Which Bible Should You Read?

WHICH BIBLESHOULD

YOU READ?

“You shall not add to the word that Ispeak to you, neither shall you take awayfrom it: keep the commandments of theLord your God which I command you.”

—Deuteronomy 4:2



WHICH BIBLESHOULD

YOU READ?By

Thomas A. Nelson

TAN BOOKS AND PUBLISHERS, INC.Rockford, Illinois 61105

“Every word of God is fire tried: he isa buckler to them that hope in him. Addnot any thing to his words, lest thou bereproved, and found a liar.”

—Proverbs 30:5-6



Copyright © 2001 by Thomas A. Nelson.

ISBN 0-89555-689-8

Library of Congress Control No.: 00-134741

Printed and bound in the United States of Amer-ica.

TAN BOOKS AND PUBLISHERS, INC.P.O. Box 424

Rockford, Illinois 61105

2001

Dedicated to The Blessed Virgin Mary,

“full of grace,”

“Mother of fair love, and of fear, andof knowledge, and of holy hope,”

Who shall crush the head of Satan.



vii

Contents

Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ixAbbreviations of the Bibles Used . . . . xivIntroduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xv

Which Bible Should You Read?The Importance of the

Latin Vulgate Bible . . . . . . . . . . . . 1The Stature of the Vulgate and

Douay-Rheims Bibles . . . . . . . . . . . 4The Method of Translating Employed

in the New Bibles . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8Three Fundamental Mistakes . . . . . . . 10

1. Which Authoritative “Original”To Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

2. Incorrect Choice of Words . . . . . . 173. Interpreting Rather than

Translating . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20Sample Problem Passages . . . . . . . . . 22

“She Shall Crush Thy Head . . .” . . . 23“I Am the Mother of Fair Love . . .” . 28“Wheresoever the Body Shall

Be . . .” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30“Let All Your Things Be Done

in Charity” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35“Amen, Amen, I Say to You . . .” . . . 37“Being of One Mind One Towards

Another” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39




“And the Gates of Hell Shall NotPrevail against It” . . . . . . . . . . . 43

“How Shall This Be Done . . .?” . . . 47Judas’ Betrayal . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50“Peace on Earth . . .” . . . . . . . . . . . 53“What Does It Profit . . .?” . . . . . . . 66“Power to Be Made the Sons

of God” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71“I Will Begin To Vomit Thee out of

My Mouth” . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88A Synopsis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Which Bible Should You Read?viii

PREFACE

Which Bible should you read? That is animportant question everyone should askhimself. For version differs from version ofSacred Scripture by so much that one hasto recognize that they cannot all be accu-rate—if indeed, logically speaking, any oneof them is. Therefore, which one should aperson choose to use for his own personalstudy of God’s Holy Word?

In order to shed some light on this ques-tion the reader is asked initially to considera most unusual letter that was mailed to this publisher in 1985, a letter whichdescribes one person’s singular, prayerfulquest to discover that one Bible translationwhich is the best version to read in Eng-lish. It was written by a nun who gave uspermission to reprint it, and it is givenhere in toto, just as it came to us. It isaddressed to the Publisher as a result ofher reading a promotional sales letter thecompany mailed out in 1985, which out-lined briefly the chief reasons for employ-ing the traditional English Catholic Bible,called the Douay-Rheims. Here is herunusual story.

ix



A Testimony

October 20, 1985Dear Mr. Nelson:

Your Letter in regard to the Douay-Rheims Version of the Bible was absolutelyfascinating. And after I finished, I wishedthat I could read more. Have you thoughtof doing a full length work on the subject?You write so beautifully.

But on the mystical side, I thought Imight share my own story with you:

I grew up in the Methodist Church, butwas hungry for a deeper spirituality, par-ticularly contemplative. In 1962 I studiedwith a Hindu guru and later also studiedother areas of Eastern contemplation. I wasfascinated with Eastern mysticism and con-templation and never would have thoughtof leaving it. But Jesus just scooped me uplike a little lamb about his shoulders, andI converted to Catholicism in 1972. So thatwas ten years in which I was immersed in“New Age” circles and Eastern mysticism.(In fact, my guru gave me the name ofShiva Kumari, and I’d had it changedlegally, which is why Cardinal O’Connorleft it as it was when he pronounced myvows as a hermit nun.)

Which Bible Should You Read?x

When I first converted to Catholicism 14years ago, I was so lost! I had no idea therewas such a thing as “left wing” and “rightwing” [in the Catholic Church]. I justwanted to learn the teachings of the Faith.But one priest said one thing; someone elsesaid the opposite; and I became terriblyconfused. So I turned back to prayer.

Then I went to bookstores, but since Ihad no concept of that which was orthodoxand that which was not, I bought booksindiscriminately and became even moreconfused! So I turned back to prayer.

Through prayer and continually throwingmyself upon the Lord, depending whollyupon Him, looking to Him in all my needand confusion, He has led me out of thedarkness into the Light. I look back nowover those many years and am absolutelyamazed at how He has led me! But I thinkthe Douay-Rheims story is most awesome:

When I first converted and was goingfrom one Catholic bookstore to another, Ipicked up different versions of the Bible,not having the foggiest notion as to whichwould be the best. I finally concluded thatthey must all be good, so I got copies ofeach. And I already had the King JamesVersion from my Protestant days.

