and read the chapter through in the Holman Christian Standard Version. I actually used my phone browser for this, and it worked out reasonably well. I still wasn't 100% satisfied with my word study results from the Logos app, and MyStudyBible.com has a terrific "click the underlined word to see the Greek or Hebrew source word" thing going on, and it clarified what I had discovered the day before. And you can't beat the price for using the HCSB Study Bible on this site... free!
The next day I read the chapter in the ESV translation on ESVBible.org. On this site you can read the ESV Study Bible notes, and although there is a minimal cost to access them, I highly recommend it; the ESV Study Bible is still my preferred study Bible. The notes were terrific; I was really getting a good handle on what I had been reading all week.
The next day I pulled out my NIV Study Bible to read the passage in the New International Version. This is my second favorite study Bible, a close runner-up to the ESV Study Bible. The NIV is probably my second-favorite translation, too... I thought for a while that the HCSB was going to take over that spot, but I've been disappointed with the translation in a few spots... maybe I'll blog about some of them one day. I still like the Holman translation, but I like the NIV better. This is an older copy of the NIV Study Bible, so this is the 1984 NIV, although I have no problem with the parts I've read from the newest edition.
The next day I pulled out the Life Application Study Bible and went through the chapter again in that book; I wanted to see if what I read made better sense to me after being through the chapter so many times. Sure enough, the text and the study notes were more meaningful to me this time through than before. I must have learned something!
How much did I pay to do all of this? Nothing! Of course, I already had the materials at my disposal; maybe you own a study Bible or two, or maybe you don't. But there are plenty of Bible study resources online; you could study a passage for weeks just using the resources on Blue Letter Bible alone and never run out, and that site is free!
I used a couple of physical volumes in my study, but the astonishing fact is that I did most of my study of this passage (it was 1 Peter 1, by the way, but it could have been any chapter) using only my low-powered Android cell phone! Just a few years ago that would have been science fiction; these days there are a wealth of materials available to anyone with a smart phone, anywhere they have a data connection (or in some cases, even without a data connection). With only the meager resources at my disposal, I did a study that would have taken hours in a physical library full of Bible commentaries fifteen years ago. We are truly blessed these days with a rich variety of sources of information about the Bible literally at our fingertips.
The real question here is: why do Christians not have a deeper understanding of the teachings of the Bible? With all of these resources available, there is no reason every Christian couldn't know as much about the Word as a graduating seminary student a half-century ago. Why don't we?
I'll leave you to answer that question yourself in the comments section below.
Showing posts with label HCSB. Show all posts
Showing posts with label HCSB. Show all posts
Saturday, June 30, 2012
Saturday, April 14, 2012
YouVersion - you should have it on your phone
A few days ago I did something I haven't done often. I wrote a "User Review" of an app on the Android Market:
Scan to download the Bible to your phone
YouVersion's Bible app really is the cream of the crop for mobile device Bible reading. Well, I'll temper that statement a little bit: the YouVersion app is free, and there may be paid apps out there that rival it in one way or another. In fact, since I use the Logos software on my home computer, I also have the Logos Android app installed, and it gives me a bunch of study materials that YouVersion doesn't have (the ESV Study Bible notes, for example), and on top of that it lets me split my screen in half and view two translations at once! But I use YouVersion far more often, and here's why:
The app I was talking about is of course YouVersion, which I have mentioned here in the blog several times before. If you have it on your phone, it's probably just called "Bible". If you don't have it on your phone, right away you should visit http://youversion.com/download with your phone and download it! Here's a QR code you can scan to take you there if that's the way you roll:This is the Cadillac of Bible apps. It's designed simply to get you reading the Bible; it has very little in the way of study tools such as cross-references or Greek/Hebrew lexicons. What it does have is just about every Bible translation that the layman has ever heard of, even in audio in some cases, and scads of "reading plans" to help you get engaged with the translation of your choice. It eliminates any excuse you might have for not reading the Bible regularly. The icing on the cake is that it's free!
Scan to download the Bible to your phone
YouVersion's Bible app really is the cream of the crop for mobile device Bible reading. Well, I'll temper that statement a little bit: the YouVersion app is free, and there may be paid apps out there that rival it in one way or another. In fact, since I use the Logos software on my home computer, I also have the Logos Android app installed, and it gives me a bunch of study materials that YouVersion doesn't have (the ESV Study Bible notes, for example), and on top of that it lets me split my screen in half and view two translations at once! But I use YouVersion far more often, and here's why:
- YouVersion has probably every Bible translation you've ever heard of. It certainly has my favorites... the ESV, NAS, HCSB, NIV, NLT. There are scads of English versions, and a bunch of non-English translations as well.
- It's easy to use. You open it up, tap the icon that says "Bible", and you're reading the Bible! Changing the passage you're looking at or changing the translation you're reading are intuitive processes (which is something I can NOT say about the Logos app... changing translations or passages in that app is pretty convoluted until you get used to it).
This is what it looks like when you're reading on
Android... how simple is THAT? - Audio. Not a recreational reader? Staring at a page of text makes your eyes roll back in your head? The YouVersion app has audio files for many of their translations, which means that after you point and click your way to a passage, you can listen to it instead of (or in addition to) reading it. This means that you could listen to the Bible in your car on a daily commute (I've done it), while you're going to sleep at night (done that too), or wherever you are.
- Reading plans. YouVersion has tons of daily reading plans that you can choose from. Some of them are only a couple of days or a week long and cover specific topics or books; others range up to long-term plans to read through the entire Bible. And you can use the audio in conjunction with your reading plan, so instead of reading passages from sometimes several different books/locations, you can have them read to you. I'm working on a reading plan that has a two chapters assigned each day from two different books. If I start the audio running on the first chapter, when it reaches the end it proceeds to the second chapter automatically! How cool is THAT? If you sign up for a free YouVersion account, you can track your reading over time, and you can actually read through an app or their Web version and you "get credit" from whichever you use (so you could read from your phone one day, listen to audio on your phone the next day, and read on your computer the next day, and the system tracks your progress from all three). It can also be set up to fire an alert on your phone every day to remind you to read your passage, and if you miss a day or two you can shift your reading program's dates so that today's reading is the only one you have to complete to be caught up. No guilt trip and no scrambling to catch up by reading multiple days... nice! It's the least stressful Bible reading plan system I've ever tried.
- Downloadable translations. Some, but not all, of the Bible translations in YouVersion can be downloaded to your mobile device so that you can access them even from places where you do not have data access; other translations (because of restrictions set by the publishers) are not downloadable.
Friday, February 4, 2011
The Best Bible Translation ...Bible series, part 3 of 6
In my last post I talked a lot about why there are different translations of the Bible into English. Today I wanted to share some of my thoughts about several of the most popular translations available; you can actually find a list of the best-selling Bible translations right here. I'm not intimately familiar with all ten of them, but it so happens that the top six or seven (as of this month) are the ones I want to talk about anyway!
Keep in mind that there are tons of wonderful Bible sites out there where you can test-drive any translation, compare it to one you're already familiar with, that kind of thing. One of the best of these sites is BibleGateway.com, which has about 25 versions in English (depending on whether you count slightly different versions of the NIV as different translations). All of the translations I will mention today are available there. Next week I'll talk more about online Bible reading/study sites, but today I want to talk about the Bible translations themselves. I'm not going to give you a bunch of history on each; you can visit Wikipedia or other sites for that (I'll provide a few links). I'm just going to give my general impressions on each translation, and you can go from there.
King James Version
Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
I talked a lot about the King James Version in my last post; I won't repeat those details today. It's a beautiful, well-respected, accurate translation, and I would never dream of discouraging anyone from using it. For hundreds of years, millions of people have considered it THE Word of God. In fact, if you search Google for about ten seconds, you'll be able to find Web sites run by people who believe it is the only legitimate Bible translation in English. Best quip ever about the KJV: "If the King James Bible was good enough for the Apostle Paul, it's good enough for me!"
The KJV is considered a very literal translation; highly recommended if you're not afraid of the old-timey sentence structure. In fact, some of the things that seem like archaisms (the usage of "thee," "thy," "thou," and so on in addition to "you," for example) are not archaisms but conscious choices by the translators to make it more literal (in standard English, "you" can be either singular or plural; in KJV usage, "thou" is singular and "you" is plural). Despite language that is sometimes clunky by "front page of the New York Times" standards, the King James Version is of high quality and highly respected. It's worth your time.
New International Version
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
The NIV was almost the only Bible translation that I read for a good decade or more of my life. The English is clear, easy to understand, and for the most part, quite accurate. I have no idea how many times over the years that I heard a minister, preaching from the KJV, correct the translation to what I was looking at in my NIV, but the number is a big one. I even think it could be used from the pulpit; at this point, many Christians are as familiar with the NIV as they are with the KJV. I especially love the Psalms in the NIV; they seem quite musical to me. Over the years, though, the NIV has suffered from some criticism over certain verses, and that plus changes in the English language over the years were reasons for the attempt at releasing an updated NIV called Today's New International Version several years ago, and the new revision of the NIV which is available for reading online right now and which will be released in bookstores this year. To compare the classic 1984 NIV, the 2005 Today's NIV, and the upcoming 2010 revision, visit this page at BibleGateway.com.
The New International Reader's Version deserves a separate mention. This is a revision of the NIV designed for beginning readers. Basically, they simplified the more complex vocabulary, and they cut longer sentences into shorter ones. It's a good translation for young children who are just learning to read, but they will likely grow out of it quickly. One of the ironies of the NIrV Bible we bought for my son when he was five years old (read about that here) was that the dramatized "Bible stories" scattered throughout the text actually were harder to read than the text itself.
