The Contemporary Torah: A Gender-Sensitive Adaptation of the JPS Translation (Jewish Publication Society, 2006; 424 pages). Rabbi David E. S. Stein, revising editor. Consulting editors: Adele Berlin, Ellen Frankel, Carol Meyers.

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WHAT OTHERS SAY

“BASED ON original and responsible scholarship . . . performed with grace and thoughtfulness . . . an important and exciting work.”

Edward Greenstein (Tel Aviv University)
author of Essays on Biblical Method and Translation

“OFTEN THOUGHT-PROVOKING AND EVEN STARTLING, while at the same time remaining deeply and thoroughly rooted in Jewish exegetical traditions.”

Leonard Greenspoon (Creighton University)
co-editor, Sacred Text, Secular Times:
The Hebrew Bible in the Modern World

“This translation SKILLFULLY moves between the contemporary focus on gender and that of ancient biblical concerns, while remaining loyal to both.”

Adriane Leveen
(Stanford University)

“A MAJOR BREAKTHROUGH in biblical translation . . . a translation of the Torah that I plan to teach from myself and that I would recommend to any teacher of the Torah who is concerned with gender issues.”

Karina Martin Hogan
(Fordham University)

“As a lexicographer, I have been especially intrigued by the way this book handles the word 'ish. It is unconventional, innovative, and worthy of serious consideration!”

Reinier de Blois
Editor,
Semantic Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew

“AN IMPRESSIVE ACHIEVEMENT in biblical translation and biblical scholarship.”

Tamara Cohn Eskenazi and Andrea Weiss
(Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion)

Editors, The Torah: A Women’s Commentary (2008)

“It is high time that this rendition of the Torah is available. . . . A major contribution to Torah study.”

Dov Peretz Elkins
Rabbi Emeritus,
The Jewish Center
of Princeton, New Jersey

“WHAT A PLEASURE to read the creation story and finally see that God created humankind. . . . This easy-to-read translation is a great place to start one’s daily or weekly reading of the biblical text.”

Susan Grossman
Rabbi, Beth Shalom Congregation, Columbia, Maryland

(from “Virtual Talmud” blog, Beliefnet.com)

“RAISES THE BAR for gender-sensitive Bible translation.”

Nathan Eubank
The Bible and Critical Theory
3/3 (Oct. 2007) [review]

“AN INEVITABLE POINT OF DEPARTURE in future discussions of gendered language used of human beings and of God in the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament. More than anyone else before him, Stein tackles the issues faced in translating the gendered language of the Bible with sensitivity and verve.”

John F. Hobbins
“Ancient Hebrew Poetry” blog
(Dec. 2007)

Review by Linda S. Schearing, in Reviews of Biblical Literature (Nov. 2008)

“ACHIEVES FAR MORE than any Christian edition could probably do.”

J. Jarick
Journal for the Study of
the Old Testament
32/5 (2008) [review]

“FAULTY, erroneous in its assumptions and application, distorting, misleading.”

Athalya Brenner
Mo‘ed 18 (2008) [review]

xxxxxMy response to Brenner’s review, published in Mo‘ed 19 (2009)

ENDORSEMENTS by the Consulting Editors (Ellen Frankel, Adele Berlin, and Carol Meyers) on an earlier version of the work

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Updated 28 June 2010 • Culver City, California, USA