Why this page exists
Most Bible websites list translations with no word about where they come from. Readers aren't told whether a version was made by Protestants, Catholics, the Orthodox Church, Jewish scholars or one individual. They aren't told which Old Testament it translates or which books it leaves out. We think readers deserve to know. Every Bible on this site carries a short, plain label covering five things: who made it, what it was translated from, which books it contains, how literally it translates, and what its licence allows.
We write as Eastern Orthodox Christians, and we say so openly. We have tried to describe every tradition the way its own members would recognise.
1. Two Old Testaments: the Hebrew and the Greek
Christians have received the Old Testament in two main forms.
The Masoretic Text (Hebrew). This is the authoritative Hebrew text of Rabbinic Judaism. It is named after the Masoretes, the medieval scribes who added vowel points and notes. The oldest complete manuscript is the Leningrad Codex, copied in Cairo in AD 1008 or 1009 [S1, S2]. It is the basis of almost all Protestant Old Testaments, including the KJV, ASV, WEB and BSB. Since the mid-20th century it has also been the basis of most modern Catholic translations [S2].
The Septuagint (Greek, "LXX"). This is the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures made by Jews in Egypt. Scholars date the translation of the Torah with confidence to the mid- or late 3rd century BC. The other books followed over the next two centuries or so [S3]. The Septuagint also contains books and passages not found in the Hebrew Bible: Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, 1–4 Maccabees, 1 Esdras, the Greek parts of Esther and Daniel, the Prayer of Manasseh, Psalm 151 and others [S3].
Fair points on both sides.
- Our surviving complete Septuagint manuscripts (Codex Vaticanus, 4th century; Codex Alexandrinus, 5th century) are much older than the oldest complete Masoretic manuscript. But Greek fragments go back to the 2nd century BC, and the Masoretic tradition itself rests on a much older consonantal text [S2, S3].
- The Dead Sea Scrolls (c. 150 BC – AD 75) show that several forms of the Hebrew text existed before the Masoretic Text became standard. Some scrolls agree with the Hebrew text behind the Septuagint. Most of the Qumran biblical fragments, however, are closer to the Masoretic Text [S2]. Honesty requires both halves of that sentence. The Scrolls do not "prove the Septuagint right" in general, and they do not prove the Masoretic Text right either. They show that the Septuagint often translates a real ancient Hebrew text, not a careless paraphrase.
A verse you can check yourself. Hebrews 10:5 quotes Psalm 40 as "a body you prepared for me". That is the Septuagint wording: Brenton's translation of Psalm 39:7 LXX reads "a body hast thou prepared me". The Hebrew-based Psalm 40:6 reads "You have opened my ears" [S4]. This is one reason the Greek Old Testament matters to Christians: the Apostles often quote it.
Another, handled carefully. In Isaiah 7:14 the Septuagint reads "virgin" (parthenos), and Matthew 1:23 quotes that wording. The 1917 Jewish Publication Society translation of the Hebrew reads "the young woman" [S5]. Both renderings come from the same Hebrew word (almah), and their meaning has been debated since the 2nd century. St Justin Martyr already argued the point with a Jewish interlocutor around AD 160 [S6].
2. Why the Orthodox Church reads the Septuagint
The Eastern Orthodox Church uses the Septuagint as its Old Testament. Where Greek is the liturgical language, it reads the Septuagint in Greek. Elsewhere it uses the Septuagint as the basis for translations into other languages [S3, S7]. The reasons are historical and theological, not a dislike of Hebrew:
- It was the Bible of the Apostolic Church in the Greek-speaking world. The New Testament writers frequently quote the Old Testament in its Greek form (see Hebrews 10:5 above) [S3, S4].
- The Fathers received it. St Augustine, a Western Father, records that the Church received the Septuagint as though it were the only Greek translation, although others existed. He reports that Jerome's new Latin translation from the Hebrew was respected, but that the churches did not set it above the authority of the Seventy. Augustine held that where the two differ, both can carry the Spirit's meaning [S8].
- The extra books are part of the Church's inheritance. The Orthodox Church reads Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Maccabees and the rest as Scripture "found only in the Septuagint" [S7] (the OCA's wording). It calls them the anagignoskomena, "the books that are read" [S9].
