Why the ESV?

Why the ESV? January 14, 2013

You might have noticed that we often use a particulartranslation of the Bible at Parker Hills: the English Standard Version. The SOSverses are printed in it, I (Josh) usually preach and teach from it, and weeven have pew Bibles in it. I thought it might be helpful to explain a few keyreasons why I prefer the ESV for use in the church.

First, however, I should probably make clear what I amnot going to say. I’m not going to say the ESV is the only God-honoring Bible.I have read through the KJV, NIV, NLT, and ESV; and I have read extensively inothers like the NAS and NKJV. I thank God for each of them, and I think theyeach have a helpful function and place. I’m not going to require anyone to usethe ESV. And I’m certainly not going to censure anyone who prefers anotherversion.

So why do I prefer the ESV? I’ll explain my reasonsover the next couple weeks, but it might be helpful to start with a littlebackground on the ESV itself. The ESV was produced in 2001 by Crossway Bibles.The publication team included over 100 worldwide Bible scholars, pastors, andEnglish experts from multiple denominations. According to the publishers, theirgoal was to produce “a new, essentially literal Bible translation that combinesword-for-word precision and accuracy with literary excellence, beauty, anddepth of meaning.”

As for its “newness,” the ESV draws on the best Biblescholarship of the last 100 years; but it also stands in a stately, historicstream of English translations that extends back to William Tyndale’s NewTestament (1526). Its more recent forebears are the King James Version (1611)and the Revised Standard Version (1971); in fact, the words and phrases of theESV grow out of the RSV itself, which was the starting point for the publishingteam’s work.

Itwas translated from the original languages, using the Masoretic text of theHebrew Bible for the Old Testament (the same Hebrew text used for everyother English translation), with occasional reference to the Dead Sea Scrolls,the Latin Vulgate, the Greek Septuagint, and other OT sources. For the NewTestament, the translation team used an eclectic Greek text compiled from whatscholars consider the best manuscripts—namely, the Greek New Testament publishedby the United Bible Societies (the same Greek text used by every Englishtranslation except the KJV and NKJV).