New King James Version
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
If you've ever heard a minister who was reading from the King James Bible but modifying the language on the fly to make it sound a little more "modern," that's a little bit like what you'll get with the New King James Version. The idea was to modernize the language of the classic KJV while still retaining some of the timeless qualities of that translation. I've used NKJV quite a bit myself (although it is not currently one of my actively-used translations) and enjoy and respect it very much. This is the translation my pastor generally uses when he is preaching. The only criticism I have of the NKJV is that the translators used (more or less) the same ancient texts as the translators of the original KJV had used back in the 1600s, which means that improvements in Bible manuscript scholarship since that time were not a big part in the translating process. Ironically, the NKJV has been soundly rejected by those KJV-only folks, even though the KJV they hold in their hands is quite a bit different from the KJV delivered to King James himself centuries ago! The KJV we read today is actually a "new" version of the KJV. If you ever have a chance to spend some time with an actual copy of the 1611 KJV, read a few chapters and then thank your lucky stars that it was re-edited and modernized over time! You would expect the KJV-only folks to have been the biggest supporters of the NKJV, but they apparently hate it.
Use the NKJV if you just like the KJV but want something written in a less-archaic style. Or, use it if your pastor reads from KJV and you can't follow what it means! Your NKJV will be essentially the same in most cases, but you'll be able to understand it better. It will be a little bit like reading captions while listening to someone speaking English with a heavy foreign accent.
English Standard Version
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
Years ago, the announcement of Today's New International Version translation created a controversy in some Christian circles. The uproar was over something called "gender-neutral" Bible translation. Basically, there are places in the original Bible texts where masculine pronouns are used in a non-gender-specific way. An English equivalent would be the word "mankind," which very rarely only refers to men but usually refers to men and women, the whole human race. An example from the Bible might be when Jesus said "Man shall not live by bread alone," not meaning that only men should depend on the Word of God but that all people should depend on the Word of God. A "gender-neutral" translation might render this phrase "a person does not live by bread alone." This may seem like hair-splitting; the pro-gender-neutrality people would say "That's what the original text means!" and the anti-gender-neutrality people would say "But it's not what the original text says, and people aren't so stupid that you have to rewrite the Bible so they can figure out the pronouns." In 1997, representatives of a number of ministries came together in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and drafted a set of "guidelines" for gender usage in Bible translation. These are known as the Colorado Springs Guidelines, and you can read them here.
The ESV was among the first translations (maybe the first translation) that consciously sought to adhere to these guidelines. The ESV calls itself an "essentially literal" translation, and like the NKJV it seeks to retain the literary beauty present in the KJV, but the ESV uses the latest textual scholarship available at the time of its translation. The ESV is currently my favorite translation for reading and for study, and it is the translation I generally use on this blog and on the related Web site, ScriptureMenu.com. This year (and last year) I'm reading the Bible cover to cover from the ESV Study Bible and the NIV Study Bible, and there have been several times where the NIV Study Bible notes said things like "The same word is used to translate this word and this word in the original texts," and the NIV translates it with two different words but the ESV translates it using the same word. The ESV is sometimes not as fluid to read as the NIV or some other modern translations, but it is not nearly as difficult to absorb as the KJV or the NASB or other literal translations, and I actually like the fact that my brain is forced to engage when I'm reading it. And there are places, particularly in poetic sections like the Psalms and Isaiah, where the ESV preserves powerful metaphors that other translations gloss over.
The ESV is a great translation to have available to you. Make sure you keep one handy, and bookmark ESVonline.org to read it online.
Holman Christian Standard Bible
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
In the past year or so I have gained a growing respect and liking for the Holman Christian Standard Bible. It seems to me to have a fluid style like the NIV, but it leans a bit more to the literal side of the equation than NIV. My perception is that its fidelity to the original texts is a notch better than the NIV, but readability was not sacrificed for the sake of accuracy. I'm not sure I would recommend the ESV for young children to read, but I think they could handle the HCSB. By way of making a very subjective, emotional comparison, I would classify the ESV as "majestic," the NIV as "friendly" or maybe "non-threatening," and the HCSB as "warm" and "inviting." Any of the three is a good read; all three are currently favorites of mine.
Have an HCSB on your shelf, and bookmark MyStudyBible.com to read the HCSB Study Bible for free!
New American Standard Bible
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
Just over a year ago, I won a beautiful, and rather expensive, edition of the New American Standard Bible in an online contest. I actually have a little cheap paperback New Testament on my shelf in the NASB translation, but I can't say I've ever spent any time with it. And to be honest, I was hoping to win a nice ESV in the contest! But this Bible is so beautiful that I've been carrying the huge black thing to church every week ever since. Hopefully people don't think I'm carrying a big Bible to impress them! I'm absolutely not. It's a beautiful Bible, and it's a wonderful translation, with some rather surprising features.
The NASB has an interesting lineage. I mentioned before that the 1611 KJV was revised and modernized to what we now use; this revision, made in the 1880s, is called the "Revised Version." In 1901, a revision of the RV called the American Standard Version was released, and in the 1960s and 1970s this ASV was once again revised and released as the NASB. The NASB you are most likely to find in a Bible bookstore is the 1995 revision of this; this is the one I won in the contest. My paperback NASB New Testament is the earlier version. (The ESV is actually a revision of the Revised Standard Version, which is a revision of the ASV, so the two translations are related.)
The NASB is probably the most literal mainstream translation on the market; I find the sentence structure a bit clunky at times, but in general I like it a lot. And as I mentioned, there are a couple of very unique features of the translation, specifically in the New Testament. One thing I find very useful and interesting is that Old Testament quotations in the New Testament are printed in ALL CAPS, so they stand out clearly. This is actually more revealing than you might think, because not every quotation of the OT in the NT is clearly indicated as a quote by the OT authors. It's very interesting to run across the "hidden" ones that would have already jumped out to a Jewish reader. My other favorite feature in the NASB NT is that on occasion, verbs are marked with an asterisk: "*". The asterisk means that the Greek text actually uses a present tense verb in a spot where the English translation uses past tense; the authors used present tense to make the narrative seem more immediate. In formal English we don't switch verb tenses midstream, but it's not unheard-of in colloquial usage: "So I left my apartment and got to the laundromat, and I'm putting my clothes in the washer, and this lady says to me..." I doubt that knowing when one of those tense shifts has occurred will ever provide a deep spiritual insight, but I think it's fascinating to know about it.
New Living Translation
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
I haven't yet had a chance to really spend a lot of time in this translation, but what little I've read of it, I really liked. The original intention was to create a revision of The Living Bible, a paraphrase written in the 1960s, but eventually it was decided to create a new translation from the original texts. Although it is not as free with the text as an actual paraphrase, the NLT uses the "thought-for-thought" translation philosophy, which makes it easier to read but potentially less accurate at expressing shades of meaning. I did some side-by-side comparison with an ESV recently, and although I did spot the occasional difference that bothered me a little, overall I would consider it trustworthy for reading; for heavy study I would recommend something closer to the "word-for-word" end of the scale. That said, I have a NLT Life Application Bible sitting on my shelf, and I look forward to delving into it in the near future.
The Message
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
I'll be straight with you: I'm not a fan of The Message Bible. It is considered a paraphrase, not a translation, although it was paraphrased directly from the original languages (as opposed to the original Living Bible, which was paraphrased from the 1901 ASV). There is no effort to match the vocabulary or sentence structure of the original text or other translations; in fact, most editions don't even bother with chapter and verse numberings. The idea is to be almost like a novelization of the Bible. The language is fresh and immediate and colloquial, and it's certainly fun to read, but I don't feel like I'm reading a Bible when I read it; sometimes it almost feels like a parody of the Bible to me. However, I have friends that I respect very much who enjoy reading The Message, and as long as you don't assume that it's something that it's not, I think it's great if it gets people interested in what God's Word has to say.
Bible Translation Continuum
I mentioned before that there is sort of a continuum for Bible translations, with the most "literal" or "word-for-word" translations on one end, and the most "dynamic" or "thought-for-thought" translations at the other end. You could arrange these eight translations roughly in this order, starting with the most "literal" and ending with the most "dynamic":
But you don't have to choose just one; if you look around you can find "parallel Bibles" with two, four, or even more of these translations in them, side-by-side for comparison. The most interesting one I've seen is a The Message/NASB Parallel Bible which, with texts from exact opposite ends of the continuum above, must quiver while you hold it, ready to spontaneously split at any moment! But in all seriousness, if you want to carry several texts with you, there are some really good parallel Bibles out there. I'm kind of partial to this one, myself. We'll talk about electronic Bibles in an upcoming post (and I've already mentioned the Bible Gateway), so comparing translations has actually become quite a bit easier in recent years, but sometimes it helps to just have a couple of translations right on the table in front of you.
Again: which one is best? The "read" Bible is the best. Get one of them, and make sure you've "read" it! The Word of God in a book has the power to prop open a door; the Word of God in your heart has the power to transform lives.
Keep in mind that there are tons of wonderful Bible sites out there where you can test-drive any translation, compare it to one you're already familiar with, that kind of thing. One of the best of these sites is BibleGateway.com, which has about 25 versions in English (depending on whether you count slightly different versions of the NIV as different translations). All of the translations I will mention today are available there. Next week I'll talk more about online Bible reading/study sites, but today I want to talk about the Bible translations themselves. I'm not going to give you a bunch of history on each; you can visit Wikipedia or other sites for that (I'll provide a few links). I'm just going to give my general impressions on each translation, and you can go from there.
King James Version
Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
I talked a lot about the King James Version in my last post; I won't repeat those details today. It's a beautiful, well-respected, accurate translation, and I would never dream of discouraging anyone from using it. For hundreds of years, millions of people have considered it THE Word of God. In fact, if you search Google for about ten seconds, you'll be able to find Web sites run by people who believe it is the only legitimate Bible translation in English. Best quip ever about the KJV: "If the King James Bible was good enough for the Apostle Paul, it's good enough for me!"
