Is It Just Me Or...

[M.SIGGA]

Wait so now you're a literalist?

When it comes to quoting my grandparents yes - I have no reason to lie about anything like. To add, my father was instructed by the Sisters of the Holy Family and he was taught the exact same way in the 1950s.

[M.SIGGA]

And the commentary in the NAB most certainly does err on the side of liberalism. It teaches that the Bible contains moral and theological errors.

So is Pope Paul VI (Sept. 18, 1970) preface of the NAB baloney?

"On all who have contributed to this translation, and all who seek in its pages the sacred teaching and the promise of salvation of Jesus Christ our Lord, we gladly bestow our paternal Apostolic Blessing."

This is after his preface, so why would the Pope give a fallible book his Apostolic Blessing? How can you discredit something approved and directly blessed by the Pope?

[Hananiah]

When it comes to quoting my grandparents yes - I have no reason to lie about anything like.

I never said you were lying. You said that your grandparents were taught to believe that creation occurred in six literal days. I said ok, perhaps their teachers were wrong; perhaps creation didn't actually occur in six days.

This is after his preface, so why would the Pope give a fallible book his Apostolic Blessing? How can you discredit something approved and directly blessed by the Pope?

Well, he isn't speaking ex cathedra here, and Pope Leo XIII taught something different, so I'm just choosing between 2 fallible statements (btw, one is in line with 2000 years of Catholic teaching, the other is not). Pope St. Gelasius denied transubstantiation, and if I were alive in the year 500 I would have disagreed with him.

[M.SIGGA]

Why would the Pope administer an Apostolic Blessing to something that is might be spiritually dangerous to read? Wouldn't the teachings of Paul VI be more developed than Leo or even Gelasius? I'm only asking this because the NAB is the only Bible I have used since I made my First Communion and it's what I was taught out of since then too. It's also my source for my extensive notes that I've taken for years and I've never found anything wrong with it. I can understand saying it's notes might not be as extensive as the St. Ignatius Bible, but to say the actual translation of the Scriptures are flawed and flat out wrong is a worry-some argument in my opinion. If you say both are fallable, then what does it really matter at all what Leo, Gelasius, or Paul said in the first place?

[Laudate_Dominum]

Historical criticism, form criticism, etc. is a mess. I have a number of Bible's and biblical commentaries and they all disagree substantially in a lot of ways. I tend to judge the worth of a commentary based on the "camp" the authors of it belong to.

Who is the main editor of the commentary you have? If I know of him/her maybe I can give you my feedback on their school of hermeneutics and their presuppositions.

Their are different versions of the NAB with different commentaries. (yes, the NAB itself has 'evolved' over the years). The most common in the states is probably the "Catholic Study Bible" by Oxford University Press. It's a disappointment in my mind. They publish a "Jewish Study Bible" which I think is vastly superior.

Edited February 19, 2004 by Laudate_Dominum

[M.SIGGA]

Historical criticism, form criticism, etc. is a mess. I have a number of Bible's and biblical commentaries and they all disagree substantially in a lot of ways. I tend to judge the worth of a commentary based on the "camp" the authors of it belong to.

Who is the main editor of the commentary you have? If I know of him/her maybe I can give you my feedback on their school of hermeneutics and their presuppositions.

Their are different versions of the NAB with different commentaries. (yes, the NAB itself has 'evolved' over the years). The most common in the states is probably the "Catholic Study Bible" by Oxford University Press. It's a disappointment in my mind. They publish a "Jewish Study Bible" which I think is vastly superior.

what do you think about the St. Joseph NAB?

[Laudate_Dominum]

And I'll second cmom. One of the best Catholic commentaries for lay people is the Navarre commentary. If your doing exigesis or apologetics I would recommend the Bible commentary that Ignatius Press is in the process of publishing. It's put together primarily by Dr. Scott Hahn and Curtis Mitch. So far they have published the four Gospels, Acts and Romans.

One of my personal favorites for meditating on Scripture is the "An Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture" series by InterVarsity Press. It is a comprehensive biblical commentary compiled entirely from the Fathers of the Church.

If your trying to do professional biblical scholarship you're going to have to use many commentaries and get tangled up in the current scholarly milieu. I don't recommend this for lay folks, as I said before, it's a mess.

[Laudate_Dominum]

what do you think about the St. Joseph NAB?

I've given away or misplaced my copy of that version. But I have used it. If I remember correctly the commentary is minimal. Actually there are different editions of the St. Joseph NAB, a personal study edition, a student edition, etc..

I don't remember which precise edition I had but the commentary was minimal anyway. It was also very one sided. I would say at the very least to take the commentary with a grain of salt. Often times they will present textual and historical opinions about passages which only reflect their own bias and are in fact not solid opinions. For example the dating given for certain books as well as elements of the historical development of the text will be biased. Keep in mind that there are those in biblical scholarship who differ dramatically from many of the views expressed. So basically I wouldn't consider it an authoritative commentary by any means.

[Aloysius]

i got a random question, we know the original texts are all infallible and inspired by God..

does Trent's approval make the Latin Vulgate infallible? it seems to me it does, so we should all just get Douay Rheims and be done with it! :P

[Laudate_Dominum]

i got a random question, we know the original texts are all infallible and inspired by God..

does Trent's approval make the Latin Vulgate infallible? it seems to me it does, so we should all just get Douay Rheims and be done with it!

Many traditionalist argue along those lines. They say that the authority of the Church instituted the latin vulgate as the one, authoritative edition of the Bible.

I wish this was true, but unfortunately I do not think it is.

The Church has always been into Biblical scholarship and has encouraged studying the ancient manuscripts and has not condemned the making of new translations. In fact it has approved other translations and even uses a different translation in it's Liturgy.