The Complete Jewish Study Bible is an expanded edition of the Complete Jewish Bible by David H. Stern. In addition to the Bible Text, it has over 130 articles aimed at connecting Christian and Jewish readers with the roots of their faith – God’s redemptive plan for his people provided through the promised Messiah, Yeshua. The Compete Jewish Study Bible contains both the Tanakh (Old Testament) and the B’rit Hadashah (New Testament) along with a treasure of helps for personal and congregational reading.

The Complete Jewish Study Bible

General Editor: Rabbi Barry Rubin
Theological Editor: Dr. John Fischer
Hendrickson Publishers

For Christians desiring to know more about the Hebrew roots of their faith, the Compete Jewish Bible presents and easy-to-read translation of both the Old and New Testaments as one continuous story of redemption. Using transliterated Hebrew names for people and places and a limited selection of Hebrew terms, this translation finds the Hebraic understanding that first century believers in Yeshua would have understood.

Dr. Stern describes the purpose of the Complete Jewish Bible (CJB) in four points:

1. My first purpose, as I said, is to restore the unified Jewishness of the Bible, and, particularly, to show that the books of the New Covenant are Jewish through and through.
2. The second aim of the Complete Jewish Bible is to express the word of God – Tanakh and B’rit Hadashah together – in enjoyable modern English. I want the Bible to be accessible and easy to read, flowing easily from the page into the mind and heart, unimpeded as much as possible by the differences between the environment of the Bible and that of the present.
3. My third purpose is to make the CJB fully usable in a Messianic synagogue, where the B’rit Hadasha would be red in the service along with the Torah and the Prophets. (The CJB can be used to follow the readings in a non-Messianic synagogue as well.)
4. And finally, I am supplying at last what my fans have been asking me for – a single volume containing my version of the entire Bible.

Some Things You Might Find Different

First, this is the Complete Jewish Study Bible. Thus, the Old Testament, or Tanakh, is in the order normally found in Jewish Bibles. The term Tanakh is actually an acronym from the three Hebrew letters Tav, Nun, and Koph. These are the first letters of the three sections of the Hebrew Bible, the Torah (Law), the Neviim (Prophets), and the Ketuvim (Writings) – the exact thing that Jesus said spoke about him (Luke 24:44).

So all of the books are there, they are just in a different order. But not to worry, there is a table of contents so you can find them easily. Also, sometimes the chapter breaks are in a different place. Again, all of the verses are there, they just may be numbered differently. When that happens, as in Exodus chapter 20, you see something like this:

¹⁵⁽¹⁸⁾ All the people experienced the thunder, the lightning, the sound of the shofar, and the mountain smoking. When the people saw it, they trembled. Standing at a distance, ¹⁶⁽¹⁹⁾ they said to Moshe, “You speak with us; and we will listen. But don’t let God speak with us, or we will die.”

This indicates that, in the verse numbering of the Hebrew Bible, it is Exodus 20:15-16. The numbers in parenthesis () indicate that in standard Christian Bibles, these are verses 18-19. Also notice that the proper names are transliterated Hebrew – Moshe (Moses) – and that key Hebrew words like shofar are shown in italics. That won’t be a problem, because there are two glossaries in the back of this Bible – one of Hebrew words and names into English, and one of English words and names into Hebrew.

5 ^1(4:21) Shlomo ruled over all the kingdoms from the [Euphrates] River through the land of the P’lishtim to the border of Egypt; they paid tribute and served Shlomo as long as he lived.

In this case in 1 Kings, in the Hebrew Bible this is chapter 5 verse 1. However, in standard Christian Bibles it is chapter 4 verse 21. Also notice the transliterated proper nouns Shlomo (Solomon) and P’lishtim (Philistines), and that the word “Euphrates” is not found in the Hebrew text but has been added for clarity.

In the New Testament, things are pretty normal if you are used to the standard Christian Bible. There is no change in the book order or in the verse numbering.

Whenever the proper name of God, Yahweh, is found in the Old Testament, most Christian Bibles show it as LORD in what are called small capitals. The Complete Jewish Bible follows a similar convention, using the Hebrew word ADONAI all in small capitals. And in the New Testament, the name of the Messiah is properly shown as Yeshua rather than Jesus. You will find a few other familiar names in Hebrew instead of English as well, such as Yochanan (John), Kefa (Peter), and Sha’ul (Saul or Paul).

Study Helps in the Complete Jewish Study Bible

There are more than 100 themed articles that help the reader understand the historical and cultural context of the Scriptures. The articles are organized into twelve themes:

• • Covenants
  • The Torah
  • Jewish Customs
  • Messianic Prophecy
  • The Names of God
  • Anti-Jewish Scriptural Interpretations
  • The Shabbat
  • Salvation and Atonement
  • The Holy Days of Isra’el
  • Jewish-Gentile Relations
  • The Land of Isra’el
  • The Tabernacle (Mishkan)

In addition, there are more than 30 informative articles by scholarly writers covering a variety of other subjects, like The Menorah, The Tongue and Leprosy, PaRDeS, The Good and the Evil Eye, and Yeshua and the Jewish Tradition to name a few. A section of Biographies of Rabbis and Sages and short biographies of the contributors of the articles is given as well.

Torah Readings

The first five books of the Complete Jewish Study Bible are divided into the 54 traditional Portions, or Parashot, in addition to the chapter and verse markings. These are normally read publicly in the synagogues every Sabbath. Each Parashah is identified by name in Hebrew and English, and at the end of each Parashah are the Haftarah (readings from the prophets) and suggested B’rit Hadashah (New Testament) readings.

In the back of this Bible is a complete listing of the 54 Torah Portions (Parashot) by name, with the Torah and Haftarah readings and suggested B’rit Hadashah readings all in one chart. Following those are additional readings for the Festivals, Feasts and Fasts.

These readings are on an annual cycle that begins following the Feast of Tabernacles in the fall. Following this cycle, Jewish worshipers all over the world are reading and studying the same thing each Sabbath. If you are not familiar with the Torah Portion readings, check out this short article.

Conclusion and Recommendation

The Complete Jewish Study Bible will help Christians to gain a deeper understanding and appreciation for the Hebrew roots of their faith. We highly recommends it.

Here is a brief video from Christianbook.com describing the Complete Jewish Study Bible:

The Complete Jewish Study Bible

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The Complete Jewish Bible

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