Preface xi

(I’m sitting here trying to think how I cancapsulize 20 years of spiritual growth andtransformation which enabled me to be ableto listen to the Lord on that mystical leveland allow Him to guide me—most of it isgrace though—all glory and honor to Him!)

What happened was odd indeed—when Ipicked up the New American Version, itwas dry like sawdust. There was no life init; I mean mystical life. (I’m having such adifficult time verbalizing this, since it wasall interior guidance on a mystical level.)So I stopped trying to read the New Amer-ican. Then I tried another version, and thewords literally swam on the page. I thoughtI might be suffering from some sort of eyestrain, so I stopped reading that version.

Finally, someone suggested the Douay-Rheims. I’d never even heard of such athing, but wrote down the words and wentimmediately to a bookstore that carried it.(I guess this was about 10 years ago.) Theminute I touched the Douay-Rheims, Iknew this was it! I stood there in the book-store, turning it about in my hand (withoutever opening it) just feeling that wonderfulsensation of life which seemed to be cours-ing through it. (I’ve never told this story to

Which Bible Should You Read?xii

anyone! They would think I was completely“off-the-wall”!)

I got my Douay-Rheims home, and oh,what a happy day! I’ve loved that book asthough it were not a book at all, becausethat sensation of life has never left it.Whenever I touch it, and certainly when Iread it, everything comes alive with God’slight, love and guidance.

A couple of years ago, a man said I oughtto read the St. Joseph’s version, and I saidI intended to stick to my Douay-Rheims—with a tone that sounded as though I weredefending my best friend—and I couldn’tgive any rational explanation as to why Ifelt that way. I never doubted that it wasthe hand of the Lord; it’s just that I hadn’treally given it any thought until I read yourletter. Then all these incidents flooded backinto my memory, and I was struck withwonder!

God bless you,

Sister Shiva Kumari

Preface xiii

Abbreviations of the Bible Versions Used in this Tract

Catholic

DRB Douay-Rheims BibleNAB New American BibleCRSV Catholic Revised Standard VersionJB Jerusalem Bible

Protestant

KJV King James VersionNKJV New King James VersionNIV New International VersionNRSV New Revised Standard VersionNASV New American Standard VersionNEB New English Bible

INTRODUCTION

The present little book is an unabashedapologia* for the traditional Catholic Biblein English, called the Douay-Rheims. Thefirst edition of this present little work was actually a sales letter promoting theDouay-Rheims Bible by explaining to read-ers why the Douay-Rheims is the mostaccurate and most reliable version of theBible in English.

This version of Sacred Scripture wasfirst published in the New Testament atRheims in Northern France in 1582 and atDouay in Flanders (Northwestern France)in 1609-1610 in its entirety. (These werethe times of the penal laws in Englandunder Elizabeth I, when it was a capitalcrime to practice the Catholic faith. Thus,the work of rendering into English a properBible translation had to be carried out onthe Continent.) It was later revised (1749-1751) by Bishop Richard Challoner (1691-1781), Coadjutor Roman Catholic Bishop ofLondon from 1741 and Vicar Apostolic from1758. A slight revision was made in 1859

* “Apologia” is used here in the sense of “adefense.”

xv



by Mgr. F. P. Kenrick, Archbishop of Balti-more, which is commonly used in theUnited States, though other Douay-Rheimsversions have been in use. The current edi-tion in print by TAN was issued in 1899 bythe John Murphy Co. of Baltimore, Mary-land, under the official approbation of HisEminence, James Cardinal Gibbons, datedSeptember 1, 1899, wherein he stated: “Wehereby approve of the publication byMessrs. John Murphy Co. of the CatholicBible, which is an accurate reprint of theRheims and Douay edition with Dr. Chal-loner’s notes.”

From the first edition of the Douay-Rheims Bible in 1609-1610 until 1941,there was no other English Catholic Biblein use, and even until approximately 1960the readings from the pulpit in mostCatholic churches in the U.S. continued tobe from the Douay-Rheims because thereexisted a popular, large-print lectionary ofthe Epistles and Gospels for each Sundayof the year that was in common use in mostCatholic parishes in this country; it usedthe Douay-Rheims translation. Therefore,one might say that the universal use of theDouay-Rheims Bible lasted from BishopChalloner’s revisions in 1749-51 untilapproximately 1960, roughly some 210

Which Bible Should You Read?xvi

years. But, if one were to begin from theoriginal issue date of the first edition of theDouay-Rheims in 1610 until 1960, the timespan of the effective, universal life of thisversion is 350 years.

Thus, the only Catholic version of theBible in use in the English-speaking worldfor 330 years (c. 1610-1940) was theDouay-Rheims, which continued to be usedfor pulpit readings for about 20 yearsmore. There was a hiatus of its availabil-ity for about 10 years, until 1971, whenthe Douay-Rheims was first issued byTAN. Even during this period (1960-1971),however, there were other English editionsof the Douay-Rheims available here andthere from older inventories.

