CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible Review
The CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible has numerous articles and images. Holman is hoping to give you the feel of visiting the Holy Land and other sacred sites while you read the Bible instead of having to leave your home.
ISBN: 9781430070429 Printed in China
Holman provided this Bible in exchange for an honest review. I was not required to give a positive review, only an honest one. All opinions are my own.
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This Bible is available at (includes some affiliate links)
and many local Bible bookstores
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Table of Contents
Video Review
Construction and Materials
The copy I’m reviewing has a British Tan LeatherTouch cover. It seems more flexible or floppy than many of the other imitation leather covers I have. The liner is pasted-down in thick brown paper that matches the color of the cover. It lays flat fairly easily and even new you don’t have to be too many pages away from the cover for it to stay open on its own.
The Bible weighs 3 pounds and 10 ounces and measures 9 1/2″ x 7″ x 1 7/8″. It has a sewn binding and two attached ribbon markers, one the same color as the cover and one a lighter more golden color.
Randy is guessing the paper to be about 36 GSM. It’s white and decently opaque. The page edges have almost a striped effect since many photographs are printed all the way to the edge and there is no gilt.
The CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible is also available in hardcover, black genuine leather, and ginger LeatherTouch editions. Thumb indexing is optional on both colors of imitation leather.
Layout and Typography
The interior of this Bible was designed and typeset by 2K/Denmark. They wanted to optimize the visual reading experience
The Biblical text is laid out in a two-column paragraph format with poetry in stanzas. The Chapter numbers looked black to me at first but are actually a dark purplish color that can be found elsewhere in the Bible.
The header contains the range of chapters in the outside corner and the page number in the center.
Footnotes are mostly translation notes and references for quotes. They are in smaller text at the bottom of the right-hand column of text on each page. Both matching superscript letters in the text and footnotes and a bold verse number in the footnote are used to show which note goes with what.
Books always start on the right-hand page with one of these beautiful full-color pictures. Most of the resulting blank space has been left blank and would be useful for notes
It has a 9.5 point font using the Bible Serif font created by 2K/Denmark. 5 lines of text and almost 5 spaces between text fit in the height of a penny. It is an all black-letter text. Quotes from elsewhere in the Bible are bolded in the same font. A bold version of a slightly different font is used for the section headings.
Articles
More than 275 full-length articles are included in the CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible. These articles cover a huge variety of topics. Archeology, geography, daily living, biographies of people mentioned in Scripture, and much more are included.
These articles are spread out through the Bible very well. There aren’t a bunch clumped together in one book of the Bible and then large portions of the Bible without ones. Also, all of them I’ve checked are placed near a passage of Scripture they are relevant to.
The articles are laid out in a three-column format. They also use a slightly off-white background and a different font from the Biblical text.
I particularly like the articles that deal with how Hebrew culture differed from the people around them and in what ways it was very similar. The articles that detail how things changed over the centuries that the Bible takes place in are also very helpful.
A large portion of the over 1,100 pictures in this Bible accompanies these articles.
An index of all the articles and a contributors list can be found in the front of the Bible.
Concordance
A 90-page three-column concordance is included. It’s large enough to be helpful most of the time. Here is a list of some sample numbers of entries:
- Christ – 35
- Christian – 2
- Faith – 34
- Faithful – 14
- Faithful Love – 8
- Faithfulness – 6
- Faithless – 1
- God – 77
- Goddess – 2
- God-Fearing – 1
- Godless – 1
- Godlessness – 2
- Godliness – 6
- Godly – 4
- Praise(N) – 8
- Praise(V) – 5
- Pray – 14
- Prayer – 6
Other Features
Book Introductions
Book introductions follow the full-color pictures at the beginning of each book. Most take a page or less but a few are longer. They deal with the circumstances the book was written under as well as the literary structure of the book and its contribution to the Biblical story. A monochromatic photo (in the same purplish color as the chapter numbers) in the background makes these easy to spot.
Digging Deeper
Over 40 shorter “Digging Deeper” articles are included. These deal with archeological finds and places and why they are important to the Bible.
A separate index from the article index helps you find all the Digging Deeper articles. This page also has an index of the rest of the maps and illustrations found within the text.
Maps and Illustrations
A handful of maps can be found here and there throughout the Bible.
There are also 8 pages of maps in the back of the Bible. They are on standard Bible paper and have deep rich colors.
These maps include:
- The Migration of Abraham
- The Route of the Exodus
- The Tribal Allotments of Israel
- The Kingdoms of Israel and Judah
- Israel in the Time of Jesus
- The Ministry of Jesus Around the Sea of Galilee
- The Passion Week in Jerusalem
- Paul’s Missionary Journeys
Final Thoughts on the CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible
The CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible is a great choice for those wanting to gain insights into the people, places, and things of scripture. The multiple articles and photographs are of great assistance in visualizing what life in Bible times was like. Understanding the context frequently helps us better understand the Scriptures. I personally think most Christians should undertake a study of Biblical customs and history at least once. While this Bible definitely isn’t the only choice for this kind of study it seems to be a very good one.
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This Bible is available at (includes some affiliate links)
and many local Bible bookstores
_________________________________________________________
Photography by Lucinda Brown
Holman provided this Bible in exchange for an honest review. I was not required to give a positive review, only an honest one. All opinions are my own.
May I know how different this is than the NIV Cultural Background Study Bible? What would be your recommendation to gain a better context when reading the Scriptures? I prefer notes that are more factual than theological, may I know how would you rate these based on that?
We’ll try to do a comparison of the two Bibles soon. Randy reviewed one and I reviewed the other so neither of us can say much about the differences without getting them out side by side.
Most of the notes I’ve read in the CSB Holy Land Bible seem to be more factual than theological.
Does this replace The Holman Illustrated Study Bible?
I’m not sure. We’ll ask our contact at Lifeway.
Here’s the response from Holman – the CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible is much more robust than the Holman Illustrated Study Bible but they are similar. The intent was not to create the CSB Holy Land Illustrated Bible to replace the Holman Illustrated Study Bible, but we won’t recreate the Holman Illustrated Study Bible in the CSB.
Thank you!
I saw a store selling them for $ 28.99 and I bought them
I feel very satisfied and want to share with you all
The store you were linking to has plagiarized our articles and we will not allow links to them.
Great review!