Why the English Standard Version (ESV) should not become the Standard English Version
Mark L. Strauss, Bethel Seminary San Diego writes:
Why the English Standard Version (ESV) should not become the Standard English Version – How to make a good translation much better
“…I am writing this article, however, because I have heard a number of Christian leaders claim that the ESV is the “Bible of the future”—ideal for public worship and private reading, appropriate for adults, youth and children. This puzzles me, since the ESV seems to me to be overly literal—full of archaisms, awkward language, obscure idioms, irregular word order, and a great deal of “Biblish.” Biblish is produced when the translator tries to reproduce the form of the Greek or Hebrew without due consideration for how people actually write or speak. The ESV, like other formal equivalent versions (RSV, NASB, NKJV, NRSV), is a good supplement to versions that use normal English, but is not suitable as a standard Bible for the church. This is because the ESV too often fails the test of “standard English.”
Click on link for full article:
https://zondervan.typepad.com/files/improvingesv2.pdf