The KJV is considered a very literal translation; highly recommended if you're not afraid of the old-timey sentence structure. In fact, some of the things that seem like archaisms (the usage of "thee," "thy," "thou," and so on in addition to "you," for example) are not archaisms but conscious choices by the translators to make it more literal (in standard English, "you" can be either singular or plural; in KJV usage, "thou" is singular and "you" is plural). Despite language that is sometimes clunky by "front page of the New York Times" standards, the King James Version is of high quality and highly respected. It's worth your time.
New International Version
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
The NIV was almost the only Bible translation that I read for a good decade or more of my life. The English is clear, easy to understand, and for the most part, quite accurate. I have no idea how many times over the years that I heard a minister, preaching from the KJV, correct the translation to what I was looking at in my NIV, but the number is a big one. I even think it could be used from the pulpit; at this point, many Christians are as familiar with the NIV as they are with the KJV. I especially love the Psalms in the NIV; they seem quite musical to me. Over the years, though, the NIV has suffered from some criticism over certain verses, and that plus changes in the English language over the years were reasons for the attempt at releasing an updated NIV called Today's New International Version several years ago, and the new revision of the NIV which is available for reading online right now and which will be released in bookstores this year. To compare the classic 1984 NIV, the 2005 Today's NIV, and the upcoming 2010 revision, visit this page at BibleGateway.com.
The New International Reader's Version deserves a separate mention. This is a revision of the NIV designed for beginning readers. Basically, they simplified the more complex vocabulary, and they cut longer sentences into shorter ones. It's a good translation for young children who are just learning to read, but they will likely grow out of it quickly. One of the ironies of the NIrV Bible we bought for my son when he was five years old (read about that here) was that the dramatized "Bible stories" scattered throughout the text actually were harder to read than the text itself.
New King James Version
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
If you've ever heard a minister who was reading from the King James Bible but modifying the language on the fly to make it sound a little more "modern," that's a little bit like what you'll get with the New King James Version. The idea was to modernize the language of the classic KJV while still retaining some of the timeless qualities of that translation. I've used NKJV quite a bit myself (although it is not currently one of my actively-used translations) and enjoy and respect it very much. This is the translation my pastor generally uses when he is preaching. The only criticism I have of the NKJV is that the translators used (more or less) the same ancient texts as the translators of the original KJV had used back in the 1600s, which means that improvements in Bible manuscript scholarship since that time were not a big part in the translating process. Ironically, the NKJV has been soundly rejected by those KJV-only folks, even though the KJV they hold in their hands is quite a bit different from the KJV delivered to King James himself centuries ago! The KJV we read today is actually a "new" version of the KJV. If you ever have a chance to spend some time with an actual copy of the 1611 KJV, read a few chapters and then thank your lucky stars that it was re-edited and modernized over time! You would expect the KJV-only folks to have been the biggest supporters of the NKJV, but they apparently hate it.
Use the NKJV if you just like the KJV but want something written in a less-archaic style. Or, use it if your pastor reads from KJV and you can't follow what it means! Your NKJV will be essentially the same in most cases, but you'll be able to understand it better. It will be a little bit like reading captions while listening to someone speaking English with a heavy foreign accent.
English Standard Version
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
Years ago, the announcement of Today's New International Version translation created a controversy in some Christian circles. The uproar was over something called "gender-neutral" Bible translation. Basically, there are places in the original Bible texts where masculine pronouns are used in a non-gender-specific way. An English equivalent would be the word "mankind," which very rarely only refers to men but usually refers to men and women, the whole human race. An example from the Bible might be when Jesus said "Man shall not live by bread alone," not meaning that only men should depend on the Word of God but that all people should depend on the Word of God. A "gender-neutral" translation might render this phrase "a person does not live by bread alone." This may seem like hair-splitting; the pro-gender-neutrality people would say "That's what the original text means!" and the anti-gender-neutrality people would say "But it's not what the original text says, and people aren't so stupid that you have to rewrite the Bible so they can figure out the pronouns." In 1997, representatives of a number of ministries came together in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and drafted a set of "guidelines" for gender usage in Bible translation. These are known as the Colorado Springs Guidelines, and you can read them here.
The ESV was among the first translations (maybe the first translation) that consciously sought to adhere to these guidelines. The ESV calls itself an "essentially literal" translation, and like the NKJV it seeks to retain the literary beauty present in the KJV, but the ESV uses the latest textual scholarship available at the time of its translation. The ESV is currently my favorite translation for reading and for study, and it is the translation I generally use on this blog and on the related Web site, ScriptureMenu.com. This year (and last year) I'm reading the Bible cover to cover from the ESV Study Bible and the NIV Study Bible, and there have been several times where the NIV Study Bible notes said things like "The same word is used to translate this word and this word in the original texts," and the NIV translates it with two different words but the ESV translates it using the same word. The ESV is sometimes not as fluid to read as the NIV or some other modern translations, but it is not nearly as difficult to absorb as the KJV or the NASB or other literal translations, and I actually like the fact that my brain is forced to engage when I'm reading it. And there are places, particularly in poetic sections like the Psalms and Isaiah, where the ESV preserves powerful metaphors that other translations gloss over.
The ESV is a great translation to have available to you. Make sure you keep one handy, and bookmark ESVonline.org to read it online.
Holman Christian Standard Bible
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
In the past year or so I have gained a growing respect and liking for the Holman Christian Standard Bible. It seems to me to have a fluid style like the NIV, but it leans a bit more to the literal side of the equation than NIV. My perception is that its fidelity to the original texts is a notch better than the NIV, but readability was not sacrificed for the sake of accuracy. I'm not sure I would recommend the ESV for young children to read, but I think they could handle the HCSB. By way of making a very subjective, emotional comparison, I would classify the ESV as "majestic," the NIV as "friendly" or maybe "non-threatening," and the HCSB as "warm" and "inviting." Any of the three is a good read; all three are currently favorites of mine.
Have an HCSB on your shelf, and bookmark MyStudyBible.com to read the HCSB Study Bible for free!
New American Standard Bible
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
Just over a year ago, I won a beautiful, and rather expensive, edition of the New American Standard Bible in an online contest. I actually have a little cheap paperback New Testament on my shelf in the NASB translation, but I can't say I've ever spent any time with it. And to be honest, I was hoping to win a nice ESV in the contest! But this Bible is so beautiful that I've been carrying the huge black thing to church every week ever since. Hopefully people don't think I'm carrying a big Bible to impress them! I'm absolutely not. It's a beautiful Bible, and it's a wonderful translation, with some rather surprising features.
The NASB has an interesting lineage. I mentioned before that the 1611 KJV was revised and modernized to what we now use; this revision, made in the 1880s, is called the "Revised Version." In 1901, a revision of the RV called the American Standard Version was released, and in the 1960s and 1970s this ASV was once again revised and released as the NASB. The NASB you are most likely to find in a Bible bookstore is the 1995 revision of this; this is the one I won in the contest. My paperback NASB New Testament is the earlier version. (The ESV is actually a revision of the Revised Standard Version, which is a revision of the ASV, so the two translations are related.)
The NASB is probably the most literal mainstream translation on the market; I find the sentence structure a bit clunky at times, but in general I like it a lot. And as I mentioned, there are a couple of very unique features of the translation, specifically in the New Testament. One thing I find very useful and interesting is that Old Testament quotations in the New Testament are printed in ALL CAPS, so they stand out clearly. This is actually more revealing than you might think, because not every quotation of the OT in the NT is clearly indicated as a quote by the OT authors. It's very interesting to run across the "hidden" ones that would have already jumped out to a Jewish reader. My other favorite feature in the NASB NT is that on occasion, verbs are marked with an asterisk: "*". The asterisk means that the Greek text actually uses a present tense verb in a spot where the English translation uses past tense; the authors used present tense to make the narrative seem more immediate. In formal English we don't switch verb tenses midstream, but it's not unheard-of in colloquial usage: "So I left my apartment and got to the laundromat, and I'm putting my clothes in the washer, and this lady says to me..." I doubt that knowing when one of those tense shifts has occurred will ever provide a deep spiritual insight, but I think it's fascinating to know about it.
New Living Translation
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
I haven't yet had a chance to really spend a lot of time in this translation, but what little I've read of it, I really liked. The original intention was to create a revision of The Living Bible, a paraphrase written in the 1960s, but eventually it was decided to create a new translation from the original texts. Although it is not as free with the text as an actual paraphrase, the NLT uses the "thought-for-thought" translation philosophy, which makes it easier to read but potentially less accurate at expressing shades of meaning. I did some side-by-side comparison with an ESV recently, and although I did spot the occasional difference that bothered me a little, overall I would consider it trustworthy for reading; for heavy study I would recommend something closer to the "word-for-word" end of the scale. That said, I have a NLT Life Application Bible sitting on my shelf, and I look forward to delving into it in the near future.
The Message
Official - Wikipedia - Bible Gateway
I'll be straight with you: I'm not a fan of The Message Bible. It is considered a paraphrase, not a translation, although it was paraphrased directly from the original languages (as opposed to the original Living Bible, which was paraphrased from the 1901 ASV). There is no effort to match the vocabulary or sentence structure of the original text or other translations; in fact, most editions don't even bother with chapter and verse numberings. The idea is to be almost like a novelization of the Bible. The language is fresh and immediate and colloquial, and it's certainly fun to read, but I don't feel like I'm reading a Bible when I read it; sometimes it almost feels like a parody of the Bible to me. However, I have friends that I respect very much who enjoy reading The Message, and as long as you don't assume that it's something that it's not, I think it's great if it gets people interested in what God's Word has to say.
