[Zancarius]

The Berean Standard Bible[1] provides their Bible and its translation tables under the public domain[2]. It's a pretty readable translation, too, but I don't remember off-hand what formats they provide. I believe they also have an interlinear (partial, NT only). There is also a version based on the Majority Text[3].

Not sure if this is something that might be of interest to you, but I've been using this occasionally in Logos and rather enjoy it.

[1] https://berean.bible/

[2] https://berean.bible/licensing.htm

[3] https://majoritybible.com/

[thrtythreeforty]

I have wanted a searchable literal and interlinear text for a long time. I may spend some time converting this to .yes for my phone. Thanks for the link.

Can you speak to the credentials or reliability of the Berean project? Even something as "straightforward" (not minimizing the work!) as a literal translation can have lots of nuance in certain passages.

[Zancarius]

Dr Grant Osborne is on their NT translation board, and his commentary series are well regarded (I've been going through Revelation: Verse-by-Verse, and it was recommended to me by my pastor). I can't remember some of the others on their board[1], but as far as I know it seems that they've selected from fairly well-known scholars.

The project itself is funded by Bible Hub. I don't know if that will affect your view of the text or not, but their objective was to have a fully transparent translation accepting feedback from academics, pastors, and lay-readers for each revision. As such, I've found it quite readable and it seems to fall somewhere between ESV and NET in terms of readability (not as terse as ESV, not as verbose as NET).

Have you considered Logos? It's not exactly cheap, but the search tools are extremely powerful. They have a Hebrew-English interlinear for both the MT and the DSS and you can quite easily search on the MSS words, the lemma, or roots throughout the entire text. The mobile version isn't quite as feature-full, however, but I use it with some regularity in church and during Wednesday night classes (currently covering Revelation).

[1] https://berean.bible/committee.htm

[thrtythreeforty]

Logos is unfortunately out of my budget, but it looks really nice and I've considered it several times.

Thanks so much for the additional info. I'll do some additional research on the project, but that sounds encouraging. I hope the literal translation ends up as a sort of modernized ASV, which sticks very closely to the original Greek sentence structure but the verbiage is a little dated sometimes.

[Zancarius]

That's unfortunately true. They do have a "fundamentals" edition for $50, which includes the ESV + reverse interlinear, but the catch is that you may have to do the feature upgrade whenever a new version comes out to keep up with changes to the library format. These are not always cheap. The fundamentals edition also does not have some of the more interesting features that are included in the starter edition and up (or didn't when I first got it). There used to be a free version, but that doesn't include an interlinear, which is disappointing and part of the reason to get Logos in the first place! May as well just stick with mobile apps like BLB...

Thinking on this, I wonder if the LSB would be of interest to you? I believe its heritage traces back to the NASB95 but with some differences (Yahweh instead of LORD).

It's something of a shame that Bibliotheca doesn't have their American Literary Version available outside their printing (which is expensive), because it's an update to the ASV—though some reviewers suggest it's a bit more literal. The absent chapter/verse numbering would also be a problem for some people (me especially!).

Here's a comparison of some common translations for Pss 74:8 (for example); I'd be happy to share other verses/comparisons if you were interested, but this may give you a starting point for other translations that fit your interests (or more to avoid haha):

Psalm 74:8 -

ESV: They said to themselves, “We will utterly subdue them”; they burned all the meeting places of God in the land.

MEV: They said in their hearts, “Let us destroy them together.” They have burned up all the meeting places of God in the land.

NASB95: They said in their heart, “Let us completely subdue them.” They have burned all the meeting places of God in the land.

LSB: They said in their heart, “Let us completely subdue them.” They have burned all the meeting places of God in the land.

ASV: They said in their heart, Let us make havoc of them altogether: They have burned up all the synagogues of God in the land.

CSB: They said in their hearts, “Let’s oppress them relentlessly.” They burned every place throughout the land where God met with us.

HCSB: They said in their hearts, “Let us oppress them relentlessly.” They burned down every place throughout the land where God met with us.

NET 2nd ed.: They say to themselves, “We will oppress all of them.” They burn down all the places in the land where people worship God.

BSB: They said in their hearts, “We will crush them completely.” They burned down every place where God met us in the land.

LES2 (Pss 73:8): They said in their heart, their kindred altogether, “Come and cease the feasts of the Lord from the land!”

(I included the Lexham English Septuagint 2nd Ed for fun... because why not!)