| Berkeley Version | |
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| Full name: | The Berkeley Version in Modern English |
| Abbreviation: | BV |
| Language: | English |
| Complete Bible published: | 1959 |
| Copyright status: | Copyright by Zondervan Publishing House |
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In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and empty, and darkness lay upon the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. God said: Let there be light, and there was light. |
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For God so loved the world that He gave His only-begotten Son, so that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. |
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In 1945, years before the NIV, Zondervan published a new translation of a New Testament called The Berkeley Version. It would later (1959) expanded to the entire Bible, and eventually receive a name change: The Modern Language Bible: The New Berkeley Version in Modern English.
According to editor-in-chief, Gerrit Verkuyl: The conviction that God wants His truth conveyed to His offspring in the language in which they think and live led me to produce the Berkeley Version (BV) of the New Testament. For I grew increasingly aware that the King James Version (AV) is only, in part, the language of our people today.
This version of the New Testament (1945) has gained for Dr. Gerrit Verkuyl a place among the first rank of translators of the Bible into modern English. This version of the Old Testament (1959) under his editorship, exhibits the same characteristics of faithful rendering of the original texts into lively modern English that mark his New Testament. The aim of this version was to achieve plain, up-to-date expression which reflects as directly as possible the meaning of the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. It is not a paraphrase. This revision was very extensive, while not being a retranslation. Explanatory notes were revised as well as added. Topical headings were rephrased.
| The Bible in English |
| Old English (pre-1066) |
| Middle English (1066–1500) |
| Early Modern English (1500–1800) |
| Modern Christian (1800–) |
| Modern Jewish (1853–) |
| Miscellaneous |