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Book notice: Genesis 1-11: A New Old Translation For Readers, Scholars, and Translators
RCRoy Ciampa · Jun 26, 2017, 6:11 PM · Last modified: Sep 28, 2026, 11:38 AM
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One of the co-authors of this interesting new translation has published a couple items about it in the Washington Post:
The publisher says: "This translation of Genesis 1-11 follows the Hebrew text closely and leaves in what many translations leave out: physicality, ambiguity, repetition, even puns. Bray and Hobbins also draw deeply from the long history of Jewish and Christian interpretation. Their translation and notes offer the reader wisdom and delight."
This should certainly interest readers of MAP, both because of the translation itself and because of the questions it raises about how we translate.
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Now reviewed in Themelios: http://themelios.thegospelcoalition.org/review/genesis-1-11-a-new-old-translation-for-readers-scholars-and-translators The final paragraph of the review: Whatever cavils the reader may have, this translation offers a fresh presentation—representation—of the Hebrew text: not fresh because it is contemporary or shocking or chatty, but fresh in its oldness, its transparency to the Hebrew, in all of that ancient text’s splendor and strangeness. And Genesis 1–11 is far more than a translation: it is a statement of first principles and, in its notes, a window on the interplay of those principles. That is why it is so valuable—for readers, for Bible translators (like myself), and for scholars—for everyone, really, who will slow down and hear the text. “In this translation, Genesis is a book that tarries, allowing itself to be caught by a reader willing to make the pursuit” (p. 16).