FAQs Casual English Bible

The Casual English Bible (TCEB) is an easy-reading paraphrase of the Bible.

It’s written especially for people who don’t read the Bible.

“Folks who don’t read the Bible need a Bible they can read.” That’s not just a catchy tagline. It guides the translation away from churchy and scholarly language that longtime Christians may love but newcomers often don’t understand.

The goal is simple: to give people who are curious about Christianity a Bible they can understand the first time they open it.

The Casual English Bible is still a work in progress. Drafts of the New Testament, Genesis, and several other Old Testament books are complete and awaiting further review, proofreading, and editing.

The paraphrase is written by Stephen M. Miller, an award-winning and bestselling Christian author whose Bible background books have sold roughly two million copies.

Miller has spent more than forty years paraphrasing Bible scholarship into everyday English. He holds a bachelor’s degree in journalism and a seminary degree in biblical studies and religious education.

For more information, see the About page.

This paraphrase began as a private devotional and Bible study exercise. Whenever a passage struck the writer as funny, poignant, or surprising, he paused to explore it more deeply and restate it in his own words.

The process involved comparing original-language words, consulting interlinear Bibles, examining how other translators handled difficult phrases, and reading what scholars and commentators had to say.

What started as personal study eventually became a resource for Bible study groups and readers who wanted clarity instead of tradition-heavy language.

That warning comes from the book of Revelation and refers to altering the meaning of God’s message—not translating it into languages people can understand.

The Bible was originally written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Translation is not addition or subtraction; it is interpretation—figuring out how to express ancient words and ideas faithfully for modern readers.

Translation allows Scripture to be read, understood, and obeyed across cultures and generations. Without translation, most people would not be able to read the Bible at all.

The King James Version is a faithful and beautiful translation that has served the church well for more than four hundred years. Modern translations benefit from manuscript discoveries made long after the KJV was completed, including biblical texts significantly older than those available to its translators.

The goal is impartiality and truth. The Casual English Bible tries to let the Bible say whatever it wants to say—just in casual English.

At times Catholics may find passages that support their distinctive teachings. At other times, Baptists or Pentecostals may feel affirmed. Scripture is theologically diverse, and this paraphrase does not attempt to soften statements that some readers find uncomfortable.

Where scholars disagree, the paraphrase includes footnotes presenting various interpretations objectively, along with background information to help readers understand the debate.

One way to spot bias is simple: if you can clearly tell what the writer believes about a controversial issue, the presentation probably isn’t objective.

Miller’s church background includes the Christian & Missionary Alliance, the Church of the Nazarene, and, more recently, the Methodist Church. He works to bend only where the biblical writers bend—and nowhere else.

Miller does not read Hebrew or Greek fluently, but he works closely with interlinear Bibles and Hebrew-English and Greek-English texts.

From there, the work moves into verse-by-verse study using scholarly commentaries and a wide range of Bible translations and paraphrases.

Some passages translate cleanly. Others are ambiguous or fuzzy. In those cases, the paraphrase makes an educated judgment and includes footnotes explaining alternative possibilities.

Much of what’s “wrong” comes down to two things: humans and language.

Translation is done by people, and people are human. Language itself is fluid—what a word means today may drift tomorrow.

Translators are trying to catch a river and bind it into a book. Sometimes they succeed beautifully. Sometimes the current shifts.