What do theology students use the NRSV bible? What made them come to the conclusion it was the most accurate?

Question

I work in a christian bookshop and am not to keen on the NRSV compared to other versions, I am interested why Theology students or lecturers like this version?

Answer 1

The NRSV (especially the Oxford annotated version) is the most accurate translation currently available.

The top scholars and linguists in the world worked on this update of the RSV. Some of the advantages of the NRSV are:

This translation of both Hebrew Scriptures and New Testament writings reflects advances in scholarship, particularly those made possible through the discovery and translation of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

It reflects current scholarship in linguistics and in accurate interpretation of original usages in both the Hebrew and the Greek. For example, "adelphoi" is better translated as "brothers and sisters" or "siblings" than the archaic and gender-biased "brethren," as we now know that Koine Greek speakers used the word to refer to groups of both men and women. Note that this is not a feminist rewriting of the text, but an effort to more accurately reflect historical usage of the term.

Unwarranted archaisms ("thee" and "thou") have been eliminated.

The deuterocanonical books are included.

In short, the NRSV looks a lot more like what we see in the original Greek and Hebrew than any other currently available translation.

Answer 2

Students in Divinity school and other graduate schools of Religion realize that ANY translation of the Bible is inaccurate. You simply can't take thoughts expressed in one language (especially aramaic or hebrew) and transfer them directly into English. But the NRSV is the best compromise between the various possible translations and has many corrections based on improved understandings of the ancient languages. At the least it is far superior to the KJV which has numerous absolute, undeniable mistakes and mistranslations, or some of the more colloquial newer versions which translate a lot of passages in ways that are very biased by the translators (or committee's) personal dogmas.

Any good theology curriculum would include a series of courses that discusses this topic in all directions.