Wednesday, November 02, 2011

Review of the Common English Bible from Abingdon Press



I know what many of you that read this blog are thinking. What? Another Bible translation? Why would we need that?

The short answer is "Because language is always changing!".

The long answer is more complicated than it at first appears, and has a lot more to do with traditions and marketing than one might expect. This is not just the case with the CEB, but also with the NIV, the ESV, The Message and even the NKJV. This agenda not necessarily an easy thing for publishers to admit. It is in fact true; however, that the variety of translations that we find in American English has as much to do with a variety of intended audiences and purposes of the translation teams and publishers as it does with developments in our understanding or knowledge of the ancient languages.

The Background

The last few years have seen several new translations and paraphrases of Scripture come on the scene. More and more of these translations also have particular publisher with particular constituencies and certain presuppositions that they bring to the text. Some of these publishers have in turn have recruited certain Christian leaders in specific circles to promote and contribute to their study bibles. This is nothing new, but it has accelerated in recent years.

For example, Crossway Books has worked hard to get  the English Standard Version developed under their imprint. Then they brought in the "New-Calvinists" like John Piper and Mark Driscoll to endorse and contribute with the ESV Study Bible. Because the New Calvinists tend to be more technical and literal, it is a good match to partner them with a version that emphasizes verbal equivalence.

Thomas Nelson owns and markets the NKJV.

Recently, Zondervan has also updated the NIV to include many of the improvements found in the TNIV, including a greater emphasis on inclusive language for human persons.

Less recently, NavPress contracted with Eugene Peterson to translate THE MESSAGE, which is a paraphrase from the original languages and has gained a lot of popularity across theological and denominational lines--especially for devotional use.

It is into this world of translations and their connections with specific publishers and "cliques" of Christians that the Common English Bible was born.

How the Common English Bible was Born

Representatives from a number of different mainline publishers began gathering to develop in the Common English Bible in 2009. These publishers included Chalice Press, Pilgrim Press, Church Publishing Inc., Westminster John Knox Publishers, and Abingdon Publishers (from whom I received this review copy).

The Common English Bible Committee has several different goals. One of their goals was to produce a translation with a diverse number of English speaking scholars on board. This included people of different racial backgrounds, and people of a variety of denominational and theological backgrounds (from UCC to Nazarene to non-denominational and everywhere in between).

Another goal of this translation is to render it in inclusive language, especially as it concerns humanity. In this way the CEB is similar to the NRSV.

The CEB is different from the NRSV in that it is written for an contemporary, everyday audience with an eighth grade reading level. This is approximately the same vocabulary level as the USA Today newspaper.

Also unique about the CEB is the priority of its purpose of developing a version of Scripture that is easily read in worship. For the whole translation the publishers developed reading groups to help them develop clarity and ease of public reading by lay persons in public.

I cannot emphasize too much how important this final step is in making the CEB an excellent translation of Scripture for my use. This is especially true in mainline denominations, which put a higher emphasis on the public reading of Scripture than do evangelical groups.  I currently am forced to use NKJV in worship at my church per church policy. It reads so choppy and awkwardly, and I almost always feel like I have to explain what I just read in order to help people understand the basic story of the text I just shared. This would not be the case if I had the opportunity to read the CEB in worship.

Digging Deeper: My evaluation of the CEB with examples

Due  to the CEB's effort to be contemporary, there are several ways that the translation reads different than a standard denominational curriculum. To see how this works, it will be helpful to look at a few specific passages. Let us begin with one of my favorites: Ephesians 2:8-9.
In the NIV it reads like this:
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast.

While in the CEB it reads like this:
 8 You are saved by God’s grace because of your faith.[a] This salvation is God’s gift. It’s not something you possessed. 9 It’s not something you did that you can be proud of.

In these verses let me point out a few differences in the passage:
  1. The CEB has simplified the sentence structure so that it does not need hyphens. It has broken down 1 long sentence into three short ones.
  2. The CEB intentionally uses contractions as part of the commitment it has to common speech.
  3. The CEB chooses "proud of" instead of "boast". Boast is not that common of a word in common speech. Pride is more so.
  4. The CEB reads more conversationally than the NIV, which reads more legal
Do I like all these changes? Sometimes. For worship reading and teaching I would often prefer the CEB. For study and even for some preaching and teaching, some more verbal equivalence in sometimes helpful.

