Generally Good Notes But Bad Text - THE ESV STUDY BIBLE

Generally Good Notes But Bad Text
THE ESV STUDY BIBLE
“The ESV Study Bible” (p.1) is the major book article in this issue.

The Reformation Study Bible, English Standard Version, (1948 pages) was reviewed in the January 30, 2006 Christian News. The jacket of this study Bible said that “No other study Bible gives the reader more assistance in understanding the great doctrines and themes of the Christian faith as found in Scriptures.” A team of fifty scholars worked on the Bible. This study Bible, using the ESV, says that the practice of infant baptism is neither prescribed nor forbidden in the New Testament. This study Bible is open to millennialism.

CN concluded its review:

“While the notes in this ESV Study Bible are generally helpful and most evangelicals and charismatics will appreciate the theology of the editor and contributors, perceptive orthodox Lutherans will have some differences with this ESV Bible. It shows why Lutherans should be promoting the AAT rather than the ESV.”

ELCA’s Lutheran Study Bible, (2112 pages), was reviewed in the March 23, 2009 and May 24, 2010 Christian News. It uses the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible. The New RSV, like the RSV, is a copyrighted by the National Council of Churches.

The ESV is 91% RSV. CN said that “This new Lutheran Study Bible (LSB) has many helpful notes, a Subject Guide, Charts and Figures, Bible Reading Plan and Maps. More than 70 Lutheran scholars worked on this study Bible”. CN said “Unfortunately the theology of the liberal translators of the RSV is often reflected in the Lutheran Study Bible. Hardly any of them accepted such doctrines as the Virgin Birth of Christ. No truly Lutheran publisher should waste time and money publishing a study Bible based on the RSV, NRSV, or ESV, particularly when there are far more accurate translations which do not use stilted outdated language.” CN’s review shows that ELCA’s Lutheran Study Bible promoted universalism, the J-E-D-P source hypotheses and many other destructive views of the Bible held by the RSV translators. CN concluded that “The new Lutheran Study Bible shows that CN is not out of date when CN opposes the destructive notions of liberal critics. If students are not interested, their professors, who should be teaching them what is going on in the theological world, are at fault. They should be urging their students to read CN and become informed. The CN editor is not living in the past.

CPH’s The Lutheran Study Bible (2428 pages) was reviewed in the November 9 and 16, 2009 CN. The November 16, 2009 CN noted in an article titled “The Lutheran Study Bible – Good Notes – bad Text”:

“What A Contrast” on page one of the November 9 Christian News, is a contrast of the LCMS’s The Lutheran Study Bible with ELCA’s Lutheran Study Bible. Numerous study Bibles are now being published. A recent study Bible based on the NKJV claims to be the study Bible to end all study Bibles. Yet reading of the Bible itself appears to be declining. CN said that on the basis of the notes the LCMS’s The Lutheran Study Bible was the best one volume study Bible available today. CN quoted some of the notes, including notes on homosexuality and living together without being married. However, there is a major similarity between The Lutheran Study Bible and Lutheran Study Bible. Both use a bad text. The Lutheran Study Bible uses the English Standard Version, which is 91% Revised Standard Version copyrighted by the National Council of Churches. Lutheran Study Bible uses the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyrighted by the National Council of Churches. The notes in ELCA’s Lutheran Study Bible are in accord with the liberal theology of the RSV translators. The notes in the LCMS’s The Lutheran Study Bible are not. While there have been some revisions the ESV, RSV, and NRSV use most of the stilted, archaic language of the RSV. The preface of the RSV says: “The Revised Standard Version is not a new translation in the language of today” (ix). The review of the English Standard Version of the Bible in the April 2005 Concordia Journal of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis said: “The text of the English Standard Version ‘feels’ antiquated, if that is the desired outcome. However, the use of archaic English is not helpful…” “The advanced reading level alone makes this translation difficult to read. . .” “outside of an articulate minority, the AAT (Beck) never caught on in the LCMS. Yet, the AAT provides a more readable and understandable translation. . .” Professor John Brug wrote in the Fall, 2006 Wisconsin Lutheran Quarterly: (Entire Review reprinted in the January 30, 2006 Christian News). “While the ESV does enjoy some advantage in not introducing as much interpretation into the text, it reads less smoothly than the NIV. It is not that its language is very archaic and hard to understand like the King James, but just that it does not have the natural flow of contemporary English. In many places it sounds quite stilted even to a reader used to the idioms of the King James. Perhaps some of this is due to the fact that the ESV is not a fresh translation but a touch-up of the RSV, done in part to meet the need for a quickly available alternative to the TNIV.” Mark I. Strauss of Bethel Seminary, who has done considerable work with Bible translation revisions wrote in a 35 page document titled “Why the English Standard Version (ESV) Should Not Become the Standard English Version:” “. .. the ESV seems to me to be overly literal- full of archaisms, awkward language, obscure idioms, and irregular word order. . .” See “Schwan Funding the Archaic ESV” reprinted in the issue from the April 6, 2009 CN. The January 5, 2009 CN noted: “Beck’s AAT, together with its various revisions, is the work of confessional Lutheran scholars just like Luther’s translation. The ESV, NIV, RSV, and many other translations are the work of liberals, evangelicals, fundamentalists, charismatics, etc. who come from a vast array of denominations which often deny the Sacraments and other doctrines of Holy Scripture. CN has frequently shown that the theology of these translators is at times reflected in their translations. “CN has been told that the primary reason why CPH would today never use the AAT even though CPH first published the New Testament portion of the AAT in 1963 is because the AAT is now published by Christian News whose editor has never been certified by the LCMS. No book or newspaper published by Christian News is to be mentioned. McCain refuses to have his ESV defending scholars debate the merits of the AAT vs. ESV with scholars who maintain that the AAT is far more accurate and in better modern English. He refuses to publish a survey which includes both the AAT and ESV. However, McCain has what counts. He has the Schwan Foundation and the big money behind him. The CN editor is being accused of going ‘mean spirited’ and not ‘objective’ toward McCain.” Surveys have shown that those who responded to a comparison survey of Beck’s AAT, originally published by CPH, with the RSV and then with the ESV by almost a 90% margin prefer the language and doctrinal accuracy of the AAT with that of the RSV and ESV. CN sent the survey to McCain, the LCMS’s Worship commission, and the editors of The Lutheran Study Bible. Not one of them answered the survey. Did they decline to answer because they would have to admit that the language and doctrine of the AAT is far better than that of the ESV? Were those who were paid to work on The Lutheran Study Bible asked not to respond to the survey? CN asked, but “Mum” is the word from editors of The Lutheran Study Bible. The attitude in the LCMS bureaucracy has long been: “Don’t answer Otten. He’s not certified and does not deserve an answer. He’s not one of us.” Several times CN asked the leaders at CPH if CPH had to pay any royalty to the liberal National Council of Churches for the use of the RSV. “Mum” again is the word. The title page of The Lutheran Study Bible says: “The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV) is adapted from the Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. All rights reserved.”

The ESV Study Bible: Generally Good Notes But Bad Text. It again shows why Christian scholars should not be wasting their time preparing notes for a Bible based on a bad text, the RSV and ESV.