Bible Translation Continuum
I mentioned before that there is sort of a continuum for Bible translations, with the most "literal" or "word-for-word" translations on one end, and the most "dynamic" or "thought-for-thought" translations at the other end. You could arrange these eight translations roughly in this order, starting with the most "literal" and ending with the most "dynamic":
New American Standard Bible
English Standard Version
King James Version
New King James Version
Holman Christian Standard Bible
New International Version
New Living Translation
The Message
But you don't have to choose just one; if you look around you can find "parallel Bibles" with two, four, or even more of these translations in them, side-by-side for comparison. The most interesting one I've seen is a The Message/NASB Parallel Bible which, with texts from exact opposite ends of the continuum above, must quiver while you hold it, ready to spontaneously split at any moment! But in all seriousness, if you want to carry several texts with you, there are some really good parallel Bibles out there. I'm kind of partial to this one, myself. We'll talk about electronic Bibles in an upcoming post (and I've already mentioned the Bible Gateway), so comparing translations has actually become quite a bit easier in recent years, but sometimes it helps to just have a couple of translations right on the table in front of you.
Again: which one is best? The "read" Bible is the best. Get one of them, and make sure you've "read" it! The Word of God in a book has the power to prop open a door; the Word of God in your heart has the power to transform lives.
"Basic to the Bible's canonical status is its 'inspiration.' This word indicates a divinely effected uniqueness comparable to the uniqueness of the person of the incarnate Lord. As Jesus Christ was totally human and totally divine, so is the Bible." - ESV Study Bible, "Reading the Bible Theologically"
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Lost in Translations ...Bible series, part 2 of 6
photo © 2005 Alfonso Surroca | more info (via: Wylio)In my last post I blogged a little bit about why I (and some friends of mine, and I'm sure many Christians above a certain age) have an awful lot of paper Bibles lying around. But why are there so many Bibles in existence at all? Aren't they all the same? Today I thought I would talk about different translations, why they exist, and why you might be interested to see a few different ones.This year is the 400th anniversary of the King James version of the Bible, which was first released in 1611. It was far from the first translation of the Bible into English. You can pick up some details in this Wikipedia article, but the short version is that even in 1611, there were several English translations of the Bible in existence. The King James Bible is special in a couple of ways, though, and it's worthwhile to look at those.
The KJV is what is known these days as a "literal" translation - the translators tried to stay as close to the actual wording of the original texts. They actually did a very good job; I suspect that's part of the reason that it has been so popular for so long. In fact, the KJV is generally seen as more literal than almost any other mainstream translation today. The KJV is artistically well-done, also; the text has been so admired over the centuries that its language and phrasing have entered deeply into the English language. In the early years of the United States, it was even used for classroom instruction. I consider the KJV a trustworthy translation (certainly, it is better in some ways than many modern translations!), but it does have its shortcomings.
The most obvious of these shortcomings is that it's just plain old hard to understand. We don't speak now the way people spoke English 400 years ago. There are words in the KJV that nobody even uses anymore, and even some words that you and I recognize easily have changed in meaning over time (see this page for some examples). If you are used to it, the KJV is a fluent, beautiful, trustworthy translation. Until you get used to it, it is confusing, wordy, and convoluted.
A second shortcoming is that scholars now understand what the original texts say far better than they did when the KJV was translated. There are words, phrases, and idioms that were not as well understood in 1610 as they are now, due to scholarship, archaeological discoveries of manuscripts that were lost until recently, that sort of thing. There are certain isolated places where the KJV's translation choice is now known to be just plain old wrong. These mistranslations are all minor matters; they are never things that affect the primary message of the Gospel. But the glitches remain, so even if you like the KJV very much (and I know many ministers still preach from it exclusively) it might be good to have a second, more modern translation around for cross-checking.
So, which one should you choose? Well, that boils down mostly to personal preference, but in order to even be clear enough on the differences to develop a preference, you need to understand what I meant by a "literal" translation.
There are two factors that come into play when a new Bible translation is being prepared: readability, and fidelity to the original manuscripts. Both things are taken into consideration during the preparation of every translation, but they are treated with different degrees of priority depending on the mandate of the translators, and every translation of any manuscript (it needn't even be the Bible) can be plotted along a kind of continuum, starting from the "most literal" (greatest fidelity to originals) to the most "dynamic" (easiest to read). I've seen this referred to as "word-for-word" versus "thought-for-thought." The main problem in translating one language into another is that there will be differences in grammar, idioms (things like "caught like a rat in a trap" which to most English-speakers is clear but when translated into another language might be total gibberish), even precisely which words are available (Bible Greek has many words that are usually all translated into English as "love," for example, although they have very different meanings in the Greek... we don't have the range of meaning in the English language to accommodate). A translator attempting a purely "literal" or "word-for-word" translation will try to directly map a Greek or Hebrew word to an English word, and as much as possible, even keep word order and sentence structure intact. A translator attempting a purely "dynamic" or "thought-for-thought" translation will read the text in the original language, figure out what he thinks the original author was trying to communicate, and communicate that same thing in English, not trying to reproduce vocabulary or grammar but trying to generate the same ideas and thoughts in the modern reader's mind that the original might have generated in the mind of a reader contemporary with the author. There is merit in both approaches; a literal translation might be very difficult to read because of awkward grammar, and a dynamic translation may unintentionally misrepresent a passage by adding to or removing from the original shades of meaning, or introducing theological biases of the translator. Both techniques certainly have strengths as well, though, and modern translations seek balance between the two (although occasionally you'll see a version come out that leans very far one way or the other, so make sure you know what you're reading!)
I've done some reading about the process of creating translations of the Bible for groups who do not have a Bible in their native tongue. Some people groups are multilingual, and there may be one in a language they understand (for example, a group may have an aboriginal language in which there is no Bible translation, but they may also understand French or Swahili, languages which have Bible translations already). But it means a great deal to those people groups when someone translates the Bible into their "heart language"... the language of their people, their birth, their home. And I think in some ways, choosing a Bible translation for your personal use is a matter of finding the one that's in your "heart language," even though all of them are already in English. If you can find a Bible that you know you can trust (because you're aware of the methods used by the translators) and which speaks to you when you read it, that's a good translation to claim as your own. Through the centuries, millions have chosen the King James as their own; through the past few decades, many thousands more have chosen the NIV as the translation that speaks to them. I'll discuss even more good modern translations in my next post. You may find a translation that speaks to you even better than any that I'll mention. The point is that you find a Bible that you want to open up and explore. As I said in my previous post, the only good Bible is a "read" Bible, so find one that you can say you have "read." Put yourself in a place where God can speak to your heart, and God will speak, and trust me, your life will never be the same!
Friday, November 5, 2010
New NIV Translators' Notes
I just read the Translators' Notes for the new revision of the NIV (PDF), and I had a couple of thoughts.
It struck me as odd that the notes seem to imply that the King James Version was the first translation of the Bible into English. That is FAR from the case, as even a quick look at Wikipedia's entry for the KJV shows. Over 200 years before the KJV, John Wycliffe made the first-ever translation of the Bible into English; William Tyndale did it 100 years after that, and there were several revisions of that translation before the KJV was undertaken. If you look at the first pages of your King James Bible, you will probably find the phrase "with the former Translations diligently compared and revised" right there. The notes aren't trying to mislead anyone; it just struck me as odd that all that history was glossed over so completely.
I did like the terms "transparency" and "comprehensibility" used to describe "formal equivalence" and "dynamic equivalence", respectively. "Formal equivalence" seeks "transparency" to the original texts (meaning, trying to make the English closely match the way the text was originally written), while "dynamic equivalence" seeks "comprehensibility" by re-wording sentences and even whole paragraphs so that the train of thought is clear to a modern English-speaker. (The other terms I've heard for it are "word-for-word" vs. "thought-for-thought")
The NIV seeks to be somewhere in the middle, and I think in general it does a good job. I've come to prefer translations like the ESV that are a little closer to the "transparency" end of the spectrum, but it occurs to me that maybe a good Bible strategy is to have at least one "dynamic equivalent" Bible (the NIV is a good choice, or the HCSB) for times when you are just reading through the Bible, and at least one "formal equivalent" Bible for more intense study times.
The examples of changes in the new NIV that are outlined in the document look pretty good to me overall... it will be interesting to see whether this new NIV gains traction!
It struck me as odd that the notes seem to imply that the King James Version was the first translation of the Bible into English. That is FAR from the case, as even a quick look at Wikipedia's entry for the KJV shows. Over 200 years before the KJV, John Wycliffe made the first-ever translation of the Bible into English; William Tyndale did it 100 years after that, and there were several revisions of that translation before the KJV was undertaken. If you look at the first pages of your King James Bible, you will probably find the phrase "with the former Translations diligently compared and revised" right there. The notes aren't trying to mislead anyone; it just struck me as odd that all that history was glossed over so completely.
I did like the terms "transparency" and "comprehensibility" used to describe "formal equivalence" and "dynamic equivalence", respectively. "Formal equivalence" seeks "transparency" to the original texts (meaning, trying to make the English closely match the way the text was originally written), while "dynamic equivalence" seeks "comprehensibility" by re-wording sentences and even whole paragraphs so that the train of thought is clear to a modern English-speaker. (The other terms I've heard for it are "word-for-word" vs. "thought-for-thought")
| formal equivalence | word-for-word | transparency | NASB, ESV |
| dynamic equivalence | thought-for-thought | comprehensibility | The Living Bible, The Message |
The NIV seeks to be somewhere in the middle, and I think in general it does a good job. I've come to prefer translations like the ESV that are a little closer to the "transparency" end of the spectrum, but it occurs to me that maybe a good Bible strategy is to have at least one "dynamic equivalent" Bible (the NIV is a good choice, or the HCSB) for times when you are just reading through the Bible, and at least one "formal equivalent" Bible for more intense study times.
