On 24 September 2026 I received an email solicitation from a person unknown to me including a press release – I am not press – and equally unsolicited, the full PDF manuscript of something called, The Kitabu Cha Imani Version of the Holy Bible (KCIV): “This wonderful Africentric version presents a literal interpretation while maintaining the same theological and text critical commitments of most Biblical scholars.”

As the sales pitch alarmed me with its many untenable claims including, “the first Bible ever interpreted by a Black author,” I emailed the person who styled himself as *interpreter and author* of this idiosyncratic canon and, as having *written* it, James Anyike, D. Min. Said canon includes only the Torah and New Testament, based on some *christological* formulation and, “the Holy Spirit.”* (*Words and phrases* cited from correspondence, included in PDF below.)

 It is critical to note Anyike is, conveniently, the publisher of this offering through his own publishing house, Popular Truth Publishing – raising questions about standards and procedures, namely peer review. If submitted to a publisher, the first question would be what credentials and qualifications do you have to write this book. And, the manuscript would be sent to experts in the field to evaluate for the publisher whether it was an appropriate for the publisher – with its reputation – to publish. Or, the reviewers might advise the publisher of the number and nature of corrections to be made before being considered. There is no evidence of any of these standard professional practices having been observed. 

My review was lengthy and detailed, rigorous and critical. The full review is available as a PDF. I am sharing some of my most significant findings so anyone considering purchase of this volume or worse, using it religiously or academically will understand why in my analysis it is completely unacceptable and is an act of fan fiction, not translation or interpretation.

The lack of citations in a supposed biblical edition advertising itself as “text critical” is astounding and further marks this creative endeavor as a pet project and not a serious representation of biblical scholarship or even the biblical texts themselves. (There are two footnotes in the front matter, providing phonetic pronunciations, but there are no sources anchoring any of the claims nor are there in the scriptural material sent me, a single footnote, text critical or other.

Genesis 1:1 בְּרֵאשִׁית בָּרָא אֱלֹהִים אֵת הַשָּׁמַיִם וְאֵת הָאָרֶץ׃

Anyike’s “when time first began” fails to address the lack of a definite article in the Masoretic Text (MT) – which appears not to have been consulted for the project at all or, the Septuagint (LXX), similarly unconsulted. The introduction of “time” before the governors of time, i.e. the celestial bodies, is not in accord with either the content or argument of the passage. Given the christological framing of the project, one is left wondering if “when time first began” indicates a successive beginning of time in accordance with a particular Christian theology. The (intentional?) mistranslation of the bound infinitive בְּרֵאשִׁית as an ordinal number is not a literal reading of the text nor, does it events any critical engagement with it.

Narrative

The first narrative I attempted was the story of Hagar and Sarai in Genesis 16. I only made it through three verses. First, Hagar’s girlhood enslavement is erased and replaced with a job; in v 1 she is a “servant-girl.” While conserving the convention of replacing “woman” in the Hebrew text with “wife” to accord with the conventions of Western readers, Anyike went further with an invented category, “concubine-wife.” Before going further, I must iterate: At no point in the history of the translation of the Hebrew Bible has אִשָּׁה ever been translated with the anachronistic discredited “concubine” reserved, however inappropriately, for פִּלֶגֶשׁ – which is never used for Hagar. (Not even in the anti-Hagar rhetoric in the writings of Paul.)

Having demonstrated an appalling ignorance of the primary language of the text of which the author claims to have provided a “literal interpretation,” he next displays a gross ignorance of the cultural context that makes the content comprehensible: Sarah trafficked Hagar to Abraham to forcibly impregnate, to produce the hoped for heir who could only be born of a woman with primary status, like hers.

Conclusion

The art and science of rigorous, critical – and even imaginative – biblical translation and interpretation require a more-than-functional working knowledge of the languages of scripture. None is indicated here. Whether for collegium, classroom or congregation, the translation and interpretation of the Bible require knowledge of the ancient textual witnesses and their relevancy.

After reading multiple passages from both testaments my assessment is, this “literal interpretation” simply re-words common biblical translations according to Anyike’s own, untutored/unlearned preferences and, evinces no critical textual scholarship within any academic discipline. Further, the project more than amply demonstrates the folly of looking up words to pick, plug and play without any understanding of the cultural and linguistic rationales for their semantic ranges (or even, whether any or all are applicable to the verse under consideration). The claim in the solicitation email, “maintaining the same theological and text critical commitments of most Biblical scholars,” is false to the point of maliciousness. With the selling price of some editions at $450, mercenary incentives may explain this gross fiction masquerading as a Bible persons of African descent can trust to faithfully convey the ancestral scriptures of their faith.

See the full text of the review here.