The Orthodox Study Bible

The last decade of the twentieth century saw an historic event. In 1993, The Orthodox Study Bible: New Testament and Psalms was released as the first English Bible with study material reflecting the ancient faith of the Eastern Orthodox Church.

St. Athanasius Academy, which had organized this effort, began receiving requests for the completion of the Old Testament—a monumental task which involved not only preparation of the study notes and outlines, but also the presentation of an acceptable Old Testament text. Though the Orthodox Church has never officially committed itself to a single text and list of Old Testament books, it has traditionally used the Greek Old Testament of the Septuagint (LXX). However, in Orthodoxy’s 200-year history in North America, no English translation of the LXX has ever been produced by the Church.

The contributors used the Alfred Rahlfs edition of the Greek text as the basis for the English translation. To this base they brought two additional major sources. The first is the Brenton text, a British translation of the Greek Old Testament, published in 1851. The availability of this work, and the respect accorded it, made it an obvious choice as a source document. Secondly, Thomas Nelson Publishers granted use of the Old Testament text of the New King James Version in the places where the English translation of the LXX would match that of the Masoretic (Hebrew) text. The development team at St. Athanasius Academy carefully studied these sources, along with other documents, to produce an English Old Testament text suitable for the project.

The Orthodox Study Bible – Ancient Christianity Speaks to Today’s World

Prepared under the auspices of the Academic Community of St. Athanasius Academy of Orthodox Theology, Elk Grove, California, Fr. Jack Norman Sparks, Ph.D., Dean

Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2008.

The Orthodox Study Bible – Contents

• Acknowledgments

• Special Recognition

• Introduction to The Orthodox Study Bible

• The Old Testament Books Listed and Compared

• Source Abbreviations

• Overview of the Books of the Bible

• Introducing the Orthodox Church

• The Old Testament

• The New Testament

• The Bible: God's Revelation to Man

• How to Read the Bible

• Lectionary

• Glossary

• Morning Prayers

• Evening Prayers

• Index to Annotations

• Index to Study Articles

• The Seventy

• Illustrations

• Endnotes