The examples of changes in the new NIV that are outlined in the document look pretty good to me overall... it will be interesting to see whether this new NIV gains traction!
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
HCSB Study Bible Online
I've been looking at a new Bible Web site. It's pretty great stuff! But before I point you that way, let me give you a quick run-down of how I found it.
Mostly on this blog I talk about the ESV, but I've gained a great deal of respect for the HCSB as a kind of more-literal NIV. I'm also a Certified Study Bible Junkie. So when I recently saw an ad for the new Holman Christian Standard Bible Study Bible, I immediately was interested. Here's a video of some of the features of the paper HCSB Study Bible:
So anyway, last week I was at a local Christian bookstore looking at the HCSB Study Bibles, and I saw a Web link printed on them: MyStudyBible.com. I wrote it on my built-in note pad (my hand), and when I got home I loaded it up. Turns out it's the new online version of the study Bible... and at least for the time being, it's free! Take a look at what it can do:
Right now the system is in beta testing (the link forwards to http://beta.mystudybible.com), and there's no indication whether Broadman Holman intends for it to be free forever, or to begin to charge for it at some point, so try it out while you can!
At first glance, it appears that they've taken some cues from the online version of the ESV Study Bible. Here's a brief video of that (most of the online videos of the ESV Study Bible are for the older version, which has been superseded by a new iteration, so this is all I've got):
Obvious similarities: two panes (actually, the ESV site defaults to three, but I just use two). Scripture on the left (usually), additional material on the right (usually). Bible verse search box above the left-hand pane, with the Scripture reference you're looking at in light gray text except when you're typing in a new one. The notes follow the Bible text as you scroll. But after that, the similarities end and the feature sets diverge a bit.
One thing I really like about the ESV online study Bible is the "endless scrolling" of the Bible text. When you get to the end of a chapter, the next chapter automatically follows it. The Holman online study Bible doesn't do that. The ESV OSB also has configurable bookmarks and a built-in audio player so you can listen to the Bible text. And the ESV OSB has Bible reading plans built in to give you a framework for your Bible study. The Holman OSB, on the other hand, is heavier on word-study tools; you can turn on links to Strong's definitions directly from the text, and the same information is also available in the right-hand side pane. It also incorporates the Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary for word definitions, and commentaries such as the Holman New Testament Commentary. It's clear that B&H is building a platform on which they can host a lot of material from their library; the ESV Online Study Bible only contains materials from that one book (although there is a VAST amount of information in that one book, and I've read hints that the architecture of this version of that site is designed so that they can add materials later on). For access to deeper study materials, the HCSB OSB currently has the ESV OSB beat by a landslide. When I've wanted access to Strong's word definitions, I've had to get them at Blue Letter Bible; now I could go to the HCSB OSB instead and find a much slicker interface.
There are some clunky parts left to be ironed out; for example, if you click a "read more" link, the full text of the study note opens automatically in the left-hand pane, right over the Bible text. The Bible text is still there, of course; it's just on a separate tab. But I'd rather see the full text of the note appear in the right-hand pane and not cover the Scripture text. You can move the tabs from pane to pane quite easily, but it strikes me as awkward for it even to happen that way in the first place, especially seeing how much effort they've put into the interface. Maybe that's one of the things that will come out in the wash as they move from beta to release version. On the other hand, things like verse popups when you hover over a cross-reference indicator are much more intuitive on the HCSB OSB site than on the ESV OSB site.
A few more odds and ends: the ESV OSB has a really nice setup for copying verses to paste into something else; I use it all the time for this blog. The esv.to Bible verse linking facility points to the ESV OSB as well, which makes for extremely easy linking from blog posts, Tweets, or anywhere you might want to link to a Bible verse. The HCSB site doesn't seem to have anything like those two features, but on the other hand, the HCSB site also contains the KJV text, and you can even set it as your default if you like.
The ESV online study Bible is a pay service; access to the Bible text is always free, but access to the study notes is $19.95, or free to anyone who purchases a hard copy of the ESV Study Bible. Currently the HCSB Online Study Bible is completely free, andI wasn't able to find any indication that they plan to charge for it in the future (see update at the bottom of this post), but I can't imagine a publisher simply giving away all of the resources they're putting out there. My guess is that the free access is a beta testing/generating buzz thing which will eventually lead to a pay service, much like Crossway gave away access to the ESV OSB for a bit back when it was brand new. I'd say if access to this new Holman site is in that same $20 range, and if it includes even only the study resources you can see today, that's a pretty amazing bargain. The HCSB text + Study Bible notes & cross-references + Strong's definitions + Bible dictionaries + a whole shelf full of commentaries = quite a value, even at a much higher cost. The link on The HCSB Study Bible site says that MyStudyBible.com contains "more than $200 in free resources" and I totally believe it. I'm looking forward to spending a little more time with the HCSB Study Bible notes to see how much I like the content, but the site is feature-rich and the materials look very useful. I think it's a great start for a new Bible Web site.
A list of HCSB Study Bibles you can buy
The official site of the HCSB translation
UPDATE: After I wrote this post, I found this in the site's FAQ:
Mostly on this blog I talk about the ESV, but I've gained a great deal of respect for the HCSB as a kind of more-literal NIV. I'm also a Certified Study Bible Junkie. So when I recently saw an ad for the new Holman Christian Standard Bible Study Bible, I immediately was interested. Here's a video of some of the features of the paper HCSB Study Bible:
So anyway, last week I was at a local Christian bookstore looking at the HCSB Study Bibles, and I saw a Web link printed on them: MyStudyBible.com. I wrote it on my built-in note pad (my hand), and when I got home I loaded it up. Turns out it's the new online version of the study Bible... and at least for the time being, it's free! Take a look at what it can do:
Right now the system is in beta testing (the link forwards to http://beta.mystudybible.com), and there's no indication whether Broadman Holman intends for it to be free forever, or to begin to charge for it at some point, so try it out while you can!
At first glance, it appears that they've taken some cues from the online version of the ESV Study Bible. Here's a brief video of that (most of the online videos of the ESV Study Bible are for the older version, which has been superseded by a new iteration, so this is all I've got):
Obvious similarities: two panes (actually, the ESV site defaults to three, but I just use two). Scripture on the left (usually), additional material on the right (usually). Bible verse search box above the left-hand pane, with the Scripture reference you're looking at in light gray text except when you're typing in a new one. The notes follow the Bible text as you scroll. But after that, the similarities end and the feature sets diverge a bit.
One thing I really like about the ESV online study Bible is the "endless scrolling" of the Bible text. When you get to the end of a chapter, the next chapter automatically follows it. The Holman online study Bible doesn't do that. The ESV OSB also has configurable bookmarks and a built-in audio player so you can listen to the Bible text. And the ESV OSB has Bible reading plans built in to give you a framework for your Bible study. The Holman OSB, on the other hand, is heavier on word-study tools; you can turn on links to Strong's definitions directly from the text, and the same information is also available in the right-hand side pane. It also incorporates the Holman Illustrated Bible Dictionary for word definitions, and commentaries such as the Holman New Testament Commentary. It's clear that B&H is building a platform on which they can host a lot of material from their library; the ESV Online Study Bible only contains materials from that one book (although there is a VAST amount of information in that one book, and I've read hints that the architecture of this version of that site is designed so that they can add materials later on). For access to deeper study materials, the HCSB OSB currently has the ESV OSB beat by a landslide. When I've wanted access to Strong's word definitions, I've had to get them at Blue Letter Bible; now I could go to the HCSB OSB instead and find a much slicker interface.
There are some clunky parts left to be ironed out; for example, if you click a "read more" link, the full text of the study note opens automatically in the left-hand pane, right over the Bible text. The Bible text is still there, of course; it's just on a separate tab. But I'd rather see the full text of the note appear in the right-hand pane and not cover the Scripture text. You can move the tabs from pane to pane quite easily, but it strikes me as awkward for it even to happen that way in the first place, especially seeing how much effort they've put into the interface. Maybe that's one of the things that will come out in the wash as they move from beta to release version. On the other hand, things like verse popups when you hover over a cross-reference indicator are much more intuitive on the HCSB OSB site than on the ESV OSB site.
A few more odds and ends: the ESV OSB has a really nice setup for copying verses to paste into something else; I use it all the time for this blog. The esv.to Bible verse linking facility points to the ESV OSB as well, which makes for extremely easy linking from blog posts, Tweets, or anywhere you might want to link to a Bible verse. The HCSB site doesn't seem to have anything like those two features, but on the other hand, the HCSB site also contains the KJV text, and you can even set it as your default if you like.
The ESV online study Bible is a pay service; access to the Bible text is always free, but access to the study notes is $19.95, or free to anyone who purchases a hard copy of the ESV Study Bible. Currently the HCSB Online Study Bible is completely free, and
A list of HCSB Study Bibles you can buy
The official site of the HCSB translation
UPDATE: After I wrote this post, I found this in the site's FAQ:
Will this site and this content always be FREE?
Our current intention is to keep all of the books that are in this BETA site free forever! And we plan to add more free books! Later, we expect that publishers will need to charge for royalty-based books. When we add those royalty-based books, we will let you know how to access them.
Saturday, June 19, 2010
Return of the Study Bible Junkie
A few days ago, I fed the monster. I bought not one, but two study Bibles!
