Bible version?

[graceandpeace]

In my experience with the Church of the Nazarene, the most commonly used Bible version was the NIV. I own the updated version of the NIV study Bible. Overall, I like it, though there were a few changes I thought unnecessary.

I am currently seeking out a UMC and I noticed the NRSV in the pews. Is that the commonly used Bible version for the UMC, or can it vary? I own an NRSV, though I have not read in it in so long, mainly because the NIV has always been a preference & convenience with churches I have attended. I also own an ESV that I was reading from for a long time.

Further, can you suggest a good Bible dictionary or study Bible? Maybe one with the NRSV? I own a Holman Christian Bible dictionary, which I have many issues with (biased, one-sided on a number of subjects, questionable notes at times).

Thanks!

 

[BryanW92]

The NRSV has been the UMC preferred bible for years but the new preferred bible seems to be the CEB. I use ESV and so does my pastor. I used the HCSB for several years before the ESV. I switched because Im his backup preacher and I figured I would follow his lead on versions.

 

[circuitrider]

The NRSV has been the UMC preferred bible for years but the new preferred bible seems to be the CEB. I use ESV and so does my pastor. I used the HCSB for several years before the ESV. I switched because Im his backup preacher and I figured I would follow his lead on versions.

I've preached out of the NRSV for years and find it is still most used in the UMC. But as Bryan says the newer Common English Bible (CEB) is becoming a new standard. It is a translation sponsored by a number of Churches including the UMC.

 

[graceandpeace]

Thanks y'all!
I am not at all familiar with the CEB, but I do like the NRSV, though again it has been a long time since I have read it. Maybe I will look into both again.

 

[BryanW92]

I've preached out of the NRSV for years and find it is still most used in the UMC. But as Bryan says the newer Common English Bible (CEB) is becoming a new standard. It is a translation sponsored by a number of Churches including the UMC.

When I was an Annual Conference this year, the Cokesbury zone (can't really call it a booth) was selling CEB's in every shape and size from cheap paperbacks to very nice leather-bound ones and the prices were incredibly low. There wasn't an NRSV to be found, but there were a few NIVs available.

Over the course of the conference, the giant stacks of CEBs didn't really shrink much.

 

[GraceSeeker]

I have some sad news with regard to Cokesburry......it is a business.


It may have been started as a ministry of, for, and to the church. But today it is a business. Now, I actually understand that as I paid my way through seminary by working at a Zondervan Bookstore. If you don't sell books (or the Jesus Junk and God Garbage that really pays the bills), you can't stay in business. If you can't stay in business. And if you can't stay in business, you have no ministry whatsoever. But, as a business, it has a vested interest in getting you to give up your old Bible and start using their "new and improved" version. Which also doesn't mean that it isn't really new and improved. But I'm still just cynical enough to believe that the availability of one and the absence of the other is pure marketing.

 

[BryanW92]

I have some sad news with regard to Cokesburry......it is a business.


It may have been started as a ministry of, for, and to the church. But today it is a business. Now, I actually understand that as I paid my way through seminary by working at a Zondervan Bookstore. If you don't sell books (or the Jesus Junk and God Garbage that really pays the bills), you can't stay in business. If you can't stay in business. And if you can't stay in business, you have no ministry whatsoever. But, as a business, it has a vested interest in getting you to give up your old Bible and start using their "new and improved" version. Which also doesn't mean that it isn't really new and improved. But I'm still just cynical enough to believe that the availability of one and the absence of the other is pure marketing.

You're not telling me anything I don't already know. I wasn't born yesterday! I thought the same thing when I saw the giant stacks of CEBs and the very low prices. They're trying to get those bibles into the hands of pastors and lay leadership in the churches. Then, those people will use it in their preaching and teaching. Then others will buy it to follow along.

When I saw those low prices, I almost bought one (because $19.99 for a leather-bound study bible is a good price) but then I remembered that I had already done some research on the CEB and I don't like it! So, I bought a John Wesley bobblehead instead.

 

[circuitrider]

Yes there are marketing reasons for the CEB of course. But also the English language continues to change. So the once new NRSV doesn't read as well for a current audience is it used to. As long as English is a living language we will need updated translations. Go back and look at Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and see how impossible middle English is to read now. Or try to get a young adult to wade through the KJV and see how many questions you get asked based on the translation's 1611 language.

