Study Bible - History

History

Perhaps the first edition of the Bible in English that qualified as a "study Bible" was the Geneva Bible; it contained extensive cross references, synopses and doctrinal points. The text of the Geneva Bible was usually not printed without the commentary. A Cambridge edition was printed without commentary.

The Church of England disputed some of the statements made in the Geneva Bible annotations; this led to the creation of the King James Bible, which was typically printed with a much less extensive apparatus or none at all. Several commentators have supplied annotated King James Bibles containing their own points of view, but unlike the Geneva Bible, these commentaries are not as thoroughly integrated into the text.

Another historically significant study Bible was the Scofield Reference Bible, first printed by Cyrus Scofield in 1909. This study Bible became widely popular in the United States, where it spread the interpretation system known as dispensationalism among fundamentalist Christians. A new version, the Recovery Version, was published in 1985. It holds a similar interpretation, and this study Bible has a very large number of cross-references, explanatory and interpretative footnotes.

The Jerusalem Bible is a widely respected study Bible originally made by French monks in Jerusalem under the auspices of the Catholic Church. The original French edition of 1961 became the basis of versions of this study Bible in several other languages, including English, revised as the New Jerusalem Bible; some versions have more extensive notes than others. Nearly all Catholic Bibles have explanatory and interpretative footnotes.

The Logos International Study Bible was published in 1972 by Logos International. Based on the 1901 American Standard Bible, it is essentially an updated version of The Cross-Reference Bible, published prior to 1929 and edited by Harold E. Monser. It includes an unusually large number of cross-references, in-text articles and treatment of variant readings.

Zondervan claims that its NIV Study Bible has six million in distribution and that it is the world's best selling Study Bible.

The ESV Study Bible is a recent addition, which sold well in its pre-release phase. In recent times, study Bibles focusing on specific aspects of the Biblical message, like the Green Bible, have appeared.