HarperCollins has announced:
The King’s Version
A Contemporary Translation of the New Testament
By N. T. Wright
On Sale: 9/27/2011
No more details are given, but Timothy of Catholic Bibles speculates that
it will simply be the New Testament translation he did for the For Everybody series of commentaries published by Westminster John Knox Press.
Well, there is hardly a need for yet another English New Testament translation, but it will be fascinating to see what Wright comes up with. But why the title “The King’s Version”? Who is “The King” here? Not Wright, I hope. But I guess this is just a marketing ploy. Thanks to Eddie Arthur on Twitter for the link.
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Clayboy, among others, also has his thoughts on this (which he later deleted, so I had to remove the link), taking a little further my point about the new version’s name. But perhaps for the name we should be blaming the Murdoch empire, owners of HarperCollins, rather than Wright. Indeed as publication is still five months away it might not be too late for Wright, if he is embarrassed by enough bloggers, to get the name changed.
Hello everyone. I have several books in Wright’s “For Everyone” New Testament Series, and he most often translates the “Christ” in Christ Jesus as “King Jesus.” He writes that he does this to help people to understand “Christ” more as a title [annointed one, messiah] than a name. If this new translation is indeed from his New Testament Series, or if he continues to translate the word Christ as King, I would assume that this is the reason for the name, “The King’s Version.” Hey, at least it’s all about Jesus, the King of kings and Lord of lords. That pretty much sounds like Wright’s style. He would never talk about himself that way or allow a publisher to name the translation for him. After all, he’s more than likely already finished translating it from the NT Series he did a few years ago, and could have it published more on his terms than theirs. Hope this helps…
Jordan, that’s an interesting observation. I’m not sure if it is good translation to render “Christ” as “King”, but it is certainly an interesting decision.
You might like to repost your comment on my post at Better Bibles Blog, as there is an active discussion there about the version’s title.
According to both the publisher’s website and Amazon, the title is now “The Kingdom New Testament: A Contemporary Translation”.
http://www.harpercollins.com/books/?isbn=9780062064912
Jonathan, thank you for the update. A much better name, I think.
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