The important point to consider fromthis brief historical sketch is that for 330years (1610-1940), English-speaking Cath-olics had no other English Catholic Biblethan the Douay-Rheims, and therefore, ifthis version is not accurate, then all themany millions of Catholics who used itsince 1610—as of this writing a time spannow of 390 years—have been deceived intheir study of Scripture. They have not, ineffect, had an accurate version of God’sHoly Word. The Holy Ghost, in otherwords, had let them down, had failed them

Introduction xvii

in their Scripture study; they have been, toa fairly large degree, deluded by a “bad”bible.

The above is also a correct line of rea-soning if we compare the Douay-Rheimsversion with the three modern CatholicBibles currently in use, namely, The NewAmerican Bible (1970, which was partiallyrevised and reissued in 1986), The CatholicRevised Standard Version (1966, originallya Protestant Version dating from 1946 and1952) and the Jerusalem Bible (1966). Ifany one of these three translations of Scrip-ture is correct (and they all differ amongthemselves), then the Douay-Rheims issimply inaccurate. But, if the Douay-Rheims is accurate, then these newCatholic versions contain many inaccuratepassages and should not be used. A num-ber of comparisons between the Douay-Rheims and these newer Catholic versionsshall be made further along in this work.These comparisons shall also include sev-eral popular Protestant versions.

In this little tract we shall study indepth 11 famous passages from the NewTestament and mention two from the OldTestament. The rationale for this approachin using mainly New Testament passagesis to eliminate any objections based on the

Which Bible Should You Read?xviii

original Hebrew texts of the Old Testa-ment, the reasoning being this: If thetranslators of these new Bibles cannottranslate correctly even the extant “origi-nal” Greek text of the New Testament—forthe New Testament was written in thatlanguage*—then how are we to trust themto translate accurately the ancient Hebrewtexts, which by reason of age and antiquityare far more arcane and often are far morepoetic and filled with double and tripleentendre?

Here a word needs to be said about theuse of Hebrew in the Old Testament of theBible. The ancient Hebrew in which mostof the Old Testament was written is anancient Semitic language that has comedown to us from time immemorial. Somethink Hebrew was the language spoken byman at the time of the multiplication oflanguages, caused by God as a curse onmankind because of man’s trying to buildthe Tower of Babel. (Genesis 11:1-9).

In the course of the centuries, Hebrew

Introduction xix

*It has been commonly held that St. Matthew’sGospel was written in Aramaic. However, nocopy of the Aramaic has survived. Current think-ing holds that it is not certain that he did not infact write his Gospel in Greek.

was discontinued as a spoken language—about the time of the Babylonian Captivityin the 6th century B.C. (599-536)—when itwas superseded by Aramaic. Thereafter,Hebrew was only written. Nonetheless, theHebrew of the Old Testament texts dis-plays a great fixity over a number of cen-turies that is admirable and quiteunparalleled in most other languages—which tend to mutate more. This relativestability of Hebrew was inspired, no doubt,by Almighty God to preserve the integrityof the Old Testament’s original language.

As a result of Alexander the Great’s 4th-century conquest (334-323 B.C.) of the landof Israel, Egypt and Mesopotamia, amongother areas, the spread of Greek influenceand language by the 3rd century B.C.caused Ptolemy II Philadelphus, King ofEgypt (284-247 B.C.), to bring to Alexan-dria, Egypt, 72 Hebrew scholars to trans-late “the Law”—presumably the Pent-ateuch, or first five books of the Bible—intoGreek (284 B.C.). This version becameknown as the “Septuagint” (from the sev-enty-two scholars) and is one of the basicversions of Scripture; the entire Greek textof Old Testament Scripture is presumednot to have been the work of the original72 men, but to have been completed during

Which Bible Should You Read?xx

many following years. Nonetheless, theGreek of the Septuagint—called koine (pro-nounced koinay)—is the Greek spoken atthat time by the Jews of Alexandria, Egypt,and the Greek Septuagint text of the OldTestament is one of the most venerable andaccurate texts of the Old Testament wehave.

Most of the Old Testament’s 45 bookswere originally written in Hebrew, and itis generally thought all of the New Testa-ment’s 27 books were written in Greek,save for St. Matthew’s Gospel, which wasthought for many years to have been orig-inally written in Aramaic, though the Ara-maic text has been lost to history, even ifthis is so.

Approximately 150 A.D., a version of theentire Bible in Latin was assembled, calledthe Old Itala (Vetus Itala). It was in gen-eral use until St. Jerome translated theBible into Latin (390-405), this latter beingcalled the Latin Vulgate, which was writtenin the “vulgar” or common Latin tongue.This version soon superseded the Old Italaversion and is now considered an august,sacred translation in its own right, havingreceived the approbation, not only of nearly16 centuries of continuous use, but also for-mally by the Council of Trent (1545-1563),

Introduction xxi

that it is free from doctrinal error. (See page 4.) The Vulgate has served the WesternCatholic Church ever since and was usedexclusively until modern vernacular trans-lations began to appear in the 15th and16th centuries.

Which Bible Should You Read?xxii

which means, as Pope Pius XII has stated,

WHICH BIBLESHOULD YOU READ?

