How Many Bible Versions Should I Read?
00:00:00.000 | [Music]
00:00:04.000 | Today's question comes from Tricia.
00:00:06.500 | "Hello Pastor John, my name is Tricia. I'm from Michigan. I know the ESV is your preferred translation,
00:00:12.000 | but I sometimes find the wording of the ESV hard to understand, so I often switch to the NIV,
00:00:18.000 | the Holman Christian Standard Bible, or the New Living Translation for clarity on a passage.
00:00:23.000 | Do you think it's important to stick with one translation for reading and meditation?
00:00:26.500 | As a Christian, I want to live and breathe Scripture because I know it's the very Word of God.
00:00:30.500 | I would love to hear your thoughts about sticking with one main Bible translation.
00:00:34.500 | I've read that many Puritans not only used one translation for their entire life,
00:00:38.500 | but also used the same physical Bible for a lifetime,
00:00:42.000 | knowing it so intimately as to have a visual memory of where the text was on a given page.
00:00:47.500 | Will I be missing out if I only use the ESV and come across wording I don't fully understand?"
00:00:53.000 | What would you say, Pastor John?
00:00:55.000 | I love the way she asked the question about wanting to live and breathe Scripture.
00:01:00.500 | That's beautiful.
00:01:02.000 | And she's right that I find the ESV, the English Standard Version, to be a translation that,
00:01:09.000 | while not perfect—there aren't any—strikes such a good balance between formal equivalence to the original language
00:01:17.000 | as far as possible and readability and appropriate dignity while being accessible, for the most part, to ordinary folks.
00:01:27.000 | I was glad to use it both for my personal reading and my study,
00:01:33.000 | and the public reading and worship services at the church, and the church memory work for children and adults.
00:01:41.000 | And that's asking a lot of a translation to cover all those bases.
00:01:45.000 | But I think we need to choose a translation, when we're a leader in church especially,
00:01:51.000 | that does best in all those areas, all things considered.
00:01:56.000 | One of the things I appreciate about the ESV is that it has continued the tradition from the Authorized Version,
00:02:04.000 | or the King James Version, through the Revised Standard Version,
00:02:08.000 | so that while it is not stuck in the 17th century Elizabethan English diction,
00:02:14.000 | it is unashamed to preserve historic translations that have proven themselves powerful and understandable and accurate for centuries.
00:02:24.000 | I love that about this translation.
00:02:28.000 | Some other modern translations involve themselves in more interpretive paraphrase to make certain meanings clearer,
00:02:38.000 | and I suppose many readers, like Tricia, will find that a gain.
00:02:44.000 | For example, if one translation—and this happens to be the ESV—if one translation translates Romans 1.5 as "the obedience of faith,"
00:02:55.000 | and another translates it, which some do, "the obedience that comes from faith,"
00:03:01.000 | the second one is interpreting, and the first one is not.
00:03:07.000 | It's leaving it ambiguous, which it is in the original.
00:03:11.000 | But the meaning of the second translation is clearer.
00:03:15.000 | "Obedience of faith" is ambiguous.
00:03:18.000 | You don't know how faith and obedience are related until you think about it in context.
00:03:23.000 | But "obedience that comes from faith" tells you the interpretation.
00:03:28.000 | Namely, faith is producing the obedience.
00:03:30.000 | Now, that may or may not be right, but it sure is understandable.
00:03:34.000 | And so she likes that, and most people do.
00:03:39.000 | It's just my personal opinion.
00:03:41.000 | I don't want translators to make those decisions for readers.
00:03:46.000 | I think interpreters, not translators, should be involved in that kind of thing.
00:03:52.000 | Now, I know that may frustrate Tricia, but I want her to have the choice to decide how to understand the phrase "obedience of faith" for herself,
00:04:02.000 | rather than having the translators decide that for her.
00:04:05.000 | That's my view of why a more formally literal version is better up to a point.
00:04:12.000 | There are, of course, formal equivalencies that are so awkward that few would read them if we tried to maintain a consistent formal equivalency.
00:04:22.000 | It just wouldn't be possible.
00:04:23.000 | Greek is just not that way in its relation to English.
00:04:26.000 | So there are limits that every translation has.
00:04:29.000 | But having said all that, for the average Bible reader, there are no contemporary English translations that I'm aware of that are going to lead people into serious doctrinal error.
00:04:41.000 | Therefore, the question of whether to stick with one or to use several is a really good question.
00:04:47.000 | And the rule of thumb that I would suggest is this.
00:04:50.000 | Use multiple translations for the purpose of increased understanding, like use them as commentaries,
00:04:59.000 | and use one main translation for the purpose of memorization and the saturation of your mind.
00:05:08.000 | It's extremely difficult to carry on over the years, year after year, a system of Bible memory, which I try to do, memorizing books and chapters of the Bible.
00:05:21.000 | It's extremely difficult to do that while bouncing around among several versions.
00:05:27.000 | It becomes very confusing.
00:05:29.000 | I don't know of anyone, I'm sure there are people, but I just don't know any, who have done serious, long-term, extensive Bible memory by using several translations,
00:05:42.000 | like memorizing one whole book in one version, another whole book in another version.
00:05:46.000 | In general, I would say to Tricia, among the worthy modern versions, pick the version where you feel most helped by the Lord to hear His voice with authority and clarity,
00:06:03.000 | and make that your go-to Bible for meditation and memorization every day.
00:06:10.000 | Then feel free to use other versions to try to wrestle through any parts that you don't understand by comparing them with the text that you use most often.
00:06:20.000 | What matters most of all is that all of us immerse our minds in the Scriptures every day until we are conformed in our thinking and in our feeling to the mind and the heart of Christ.
00:06:35.000 | Yeah, thank you, Pastor John.
00:06:37.000 | And Tricia, thank you for the great question.
00:06:39.000 | And for those of you out there who are interested in the ESV and maybe have never seen the ESV translation yourself, you can find it online at ESV.org.
00:06:48.000 | It's an incredible website for a translation that we really can ask a lot from.
00:06:53.000 | And we're grateful to God for the labors of our friends at Crossway for the translation and for making it so freely available online.
00:07:00.000 | Well, thank you for making this podcast a part of your life.
00:07:03.000 | You can find our audio feeds in our episode archive, and you can reach us via email all through our online home at DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.
00:07:12.000 | I'm your host, Tony Reinke. We'll see you on Friday.
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