A Helpful, Detailed Review of the NRSVue 2025-09-27T09:47:47-04:00 Ben Witherington
I whole-heartedly agree with this detailed review by James-Michael Smith. This new updated edition of the NRSV does not allow the Bible to say what it actually says about same-sex sexual activity, nor is it fair to the full scope of what the Bible says about women and their roles. Furthermore, underlying all this is a rejection of the notion that Scripture itself should have the final authority over human reason, tradition, or experience on matters that it actually teaches us about. See my detailed discussion of Sola Scriptura in my book with that title. There are numerous other problems with this translation, not the least is allowing people who are not experts in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek or the Bible in its translations to contribute, at least in the essays to this Bible. Moderate and conservative Catholic and Protestant Bible scholars are also under-represented on the team who undertook this revision (some 20,000 changes to the previous NRSV), though Brent Strawn and David deSilva are mentioned. My advice is to stick to the latest edition of the NIV or the NET Study Bible. Having had Bruce Metzger as one of my mentors, who was the original head of the original NRSV team, and knowing of his views on the controversial issues of our day, I’m pretty sure he would not be happy with the tendentious way hot button issues are treated in this latest translation at the expense of what the Bible actually says.
English (US) · 