The Importance of theLatin Vulgate Bible

To begin, the Douay-Rheims Bible is an absolutely faithful translation into Eng-lish of the Latin Vulgate Bible, which St. Jerome (342-420) translated into Latinfrom the original languages. The Vulgatequickly became the only Bible universallyused in the Western Church, or the LatinRite (by far the largest rite of the CatholicChurch, spread virtually worldwide). St.Jerome, who was one of the four GreatWestern Fathers of the Catholic Church,was a man raised up by God to translatethe Holy Bible into the common Latin ofhis day.

He was Greek-speaking from birth, andbeing an educated man, he also knewLatin perfectly, speaking it as we do Eng-lish; he also knew Hebrew and Aramaicnearly as well (he studied Hebrew, e.g.,

1




from approximately age 26 as a penance).He even learned Chaldaic just so he couldcheck the translation of the Book of Daniel(the only biblical book written in that lan-guage), which he had commissioned some-one else to translate for him. He lived atBethlehem and was near enough to theRabbinical school at Caesarea-Philipi thathe could consult with one of the learnedRabbis, who agreed to help him with hisHebrew—though rendering such help wasactually forbidden in Jewish custom. Hebecame so good at translating Hebrew thatat the age of 70 or so he translated thebook of Tobias in one night. Besides beinga towering linguistic genius, he was also agreat Saint, and he had access to ancientHebrew and Greek manuscripts of the 2ndand 3rd centuries which have since perishedand are no longer available to scholars today.

St. Jerome’s translation, moreover, was(wherever possible) a careful, word-for-word rendering of the original texts intoLatin. To quote one writer, “His sourcesbeing both numerous and ancient, hisknowledge of the languages a living knowl-edge, his scholarship consummate, he wasa far better judge of the true shade ofmeaning of a particular word than any

Which Bible Should You Read?2

modern scholar . . .” (Ronald D. Lambert,Experiment in Heresy, Triumph Mag.,March, 1968). Or, one might add, than anymodern scholar could ever hope to be!

Truly, God raised up for the Church thisgreat, great man, that He might, throughhim, give us a faithful rendering of HisDivine Word into Latin—which was, untilonly 200 years ago, the universal languageof all Western Christendom and which isstill today the official language of theCatholic Church. Latin, moreover, as withGreek, is still taught in most major collegesand universities in the Western World,which makes the Vulgate easily accessibleto scholars throughout the world yet today.

St. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate Bible hasbeen read and honored by the WesternChurch for almost 1600 years! It wasdeclared by the Council of Trent (1545-1564) to be the official (literally “authen-tic”) version of the canonical Scriptures,that is, the Bible of the Catholic Church.Hear what that Sacred Council decreed:

“Moreover, the same Holy Council . . .ordains and declares that the old LatinVulgate Edition, which, in use for so manyhundred years, has been approved by theChurch, be in public lectures, disputations,

Importance of the Latin Vulgate 3

sermons and expositions held as authentic,and that no one [may] dare or presumeunder any pretext whatsoever to reject it.”(Fourth Session, April 8, 1546).

As Pope Pius XII has stated in his 1943encyclical letter On The Promotion of Bib-lical Studies, this means that the Vulgate,“interpreted in the sense in which theChurch has always understood it,” is “freefrom any error whatsoever in matters of faithand morals; so that, as the Church herselftestifies and affirms, it may be quotedsafely and without fear of error in disputa-tions, in lectures and in preaching . . .”(Par. 21). No other Bible—not even theNew Vulgate, promulgated in 1979, and notyet available in English—has beenendorsed by the Church in this manner!

The Stature of the Vulgateand Douay-Rheims Bibles

The reason that the Douay-Rheims Bible isso important is that it is the only English Biblethat is a faithful, word-for-word translation ofthe Latin Vulgate of St. Jerome. Thisabsolute fidelity to the Vulgate hasalways been its claim, and no onedenies that it is so! The obvious conclu-


sion to be drawn from these basic facts isthat the Douay-Rheims Bible is there-fore the best and safest translation ofthe Holy Bible into English!

Personally speaking, this writer has beenreading the Douay-Rheims Bible for over 30years and can attest that it literally bris-tles with meaning, that it is replete, verseafter verse, with wonderful shades andnuances of meaning, such that no humanbeing could possibly have written withoutbeing aided by Almighty God—and whichsubtleties the modern translators haveoften translated out of their versions. Asingle phrase—sometimes only a word—can deliver a key insight to the personreading the Douay-Rheims. This writer hasnever experienced anything similar whilereading any other version. In comparison,all other versions seem prosaic and flat.

This characteristic makes an extremelystrong argument by itself that the Douay-Rheims is an accurate translation of theBible as it existed in its original lan-guages—even though the Douay-Rheims isin large part a translation of a translation(i.e., English from Latin). But the wonder-ful subtleties of the Douay-Rheims arealmost all lost in the other versions.

Stature of the Vulgate/Douay 5

“Which Bible should you read?” Itreally devolves to this: If God does notguide the translation of the Bible, much ofits meaning can easily be lost in transla-tion—which this writer believes has infact happened to the English versionsother than the Douay-Rheims. It is thefirm opinion of this writer that God hassafely guided St. Jerome and the transla-tors of the Douay-Rheims Bible, for whichreason the latter is such a pithy transla-tion, and so pregnant and charged withmeaning at every turn. Comparable to theexclamations directed at the chief priestsand Pharisees by the ministers sent toapprehend Jesus, who had heard Our LordHimself: “Never did man speak like thisman” (John 7:46); this writer is convinced,from repeated, careful, studied reading ofthe Douay-Rheims Bible, that we can say,“no human being, unaided by divine inspi-ration, could have written such a book asthe Douay-Rheims Bible,” something hecould never say of any other version he hasread. The Douay-Rheims Bible sponta-neously elicits from the human heart theexclamation: “This is Sacred Scripture!”

