One Bible, Many Versions: Are All Translations Created Equal? by Dave Brunn
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

“Why are there so many versions of the Bible in English? And which of them should I read?” Those are questions I’ve often been asked by both believers and those exploring Christianity confronted by the bewildering array of translations you can find in the Bible section of any book store.

What is perhaps less apparent is that the answer to the second of those questions has been a source of sometimes bitter contention in certain sectors of the church. There are still “KJV only” factions. Likewise, there is contention over “literal” versus “meaning-based” or “dynamic equivalent” versions of the Bible. The former believe that one should translate word for word from Hebrew or Greek to English. The latter argue that for accuracy of meaning, translations may often resort more to “phrase by phrase” renderings.

Dave Brunn believes the divisions over translations are actually scandalous–one more way in which Christians are dividing over what should unite them. He also believes that our many translations in English are actually a blessing, allowing us to compare renderings as we seek to accurately understand a particular text.

Brunn is a Bible translator, but one who has worked in translation work in Papua New Guinea translating the Bible into Lamogai. This gives him a unique perspective on translation work in several ways. For one, he argues that most of the contention about translations is an English-based discussion, assuming that this is the only real language into which Bibles are translated. For another, Lamogai is a very differently structured language from the biblical languages as well as from English, which is actually part of the same language family as Greek. One of his contentions is that if word for word translation were God’s intention, then all the languages which God brought about as a result of the tower of Babel would correspond word for word (and even prefix/suffix) to the biblical languages. The truth is that none of them do.

Brunn does not leave this on a theoretical level. Through scores of charts he shows how all of the versions, even the most “literal” often give renderings that are not word for word, and that in some instances, some of the more idiomatic translations actually give closer word for renderings than these literal translations. He builds up evidence that this occurs in hundreds if not thousands of instances in the Bible and that if word for word is the only standard for translation, ALL of our English translations fail.

Brunn actually believes that they all fail for good reasons. Sometimes, word for word renderings from one language to another result in nonsense in the translation language, or actually are misleading in terms of the meaning of the text. Sometimes the questions are as simple as grammar and may mean rendering a verb as a noun or vice versa. Sometimes the question is readability. For example, Young’s translation comes as close to word for word as any, and while helpful for study, is laborious to read. Brunn points out that this isn’t a characteristic of the original Hebrew or Greek, which read well, but rather a result of word for word rendering. Thus, he would argue that all “literal” translations are really “modified literal” and actually these and the translations that focus more on meaning than formal equivalence actually have much in common with the more “literal”.

The author concludes by passing along the counsel of a professor that ideally, there should be a good “modified literal” and good “idiomatic” translation every twenty years and he believes we are actually blessed to have such a situation in the English language for the light each of these sheds on the other.

One quibble with the book is that I don’t think the author in the end finally answers the question in the subtitle: Are all translations created equal? In saying that all the translations have much in common and are valuable when used together he does not answer this question explicitly. At most he seems to say we might dispute renderings in particular translations. In my own experience, I would not say to a new believer or seeker, pick any of them, they are all equal or all equally valuable. I would discourage starting with the KJV, because while beautiful, it is not based on the best manuscripts and the language is archaic and may be misunderstood or more difficult to understand. For a first Bible, I would probably choose readability without the idiosyncracies of paraphrase versions. For a second Bible, I would encourage getting something that is closer to word for word once they are serious about studying texts.

All in all, I think this book is a valuable contribution to understanding the issues involved in translation that hopefully will contribute to a wider appreciation of the wealth of translations available in English, more careful engagement with diverse translations, and a passion to see the scriptures translated in every ‘heart language’ in the world.

View all my reviews

A good resource for those who do not want to go out and by a plethora of Bibles to compare translations is Bible Gateway, which allows you to look up verses and passages in a variety of translations (including non-English language translations).