Do we need another Bible translation?

Is this Bible necessary?

That is the question, as the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB) enters the cluttered and competitive market for English translations.

The HCSB is a $10 million project of the Southern Baptist Convention's publishing arm. (The New Testament portion appeared in 2000.)

Holman says things change so quickly that new Bibles are continually needed, calling this "the first major English-language translation in more than 30 years." That's a surprising fib. Among the versions appearing within the past 30 years, the HCBS's main competitors may be these two, similarly pitched to the huge evangelical Protestant audience:

New International Version (NIV, Zondervan, 1978), an evangelical best seller.

English Standard Version (ESV, Crossway, 2001), a slight reworking of the 1952 Revised Standard Version (itself a reworking of the still-popular King James Version), with "corrections" and updating (no more "thees" and "thous").

Other options include the simplified New Living Translation (Tyndale, 1996) and Good News Bible (American Bible Society, 1976).

The HCSB, ESV and NIV all claim to be accurate yet readable, and were translated by large teams of conservative scholars. The NIV group was committed to "the authority and infallibility of the Bible" and the ESV translators to "the truth of God's Word and to historic Christian orthodoxy."

The HCSB says its people uphold strict "biblical inerrancy," signifying the Scriptures are totally free of errors in historical details as well as doctrine, morality and spiritual guidance.

Despite the HCSB's denominational sponsorship, only half its translators were Baptists and their version isn't particularly baptistic. But there's a Southern Baptist Convention scruple worth noting.

In 2000, the denomination added to its official statement of faith the belief that "a wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband."

Conservatives cite Ephesians 5:22: "Wives, submit to your own husbands as to the Lord." But the preceding verse 21 directs all Christians to submit to each other, and moderate evangelicals say that overall principle binds husbands as well as wives.

The NIV, ESV and now HCSB all give hard-liners a typographical boost by dividing verse 21 from verse 22 through white space and a new section heading (such divisions are not part of the biblical text). However, the Harper Study Bible by Harold Lindsell, now deceased, a staunch Southern Baptist inerrancy champion, puts his section division before Ephesians 5:21 so that the topic sentence covers husbands and wives.

The HCSB follows literal word-for-word translation rather than the looser thought-for-thought approach of some modern translators.

Pious touches include introductions to books that take conservative stands on authorship and dates, capitalization of pronouns referring to God and Jesus, and a "plan of salvation" chart in the front.

A surprise: The beloved Psalm 23 ends "as long as I live" rather than the familiar translation, "forever," suggesting eternal life.

From a quick check, the HCSB's Old Testament poetry, always a key test for a translation, looks solid.

During the next few years, readers get to decide: Is this Bible necessary?