St. Jerome and the other ancient trans-lators rendered their translations of Scrip-


ture as much as possible in a word-for-wordor expression-for-expression manner fromthe original manuscripts. They did not tryto interpret their own understanding intothe Bible and thereby translate for us whatthey understood the meaning to be, as themodern biblical translators often seem tohave done. (This practice is fatal to anaccurate translation of the Bible and inthis writer’s opinion is the primary reasonwhy there are so many versions of theBible.) Rather, the ancient translatorstranslated the texts exactly as they foundthem and “let the chips fall as they may.”

The Douay-Rheims Bible, in its ownright, is just such a translation into Eng-lish—a word-for-word, you might say slav-ishly faithful translation of the Vulgate, the“authentic” Bible of the Catholic Church (Itis the Council of Trent that used the word“authentic.”) But its translation was madeby comparing it also to the transcripts ofthe original languages (wherever this waspossible) and to the Greek Septuagint ofthe Old Testament.

Moreover, thousands of Catholic Saintswere raised on the Latin Vulgate and theDouay-Rheims Bible. Our Catholic literaryheritage overflows with quotations from

Stature of the Vulgate/Douay 7

the Vulgate and the Douay-Rheims trans-lation. But in the new bibles, the familiarwording of the Douay-Rheims is often gone,in some verses totally—and many timesalso the meaning!

Furthermore, the notes in the Douay-Rheims Bible are in total accord with thepronouncements of the Church on the truemeaning of the Scriptures. This cannot besaid of all the modern bibles. (The Prefaceto the New American Bible (NAB, ’70), e.g.,states that some of its collaborators werenot even Catholics!)

Without the Douay-Rheims Bible’s beinguniversally available and used, our Cath-olic Scriptural traditions in English will belost to our children and grandchildren, as well as to future generations in theChurch!

Therefore, it is the considered opinion ofthis writer that, if one wants the true Wordof God in the English language—officiallyguaranteed by the Catholic Church—he orshe must go to the Douay-Rheims Bible.

The Method of TranslatingEmployed in the New Bibles

At this point, it is of paramount impor-


tance to explain the method of translatingthe Sacred Scriptures which the modernCatholic translators—from the evidence oftheir translations—would seem to haveemployed, a method which has resulted inrenderings of Scripture into such unfamil-iar language as to make a person some-times wonder whether or not he is actuallyreading the Bible.

For the purposes of this booklet, discus-sion of the modern Catholic versions of theBible will be confined to and refer specifi-cally to the three most widely used trans-lations, viz., the New American Bible of1970 (which is used in the Catholic liturgyin America), and also occasionally of 1986(here referenced as NAB, ’70 or NAB, ’86) ;the Catholic Edition of the Revised Stan-dard Version (CRSV, ’66), and theJerusalem Bible of 1966 (JB, ’66). But,because many Catholics are now using theNew King James Version (NKJV, ’85), theNew International Version (NIV, ’78), theNew Revised Standard Version (NRSV, ’89),the New American Standard Version(NASV, ’77) or the New English Bible(NEB, ’76), these five will also be consid-ered.

Method of Translating the New Bibles 9

Three Fundamental Mistakes

In researching this subject, the presentwriter soon concluded that the translatorsof the three modern Catholic bibles cur-rently most in use—and indeed of all themodern translations reviewed—have madethree fundamental mistakes:

First, they have bypassed St.Jerome’s Latin Vulgate version ofScripture in favor of translating tran-scriptions of texts in the original lan-guages which are not considered astrustworthy by the translators of the orig-inal Douay-Rheims Bible as is the Vulgate.

Second, they have often employedword meanings for their translationswhich, though correct in some sense ofthe words, are often incorrect for theparticular use in which they occur inthe Bible.

Third, and probably worst of all, themodern translators seem to have readthe original language versions of theBible, decided in their own mindswhat the meaning is, and translatedthat meaning into English, rather thanwhat the Bible actually says.

Let us explain the ramifications of these


three fundamental mistakes:

1. Which Authoritative “Original” To Use?

First, we do not possess any originalmanuscripts of any of the books of theHoly Bible. The passage of time and thedeterioration of materials have causedthese to be lost to us. Moreover, the textswe do have of the Hebrew and the Greekoriginal languages do not completely agreeamong themselves as well as do the textswe have of the Latin Vulgate of St. Jerome.

