New ESV Bible

This weekend I got a new Bible for myself. For a while I've had a creeping discomfort with study bibles in general. It is really easy to get distracted and spend a lot more time reading about the Bible than you spend actually reading the word of God.

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For that reason, I purchased a new ESV bible in 2-column format with a center column of cross references and a little bit of concordance and map section at the end. The complete lack of study notes helps keep me from getting distracted and the concordance helps finding half-remembered passages. The cross-references allow you to use the Bible as its own commentary anyway - you know, let Scripture interpret Scripture.

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An added benefit of a non-study bible is that a bible that is studded with lots of commentary and essays and chapter notes, etc... can be incorrectly proportioned. For example, on day-one of bible school long ago, you learnt that Psalms is right in the middle of the Bible and you learnt how far back you have to open the book to find the New Testament. Well, in a study Bible the proportions of the pages can be all wrong. Psalms may not be in the middle. So finding your way around can be harder.

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I still like my old Reformation Study Bible (though I'm not really hip on the NKJV's lack of readability), and I also like Zondervan's NIV Study Bible for the notes and essays. But for my dollar, a non-study Bible seems better.