Being fair: the Orthodox Church does not reject the Hebrew text. Orthodox scholars study it.
3. Which books are in the Bible? (Canons)
| Tradition | Old Testament | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Jewish (Tanakh) | 24 books (= the 39 of Protestant Bibles, counted differently) | Hebrew order: Torah, Prophets, Writings [S11]. |
| Protestant | 39 books → 66 total | After the Reformation, Protestant Bibles followed the Jewish canon. The Septuagint's extra books were called "Apocrypha". Early Protestant Bibles (KJV 1611, Geneva 1560, Reina 1569) still printed them, often in a separate section [S3, S11, S12]. Anglicans accept them "for instruction in life and manners, but not for the establishment of doctrine", as do Lutherans in a similar way [S11]. |
| Catholic | 46 books → 73 total | Confirmed by the Council of Trent on 8 April 1546. The "deuterocanonical" books are Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch, 1–2 Maccabees and the Greek parts of Esther and Daniel. The Clementine Vulgate printed the Prayer of Manasseh and 3–4 Esdras in an appendix, as non-canonical [S11]. |
| Eastern Orthodox | The Catholic list plus 1 Esdras, 3 Maccabees, the Prayer of Manasseh and Psalm 151; 4 Maccabees is commonly printed in an appendix | The Greek Orthodox reckon Psalm 151 part of the Psalter. They count four books of Maccabees, the fourth usually in an appendix with the Prayer of Manasseh. For the Greeks the "two books of Esdras" are 1 Esdras and Ezra–Nehemiah [S9]. The Synod of Jerusalem (1672) affirmed Wisdom, Judith, Tobit, Susanna, Bel and the Dragon, the Maccabees and Sirach as "genuine parts of Scripture" [S9]. As a local council, its decrees bind only as far as they are received by the Orthodox Churches [S9]. Editions differ: one Antiochian parish guide says only that "some editions" include 3–4 Maccabees, Psalm 151, 1 Esdras and the Prayer of Manasseh [S14]. |
| Oriental Orthodox | Varies; the Ethiopian canon is the broadest | The Ethiopian Church accepts the Catholic and Orthodox extra books except the four Maccabees, and has its own wider list [S11]. Not covered by this reader. |
The New Testament has the same 27 books in the Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant Churches [S11].
In this reader each translation carries a canon label: Protestant (66 books), Protestant, with the Apocrypha, Catholic (73 books), All books (ecumenical), Septuagint Old Testament, Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) or New Testament only. Where the Orthodox books are present, we say which ones.
4. Which Greek New Testament? (TR, Byzantine, Patriarchal, Critical)
All New Testament translations rest on Greek manuscripts. The differences between printed Greek texts are real but usually small.
- Textus Receptus (TR, "Received Text"). This is the series of printed Greek New Testaments that began with Erasmus in 1516 and continued with Stephanus, Beza and the Elzevirs. Scrivener's 1894 edition reconstructs the Greek behind the King James Version [S15, S16]. It underlies the KJV, the Geneva Bible, the Reina-Valera and many Reformation-era Bibles [S15]. It resembles the Byzantine text, but in a few places it follows late or Latin-influenced readings [S15].
- Byzantine / Majority Text. This is the form of the text found in the largest number of Greek manuscripts and handed down in the Greek-speaking Church. The Robinson–Pierpont edition is its standard scholarly form and is in the public domain [S17, S18].
- Patriarchal Text (1904). This is the edition published by the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople in 1904 and revised by 1912. Its title presents it as "approved by the Great Church of Christ" [S19]. It is Byzantine in type and was built largely from the Church's lectionaries [S20]. It is widely used in Greek-speaking Orthodoxy, but no one Greek text is accepted by every Orthodox Church [S19].
- Critical (eclectic) text. Modern scholars reconstruct the text by weighing the oldest manuscripts, especially the 4th-century codices. The leading editions are Nestle-Aland/UBS and the SBL Greek New Testament (2010) [S21]. Most modern Protestant and Catholic translations use this kind of text. Most academic textual critics regard it as closest to the original wording. Defenders of the Byzantine text dispute that judgement [S15, S17].
A test case: 1 John 5:7–8 ("three that bear witness in heaven").