Sometimes the question is raised: Whytranslate from a translation (i.e., from theLatin Vulgate), rather than from the origi-nal Greek and Hebrew? This question wasalso raised in the 16th century when theDouay-Rheims translators (Fr. GregoryMartin and his assistants) first publishedthe Rheims New Testament. They gave tenreasons, ending up by stating that theLatin Vulgate “is not onely better then alother Latin translations, but then theGreeke text itselfe, in those places wherethey disagree.” (Preface to the Rheims NewTestament, 1582). They state that “both theHebrew and Greeke Editions are fouly cor-

Which Authoritative “Original”? 11

rupted . . . since the Latin was truly trans-lated out of them, whiles they were morepure; and that the same Latin hath beenfarre better conserved from corruptions.”(Preface to the Douay Old Testament, 1609facsimile edition published by Gordon Win-rod, Our Savior’s Church and Latin School,Gainesville, Mo., 1987).

What is the reason? There were alwaysfar more copies of the Vulgate made, and ithas therefore been much easier to detectcopyists’ errors. It must be rememberedhere that printing from moveable type wasnot invented until approximately the 1430’sand not really employed very much untilthe 1440’s, when Johann Gutenbergprinted a calendar in 1448 and the firstBible at Mainz, Germany in the 1450’s.Prior to that, the Bible, as with all books,had to be reproduced by handwriting.

Also, it was commonly believed by theFathers of the Church “that the Jews didcorrupt the text of the Bible in order todestroy the arguments of the Christians,”(cf. Hugh Pope, O.P., Eng. Versions of theBible, 1952, p. 655, n. 15). They would havedone this in order to disclaim Our Lord asthe Messias. For example, in the Old Tes-tament prophet Aggeus, 2:8 (Haggai 2:7 in


the new bibles), we find a prophecy aboutOur Lord as the Messias which reads, “AndI will move all nations: AND THE DESIREDOF ALL NATIONS SHALL COME: and I willfill this house with glory: saith the Lord ofhosts.” (DRB, emphasis in original).

Let us now hear what the New AmericanBible has: “I will shake all the nations, andthe treasures of all the nations will comein, And I will fill this house with glory,says the LORD of hosts.” (NAB, ’70 & ’86).The two other Catholic versions have basi-cally the same translation, as also do theNEB, the NASV and the NRSV; only theNIV agrees with the Douay-Rheims; theNKJV almost does.

“The Desired of all nations” refers toChrist. “I will move all the nations” (DRB)would seem to refer to God’s grace movingthem to be disposed to accept Christ whenHe comes to them through the CatholicChurch. On the other hand, “and the trea-sures of all the nations shall come in”(NAB, ’70 & ’86) appears to indicate therewill be a worldwide empire that “shakesdown” the nations to extort from themtheir wealth. Thus, a far different meaningis rendered from what the Douay-RheimsBible has.


In any case, for modern scholars to goback to the transcriptions of the Hebrewand Greek, in which various books of theBible were originally written, and maketranslations from these (not always reli-able) transcriptions that are fundamentallydifferent in hundreds of different casesfrom the translation rendered by St.Jerome nearly 1600 years ago (and faith-fully translated by the Douay-Rheims) is todemand of any sensible Catholic today toreject their work completely and out ofhand—and for this reason only. For if aCatholic does not reject these newtranslations of the Bible, then hereally has rejected the nearly 1600years of Catholic biblical interpreta-tion, based on the Latin Vulgate Bible,and has accepted in their stead one or allof the many truncated, ersatz biblical ren-derings of the modern Bible translators.

Rather, and far more sensibly, Catholicsshould reject these questionable new“bibles” (bibles that are seemingly alwaysbeing updated and corrected in ever newereditions) and return to the traditionaltranslation of Scripture based on St.Jerome, which in English is the Douay-Rheims Bible.


One should remember the status of St.Jerome’s translation of the Bible for theCatholic Church: His translation is, forworking purposes, in effect, THEBIBLE as far as the Church is con-cerned, for it was the only Bible in uni-versal use by the Latin Rite of the CatholicChurch for some 1600 years. And it is stillthe only “authentic” Bible of the CatholicChurch for use in sermons, lectures andtheological discussions, as declared by theCouncil of Trent! (The Church has not clar-ified yet what is the status of New Vulgate,completed in 1979, which has not yet beentranslated into English.)

If the new bibles are correct in the count-less ways they differ from St. Jerome’stranslation, then his translation is terriblyflawed; therefore, the Latin Rite of theRoman Catholic Church simply has not hadthe Bible properly translated for more than1600 years! But such a situation is sim-ply preposterous in the True Church ofGod, which is guided by the HolyGhost. For Scripture, with Tradition, formsone of the two sources of the Catholic Faith.Therefore, on the basis of concluding thatthe Catholic Church must have alwayshad the correct translation of Scripture—


its being God’s Church, and Sacred Scrip-ture being, with Tradition, one of the twosources of the supernatural True Faith—then we are forced to concede that St.Jerome’s translation is accurate (espe-cially as far as doctrine goes—cf. the quotefrom Pius XII on page 4), and that the newtranslations that differ from it so pro-foundly are not—at least to the extent thatthey do differ from it! One simply cannotescape this conclusion.

What is of paramount importance con-cerning the translation of the originalHebrew and Greek is that St. Jerome hadfar more texts of the original language ver-sions to work with than scholars havetoday. It is commonly acknowledged thathe had many texts that simply no longerexist.

Of particular importance was the Hexa-pla, assembled by Origen (c.185–c.254), asix-column Bible dating from about 240A.D., giving the existing two Hebrew andfour Greek versions of Scripture; it was awork kept at Caesarea in Palestine, nearwhere St. Jerome worked on the Bible.

