Dr Paul Allen

The English Standard Version (ESV) Bible is set to undergo its first text update in nearly a decade. The ESV Translation Oversight Committee has announced revisions to 36 passages across 42 verses. One of the most significant  changes  involves  Genesis 3:16 , a verse that has sparked considerable discussion among theologians.  The  ESV's 2016 edition  translated the Hebrew preposition "el" as "contrary to," resulting in the verse: "Your desire shall be contrary to your husband, but he shall rule over you." In the 2025 revision, the verse will revert to its 2001 translation: "Your desire shall be for your husband, and he shall rule over you."  This revision aligns the translation with historic English Bible versions such as the Revised Standard Version (RSV), New American Standard Bible (NASB), and New King James Version (NKJV), according to the TOC. "The interpretive options can now be seen in the alternative renderings provided in the ...

One of the more surprising truths of the Christian religion is that we don’t know for sure how to pronounce the name of our own God. Good evidence suggests it should be   Yahweh , but good evidence is all God has chosen to leave us—not certainty. There is one thing we do know, though: God’s name is not  Jehovah . That word is a colossal, unrepealable, European mistake. People can get really uptight about the way the name of God gets translated in English Bibles. The Jehovah’s Witnesses, a non-trinitarian religious group, have made it one of their leading distinctive to insist that the best way to translate the Hebrew word יהוה (YHWH) is with the English word  Jehovah . Their custom-made Bible, the New World Translation, uses it over 7,000 times. Even the venerable King James Version uses it seven times. But there are at least two excellent reasons why  Jehovah  should not appear in any English Bible. 1. Jehovah was created by a misunderstanding. First,  Je...