One of the most criticized translations by the CEB has to do with translating "blessed" as happy. For me, that "blessed" word is essential for teaching what the text is like through preaching. I would not like "happy" at all. But it might be helpful for someone in another context.
Another criticism is the rendering of the term "justification". This is a little bit more of a challenge of the CEB when translating the passage, because there are a lot of arguments, which I do not completely comprehend, regarding the word "justification" and its meaning. The CEB, believing that the term "justification" is not necessarily an easy concept or vocabulary word, choses to simply render the term justify as "made righteous". If I want to preach a deep theological sermon, would I want to explain the more legal and theological term "justification"? Perhaps. But I do not have a problem with translating the term justification "made righteous" for those who are needing to read a smooth, easy to understand text.

Final Thoughts
I think the CEB is a fine translation of Scripture. Will I run out and encourage my church to replace its pew Bibles? Probably not. Will I eagerly encourage young believers and friends to read from the translation? I think I might!

Its strength is that it reads smoothly and incorperates mainline concerns as well as thoughtful evangelical concerns as well. I am all for inclusive language, so I love that about this translation.

There are a number of pleasing things about the Common English Bible's presentation. It uses maps from the National Geographic Society. It's cover, font, and text are put together in a classy way, which makes this new Bible a pleasure to stick my nose in. Some of the translation notes help with understanding the text a little better as well.

The CEB has accomplished its stated goals to be "Relevant, Readable, and Reliable". I hope it is used for years to come!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

I know this is an old post, but I felt some things needed to be addressed here. I have just come across the CEB, and being somewhat of a bible junkie, I was intrigued, and stumbled upon this site.

Overall, I think your information is helpful, and useful, but not without some comments.

Firstly, the NIV is translated by Biblica, a charity, not Thomas Nelson, a business. It is printed in the USA by Zondervan (not Nelson.)

The ESV is translated by Crossway, another not-for-profit company.

Neither of these companies are owned or run by a particular denomination, which is not the case with the CEB, which, I believe, pollutes the politics a little, and certainly makes it impossible to compare the agenda of someone like Crossway or Biblica with someone like Abingdon Press (owned by the United Methodist Church) Chalice Press (Christian Church Disciples of Christ) Pilgrim Press (UCoC) Church Publishing Inc. (Episcopal), Westminster John Knox Publishers (PCUSA).

Secondly, you mention that CEB has a simplified sentence structure, while using Ephesians 2:8-9 as an example. This is true, yet in the case of Paul, not always helpful.

Paul's works are characterised by their complex thought progression, and interwoven ideas. In many cases, when studying Paul's letters, I find even chapter and verse numbers to be an unhelpful division. Breaking it down into (in my opinion) unnecessarily short sentences breaks that flow. Perhaps it reads better aloud, though again, that is debatable, most people still know to take breaths at em-dashes, semicolons or commas, which are abundant in other translations, without the need to separate the thoughts.

You also mention that boast is less common than pride. This is true, yet google news shows over 24,500 hits for the word boast or boasts in recently written articles, so not so uncommon as to be easily misunderstood.

Boasting and pride, while related, are not analogous. Pride is defined as a sense of ones own proper dignity or value; self respect first, and only the negative, arrogance or excessively high opinion of ones self later. Nonetheless, even in that pride is an internal feeling.

Boasting, however, is an outworking of that internal feeling or sense, an action.

The greek καυχήσηται is unquestionably, and pretty much exclusively used in reference to the action of boasting, literally speaking highly of ones self. I have seen no compelling argument otherwise. The modern greek equivalent καυχιέμαι has the same sense, the act of boasting or bragging, not just the feeing of pride.

For me this is a case of unnecessary simplification of a word which is clear and easily understood, at the expense of clarity.

I do not think that the CEB is an entirely bad translation, but I don't see the particular example you chose as one of it's shining moments either.

Friar Tuck said...

Regarding publishers, I should have put Zondervan instead of Thomas Nelson. I will fix this and edit it.

Friar Tuck said...

In regard to Biblica, I believe the partnership with Zondervan was in the works from the beginning. One degree of separation does not erase a profit motive, nor does non profit status

Friar Tuck said...

Also, affiliation with a group of denominations does not necessarily create any more bias than non-denominational publishing. As a matter of fact, I would think in some ways the bias is as large if not larger in non-denominational, conservative publisher has, even if they are non-profit. Everyone comes to translation with their own hermeneutic.

hoshie said...

Hi Friar Tuck,

Thanks for your review of the CEB. I've used the NRSV (and before that, the Living Bible, KJV, & NIV84) as my primary Bible. I got a copy of the CEB when they were giving out free copies of the NT a while back. As for me, generally I like the CEB. I find it has woken up my Bible Reading! i'm sill getting used to "the Human One", though. The only weird renderings I've found are in Acts 9:4 and Luke 24:46.

In saying this, I feel the CEB is like the HCSB. That is, a translation that is made to wean churches off their preferred translation for monetary reasons. In short, a translation these churches can control,

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