New Testament in Modern English: Student Edition Kindle Edition

Very grateful to the person who introduced me to the Phillips New Testament. As accurate and true a translation as any, but notably warm and encouraging. Typesetting a little muddy, and very readable nonetheless. Inexpensive paperback. This student version includes a concise and interesting introduction at the head of each book. Otherwise the same as the reader version. If you read the bible for pleasure, or if you have never read the bible at all, get this one. You will enjoy it.

This is the standard translation for congregants and scholars alike for most of the 20th Century. It is an accurate translation and eliminates the error of mistranslation modern speakers often encounter because of simple problems in simple spelling, sentence construction, changes in cultural values. Shew is Elizabethan for show. Ye, thee,thou,thy,mine,thine, are replaced with "you", "you", "you", "you", because the earlier English speakers distinguished grammerically by spelling variation. Mine is still mine but thine has become "your" and "your's" etc. The wonderful thing about J.B. Phillips is his great knowledge of ancient classic language. He not only understood the vocabulary, and common translation meanings but also the derivation of words etmymlogically, but also understood phrase transliteration was often not what the original speaker had in mind in original context as spoken. I love this translation because it is possible to read the Word of God having confidence that what I understand is what the God inspired writer meant. I have long loved the King James version because I was a lover of Shakespear when I encountered it in high school. I was also generously gifted by happenstance to have three instructors who loved the venerable Bard and gave me insight to how English was spoken fluidly as in Hamlet Act2, Scene 1, "as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue". It is often difficult for modern speakers because love of speech, grammar,poetry,have almost vanished in our sports / celebrity worshipful, hard materialistic, reductionist, revolutionary, politically correct speech and popular vernacular culture. We in our age have become the rubes and barbarians much of the lower economic classes of Elizabethan England were, the residents of lower London, the Cockney of Liverpool, and the occupied Welsh and Irish. England was and remains a melting pot of class and culture, as is America. The main difference is that Americans through assimilation tend to greater homogenization. English society tends toward settling out as by specific gravity in chemistry and physics. America speaks the common language of a homogenous society and the English speak in regional dialect and cultural idiom. J.B. Phillips is readable to all modern speakers of English because post industrial revolution speakers in all regions have become to tend more to the rube / barbarian than poetic.

5-Stars for this wonderful, wonderful translation of the New Testament3-Stars for the horribly flawed and compromised Kindle EditionThis is a wonderful translation of the New Testament. It's less literal (and therefore LESS word-for-word accurate) than my beloved New King James Version and less vernacular (and therefore MORE word-for-word accurate) than my beloved The Message.Let's compare shall we? Here's John 3:16-21 in all three translations:"For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God."-- New King James Version (NKJV)"This is how much God loved the world: He gave his Son, his one and only Son. And this is why: so that no one need be destroyed; by believing in him, anyone can have a whole and lasting life. God didn’t go to all the trouble of sending his Son merely to point an accusing finger, telling the world how bad it was. He came to help, to put the world right again. Anyone who trusts in him is acquitted; anyone who refuses to trust him has long since been under the death sentence without knowing it. And why? Because of that person’s failure to believe in the one-of-a-kind Son of God when introduced to him.This is the crisis we’re in: God-light streamed into the world, but men and women everywhere ran for the darkness. They went for the darkness because they were not really interested in pleasing God. Everyone who makes a practice of doing evil, addicted to denial and illusion, hates God-light and won’t come near it, fearing a painful exposure. But anyone working and living in truth and reality welcomes God-light so the work can be seen for the God-work it is."-- The Message (MSG)"For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that every one who believes in him shall not be lost, but should have eternal life. You must understand that God has not sent his Son into the world to pass sentence upon it, but to save it—through him. Any man who believes in him is not judged at all. It is the one who will not believe who stands already condemned, because he will not believe in the character of God’s only Son.This is the judgment—that light has entered the world and men have preferred darkness to light because their deeds are evil. Anybody who does wrong hates the light and keeps away from it, for fear his deeds may be exposed. But anybody who is living by the truth will come to the light to make it plain that all he has done has been done through God.”-- J.B. Phillips New Testament (PHILLIPS)See how J.B. Phillips strikes a nice balance between elegance and readability? It is highly readable without compromising accuracy to the breaking point.That said, it still makes a better devotional Bible than Study Bible due to it's lack of verse indicators as well as it's more vernacular translation philosophy and style.Finally, the Kindle edition that I read had a LOT of typos - as in at least one per chapter. It also suffers from nearly a complete lack of live links. For example, the Table of Contents only has link to sections ("The Gospel", "Letters to Young Churches") but not individual books, let alone chapters.Overall, the Kindle edition that I read seems so slapped together and sloppy that it's as if someone OCR'd the paper edition threw in a few links and then walked away. A translation this fine deserves better! Hopefully Simon & Schuster will do better in future revisions or editions of this classic.

Perfect to help my grandson along his journey !! Thank you !!

You may not know this, but he was a friend of C.S. the Oxford scholar and Christian apologist. I've owned more than a few Phillip's. It flows without compromising the integrity of Scriptural authority.

My wife had an old old well used paperback version that was really falling apart. This hard cover was a great improvement in quality and a great price. the only noticeable difference is that there are no verse markings only chapters. This is okey though, as the word was not recorded by chapter and verse so now sometimes the overall discourse is brought out a bit more.

It is easy to read but it has a need for an editor. Many mistakes in spelling and grammar. But since it is God’s Word I can over look the mistakes.

This was in very God condition. Received on time. J.B. Philips translation is easy to understand without taking away the meaning.

If you want to read the New Testament in a plain and understandable manner I recommend this version.

Excellent version in simple English worth every cent