Another issue is control/cost. The National Council of Churches controls the copyright to the NRSV. That is why it shows up on so few online Bible browsers etc. You have to pay a fee to the NCCC any time you publish a new rendition of the NRSV. But the UMPH is one of the owners of the CEB along with other mainline churches and so none of those Churches pay a licensing fee just to print or distribute a Bible.

Also there is theological slant to deal with. If you do walk into a Christian trinket store (what the other stores look like to me) they primarily carry NIV Bibles because the NIV has a certain conservative theological slant in its translation. You'll never see a far right winger using the NRSV because of the gender equality of the translation. And because the NIV slants against women's leadership.

Then there are the study Bibles. Everyone produces a study Bible. If mainline churches don't produce new study Bibles the lay people get ahold of study Bibles only written from a certain perspective. So I see people carrying around study Bibles that have a Dispensationalist slant and don't know it or that have a certain kind of Evangelical/Conservative stance and don't know it. So they are by osmosis getting fed a theology that may contradict the teachings of their church.

I personally think we've done ourselves as United Methodists a huge disservice to us and the rst of the mainline by ceding the ground on Christian bookstores to the independent stores, most of which slant theology in directions that don't fit many of the customers of Cokesbury. When I wanted to find serious theological works I went to Cokesbury, when I was looking for church supplies I went to Cokesbury, when I wanted to get a new picture for the office or find out which right wing politician's books more conservative Christians are now pushing I'd go to the independent Christian trinket store.

 

[GraceSeeker]

circuitrider, I don't disagree with any of what you've said above. After all, I did say: "Which also doesn't mean that it isn't really new and improved." But I'm still cynical. I'm cynical becuase if we as a denomination were concerned about the issues you raise above (and we should be), we wouldn't be closing the Cokesbury stores we had. Talk about ceding the ground to the independent bookstores, we've fully surrendered!!

 

[circuitrider]

circuitrider, I don't disagree with any of what you've said above. After all, I did say: "Which also doesn't mean that it isn't really new and improved." But I'm still cynical. I'm cynical becuase if we as a denomination were concerned about the issues you raise above (and we should be), we wouldn't be closing the Cokesbury stores we had. Talk about ceding the ground to the independent bookstores, we've fully surrendered!!

Well I think we have and we haven't surrendered. While I wish the Cokesbury stores were still here the economic realities can't be denied. Cokesbury used to make money for our pension system and now it is a financial drain we don't have money for.

The truth is that electronic books and online purchases are taking over the market. I buy more things on Amazon.com than I do at the mall and ebooks are bit by bit replaces and/or supplementing print media.

The non-denominational book sellers are also slowly going out of business and will continue to.

What I think Cokesbury should be doing is trying to ramp up the way it sells books to offer a more appealing website experience. Right now it is much easier to buy a book on amazon than on cokesbury's page.

Also I think groups like UMPH, John Knox Press, Chalice Press and others need to think about merging our publishing into one larger more effect mainline church publishing service. The individual denominational presses can't compete with big box book publishing.

Unfortunately as much as I miss the stores and see them as a loss I also don't think Cokesbury had much of a choice.

But I do think we need to really start to target the online market in a much bigger way then we are. Otherwise we may lose all influence in our publishing.

 

[GraceSeeker]

Unless books themselves disappear, and I don't see that actually happening, there will always be a desire to find a place to thumb through it before purchasing. So, Amazon and other online retailers may become the norm, but I don't think that bookstores are quite going the way of the dinosaur. The chain distributer might though. Cokesbury was once a part of our understanding of doing mission, we wanted books because we were a literate group of people, disciples of Christ that read THE Book and many books. Now, the local UMW has 20 books they recommend be read, and one is lucky if 4 or 5 are read total over the course of a year, and that by only one or two members.

We are more likely to have a member go out and find a Beth Moore DVD series on their own, than to be instructed in Wesleyan theology from Wesleyan authors. I don't see Cokesburry's changes doing anything to change that pattern. Yes, I know it was a money losing venture. Our denomination's claimed mission is "to make disciples for the transformation of the world." Did we think that there wouldn't be any cost to doing so? Or that we could support this entirely through the local church?

I'm not for throwing good money after bad, but we either operate using a business model or a mission model. Right now we have part of the church doing one thing, and another part of it doing another. And so, of course, the denomination gives evidence of being a little bit schizophrenic; we are. Ultimately the tides of time and culture will forced us to decide whether we are a mission or a business. Which ever we choose will determine our future.

 

[graceandpeace]

Just to chime in here... The updated NIV uses gender-inclusive language & does not have bias against women in leadership, from what I can tell.

