This month I’ve decided to focus on something very practical: how to choose a Bible translation. For 1600 years, you couldn’t read the Bible unless you knew Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and/or Latin. For about 300 years, there was only one English translation that was readily available: the King James Translation. Nowadays, with changes in language, the discovery of more ancient Biblical manuscripts, and advances in technology, I carry around at least 50 different English translations on my phone all the time. How are we supposed to choose? There are two basic approaches to translating the Bible. First, there is the “Literal” approach—also known as “word for word.” In this approach, the translators take each work in the original text and translate it into an English word, so that they can get the most precise translation possible. This is the approach used by the King James translators, as well as the ESV, NRSV, and NASB. The benefit of this approach is that it gives you a highly accur
(or, A Fragment of Theology)