Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB) reader edition

When the B&H Publishing group kindly sent me review copies of the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB), the first thing I noticed was the packaging! Yes, the packaging. In all my decades of buying Bibles and now of receiving them for my review on the Bible Reviewer blog, I’ve never seen an edition treated with such care.

Inside each sturdy box, I found a Bible wrapped in both directions in heavy-duty paper to ensure its safety. Then, inside the wrapping, I found a thick leather cover – ready for long wear, yet flexible and soft to the touch. No wonder Holman Bibles come with a lifetime guarantee!

Earlier I had received a review copy of the hefty, impressive, award-winning HCSB Study Bible, which I highly recommend, but this time I wanted a reader’s edition to read, cover to cover, without the distraction of lengthy footnotes and articles. So the publisher sent two!

The HCSB Large Print Personal Size Reference Bible measures about 5.75" x 8.5", which provides a nice size for carrying in one hand. To keep down the weight and thickness, the paper is a bit thin with some bleed-through, but the large font (about 10-point) is very readable. With no footnotes except essentials and no center-margin references, this truly is an edition to just sit down and read.

The HCSB Large Print Ultrathin Reference Bible measures about 6.75” x 9.5” and is also easy to carry, but the slightly larger size helps the leather cover to lay flat. The unusual font choice blocks out the bleed-through but might take some getting used to if you’re expecting the typical roundish serif. Once I actually began to read the text, however, I found the dark, narrow san serif font to be super easy on my eyes.

The ultrathin edition also includes a small concordance at the back of the book and cross-referencing in the center column, providing features I like even in a reader’s edition. In addition, I discovered an unusual feature I don’t recall seeing before: The names and chapters of the books have been placed in the left corners of the bottom margins of the pages! In the opposite corner, page numbers have also been placed at the bottom of each page, so with the ultrathin edition, I was able to look up scriptures very quickly in my Bible study group.

Regarding those scriptures, the HCSB provides a contemporary translation of the Bible that, unlike some updated versions, wisely retains such key words in Christianity as “justification,” “sanctification,” and “redemption.” As a writer and poet who aims toward compression, I seldom like the use of ten words when one precise word will do – especially if it carries the weight of centuries of faith and theology.

I’m also happy to say this translation retains the word “blessed,” which says so much more than my momentary happiness over that discovery! In the Sermon on the Mount, for example, Matthew 5:3-5 reads:

“The poor in spirit are blessed,
for the kingdom of heaven
is theirs.
Those who mourn are blessed,
for they will be comforted.
The gentle are blessed,
for they will inherit the earth.”

In the next chapter, Matthew 7:7 in the HCSB clearly states:

“Keep asking, and it will be given to you. Keep searching, and you will find. Keep knocking, and the door will be opened to you.”

With red letters in the ultrathin edition, I immediately found those words of Christ, and with bold letters for the biblical quotes in various chapters, I easily found scriptural references from the Old Testament to the New. With either edition though, I'm finding the HCSB a good choice to read.

©2015, Mary Harwell Sayler, poet, writer, and reviewer, is a lifelong lover of Christ, the Bible, and the church in all its parts.


HCSB Large Print Ultrathin Reference Bible, Brown Genuine Cowhide Leather



HCSB Large Print Personal Size Reference Bible, Brown Genuine Cowhide



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Award-winning Holman Study Bible

As an ecumenical Christian who loves the church in all its parts, I greatly appreciate fair-mindedness, thoroughness, and accuracy in the essays, commentaries and footnotes found in newer study editions such as the Holman Study Bible.

Available now in either the New King James Version (NKJV) or the Holman Christian Standard Bible (HCSB), both editions share many of the same fine features. For instance, both choices generously supply in-text photographs, timelines, and maps to help you better envision what’s happening in a particular time or place. Cross-references, introductions to each book, and informative footnotes also provide a balanced view of the scriptures.

The main differences between these editions of the Holman Study Bible include an extensive concordance in the back pages of the NKJV and a topical concordance of “bullet notes” in the HCSB. Also, the HCSB includes word studies in sidebars scattered throughout the text, showing, for instance, “charis” in Romans 5:2 as a Greek word meaning grace and defined as the “unmerited favorable disposition toward someone or something,” primarily as relates to salvation. The sidebar continues with such interesting information as the use of “charis” 155 times in the New Testament (NT.)

Another feature I like in the HCSB study edition occurs in the boldface type used to emphasize the quotations from the Hebrew Bible in the NT. However, the NKJV consistently has a darker, highly readable font so uses italics to emphasize those biblical quotes.

If you’re not familiar with either translation, you might compare some of your favorite verses and/or some hard-to-understand passages of scripture as I often do on BibleGateway.com.

To give you a brief recap here: Holman Bible Publishers worked with an interdenominational team of biblical scholars dedicated to precision in providing a mostly literal translation yet open to an “optimal equivalence” when a word-for-word rendering of the text might prove confusing. The resulting HCSB Study Bible, which won the 2011 ECPA Christian Book Award, gives students, teachers, pastors, and Bible lovers an accurate, readable, contemporary translation. With similar intent, the NKJV might be less contemporary in word choices but has a poetic flow similar to the original KJV.

Since both editions deserve high praise, I highly recommend you get whichever translation you don’t have or, if you’re fortunate enough to have both, whichever one you will be most apt to read. Either way, this hefty edition will add biblical heft to your study at home, at church, or in a Bible study group.

©2013 by Bible Reviewer, Mary Harwell Sayler

HCSB Study Bible, hardback



Holman Study Bible, NKJV edition


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