ESV Study Bible | English Standard Version

Fred Sanders, Associate Professor of Theology at the Torrey Honors Institute (Biola University) and blogger at The Scriptorium Daily, has a helpful post today: Let Us Now Praise Study Bibles. He explains his high hopes for the ESV Study Bible, his experience with various Bibles in the past, the dangers of using a tool like a Study Bible, as well as the ways it can be of help. Here’s the conclusion:

There are other ways of distinguishing text from commentary. These ways involve careful page design, typography, and shading. The ESV Study Bible excels in precisely these areas. The text of Scripture is compactly placed on the page in a way that enables you to read straight off the page without being dragged off into commentary unless you choose to go there. The best thing in any study Bible is still a good, thoughtful selection of marginal cross-references, and the great system of references from the ESV Classic Reference edition is apparently expanded considerably for the Study Bible edition. Becoming fluent in the use of those cross-references is the fundamental skill needed by all serious Bible students: habitually perceiving those canonical interconnections produces a discipled mind, able to read Scripture holistically. It also unties the mental knots that keep us from seeing the reality that Scripture is deeply self-interpreting. A study Bible that goes about its work humbly and helpfully can do the same. I’m hopeful that I might end up with a new “main Bible” this season.