Actually, to be fair to myself, one of them IS a gift. I promised my niece-in-law Olivia that I would buy her a nice new copy of the Apologetics Study Bible for Students; it was on sale at Lifeway so I picked it up there. It's an awesome HCSB Bible that's full of supplemental articles covering tons of issues that young people are likely to run into in college (or even in high school). How about an article on "If I Can't See God, How Do I Know He's Real?" or one about "Does the Bible Contain Errors?" or maybe "How Important Is Darwinian Evolution?" or "Aren't All Religions Basically the Same?" or "Can God Make A Rock So Big He Can't Lift It?" The answers are well thought out, logical, and meaningful. Here's a little more about this Bible:
While I was there, I took advantage of another sale that was going on... I picked up a hardback copy of The ESV Literary Study Bible for ten dollars(!) You can't beat a $35 Bible for a ten-spot, and if you read my previous Study Bible Junkie post, you already know that I was planning on picking one of these up anyway. So I saved myself some cash and picked it up early!
Am I an addict? Is this bad? Am I just buying multiple Bible so I can be smug about my Christianity? Well, I haven't bought them because it makes me feel more Christiany; I've bought them because it gives me multiple ways to learn about God's Word. I haven't read all of them yet... but I will. The old joke... the only useful Bibles are the "red" ones, because if you don't read 'em they can't help you... these will all eventually be "read" Bibles. And hopefully I'm modeling a reverence for God's Word for my children, and at the same time making a resource available for them when they are old enough to use it.
I have maybe three or four more "study Bibles" in mind that I would like to get my hands on, but I'm in no hurry to buy more of them. The ones I have will literally take me years to get through without ever reading the same one more than once (although I'll be looking at the ESV translation twice, because I have two different study Bibles with that translation) and when I run out, there will be something else new to check out... but even if I make it through all of them and study Bibles have suddenly stopped being made, we have enough Bible knowledge in just the six study Bibles in our library to start again at the beginning and learn all new stuff. In the United States of America in the year 2010 we are so blessed in the amount of sheer Bible knowledge that is available to us for very limited amounts of money. Some people graduate from seminary knowing less about the Bible than the information on my one bookshelf. What a blessing!
I'm going to go read my Bible now!
Actually, to be fair to myself, one of them IS a gift. I promised my niece-in-law Olivia that I would buy her a nice new copy of the Apologetics Study Bible for Students; it was on sale at Lifeway so I picked it up there. It's an awesome HCSB Bible that's full of supplemental articles covering tons of issues that young people are likely to run into in college (or even in high school). How about an article on "If I Can't See God, How Do I Know He's Real?" or one about "Does the Bible Contain Errors?" or maybe "How Important Is Darwinian Evolution?" or "Aren't All Religions Basically the Same?" or "Can God Make A Rock So Big He Can't Lift It?" The answers are well thought out, logical, and meaningful. Here's a little more about this Bible:
While I was there, I took advantage of another sale that was going on... I picked up a hardback copy of The ESV Literary Study Bible for ten dollars(!) You can't beat a $35 Bible for a ten-spot, and if you read my previous Study Bible Junkie post, you already know that I was planning on picking one of these up anyway. So I saved myself some cash and picked it up early!
Am I an addict? Is this bad? Am I just buying multiple Bible so I can be smug about my Christianity? Well, I haven't bought them because it makes me feel more Christiany; I've bought them because it gives me multiple ways to learn about God's Word. I haven't read all of them yet... but I will. The old joke... the only useful Bibles are the "red" ones, because if you don't read 'em they can't help you... these will all eventually be "read" Bibles. And hopefully I'm modeling a reverence for God's Word for my children, and at the same time making a resource available for them when they are old enough to use it.
I have maybe three or four more "study Bibles" in mind that I would like to get my hands on, but I'm in no hurry to buy more of them. The ones I have will literally take me years to get through without ever reading the same one more than once (although I'll be looking at the ESV translation twice, because I have two different study Bibles with that translation) and when I run out, there will be something else new to check out... but even if I make it through all of them and study Bibles have suddenly stopped being made, we have enough Bible knowledge in just the six study Bibles in our library to start again at the beginning and learn all new stuff. In the United States of America in the year 2010 we are so blessed in the amount of sheer Bible knowledge that is available to us for very limited amounts of money. Some people graduate from seminary knowing less about the Bible than the information on my one bookshelf. What a blessing!
I'm going to go read my Bible now!
Monday, April 5, 2010
Study Bible Junkie
On Easter of 2005, everybody in my family got new Bibles.
My baby girl wasn't born yet, but my little boy was almost 5 years old at the time, and we decided that it was high time he had his own kid Bible. My wife needed a new Bible too, and I had my eye on an ESV Bible (I had been a long-time NIV reader, but I wanted to switch to the more literal translation - and I've never looked back!) I had done some looking around and I had discovered what I believed (and still believe) is the most awesome kid Bible ever created: the NIrV Super Heroes Bible. Take a look at that cover: that's Moses parting the Red Sea! The Bible has forty of those incredible, comic book style illustrations of Bible "Super Heroes" like Elijah, John the Baptist, David (and Goliath), and even some of the awesome female super heroes of the Bible like Mary, Queen Esther, Deborah, and Ruth. The pictures are filled with action and humor, but are never irreverent. Perfect for getting a kid interested in looking at what's in their Bible! There are also over 200 profiles of Bible characters, written at a kid's level of understanding. (The ironic thing about these well-written profiles is that the vocabulary and sentence structure are actually harder than the NIrV translation itself is!) We bought this Bible for him partly because the translation is very easy for beginning readers. When he turns ten next week, we might think about upgrading to an NIV.
My wife Cathy picked out an NIV Life Application Study Bible. It has book introductions, maps, all of the regular Study Bible stuff, but the text notes on each page are focused on "How does this really apply to me? What does this mean to my life?" She actually had a tough time concentrating on the message in Church for a while because she would get distracted by the study notes! (This is the main reason I still to this day bring a more plain-jane Bible to church with me!)
That was my first brush with a study Bible... well, as a high school student I owned a New King James "Open Bible" (they are out of print now) and I really loved it a lot. As I remember, I gave it away to someone that I felt needed it more than I did. I really wanted a study Bible in the ESV translation, but at the time there really wasn't one! I went with a small ESV Compact Trutone Bible which is almost the opposite... no study notes, no book introductions, no cross-references. It actually served me very well for many years, but I still wanted a study Bible in the ESV translation.
The first ESV-translation study Bible I remember hearing about was the ESV Reformation Study Bible. I actually checked a copy out from the library, and enjoyed it quite a bit, but I was a little bit nervous that it is self-classified as a "reformation" Bible; I was concerned that the notes might be slanted toward "reformed" Theology, and I wasn't quite comfortable with joining that camp whole hog. I wouldn't at all mind having this Bible in my library, but it wasn't really "the one" that I wanted to have for my primary study Bible.
The next ESV study Bible that came out was The ESV Literary Study Bible.. This Bible focuses on the Bible as a book, a work of literature. This might trigger red flags for some, but really, it shouldn't. The Bible is a book. It's got characters, settings, and plots. It's also got poetry, historical accounts, and letters. The Bible is a book consisting of dozens of genres of writing, and it is valuable to understand those genres in order to truly understand the Bible. I was very interested in this Bible, but I really wanted something as my primary study Bible that would explain things like historical details, settings, that sort of thing, and this Bible focuses on the literary aspects. I wanted something that I could approach at a more basic level. I still want to pick one of these up, but it will be a future purchase.
Finally, I heard that The ESV Study Bible was coming out! This was the Bible I was looking for. It didn't look to be focused on one slant on the Bible to the exclusion of others, although it was conservative in its point of view. It had book introductions, study notes, cross-references, and articles about Bible topics. I picked up a sample of the Gospel of John from Mardel and read it straight through... I was hooked! I preordered a copy and picked it up on the day of release. It's my all-time favorite Bible! One of my first projects was to make my way through the book of Revelation, and I came away understanding it in a way I never understood it before. I started to see it as almost symphonic in nature, with a prelude, movements and interludes, loud sections and quiet sections. I'm a trained musical composer, so the fact that the ESV Study Bible caused me to see the Word in a way that made sense to me as a musician was a big deal!
When I decided at the beginning of this year to read my way through the whole Bible, cover to cover, of course my ESV Study Bible was at the center of the whole idea. But I never anticipated just how much having study notes to give me context and background would really help me to engage the Scripture. Reading the Bible isn't like reading the latest Tom Clancy novel; the Bible is a book that was written thousands of years ago in a different language in an ancient culture. There are things that would have been obvious to a Hebrew reader on 1,000 B.C. that just aren't obvious to an American in the year 2010. Some historical and geographical context is critical to really understanding what's going on.
I was so excited about the things I was learning in the Bible that I wanted more! I checked out The NIV Study Bible from the library to give it a test drive.I added it into my study times, reading the ESV text, then the ESVSB notes, then the NIVSB notes. To my surprise, the NIVSB was teaching me additional things that the ESVSB wasn't getting at! Occasionally there are notes in the two that disagree on some small point, but in general, the two simply have a different focus. This seems to be the case with study Bibles; no reference work will tell you everything there is to know about the text, so consulting different sources will often give you more insight into the passage. I bought one from CBD one day when they had it on sale (sometimes they announce one-day sales from their Facebook page), and now my Bible reading time includes two study Bibles!