Moreover, St. Jerome was a fairlywealthy man, and he collected texts andpaid copyists to copy them for him as often


as he came across anything worthwhile. Hesimply had far more to work with thanscholars have today, as far as texts go. Fur-ther, he was 1600 years closer to the orig-inal languages than modern scholars. Andhe was bilingual, speaking Greek frombirth and Latin from his youth.

2. Incorrect Choice of Words

Second, regarding the meanings ofthe words used by the original biblicalwriters, who is going to be a better judgeof the exact meanings of the variousHebrew and Greek words employed inScripture: St. Jerome, who was Greek-speaking from birth, who knew Latin aswell as most of us know English, and whoknew Hebrew almost as well, who was alsoa towering linguistic genius, a great Saint,a holy Doctor of the Church, and one of thefour Great Western Fathers of the Church;or, is it going to be the modern scholars,who have to learn their ancient Latin,Greek and Hebrew from grammars and lex-icons, from dictionaries and from professorswho (presumably) do not speak the lan-guage natively either and who themselveshave thus had to learn it—and so forth,

Incorrect Choice of Words 17

back through time, during the course ofsome 1600 years? The far safer bet is St.Jerome!

On this second point, concerning whichmeaning of the original words of Scriptureto use in making translations, one shouldconsider momentarily the English word“grace” and its various meanings. It canmean “supernatural life,” “unmerited divineassistance,” “a prayer said before meals,”“an instance of human kindness,” “pardon,”“a reprieve,” “to be in one’s favor,” “ease andsuppleness of movement,” “a charmingtrait,” “a title of address” (e.g., “YourGrace”), etc. The same problem exists in theancient languages, Greek and Hebrew, inwhich the Bible was originally written.

The translators of the modern Catholicbibles in question would seem to be choos-ing the wrong meaning to words in many,many instances. Granted, they generally dohave one of the correct meanings of a givenword in question, but have they chosen thecorrect meaning of the word in everyinstance? From the results of their trans-lations, it would seem not—and this can beseen merely by the crazy way the passagesoften read when they get done.

Again, consider the word “grace”—in


Greek, charis. As one conservative Catholicprofessor of Hebrew, Greek and Latin toldthis author, by the time St. Paul wrote, theGreek word charis already had its specifi-cally Christian theological meaning of“grace.” And St. Jerome corresponded to St.Paul’s meaning by translating charis intoLatin as gratia, which in English becomes“grace.”

(Let us remember that the Septuagint—the Old Testament Bible in Greek, datingfrom circa 284 B.C.—had been renderedinto that language some 300 years before St. Paul wrote, and therefore the meaningsof the words St. Paul and the other NewTestament writers used in the originalGreek of the New Testament were alreadywell established in most cases.)

But the translators of the New AmericanBible, for example, render Luke 1:28—which traditionally reads, “Hail, full ofgrace, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women” (DRB)—as,“Rejoice, O highly favored daughter! . . .”(NAB, ’70. The NAB, ’86 has “Hail, favoredone!”).

It does not take any particular men-tal acumen to distinguish the differencebetween being “full of grace” and “highly

Incorrect Choice of Words 19

favored.” “Favor” or “favored” is one of themeanings for charis, but not the oneintended by St. Luke in Scripture. A per-son may be highly favored with any num-ber of talents and abilities, or with goodlooks or plenty of money, and so forth. Butdoes that mean he or she is therefore “fullof grace”? We understand Our Lady to be“full of grace” in the sense of beingabsolutely full of God’s divine life (Sancti-fying Grace), so that there is no sin in hersoul whatsoever. What a difference inmeanings!

3. Interpreting Rather than Translating

And thirdly, concerning the methodof translating employed by the trans-lators of the modern Catholic Bibles,this writer believes it can be demonstratedclearly where they are mistaken; and thispoint alone brings into question the value oftheir entire work.

The ancient translators of the SacredScripture, by and large, did literal, word-for-word translations of the Bible. It wastheir policy to be faithful to every word—and to every shade of meaning of every


word—used in the Bible. This included the72 Hebrew scholars who translated the OldTestament into Greek at Alexandria,Egypt, about 284 B.C.; the translator(s) ofthe Old Itala (Vetus Itala) Latin Bible ofabout 150 A.D.; and of course, St. Jerome,who did the Latin Vulgate Bible and whofinished his work about 405 A.D. The sameis true of the original Douay-Rheims com-mission (1582-1610), of Bishop RichardChalloner (1748-1751), and of Mgr. Kenrick(1859).

However, the translators of the modernCatholic bibles—in the judgment of thiswriter, after reading their translations andcomparing them to the Douay-Rheims, theVulgate and the Greek of the New Testa-ment—are proceeding according to the fol-lowing method:

They read a text in the current tran-scriptions of the original languages,decide what THEY THINK it means,and then translate THEIR interpreta-tion into English! The result is that theEnglish is sometimes (not always!) easierto understand, but it is not necessarilywhat the Bible says; rather, it is THEIRINTERPRETATION AND THEIR UN-DERSTANDING OF WHAT THE BIBLE

Interpreting Rather than Translating 21

SAYS! And often the difference from theVulgate and DRB, the traditional Catholicversions, is glaring.

