Monday, November 05, 2012

Which Bible Translation Should I Use?


I'm sometimes asked this question - what version of the Bible should I read? For guidance see this new book edited by NT scholar Andreas Kostenberger - Which Bible Translation Should I Use?: A Comparison of 4 Major Recent Versions.

The book compares four versions:
  • NIV 2011 (Doug Moo) - I've used the NIV for a bazillion years. It's what I preach out of now, excepting scholarly translations as required.
  • ESV (Wayne Grudem)
  • HCSB (Ray Clendenen)
  • NLT (Philip Comfort) - I love reading the NLT.
Grudem is a favorite scholar of mine. He favors the ESV. I've never used it. It's free on Kindle, so I just picked it up.

Ben Witherington has a helpful review of Kostenberger's book - "The Problem with Literalism When it Comes to Translation."