A few weeks after I added the NIV Study Bible to the mix, I got a sale paper from Lifeway Christian Stores which led to another study Bible purchase. I had seen a video on the Internet talking about the Apologetics Study Bible for Students (you can view the video at that link if you like) and I was pretty impressed with the idea that a study Bible would have its focus specifically on explaining things about the Bible that people have a hard time understanding. I had seen the Web site for the (non-"Student") Apologetics Study Bible already, and so when I saw it on sale in the Lifeway flyer, I knew I needed to pick it up. The weekend of the sale at Lifeway was kind of crazy; it was a "spring sale" on the literal first day of spring, but the day before we had a freak snowstorm and there was like six inches of snow on the ground! I went anyway and picked up another new study Bible for less than twenty bucks, and it's been great. I did not try to add it into my daily Bible reading regimen (two is plenty... I could spend hours just reading notes and following links in those two study Bibles!), but this won't be my last trip through the Bible. The Apologetics Study Bible will probably be my companion on the trip next year, or the next, or the next! It was a good purchase anyway; we didn't have a full copy of the Holman Christian Standard Bible in the house yet, so it was another translation to add to our collection. The Holman translation is a good, solid translation, too... it's probably my second favorite now, next to the ESV. The NIV still holds a place in my heart, though; it's probably my #3 favorite translation.
Now that I've become a bonafide Study Bible Junkie, I have my eye on some other study Bibles. I still want to pick up that ESV Literary Study Bible that I mentioned above; my plan is to buy one of those for myself as a reward for making it all the way through the Bible this year (or maybe I'll ask for it for Christmas!) A few years ago I spied an NIV Archaeological Study Bible that someone had accidentally left on the seat at church, and I leafed through it. It has full-color photographs to support the information it contains about the archaeology of the Bible. It's a beautiful Bible; although I haven't looked at one long enough to be able to report on the quality of the in-text notes, it's another one that I'd like to pick up a copy of sometime.
I've had an interest in the New Living Translation for a while, and the best way to satisfy my desire to have that translation and also to get a new study Bible would be to pick up a copy of the NLT Study Bible! The New Living Translation is kind of the child of the Living Bible Paraphrase from the 70s; the NLT is supposed to be a Bible with the clarity of language of the paraphrase, but with the precision of a new translation from the original languages (the paraphrase is a rewording of the text of the American Standard Version, with no reference to the original language texts. Kind of like "The Message" except from the 70s). I've briefly read some passages from the NLT and I liked what I saw; my concern is fidelity to the source texts. I'll just have to spend some time reading it to have a verdict on that. I hope to pick up this sampler of Genesis sometime and spend some time with it; it helped me get the feel of the ESV Study Bible to read a sample, so maybe that will help me with this one too! (If you don't mind reading on your computer, or if you have a Kindle or similar reader that can handle PDF files, you can download that Genesis sampler here.)
In my research about study Bibles, I ran across the NRSV New Oxford Annotated Bible with Apocrypha. I haven't actually seen one, so I'll probably want to spend some time browsing it before I buy (I expect a slightly liberal bias), but it sounds like a well-respected reference work. Plus, I would really like to have a copy of the Apocrypha in my library, again for reference. ("Bel and the Dragon?" What's that? And who is this "Susanna?" Oh wait, didn't she come from Alabama with a banjo on her knee?) Of course, I might just wuss out on that one and pick up the Apocrypha parts by themselves instead.
The Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible sounds pretty cool for in-depth study. I would probably pick it up in the New American Standard version; I already have a beautiful NASB which I carry to church, but there is certainly no shortage of KJV Bibles around here, so since those appear to be the only two choices, probably I'd go with the NASB. I haven't seen one of these Bibles yet, though, so I can't recommend it (same with the Oxford one, and others in this post that it's clear I haven't spent time using).
If you are interested in study Bibles, CBD has a Study Bible Store that you could use for doing a little bit of research on what's out there. I got my NIV Study Bible and my Apologetics Study Bible each on sale for about $20 apiece; watch for sales and you can sometimes get a fabulous deal, particularly if you're cool with hardback copies (I prefer them, actually; they seem to do better on shelves, they're generally a little cheaper, and the covers have some personality to them!) For a deal from CBD, check the Slightly Imperfect Study Bibles store. That doesn't mean study Bibles with faulty Theology, or missing the book of Esther, or anything like that; it just means Bibles with maybe something wrong with the cover or some other minor manufacturing defect. Copies with a flaw that does not detract from their usefulness, but that makes them impossible to sell as though they were new. You can often get them for 40-50% off regular price, and sometimes never even notice the flaw.
There are tons of great Bibles out there, in zillions of translations, styles, designs, colors, and sizes. I've got probably a dozen different English translations in my library (and a couple in languages I don't even speak!), three study Bibles so far, and even one with the events of the entire Bible in chronological order. I even have a metal Bible! (I haven't picked up a waterproof Bible quite yet... then again, I don't read the Bible in the swimming pool!) But all the Bibles in the World can't help you a bit if you don't read them. When we picked out those Bibles five Easters ago, my goal was to find a Bible for each of us that we would like enough to open them up and read them. Pick a version and Bible that you enjoy reading, and get into the Word. These great study Bibles can help, but if cartoons of Bible characters are what it takes to get you to open up The Book, go with the cartoons. Just get into the Bible!
Useful Links
ESV Study Bible
ESV Literary Study Bible
ESV Reformation Study Bible
ESV MacArthur Study Bible
NLT Study Bible
HCSB Apologetics Study Bible
ESV translation
NIV translation
NIrV translation
HCSB translation
NLT translation
My baby girl wasn't born yet, but my little boy was almost 5 years old at the time, and we decided that it was high time he had his own kid Bible. My wife needed a new Bible too, and I had my eye on an ESV Bible (I had been a long-time NIV reader, but I wanted to switch to the more literal translation - and I've never looked back!) I had done some looking around and I had discovered what I believed (and still believe) is the most awesome kid Bible ever created: the NIrV Super Heroes Bible. Take a look at that cover: that's Moses parting the Red Sea! The Bible has forty of those incredible, comic book style illustrations of Bible "Super Heroes" like Elijah, John the Baptist, David (and Goliath), and even some of the awesome female super heroes of the Bible like Mary, Queen Esther, Deborah, and Ruth. The pictures are filled with action and humor, but are never irreverent. Perfect for getting a kid interested in looking at what's in their Bible! There are also over 200 profiles of Bible characters, written at a kid's level of understanding. (The ironic thing about these well-written profiles is that the vocabulary and sentence structure are actually harder than the NIrV translation itself is!) We bought this Bible for him partly because the translation is very easy for beginning readers. When he turns ten next week, we might think about upgrading to an NIV.
My wife Cathy picked out an NIV Life Application Study Bible. It has book introductions, maps, all of the regular Study Bible stuff, but the text notes on each page are focused on "How does this really apply to me? What does this mean to my life?" She actually had a tough time concentrating on the message in Church for a while because she would get distracted by the study notes! (This is the main reason I still to this day bring a more plain-jane Bible to church with me!)
That was my first brush with a study Bible... well, as a high school student I owned a New King James "Open Bible" (they are out of print now) and I really loved it a lot. As I remember, I gave it away to someone that I felt needed it more than I did. I really wanted a study Bible in the ESV translation, but at the time there really wasn't one! I went with a small ESV Compact Trutone Bible which is almost the opposite... no study notes, no book introductions, no cross-references. It actually served me very well for many years, but I still wanted a study Bible in the ESV translation.
The first ESV-translation study Bible I remember hearing about was the ESV Reformation Study Bible. I actually checked a copy out from the library, and enjoyed it quite a bit, but I was a little bit nervous that it is self-classified as a "reformation" Bible; I was concerned that the notes might be slanted toward "reformed" Theology, and I wasn't quite comfortable with joining that camp whole hog. I wouldn't at all mind having this Bible in my library, but it wasn't really "the one" that I wanted to have for my primary study Bible.
The next ESV study Bible that came out was The ESV Literary Study Bible.. This Bible focuses on the Bible as a book, a work of literature. This might trigger red flags for some, but really, it shouldn't. The Bible is a book. It's got characters, settings, and plots. It's also got poetry, historical accounts, and letters. The Bible is a book consisting of dozens of genres of writing, and it is valuable to understand those genres in order to truly understand the Bible. I was very interested in this Bible, but I really wanted something as my primary study Bible that would explain things like historical details, settings, that sort of thing, and this Bible focuses on the literary aspects. I wanted something that I could approach at a more basic level. I still want to pick one of these up, but it will be a future purchase.
Finally, I heard that The ESV Study Bible was coming out! This was the Bible I was looking for. It didn't look to be focused on one slant on the Bible to the exclusion of others, although it was conservative in its point of view. It had book introductions, study notes, cross-references, and articles about Bible topics. I picked up a sample of the Gospel of John from Mardel and read it straight through... I was hooked! I preordered a copy and picked it up on the day of release. It's my all-time favorite Bible! One of my first projects was to make my way through the book of Revelation, and I came away understanding it in a way I never understood it before. I started to see it as almost symphonic in nature, with a prelude, movements and interludes, loud sections and quiet sections. I'm a trained musical composer, so the fact that the ESV Study Bible caused me to see the Word in a way that made sense to me as a musician was a big deal!
When I decided at the beginning of this year to read my way through the whole Bible, cover to cover, of course my ESV Study Bible was at the center of the whole idea. But I never anticipated just how much having study notes to give me context and background would really help me to engage the Scripture. Reading the Bible isn't like reading the latest Tom Clancy novel; the Bible is a book that was written thousands of years ago in a different language in an ancient culture. There are things that would have been obvious to a Hebrew reader on 1,000 B.C. that just aren't obvious to an American in the year 2010. Some historical and geographical context is critical to really understanding what's going on.
I was so excited about the things I was learning in the Bible that I wanted more! I checked out The NIV Study Bible from the library to give it a test drive.I added it into my study times, reading the ESV text, then the ESVSB notes, then the NIVSB notes. To my surprise, the NIVSB was teaching me additional things that the ESVSB wasn't getting at! Occasionally there are notes in the two that disagree on some small point, but in general, the two simply have a different focus. This seems to be the case with study Bibles; no reference work will tell you everything there is to know about the text, so consulting different sources will often give you more insight into the passage. I bought one from CBD one day when they had it on sale (sometimes they announce one-day sales from their Facebook page), and now my Bible reading time includes two study Bibles!
