Michael F. Bird, Romans: Lexham Interpreter’s Translation

Bird, Michael F. Romans. Lexham Interpreter’s Translation. Bellingham, Wash.: Lexham Press, 2024. xvi+161 pp.; Pb.; $15.99. Link to Lexham Press

The Lexham Interpreter’s Translation is a new series that Michael Bird describes as an “exegetical first responder.” This inaugural volume in the series is Romans. Bird completed the Story of God commentary on Romans in 2016. He is well-known for his work in Pauline Theology, the Gospels, and his Evangelical Theology (now in a second edition).

Bird wants to tease out the historical and cultural “otherness” of the ancient text through a literal (interlinear) translation, as well as to paraphrase the text with gloss and “creative catchphrase,” resulting in a contemporary reading of an ancient document. Bird acknowledges there is no need for another English translation or paraphrase, and this resource is not an attempt at creating competition for the NIV or ESV Bibles.

As he explains in his introduction to the series, he has three goals. First, Bird provides a preliminary interpretation of the text. Second, Bird sees this book as a “paratextual reading aid.” This does not replace one’s regular Bible. He expects people to use this resource alongside a “real Bible.” Third, he wants to present a tradition of interpretation known as “gloss and paraphrase.”

Even-numbered pages print lines from the SBL Greek text with Bird’s literal translation paired with the Greek. His literal translation is occasionally “weirdly literal.” For example, for justification in Romans 5:12, Bird literally translates dikaiosynē as “we have been righteoused by faith” in order to avoid the old (erroneous) definition of justification as “just as if I never sinned.” Proper names are transliterated, so Jesus is Iēsous in his literal translation.

The facing odd-numbered pages are Bird’s “gloss and paraphrase” of the unit in paragraph form. His goal is to be creative and use contemporary catchphrases to make the ancient, distant text come alive. In Romans 5:12, “we have been righteoused by faith” becomes “we are declared righteous” (the proper definition of justification). In Romans 1:1, Paul is a “slave of Jesus Messiah.”  He translates nomos, “law,” as Torah to ensure the reader knows Paul refers to the Mosaic Law. In the greetings sections (Romans 16), he paraphrases each greeting as “Say hi to….” In 16:17, “avoid them” becomes “avoid them like the plague.” Bird calls Andronicus and Junia “special envoys” rather than apostles. In a footnote, he explains that he doubts they are “big-A Apostles” but rather “little-A apostles” sent as delegates from some church (155).

Included on each page are a series of notes. These are not really footnotes since there is no indication in the text, but rather Bird’s exegetical insights and comments on the text. The fall into six categories:

• GK discusses Greek vocabulary and grammar. All Greek appears transliterated, and non-Greek readers will have no trouble following these notes.
• INT covers matters of interpretation, including key interpretive issues anyone reading Romans will need to wrestle with. For example, in Romans 3:22, Bird (briefly) discusses the nettlesome pistis Christou debate (the faith of Jesus, or faith in Jesus?) ;
• BKG often are mini-word studies. For example, in Romans 3:20, he mentions the meaning of erga nomou (what are the “works of the Law).
• OT identifies Old Testament quotations and possible allusions.
• NT identifies themes common in the New Testament. For example, in the rare mention of the Kingdom of God in Romans 15:17, Bird gathers other references to the Kingdom of God in Paul’s writings.
• TXT comments briefly on textual critical issues in the verse. There is little detail given for these notes. In Romans 11:33-36, he merely observes that the place of the doxology appears in different places in different manuscripts.

In addition to Bird’s own caveats, let me add two observations about what this book is not. At first glance, one might think this is a translation guide like B&H’s Exegetical Guide to the Greek New Testament (see a review here), the Baylor Handbook on the Greek New Testament, or Kregel Academic’s Big Idea Greek Series (see a review here). Although he occasionally comments on Greek syntactical or lexical issues, this book will not help students translate the Greek text of Romans. Second, it is not really an interlinear, either. Although the literal Greek translation is printed directly under the SBL Greek text, there is no attempt to line up the translation with the corresponding Greek word. For example, in Romans 5:14, the word Adam is repeated twice in English, and the Greek Ἀδάμ appears only once and then in the next line.

Conclusion. Bord’s “gloss and paraphrase” style is fun to read. This book does indeed function as an “exegetical first responder” that will aid any Bible reader as they work their way through Romans. I look forward to more volumes in this interesting series.

NB: I appreciate Lexham Press’s generous offer of a review copy of this book, but this did not influence my thoughts about the work.