Oxford Annotated Bible

The 1973 edition of the New Oxford Annotated Bible, with the RSV text

The 2000 edition of the New Oxford Annotated Bible, with the NRSV text

The Oxford Annotated Bible (OAB) is a study Bible published by the Oxford University Press (OUP). The notes and the study material feature in-depth academic research from non-denominational perspectives, with contributors from mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Jewish traditions.

The original OAB and the first edition of the New Oxford Annotated Bible (NOAB), edited by Herbert G. May and Bruce Metzger, were based on the Revised Standard Version (RSV) of the Bible. After the release of the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible in 1989, OUP published a second edition of the NOAB based on that translation. The NRSV was also the basis of the third edition (2000), edited by Michael Coogan, which is considered to be much more ecumenical in approach. For example, it calls the Old Testament the "Hebrew Bible" out of consideration to Jewish readers. A fully revised Fourth Edition was released in May 2010.

Some editions of the Oxford Annotated Bible also include the apocryphal and deuterocanonical books used by the Roman Catholic Church and the Greek and Slavonic Orthodox Churches, as well as churches of the Anglican Communion (including The Episcopal Church); these editions are titled the "[New] Oxford Annotated Bible with the Apocrypha". The Apocryphal books are also available in a separate volume.

Some groups, including fundamentalist and evangelical Protestants as well as traditional Catholics object to some of the translation principles used by this Bible, such as the assertion that passages in the Old Testament traditionally seen as referring to Jesus do not do so, and the claim that 1 Corinthians 6 does not refer to Homosexuals. Another objection is raised to the OAB because the editors adhere to contemporary, scholarly views of Biblical criticism, and thus call into question the traditional authorship of some books.

Despite controversy over its content, the NOAB is widely accepted for numerous reasons. It remains one of the most thoroughly researched and painstakingly translated Bibles available in contemporary, idiomatic English. It relies upon centuries of Biblical interpretation and scholarship. Aesthetically, it is beautifully designed and typeset. The text of the Bible appears in the upper portion of the page in two columns with the annotations in a separate section at the bottom of the page. Annotations are judicious and comprehensive without distracting from the reading experience. The flow of the verses is similarly undisturbed by subheadings or cross references. The only superscripts are those that appear in the NRSV text. This arrangement allows for clearn reading of the passages.

This edition also includes a number of useful essays. Essay topics include Bible translations, early Jewish history and the geography of the Bible. The NOAB also features maps of the Holy Land during various time periods. Because of its many features, the NOAB is now commonly assigned in collegiate classes about the Bible.

In addition to the NRSV editions, OUP continues to make the 1973 and 1977 RSV editions available.

In 2009, the 4th edition was published, containing new color maps and updated essays and commentaries. As always, versions with and without the Apocrypha were made available.

A cursory review of select excerpts from the in-depth introductions to various parts of the NOAB illustrate the influence of contemporary Biblical scholarship. The excerpts from the various introductory essays prepared by the editors are intended to shed light on the perspective of those involved in preparing the NOAB.

INTRODUCTION TO THE OLD TESTAMENT

[by Herbert G. May, Chair, RSV Bible Committee, Professor of OT, Oberlin College]

From page Xxv: “The Old Testament reflects the many facets of the life of Israel, and its literature takes many forms; in it are prose and poetry, myth and legend, folk tale and history, sacred hymns and a superb love song, religious and secular laws, proverbs of the wise and oracles of the prophets, epic poems, laments, parables, and allegories. Despite the variety in content as well as in viewpoint, there is a significant unity, centered in belief in the God of judgment and redemption, of justice and mercy, and springing out of the continuity and corporate nature of that people chosen by God to play the main role in the drama of revelation and from whom was to come Jesus of Nazareth.”

Page Xxv: “The Israelites were more history-conscious than any other people in the ancient world. Probably as early as the time of David and Solomon, out of a matrix of myth, legend, and history, there had appeared the earliest written form of the story of the saving acts of God from Creation to the conquest of the Promised Land, an account which later in modified form became a part of Scripture. But it was to be a long time before the idea of Scripture arose and the Old Testament took its present form.”

Xxv: “In the Hebrew Bible, Ruth, Lamentations, and Daniel are placed among the Writings, a section which begins with the Psalms and ends with 1 and 2 Chronicles; this is in contrast with the English bible, where the order is influenced by Greek and Latin versions.”

P. Xxvi: “Before the time of the council of Jamnia, about A.D. 90-100, there did not exist a single standard text of the various books of Scripture regarded as possessing sole authority (a textus receptus). Rather, as the Dead Sea (Qumran) Scrolls afford evidence, there were variant recensions of the same Old Testament book. It is true that there was already in existence a form of that Hebrew text which was to be edited later by the Jewish scholars known as Masoretes (from about A.D. 600 to the 10th century) and their predecessors and which is the standard text used today, but there were also variant forms of the text.”

