The professor was an expert on ancient Canaanite myths. He contributed to Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, a key sourcebook for ancient texts with a literary relationship with the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible, a.k.a. Old Testament.) During the 1930s and '40s, he was the leading scholar of the newly discovered north Canaanite language of Ugarit and a major scholar of Aramaic.
Ginsberg was also one of the key translators of the New Jewish Publication Society of America Version of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, the second translation published by the Jewish Publication Society of America (JPS), superseding its 1917 version. It is a fresh translation into modern English, independent of the earlier translation or any other existing one. Current editions of this version refer to it as The Jewish Publication Society Tanakh Translation. Originally known by the abbreviation “NJV” (New Jewish Version), it is now styled as “NJPS.” The translation follows the Hebrew or Masoretic text scrupulously, taking a conservative approach regarding conjectural emendations. It avoids them almost completely for the Torah but mentions them occasionally in footnotes for Nevi'im and Ketuvim. Attested variants from other ancient versions are also mentioned in footnotes, even for the Torah, in places where the editors thought they might shed light on difficult passages in the Masoretic text.
