Which Bible?

Marissa and I have started out inductive Bible study. We started in Acts. It is difficult to learn to chew on Scripture this way, but we are already being blessed by our time in the Word. In fact, Marissa finds this the “most fun” part of our day.

Before starting, I decided to get Marissa and I both new Bibles. Marissa had a King James Bible that had been given to her by her birthmother. She struggled reading this Bible. Besides, she didn’t want to write all over a gift from her mom. I know that there are many people who advocate a King James only view of acceptable Bible translations. But, let’s face it: the English language has changed since 1611. The words employed are not common anymore. Marissa focused more on the fact that the words “didn’t sound right” than the message of the text. I had a New King James Bible, but the font was small and I am forty-three. Even with my glasses on, I really had trouble focusing on the words.

The number of available Bible translations made this simple purchase mind-boggling. Besides, I know that no matter how good these translations are they are still translations of writings written to be read by Jewish men whose culture and language are far different from mine. Still, new Bibles are a big investment and I wanted to teach my daughter to rightly handle the Word of Truth so I wanted to get the “best” translation. I will not presume to tell anyone which Bible translation to use. Instead, I will share what I learned as I researched my purchase options. There are essentially three different styles of translation: essentially literal translations, dynamic equivalent translations and paraphrased Bibles.

An essentially literal translation says what the original text says. The goal of the translator is to create a translation that reads well in English but remains faithful to the original Hebrew and Greek. The benefit of this type of translation is that since it remains as close to the original text as possible, theoretically, there is not a risk of the translator’s preconceived biases about how a passage should be translated making its way into scripture and being canonized. Some common essentially literal translations are the King James Version, the New King James Version (KJV), the New American Standard (NAS) and the English Standard Version. Additionally, because the goal of this translation is a word-for-word translation of the original language, a reader can find the original word in a free on-line version Strong’s Concordance for both the KJV and the NAS.

Unlike the essentially literal translation, a dynamic equivalent translation of the Bible does not attempt a word-for-word translation of the Bible. Instead, this method of translation attempts to produce a Bible that is an accurate thought-for-thought translation of the Bible. This type of Bible remains true to the language the Bible is being translated into. For example, the NAS Bible translates a phrase in Luke 1:42, “and blessed is the fruit of your womb!” In 21st Century America , we would never say fruit of the womb. (Okay, I just had to insert that after writing this my first thought was Fruit of the Loom! Whatever makes things like that pop into your head?) Oh, we all know what this verse is trying to say, but we would express our thoughts using a word besides “fruit.” In fact, calling someone a fruit is not really considered complimentary. A dynamic equivalent translation of the same portion of text reads, “and blessed is the child you will bear!” (New International Version) The New Living Translation (NLT) is another dynamic equivalent Bible.

Finally, a paraphrased Bible is the translation that is least true to original manuscripts. A paraphrased Bible tries to communicate general truths from scripture in language that is easily understood by a person with little or no Bible knowledge. The Message is the most commonly available paraphrased Bible. When I first read about this style of translation, I thought, “Why in the world would someone want a Bible that didn’t even attempt to communicate the original text?” Then I remembered, the first time I read through the Bible, I was reading a One-Year-Bible. The translation I used was the Living Bible, a paraphrased Bible and the translation I was reading when I claimed my life verse.

Finally, to put this all into one table compare the following well-known portion of scripture. Psalm 23:4:

Essentially Literal	Dynamic Equivalent	Paraphrase
NAS	NLT	The Message
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.	Even when I walk through the dark valley of death, I will not be afraid, for you are close beside me. Your rod and your staff protect and comfort me.	Even when the way goes through Death Valley I’m not afraid when you walk by my side. Your trusty shepherd’s crook makes me feel secure.

Hopefully, someone will find this useful when making their next Bible purchase. My dream study Bible would be a parallel Bible with both the NAS and the NIV side-by-side on the left and then the original language and their meaning on the right. This is probably unreasonable. I would need to add a room onto my house to hold these several volumes. Instead, I am just saving up to purchase the Scholar’s Edition of Logo’s Bible Software. I think I will need to go to a two day training camp too. Maybe ~ Hawaii. A girl can dream can’t she?