 

[circuitrider]

Just to chime in here... The updated NIV uses gender-inclusive language & does not have bias against women in leadership, from what I can tell.

Glad to hear that! I don't have chapter or verse in front of me. But I remember examples where when the word "diakonia" was translated into English it was translated "servant" when next to a woman's name and either "deacon" or "servant" next to a man's name. But there was no grammatical reason for the choice. It was a theological interpretative reason.

 

[Maid Marie]

circuitrider, I don't disagree with any of what you've said above. After all, I did say: "Which also doesn't mean that it isn't really new and improved." But I'm still cynical. I'm cynical becuase if we as a denomination were concerned about the issues you raise above (and we should be), we wouldn't be closing the Cokesbury stores we had. Talk about ceding the ground to the independent bookstores, we've fully surrendered!!

Agreed

 

[BryanW92]

circuitrider, I don't disagree with any of what you've said above. After all, I did say: "Which also doesn't mean that it isn't really new and improved." But I'm still cynical. I'm cynical becuase if we as a denomination were concerned about the issues you raise above (and we should be), we wouldn't be closing the Cokesbury stores we had. Talk about ceding the ground to the independent bookstores, we've fully surrendered!!

I hear the other Christians stores referred to here as trinket shops, selling Jesus Junk, God Garbage, Beth Moore (or was it Joyce Meyers?), and (shudder) right-wing books. But, that's what non-scholarly Christians buy as we bitterly cling to our God (and guns). We lack the sophistication that 6+ years of proper theological training in an approved seminary delivers. We're stuck being the engineers, teachers, nurses, construction workers, soldiers, and thousands of other roles in society.

If Cokesbury chooses to only cater to a very limited audience of ordained clergy, then it probably needs to go fully online. If it wants to diversify its product lines, as Lifeway or Family Christian Stores has done, then it might be successful--and it might have an actual mission in addition to being a business.

 

[MystyRock]

Cokesbury was once a part of our understanding of doing mission, we wanted books because we were a literate group of people, disciples of Christ that read THE Book and many books. Now, the local UMW has 20 books they recommend be read, and one is lucky if 4 or 5 are read total over the course of a year, and that by only one or two members.

Just out of curiosity, what are the 20 books?

 

[Anto9us]

Well I say if that KING JAMES VERSION was

GOOD ENOUGH FOR PAUL AND SILAS

it's GOOD ENOUGH FOR ME!!

lol

just kidding...

I like NRSV - I have one to highlight in - one to leave unmarked - and also an Interlinear with NRSV and 27th Nestle-Aland text

so now I gotta get a CEB or my English will sound like CHAUCER?

whew

whan that aprille with its shours swootah

I don't go into those Crishun trinket stores unless I am buying presents

 

[GraceSeeker]

Just out of curiosity, what are the 20 books?

I don't know. I don't even know that it is 20, that was just a rough number. But there is an officer in your local UMW who is supposed to be sharing these selections with the women of the church and encouraging them to read them.

This link might help you: UMW Reading Program.

 

[graceandpeace]

Glad to hear that! I don't have chapter or verse in front of me. But I remember examples where when the word "diakonia" was translated into English it was translated "servant" when next to a woman's name and either "deacon" or "servant" next to a man's name. But there was no grammatical reason for the choice. It was a theological interpretative reason.

Yea, Romans 16:1 uses deacon for Phoebe in the updated NIV. Throughout the NT it is brothers & sisters instead of brothers, and in the OT it is humankind or mortals instead of mankind...from what I can see so far! I am doing a chronological reading, so I am not through with the whole thing yet, but the gender updates are good. It is on a few other verses/passages that some wording was changed that I don't like as much, though.

 

[Anto9us]

Beyond what "version" of translation is each "edition" of a Bible - the ones that have any commentaries are easily discernible between "fundamental/conservative" and "liberal/higher criticism"

The first place I look in a Bible that has commentary notes and "introductions to books" is the introduction to Daniel

Either "written in Babylonian exile" or "written under Antiochus IV Epiphanes persecution" will be the tell tale slant of all that bible's NOTES

Daniel 9:24-27 will either say "Messiah" or "an anointed one" with footnotes that "an anointed one is Onias III and/or Joshua the High Priest in Zerubbabel's time.

It's a litmus test of Bibles.

The ones that give a Macabbean date for Daniel will also say second Peter was NOT written by Peter, and challenge Pauline authorship of many epistles besides Hebrews

ya pays ya money - and ya takes ya choice