- The TR prints the longer wording [S22].
- The Robinson–Pierpont Byzantine text and the SBL critical text both omit it [S22].
- The Patriarchal Text prints it in small type. Its 1904 editors say that the passage is "entirely unattested" in the Church's texts, in the Eastern Fathers and in the older manuscripts. They kept it "upon the opinion of the Holy Synod" [S20].
So the traditional Orthodox text is not simply "the TR", and it is not simply the "majority" either. This is why the reader labels each New Testament precisely.
5. How literally does it translate?
Broadly, translations fall into these kinds (the badge on each translation uses similar terms: very literal, formal, dynamic, simplified, paraphrase). Real translations sit on a spectrum.
- Literal-concordant. Tries to mirror the original's grammar, sometimes at the cost of natural English (e.g. Young's Literal Translation) [S23].
- Word-for-word (formal). Keeps close to the original wording but writes normal sentences (e.g. KJV, Douay-Rheims, ASV, LSV, Reina-Valera 1909, Brenton).
- Balanced. Formal where possible, freer where needed for clarity (e.g. BSB, which describes itself as "near the middle of the range" [S24]; WEB).
- Thought-for-thought (dynamic). Translates the sense of each sentence (e.g. Bible in Basic English, Free Bible Version, Nueva Biblia Viva).
- Paraphrase / expanded. Adds explanation in the text (e.g. Translation for Translators, which spells out "implied information" in italics [S25]).
Literal translations help with study. Freer ones help with first reading and with children. Neither is "the real Bible" while the other is fake. Comparing two is often the wisest course.
6. So which should I read?
If you are Orthodox, or want to read as the Orthodox Church reads:
- Old Testament: Brenton's Septuagint (or the spelling-updated Brenton). It is the only complete public-domain English Septuagint with all the Orthodox books that we found [S26].
- New Testament: the Majority Standard Bible or the World English Bible, both of which follow the Byzantine text-type. The British Edition with Deuterocanon uses "LORD" rather than "Yahweh". It also includes 3–4 Maccabees and Psalm 151, though its Old Testament is translated from the Hebrew [S27].
- Greek: the Patriarchal Text [S19, S20].
- In print: the Orthodox Study Bible (Thomas Nelson; its Old Testament was prepared by Orthodox scholars from the Septuagint, its New Testament is the NKJV) and the Eastern/Greek Orthodox Bible New Testament (Orthodox-made). Their copyrights do not let us host them [S28, S29].
If you are Catholic: the Douay-Rheims (Challoner), which carries a cardinal's approbation [S30]. There is also the modern-English Catholic Public Domain Version, which has no imprimatur and is the work of one translator [S31]. In Spanish, the Scío New Testament (translated from the Vulgate; authorised in Spain in 1782) [S32].
If you are Protestant: the King James Version, the Berean Standard Bible or the World English Bible. In Spanish, the Reina-Valera 1909, or for plainer Spanish, Palabra de Dios para ti or the Nueva Biblia Viva.
If you want to see how Jewish tradition reads the Hebrew: the JPS Tanakh (1917) [S5].
If English is not your first language, or for children: the Bible in Basic English, or La Biblia en Español Sencillo in Spanish.
7. An honest gap
We searched for an openly licensed translation made by the Orthodox Church in English or Spanish. We found none we are allowed to host:
- The Eastern/Greek Orthodox Bible (EOB) New Testament, edited by Fr Laurent Cleenewerck from the Patriarchal Text, is "All rights reserved". It may be used for non-commercial, liturgical or scholarly purposes within the Orthodox jurisdictions named in its permission notice. Other print use is limited to 1,500 verses [S29].
- The Orthodox Study Bible is a commercial copyright [S28].
- In Spanish we found no Orthodox-made translation of the Bible with an open licence. The only openly licensed Spanish Bibles with the full Orthodox-length list of books that we found are the Biblia libre para el mundo and its Latin-American edition (not offered in this reader for now). These are public-domain drafts translated from the English World English Bible, not from the Greek [S33].
The public-domain text that best fits the Orthodox Church's own Bible is in Greek: the Patriarchal Text for the New Testament and the Septuagint for the Old. We say this plainly rather than present a Protestant or Catholic translation as if it were Orthodox.