Xxvi: “If by canonical one means that a book must be regarded as having a special authority, that it is holy and inspired, that it is one of a strictly limited number of books, and that there is a single, standard text with its verbal form inviolable, then one cannot speak of a canon of Old Testament Scripture before about A.D. 100.”

Xxvii: “… only Genesis to Deuteronomy came to be regarded as Mosaic in origin, and so the Law was limited to the Pentateuch. Certainly before the middle of the third century B.C., when according to tradition the Pentateuch was first translated into Greek, it had achieved a primary status as the Scripture of the Jews. It was to retain this primary position even after the body of Scripture had been enlarged to include the Prophets and the Writings. When in the second century B.C. the Samaritans finally separated from Judaism, they retained the Pentateuch as their sole Scripture, preserving it in a script derived from the old Hebrew script which was revived in the Maccabean period.”

[On the Septuagint and Apocrypha]

From page xxviii: “Among many writings not included in the canon were the books of the Apocrypha, which are found in the Septuagint …, and which, with the exception of 1 and 2 Esdras, were composed in the last two centuries B.C., certainly before the council of Jamnia (about A.D. 100). They could not be accepted, in part because of the current conviction that the Old Testament canon was closed at the time of Ezra when prophetic revelation was supposed to have ceased, or because, in the case of some, they had been written in Greek or else had ceased to be copied in Hebrew and Aramaic after their translation into Greek. There was also probably no widespread demand for their canonization.”

THE PENTATEUCH Xxviii: “In the early monarchy (perhaps about 950 B.C.) a traditionist from Judah (J) first organized the traditions into a written epic. Sometime later (between about 900 to 750 B.C.) a traditionist from North Israel or Ephraim (E) presented another version of the sacred story. In the seventh century B.C. Deuteronomy (D) was published 92 kg. chs. 22-23), although this version rests upon old traditions. And finally, about the time of the Exile, priestly writers (P) rounded out the expanded tradition with materials preserved by the Jerusalem priesthood.”

INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW TESTAMENT [by Bruce M. Metzger, Vice Chair, RSV Bible Committee, Professor NT, Princeton Theological Seminary]

From Page 1167: “Unlike the books of the Old Testament, which originated during a period extending over many centuries, the books of the New Testament were written within a period of somewhat less than one hundred years. These books fall into four different literary forms. Four of them are ‘Gospels’ because they tell the ‘gospel’ (a word derived from the Anglo-Saxon god-spell, meaning ‘good tidings’) of Jesus Christ, that is, his birth, baptism, ministry of teaching and healing, death, and resurrection. Church history is represented in the Acts of the Apostles, which is an account of the spread of the Christian faith during the first thirty or so years after the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Twenty-one of the books of the New Testament are in the form of letters. The last book of the New Testament is an apocalypse, that is, a revelation (Greek apokalypsis) or disclosure of God’s will for the future.”

Page 1168: “The language in which the books of the New Testament were written was the koine or common Greek of the time. This form of Greek, which lacks many of the subtle refinements of classical Greek of an earlier period, was known and used by most of the peoples of the Roman Empire to whom the first Christian missionaries carried the gospel. Noticeably different grades of koine Greek are found in the several New Testament documents. The most highly literary as regards sentence structure and vocabulary are the Letter to the Hebrews and the two books written by Luke (the Gospel and the Acts). Those which are the furthers removed from classical Greek standards and closest to colloquial Greek are the Gospel of Mark and the book of Revelation. Furthermore, since all the authors represented in the new Testament appear to have been either Jews or Jewish proselytes before becoming Christians, it is natural that their use of koine Greek was colored by their familiarity with the special characteristics of the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament (the Septuagint). Here and there the Gospels and the first half of Acts preserve in Greek certain turns of expression which reflect an underlying Aramaic idiom, which was the mother tongue of Jesus and his disciples.”

P. 1170: “The fourth century was marked by authoritative pronouncements, first by bishops of provincial churches and later by synods or councils. St. Athanasius in his Festal Letter for A.D. 367 was the first to name the twenty-seven books of the New Testament as exclusively canonical.”

HOW TO READ THE BIBLE WITH UNDERSTANDING: THE DIVERSITY AND THE UNITY OF THE SCRIPTURES

[by late H.H. Rowley, University of Manchester]

From Page 1515: “The opening chapters of the Old Testament deal with human origins. They are not to be read as history, but neither are they to be dismissed as childish myths. They are marked by profound spiritual insight. … These chapters think of sin not as a theological abstraction, but as something real which recoils upon man to his own hurt. It broke up the first family, brought murder and strife and corruption, and ate like a canker into the heart of man.” -- late H.H. Rowley, University of Manchester

P. 1515: “These chapters are followed by the stories of the patriarchs, which preserve ancient traditions now known to reflect the conditions of the times of which they tell, though they cannot be treated as strictly historical. That they contain genuine historical memories is increasingly recognized today. Yet here again it is not for history but for religion that they are preserved, and they have much of abiding value to say to us today. Every reader should be alert to understand not merely God’s dealings with the patriarchs, but what he is saying to us through these stories.”

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