A few weeks after I added the NIV Study Bible to the mix, I got a sale paper from Lifeway Christian Stores which led to another study Bible purchase. I had seen a video on the Internet talking about the Apologetics Study Bible for Students (you can view the video at that link if you like) and I was pretty impressed with the idea that a study Bible would have its focus specifically on explaining things about the Bible that people have a hard time understanding. I had seen the Web site for the (non-"Student") Apologetics Study Bible already, and so when I saw it on sale in the Lifeway flyer, I knew I needed to pick it up. The weekend of the sale at Lifeway was kind of crazy; it was a "spring sale" on the literal first day of spring, but the day before we had a freak snowstorm and there was like six inches of snow on the ground! I went anyway and picked up another new study Bible for less than twenty bucks, and it's been great. I did not try to add it into my daily Bible reading regimen (two is plenty... I could spend hours just reading notes and following links in those two study Bibles!), but this won't be my last trip through the Bible. The Apologetics Study Bible will probably be my companion on the trip next year, or the next, or the next! It was a good purchase anyway; we didn't have a full copy of the Holman Christian Standard Bible in the house yet, so it was another translation to add to our collection. The Holman translation is a good, solid translation, too... it's probably my second favorite now, next to the ESV. The NIV still holds a place in my heart, though; it's probably my #3 favorite translation.
Now that I've become a bonafide Study Bible Junkie, I have my eye on some other study Bibles. I still want to pick up that ESV Literary Study Bible that I mentioned above; my plan is to buy one of those for myself as a reward for making it all the way through the Bible this year (or maybe I'll ask for it for Christmas!) A few years ago I spied an NIV Archaeological Study Bible that someone had accidentally left on the seat at church, and I leafed through it. It has full-color photographs to support the information it contains about the archaeology of the Bible. It's a beautiful Bible; although I haven't looked at one long enough to be able to report on the quality of the in-text notes, it's another one that I'd like to pick up a copy of sometime.
I've had an interest in the New Living Translation for a while, and the best way to satisfy my desire to have that translation and also to get a new study Bible would be to pick up a copy of the NLT Study Bible! The New Living Translation is kind of the child of the Living Bible Paraphrase from the 70s; the NLT is supposed to be a Bible with the clarity of language of the paraphrase, but with the precision of a new translation from the original languages (the paraphrase is a rewording of the text of the American Standard Version, with no reference to the original language texts. Kind of like "The Message" except from the 70s). I've briefly read some passages from the NLT and I liked what I saw; my concern is fidelity to the source texts. I'll just have to spend some time reading it to have a verdict on that. I hope to pick up this sampler of Genesis sometime and spend some time with it; it helped me get the feel of the ESV Study Bible to read a sample, so maybe that will help me with this one too! (If you don't mind reading on your computer, or if you have a Kindle or similar reader that can handle PDF files, you can download that Genesis sampler here.)
In my research about study Bibles, I ran across the NRSV New Oxford Annotated Bible with Apocrypha. I haven't actually seen one, so I'll probably want to spend some time browsing it before I buy (I expect a slightly liberal bias), but it sounds like a well-respected reference work. Plus, I would really like to have a copy of the Apocrypha in my library, again for reference. ("Bel and the Dragon?" What's that? And who is this "Susanna?" Oh wait, didn't she come from Alabama with a banjo on her knee?) Of course, I might just wuss out on that one and pick up the Apocrypha parts by themselves instead.
The Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible sounds pretty cool for in-depth study. I would probably pick it up in the New American Standard version; I already have a beautiful NASB which I carry to church, but there is certainly no shortage of KJV Bibles around here, so since those appear to be the only two choices, probably I'd go with the NASB. I haven't seen one of these Bibles yet, though, so I can't recommend it (same with the Oxford one, and others in this post that it's clear I haven't spent time using).
If you are interested in study Bibles, CBD has a Study Bible Store that you could use for doing a little bit of research on what's out there. I got my NIV Study Bible and my Apologetics Study Bible each on sale for about $20 apiece; watch for sales and you can sometimes get a fabulous deal, particularly if you're cool with hardback copies (I prefer them, actually; they seem to do better on shelves, they're generally a little cheaper, and the covers have some personality to them!) For a deal from CBD, check the Slightly Imperfect Study Bibles store. That doesn't mean study Bibles with faulty Theology, or missing the book of Esther, or anything like that; it just means Bibles with maybe something wrong with the cover or some other minor manufacturing defect. Copies with a flaw that does not detract from their usefulness, but that makes them impossible to sell as though they were new. You can often get them for 40-50% off regular price, and sometimes never even notice the flaw.
There are tons of great Bibles out there, in zillions of translations, styles, designs, colors, and sizes. I've got probably a dozen different English translations in my library (and a couple in languages I don't even speak!), three study Bibles so far, and even one with the events of the entire Bible in chronological order. I even have a metal Bible! (I haven't picked up a waterproof Bible quite yet... then again, I don't read the Bible in the swimming pool!) But all the Bibles in the World can't help you a bit if you don't read them. When we picked out those Bibles five Easters ago, my goal was to find a Bible for each of us that we would like enough to open them up and read them. Pick a version and Bible that you enjoy reading, and get into the Word. These great study Bibles can help, but if cartoons of Bible characters are what it takes to get you to open up The Book, go with the cartoons. Just get into the Bible!
Useful Links
ESV Study Bible
ESV Literary Study Bible
ESV Reformation Study Bible
ESV MacArthur Study Bible
NLT Study Bible
HCSB Apologetics Study Bible
ESV translation
NIV translation
NIrV translation
HCSB translation
NLT translation
Tuesday, August 15, 2006
The Son In Paul
The ESV translation of Galatians 1:15-16 reads:
But when he who had set me apart before I was born, and who called me by his grace, was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone... [emphasis mine]There is a footnote on the word "to" that the Greek actually says "in" me. Since I am still reading from The Evengelical Parallel New Testament, I was able to easily check a whole bunch of translations... and the NKJV, NIV, TNIV, and HCSV all say "in." Of all of the translations in the book (NLT and The Message are not what I consider reliable to look at as "translations") only the ESV and the NCV (which is supposed to be one of the more "dynamic" translations) said "to." I can only assume that the idea is that we don't want anyone to think that Christ was in Paul even before he was a believer and was only "revealed" in him later. Seems like the translators of the other versions didn't have too much trouble with that, though. I'd say if the Greek says "in" I'd like to read "in" and settle out any Theological difficulties myself. (Although I understand that articles in Greek are pretty vague, so maybe "to" is just as valid as "in" and the other translations were simply following the traditional rendering; I'm not a Greek scholar so I don't know for positive!)
Monday, August 7, 2006
You Can't Beat The Classics
Lately I've been doing my Bible reading from a copy of The Evengelical Parallel New Testament that I borrowed from the library. The layout of the book is really pretty informative for someone who, like me, has read up a bit on the whole literal vs. dynamig translation method debate; the two translations on the far left, the NKJV and the ESV, are the most "literal" translations (close to word-for-word from the originals). The others (NIV and HCSB, TNIV and NCV, NLT and The Message) are arranged that way so that the most "dynamic" of the translations (actually both paraphrases) are on the far right, and the four in between are roughly arranged in sequence from most literal to most dynamic.
Anyway, today I ran across a "classic" example for literal translation advocates: 2 Corinthians 5:21. That link is to a page that displays the renderings from the first five translations in the book: NKJV, ESV, NIV, HCSV, TNIV. They all say something to the effect that Jesus was made "to be" sin, so that we could "become the righteousness of God." Interestingly, when I glanced over at the NCV version of the verse, I had no longer "become" the righteousness of God, but was simply "made righteous." Likewise with the NLT and The Message. Maybe to some people that's a minor, hair-splitting change, but Theologically it's a big difference whether Jesus took a mud-bath in our sin and then he said we were OK, or whether he became the sin and we became the righteousness. Actually, I guess you could say it's the difference in old covenant covering with animal blood vs. new covenant cleansing with Jesus' blood.
I notice that The Good News translation is even worse... in that one Jesus just shares our sin with us, and we get to share God's righteousness with Him. Like he gave us a piece of his Snickers. ARGH!
(Notice that in this case, two of the translations that are often considered dynamic-equivalent "offenders" - the NIV and TNIV - came out with the more literal version of the verse. Fear of what the TNIV update of the NIV would mistranslate was a big part of the reason why the ESV and HCSB were created in the first place!)
Anyway, today I ran across a "classic" example for literal translation advocates: 2 Corinthians 5:21. That link is to a page that displays the renderings from the first five translations in the book: NKJV, ESV, NIV, HCSV, TNIV. They all say something to the effect that Jesus was made "to be" sin, so that we could "become the righteousness of God." Interestingly, when I glanced over at the NCV version of the verse, I had no longer "become" the righteousness of God, but was simply "made righteous." Likewise with the NLT and The Message. Maybe to some people that's a minor, hair-splitting change, but Theologically it's a big difference whether Jesus took a mud-bath in our sin and then he said we were OK, or whether he became the sin and we became the righteousness. Actually, I guess you could say it's the difference in old covenant covering with animal blood vs. new covenant cleansing with Jesus' blood.
I notice that The Good News translation is even worse... in that one Jesus just shares our sin with us, and we get to share God's righteousness with Him. Like he gave us a piece of his Snickers. ARGH!
(Notice that in this case, two of the translations that are often considered dynamic-equivalent "offenders" - the NIV and TNIV - came out with the more literal version of the verse. Fear of what the TNIV update of the NIV would mistranslate was a big part of the reason why the ESV and HCSB were created in the first place!)
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