I am the only one who has a problem with most modern Bible translations?

[Fr. Rob]

Hi All! It's the opinionated Father Rob here again with another question.

I was having a discussion over the weekend with some friends, and we were discussing bible translations. It shocked me to see the NAB: Revised NT and Psalms had degraded so far from the NAB I knew as a child.

I always check Bibles before I use them for prayer/devotion/teaching. In looking at several different bibles, we found that the NAB Revised Psalms had a very serious problem in it. . . Psalm 1, a Messianic Psalm, had been destroyed. The orignal Ps.1 in the original NAB says, "Blessed is the Man who. . ." while the Revised NAB says "Blessed are they who. . ."

This *tiny* change is one of the examples of changes to the text of Scripture that radically alter the meaning. They prevent us from praying the Psalter as Christ himself would have.

The Episcopal Church, in it's 1979 BCP, did the same thing. . . as have many other translators and Churches.

Do any of you here have a problem with this trend?

Fr. Rob

 

[isshinwhat]

I, too, have a problem with the translation of several of the new editions. I read the RSV almost exclusively now. The NAB is so cold in its renderings. The Psalms seem almost heartless at times. It's a sad situation, but one I feel will be fixed as things swing back the other way, as they always do.

God bless,

Neal

 

[VOW]

To Fr Rob:

Truthfully, I have MORE of a problem with people who insist on beating Catholics over the head with the KJV as the "only inspired English translation" of the Word of God.

I also have a major problem with people who cut the Bible up into little, tiny pieces and paste it back together like a ransom note to get it to say whatever they THINK it should say, because "they are inspired by the Holy Spirit, and that's all they need."

Your gripe is legitimate, though. And the only solution I can see is to use SEVERAL versions.


Peace be with you,
~VOW

 

[Fr. Rob]

In Public Liturgy, my Church uses the King James for the Lessons at Morning and Evening Prayer, as well as at the Eucharist, funerals, etc. The Psalms are taken from the Miles Coverdale translation of the 1530's.

In my private devotion, I use the New English Bible for both Psalter and Readings when I pray my Divine Office alone.

I love the NEB's renderings.

There is a new one out there too, the English Standard Version (ESV) that just came out this past year. It's not too bad.

I used to really like the NAB, but with the modernisations, I just don't know anymore. Sigh.

Father Rob

 

[Anise]

And even stranger, my copy of the NAB says Happy the man who...

I sort of like my copy (from the 1980's). It is not nearly as revised as the later stuff, I'm told. On my computer bible program, the NAB is pretty awful, I guess because it is more recent.

I feel the best solution is to read a parallel bible (or multiple versions). Or, I suppose if you study it for hours and hours every day, you would eventually know the whole NT at least well enough so it didn't matter. Your head would contain what you needed.

Still, the NIV is more annoying than the NAB. I just love some of it's choices. I really dig how in james 2:21, 25 it translates righteous as "considered" righteous.

 

[VOW]

To Fr Rob:

The Psalms in KJV are more poetic than any other translation. But the language for most of it is simply too archaic for my tastes. I end up getting the giggles, too, at the way almost every verse has one or more words emphasized in Italics.


Peace be with you,
~VOW

 

[Wolseley]

Well, I still use the NAB for my everyday use, because it's the one I'm familiar with, and I like the notes. I rarely go into the Psalms anyway, and if I do, I tend to use my mother's ancient Douay-Rheims (with an Imprimatur from His Eminence John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York---guess how far back that goes?)

My previous NAB was the 1986 edition, which I acquired in 1990, but it was literally falling apart at the seams, and my wife got me a brand-new NAB for Christmas, with the leather cover, gilt-edged pages, all the trimmings. It has the inclusive language 1991 Psalms, which is annoying, but like I said, I rarely read the Psalms anyway.

When I'm on a stretch of using my old Breviary that I got when I was a Franciscan (Christian Prayer from 1976), I get a goodly dose of daily Psalms, but they use the 1963 Grail Translation. Frankly, I'm not particularly fond of that translation either, but hey.

I guess Anise and VOW are right---good thing I have several translations.

