Ideal for personal reading, public worship, in-depth study, and Scripture memorization, the ESV is an essentially literal translation of the Bible in contemporary English.

The English Standard Version stands in the classic stream of essentially literal Bible translations that began nearly five hundred years ago. The first translation in this classic stream was William Tyndale’s New Testament of 1526. The Tyndale legacy was carried forward by the King James Version of 1611 (KJV), by the American Standard Version of 1901 (ASV), and by the Revised Standard Version of 1952 and 1971 (RSV). The English Standard Version (ESV) follows in this tradition, where accuracy, simplicity, dignity, and beauty of language have always been the standard.

With this classic translation legacy as the starting place, every word and phrase has been compared and weighed against the original languages for accuracy, precision, and literary excellence. More than one hundred people have been involved on the translation team, including the fourteen-member Translation Oversight Committee, over fifty Translation Review Scholars, and more than fifty members of the ESV Advisory Council. The publishing team represents many denominations and countries, and is committed to the authority, inerrancy, and sufficiency of the Bible as the Word of God.