ESV

From Acts 8 from the ESV website in 2021. Notice that Acts 8:37 is missing.

The English Standard Version (2001- ) or ESV is a literal, conservative Protestant translation of the Bible. It is the latest in a long line of translations that go all the way back to Tyndale and the King James or Authorized Version (KJV/AV). As of June 2021, the ESV is the third best selling Bible in the US. Only the KJV and NIV outsell it.

Sample text: Matthew 5:44 from the Sermon on the Mount:

KJV: But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;

ESV: But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,

Always up-to-date: Every five years or so they come out with a new update to match changes in English and the latest in Bible scholarship. It was updated in 2007, 2011, and 2016.

Versions: It is aimed at Evangelical Protestants, but there are also Catholic and Anglican versions (both with the Apocrypha). The Augustine Bible is the Catholic version, used by churches in the UK and India. Even the Gideons, who put Bibles in hotel rooms, have their own version (they changed some 50 verses).

Compared to the RSV, which it updates, it gets rid of the all the thee’s and thou’s (which the RSV used when addressing God) and made the language more gender neutral. It keeps the sexism of the original Greek and Hebrew text, but gets rid of the needless sexism that the RSV translators added.

Compared to the NIV, the ESV is more literal. That makes it better for Bible study and learning verses, but harder to read and understand. The NIV is also aimed at Evangelical Protestants.

Compared to the KJV, its language and scholarship are way more up-to-date while trying to keep to the same literary level as the KJV, the same sort of sound when read out loud in church. It preserves Tyndale’s phrasing, like “Man shall not live by bread alone”. But it is different enough that it is hard to follow along in an extended passage if your church uses the KJV or NKJV.

Not only has the English language changed in the past 400 years, so has the number of manuscripts that have been discovered. The KJV was based on maybe 25 manuscripts of the Greek New Testament. The ESV and NIV are based on over 5,000, some way older than anything the KJV used. That has led to:

Missing verses: From the point of view of KJV enthusiasts, the ESV has dropped more than a dozen verses and parts of dozens more. Among them:

• Bracketed verses: Mark 16:9-20, John 7:53-8:11.
• Missing verses:
  • Matthew 12:47, 17:21, 18:11, 23:14,
  • Mark 7:16, 9:44, 9:46, 11:26, 15:28
  • Luke 17:36, 23:17,
  • John 5:4
  • Acts 8:37, 15:34, 24:7, 28:29
  • Romans 16:24.
• Parts of verses missing:
  • Matthew 5:44, 6:13, 19:9, 26:45,
  • Mark 9:29, 9:49, 10:24, 13:33
  • Luke 4:4, 4:8, 9:55, 11:2, 11:4, 11:11,
  • John 5:3, 7:8,
  • Acts 24:6, 24:8,
  • Romans 8:1,
  • 1 Corinthians 11:24,
  • Colossians 1:14,
  • 1 John 5:7.

Why: These do not always appear in the oldest manuscripts, so scholars and most modern Protestant and Catholic translations drop them. Sometimes they appear in the footnotes, sometimes not. “Modern” means since 1881.

The Gideon Bible restored these.

ESV enthusiasts say that none of these verses affect core Christian doctrines.

– Abagond, 2021.

See also:

• Bible
  • Codex Alexandrinus
  • English Bible translations
    • Tyndale
    • KJV
    • NKJV
    • RSV
    • NIV
    • Gideon Bible
  • Luke 4:4 – a brief history – from ancient manuscripts to the ESV
• The Jesus Seminar
• White Evangelical Protestants

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