 

[Fr. Rob]

Originally posted by VOW
To Fr Rob:

The Psalms in KJV are more poetic than any other translation. But the language for most of it is simply too archaic for my tastes. I end up getting the giggles, too, at the way almost every verse has one or more words emphasized in Italics.


Peace be with you,
~VOW

Indeed it can be funny, however the italics are not words for emphasis. Those were words that the translators agreed could be translated in several ways. The italics are the translators choice. There are other possibilities.

Fr. Rob

 

[Anise]

Originally posted by VOW
To Fr Rob:

The Psalms in KJV are more poetic than any other translation. But the language for most of it is simply too archaic for my tastes. I end up getting the giggles, too, at the way almost every verse has one or more words emphasized in Italics.

The italics can mean words that are not actually in the original Greek or Heb or Aram, but were considered to be implied by text anyway. The word "is" is often in italics in the KJV, to my memory in the OT.

The first NT example that I found (and that I could simultaneously read enough of the Greek underneath) was James 1:27, "and to keep himself unspotted".

But there is no "kai" (and) there in the text. So maybe the KJV is doing what the preface to my naSb says the NASB does. It can be distracting, I agree!

 

[kern]

I don't really see the problem with inclusive language. For psalm 1:

1 Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.

Should this be taken to mean that women who do these things are not blessed, only men? I don't think so, which is why a change to "blessed are they" doesn't seem that bad to me.

-Chris

 

[Fr. Rob]

Originally posted by kern
I don't really see the problem with inclusive language. For psalm 1:


Should this be taken to mean that women who do these things are not blessed, only men? I don't think so, which is why a change to "blessed are they" doesn't seem that bad to me.

-Chris

The problem is that Psalm 1 is not a general psalm. It is a messianic psalm of prophecy. Blessed is the man . . . this phrase refers to Jesus Christ.

While we may be blessed if we avoid the paths of the unrighteous. . . however, that's not the reason the Psalm was written. It is a prophecy of the Messiah, and changing it to "they" changes the entire meaning.

Fr. Rob

 

[Hoonbaba]

Hi,

I guess I'll share my opinion on modern Bible translations. I don't have a NAB, but I have NIV, NKJV, and YLT (Young's Literal Translation). I read the following article:

http://www.catholic.com/library/Bible_Translations_Guide.asp

And it frustrates me sometimes to see that there's no translation that's literal and dynamic at the same time (in other words it's hard to find good sounding translations which are literal) =)

I like Young's literal translation because it's very literal with the original text. For example, in the ten commandments, most translations say something like "Thou shall not kill". Here's a bunch of translations:

You shall not murder. (NIV)
You shall not murder. (NAS)
Do not murder. (NLT)
Thou shalt not kill. (KJV)
You shall not murder. (NKJV)
You shall not commit murder. (AMP)
You shall not kill. (RSV)
Thou shalt not kill. (KJ21)
Thou shalt not kill. (ASV)

They all basically say, "you shall not kill". But the neat thing about Young's Literal Translation is that it says the following:

Thou dost not murder. (YLT)

Why is this important? Because in modern English it's understood as, "You do not murder". And I firmly believe God was saying it in faith.

I think this opens up the reality of sin in our lives, especially whenever God commands something it's done, like how God created the world in Genesis. He said something and the result is that whatever God commanded, it was done.

I think it's a lot like the centurion who went up to Jesus in Matt 8:9-10, which says:

For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, `Go,' and he goes; and that one, `Come,' and he comes. I say to my servant, `Do this,' and he does it." When Jesus heard this, he was astonished and said to those following him, "I tell you the truth, I have not found anyone in Israel with such great faith. (Matt 8:9-10)

Isn't this fascinating? Jesus clearly noticed this guy had 'great faith', and he was a man who commanded people and things were done. I believe that's how God is. So every time we sin, we're disobeying God's commands like "You do not murder".

It almost reminds me of Luke 17:6 where Jesus talks about faith. He says, "If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, `Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it will obey you."

So from God's perspective we're like the mulberry tree that obeys the commander. If we break the commands of God, then we've clearly disobeyed our God who spoke a clear command where we wouldn't sin, yet God gave us the choice to sin or not. Wow...I got a bit carried away there. Anyway, so yea translations can be good and sometimes not so good. LOL!

-Jason