There are a number of English translations of the bible – King James, Revised Standard, New International and so on. These include both Old and New Testaments and can thus be considered Christian bibles.
As I understand it, Jewish scripture comprises the Torah, Prophets, and Hagiographia, which when taken together can be put in one-to-one correspond with the books of the Old Testament.
Which English translations do Jews use? Do they accept any of the “standard” Christian versions of the OT or are there other translations specifically for English speaking Jews?
I am not sure that “Hagiographia” is an accurate term for “the Writings” – the “Kh” element of the Tanakh (and no doubt somebody will provide the proper term: Torah and Neba’im are Law and Prophets respectively).
The Tanakh as accepted by Judaism generally corresponds precisely to the Protestant Old Testaement (not to the Catholic or Orthodox versions, which draw on the broader Septuagint Canon, not recognized AFAIK by any Jewish groups today).
I know that the Jewish Publication Society produced a “Jewish Bible” (the Tanakh) in English. What else may be acceptable is a question I’ll have to leave for our active Jewish Dpoer contingent to answer.
“Tanach” is an acronym for Torah (first five books of the Bible), Neviim (prophets), and Ketuvim (writings). The arrangement of the books is a bit different than a Christian Old Testament.
Neviim:
6 Joshua
7 Judges
8 I Samuel (Shmuel)
9 II Samuel
10 I Kings (Melachim)
11 II Kings
12 Isaiah
13 Jeremiah
14 Ezekiel
15 Treisar - The Minor Prophets
Book of Hosea
Book of Joel
Book of Amos
Book of Obadiah
Book of Jonah
Book of Micah
Book of Nahum
Book of Habakkuk
Book of Zephaniah
Book of Haggai
Book of Zechariah
Book of Malachi
Ketuvim:
16 Psalms
17 Proverbs
18 Book of Job
19 Megilot
Song of Songs
Ruth
Lamentations
Ecclesiastes
Book of Esther
20 Daniel
21 Ezra
22 Nehemiah
23 I Chronicles (Divrei hayamim)
24 II Chronicles
That being said, there doesn’t seem to be the big emphasis on bible translations as there is in Christianity. In my experience, Jewish translations of the Bible tend to be written in more of a “plain English” than Christian translations. The big differences, especially when it comes to the Torah, are with the commentary. The commentary in the JPS Torah (Reform) delves into historical, linguistic and archaeological facts, while the commentary in the Artscroll Torah (Orthodox) is written from the perspective that all the events described were true. Etz Hayim (Conservative) is somewhere in the middle; it acknowledges that the Torah is a historical document, but it’s not as “cold” as the JPS translation.
I keep a number of Bible translations around for reference purposes (imagine! there once was a time when you couldn’t look this up in an instant on the internet!).
One is The Holy Scriptures: A New Translation from the Jewish Publication Society of America.
In the introduction, it says:
So a bit like the KJV, but without a King involved. This was in 1916, but this version was in use at least through the 1950s, and other versions with only slight differences were disseminated by other groups. Alexander Harkavy’s revised 1928 translation is almost identical and many verses are the same. It was put out by the Hebrew Publishing Co. and used at least through the 1960s. The JPSA version is all English but the Harkavy version has dual pages in English and Hebrew.
It is utterly unthinkable that any Jewish group would use a standard Christian translation of the Old Testament. It is also unnecessary.
Elmwood, a nitpick: The 24 books of Tanakh are counted in a slightly different manner than the way you describe. The five Megillos are counted separately, and the books of Samuel, Kings, Chronicles and Ezra-Nehemia are not divided.
The standard Hebrew texts of the Tanakh can be found in many editions. Two of the best (at least from an Orthodox perspective) are the Artscroll Stone Edition Tanakh, or the Jerusalem Bible by Koren Publications.
This was in 1916, but this version was in use at least through the 1950s, and other versions with only slight differences were disseminated by other groups. Alexander Harkavy’s revised 1928 translation is almost identical and many verses are the same. It was put out by the Hebrew Publishing Co. and used at least through the 1960s. The JPSA version is all English but the Harkavy version has dual pages in English and Hebrew.