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The Listener's Bible  By  cover art

The Listener's Bible

By: Fellowship for the Performing Arts
Narrated by: Max McLean
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Publisher's summary

Max McLean brings his compelling voice and artistic narrative skills to the ESV Bible. This Gold Medallion-winning new translation combines a word-for-word translation approach with a literary beauty that is perfect for the oral expression of God's Word.
Public Domain (P)2004 Max McLean

What listeners say about The Listener's Bible

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  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    632
  • 4 Stars
    72
  • 3 Stars
    66
  • 2 Stars
    26
  • 1 Stars
    36
Performance
  • 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • 5 Stars
    487
  • 4 Stars
    49
  • 3 Stars
    37
  • 2 Stars
    22
  • 1 Stars
    20
Story
  • 5 out of 5 stars
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    563
  • 4 Stars
    19
  • 3 Stars
    17
  • 2 Stars
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    11

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Excellent Audio Rendered Useless

While the quality of this reading is, in my opinion, the best reading of the ESV, Audibles execution is useless. The Bible is broken into random Parts and each audio file is labeled as a consecutive chapter number. This means to listen to Genesis you must go to Part 1, chapter 1. But to find Isaiah 11 you have to figure out that it is in Part 6, chapter 477. This is not organized to be used easily at all. I took the time map out every book of the Bible to make this slightly more useable. Hopefully it will help some others.

I would really like Audible to fix this or provide a refund.

OLD TESTAMENT
Part 1
Genesis 1-50
Exodus 51-90

Part 2
Leviticus 91-117
Numbers 118-153
Deuteronomy 154-187

Part 3
Joshua 188-211
Judges 212-232
Ruth 233-236
1 Samuel 237-267

Part 4
2 Samuel 268-291
1 Kings 292-303
2 Kings 304-328
1 Chronicles 329-335
2 Chronicles 336-364

Part 5
Ezra 365-374
Nehemiah 375-387
Esther 388-497
Job 398-418
Psalm 419-433

Part 6
Proverbs 434-456
Ecclesiastes 457-462
Song of Songs 463-466
Isaiah 467-532

Part 7
Jeremiah 533-584
Lamentations 585-589

Part 8
Ezekiel 590-637
Daniel 638-649
Hosea 650-663
Joel 664-666
Amos 667-675

Part 9
Obadiah 676
Jonah 677-680
Micah 681-687
Nahum 688-690
Habakkuk 691-693
Zephaniah 694-696
Haggai 697-698
Zechariah 699-712
Malachi 713-719

NEW TESTAMENT
Matthew 720-746

Part 10
Mark 747-762
Luke 763-786
John 787-807
Acts 808-835

Part 11
Romans 836-851
1 Corinthians 852-867
2 Corinthians 868-880
Galatians 881-886
Ephesians 887-892
Philippians 893-896
Colossians 897-900

Part 12
1 Thessalonians 901-905
2 Thessalonians 906-908
1 Timothy 909-914
2 Timothy 915-918
Titus 919-921
Philemon 922
Hebrews 923-935
James 936-940
1 Peter 941-945
2 Peter 946-948
1 John 949-953
2 John 954
3 John 955
Jude 956
Revelation 957-978

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311 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

Excellent Audiobook, no chapter breaks

This recording is excellent. Max McLean does a great job reading (I have listened to it many times at a free online site) which is why I wanted this audiobook. However, the download has no chapter divisions, which is extremely frustrating. In some cases, multiple books are in a single file, which presents a similar problem. You have to fast forward or rewind through entire books of the Bible in order to get to a certain chapter, and even then, if you miss the chapter heading, it is very difficult to tell which chapter you are in. Online, I primarily listen to a chapter or a few chapters at a time, not necessarily starting from the beginning of a book and then moving all the way through. I would have easily given this a 5 star rating if there were chapter breaks.

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81 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars

OK

Probably the best option on Audible at the moment. The translation isn't what I'd hoped for. Mostly I have to give this 3 stars because of the formatting. It's split into 37 different files. This makes it a bit of a pain to organize. The book of Psalms was messed up and there are no chapters for it. For the largest book in the bible that makes going through it hard. Psalms also would lock up my mp3 player at times.

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64 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    2 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

DONT BUY IT!

What disappointed you about The Listener's Bible?

I loved the reader but the getting around was IMPOSSIBLE and you have a ton of downloads. You get the SAME man reading the Bible, same version and you can navigate to whatever verse you want by downloading the Bible Gateway app for FREE!!!!!

What about Max McLean’s performance did you like?

Max's voice was very nice to listen to. I even enjoyed it in the begats!

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47 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Good recording - Great translation

The recording is high quality with some soft background music that I at 1st thought would be distracting, but after listening for a while found it not to be so.
This is the 1st time I have listened to the ESV and must say that I really enjoy the way it flows. Very simple yet accurate translation. I currently read from the NKJV but I will probably switch to this with the purchase of my next Bible.

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23 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

Love It!!

I drive an hour to work each so I decided to make the drive a little more fruitful. Initially, I thought I wouldn't get or that it wouldn't "sink in". But God definetly speaks to me. I particularly noticed it when i was praying out loud- what I had been listening to earlier that day seemed to come out in my prayer. It surprised even me. So if you think you won't be able to focus I encourage you to try anyway. You'll get something out of it. I slowed it down on my ipod to help myself out and its perfect.

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20 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

Great reading of a great translation!!!

My church has a daily bible reading that takes you through the bible in one year. They have a "listen" button on their website and this is the version that they use for that. I started to really enjoy having it read to me, but I am not alsways able to listen on the computer so I bought this for my car. It is a very fine reading and keeps me interested even through some of the tougher parts of the OT. I actually enjoyed Leviticus!!!

Update: July 8, 2019 - I want to thank William S Cross for his table of contents which has finally made this audio bible usable. Thank you so much William!!!

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19 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

Good Listen

This is a very good narration of the Bible. Max McLean is a wonderful reader. Only problem I had is that no matter how it is load onto the player, it will not play the books in correct order. It is very distracting to have to search for the next book.

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16 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

There are chapter breaks in the app

As said in the title. I'm not sure what other people are using but if you are using the audible app you can easily go from chapter to chapter. Very solid performance.

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14 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars

A solid value

The reading is just a bit fast for my taste, but otherwise it's very good. It is well modulated without being excessively theatrical. The sound quality is acceptable. It's got adequate divisions in it that you can find the book and perhaps chapter that you want without too much trouble. The translation is one I haven't used before, but it seems pretty good. I usually listen to it while driving, and it's very good for that purpose. I also like to play audio when I am going to sleep, and it's quite good for this purpose too.

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8 people found this helpful