Sample Problem Passages

At this point let us consider some exam-ples of the devastating results to SacredScripture from these three—what thiswriter believes to be—mistakes of thetranslators of the modern Catholic editionsof the Bible. One should remember thatthese “mistakes,” as maintained here, are1) the use of transcriptions fromancient texts that are questionableand that disagree with the Latin Vul-gate of St. Jerome, 2) the wrongchoice of meanings of words in certainspecific cases (though these poorly chosenmeanings would be legitimate meaningswhen used in other contexts), and 3)translating their INTERPRETATIONof what the Bible means, as opposed totranslating what the Bible actually says.


“She Shall Crush Thy Head . . .”

In Genesis 3:15 (Douay-Rheims Bible) weread God’s judgment against Lucifer for hispart in Original Sin, as well as God’sprophecy concerning him: “I will putenmities between thee and the woman,and thy seed and her seed: she shallcrush thy head, and thou shalt lie inwait for her heel.” (DRB).

All three modern Catholic translationsare fundamentally different from theDouay-Rheims, but all basically agree witheach other. First in order is the translationof the New American Bible, the one used inthe Catholic liturgy today:

“I will put enmity between you and thewoman, and between your offspring andhers; He will strike at your head, while youstrike at his heel.” (NAB, ’70 and ’86). Thisrenders a very different meaning indeedfrom the Douay-Rheims version. Now readhow the other versions render this passage:

“I will put enmity between you and thewoman, and between your seed and herseed; he shall bruise your head, and youshall bruise his heel.” (CRSV, ’66).

“I will make you enemies of each other:

“She Shall Crush Thy Head . . .” 23

you and the woman, your offspring and heroffspring. It will crush your head and youwill strike its heel.” (JB, ’66).

“I will put enmity between you and thewoman, between your brood and hers. They[note the plural] shall strike at your head,and you shall strike at their heel.” (NEB,’76).

“And I will put enmity between you andthe woman, and between your offspringand hers; he will crush your head, and youwill strike his heel.” (NIV, ’78).

“And I will put enmity between you andthe woman, and between your seed and herSeed; He shall bruise your head, and youshall bruise His heel.” (NKJV, ’85).

“I will put enmity between you and thewoman, and between your offspring andhers; he will strike your head, and you willstrike his heel.” (NRSV, ’89).

“And I will put enmity between you andthe woman, and between your seed and her seed. He shall bruise you on the head,and you shall bruise him on the heel.”(NASV, ’77).

Note how the Douay-Rheims makes per-fect sense, but the others are confusing.(The words literally “swim” on the page.)


All of the English versions other than theDouay-Rheims translate this verse in a verysimilar manner: The JB takes the pronounto be neuter, “it” (seemingly an indecisive“cop-out”), and the NEB takes it to beplural, referring to the woman’s “brood.”But most take the pronoun to be masculine,referring to Our Lord as the one to “bruise”or “crush” the head of the serpent, ratherthan “she,” referring to Our Lady. Somemay think this a “small” difference, but infact, it is very great indeed. For, from thisprophecy in the Douay-Rheims comes alongstanding Catholic tradition that towardthe End of Time the Blessed Virgin Marywill crush the head of Satan, after her devo-tees have promoted her honor and devotionand directed countless prayers for her inter-cession during a long period of time. Thisancient tradition, which is based on Gene-sis 3:15, is in danger of being relegated tothe scrap-heap if we accept these non-traditional translations.

Consider what Bl. Pius IX (Pope, 1846-1878) wrote on this score in his bull Inef-fabilis Deus, declaring the dogma of theImmaculate Conception of the Blessed Vir-gin Mary (December 8, 1854). After citingthe writings of the Fathers of the Church


and other learned writers, he concludes:“Hence, just as Christ, the Mediatorbetween God and man, assumed humannature, blotted the handwriting of thedecree that stood against us, and fastenedit triumphantly to the cross, so the mostholy Virgin, united with Him by a mostintimate and indissoluble bond, was, withHim and through Him, eternally at enmitywith the evil serpent, and most completelytriumphed over him, and thus crushed hishead with her immaculate foot.”

The Douay-Rheims, following the Vul-gate, is the only English Bible that trans-lates this passage with “she shall crush”and “thou shalt lie in wait for her heel,” thereference being to Blessed Virgin Mary’sultimately defeating the devil and his min-ions in a great spiritual battle, with thefinal victory being attributed to her inter-cession. Now this is exactly the traditionalCatholic translation of this passage. More-over, translated this way, the text makesperfect sense; translated the new way, it isconfusing! One should stop here to readthe passage again from the Douay-Rheimson page 23, paragraph 1, and see hownicely the meaning flows when it refers tothe woman in both clauses, plus how mean-


ingful the second clause is compared to thesecond clause in all the other translations.

In light of these new translations of Gen-esis 3:15, what is to become of this Catholictradition about the role of the Blessed Vir-gin Mary in defeating the devil?—a tradi-tion reinforced, it might be added, by OurLady’s apparition to St. Catherine Labouréin 1831, wherein she gave us the MiraculousMedal, whose image presents her standingon the world and crushing the head of a ser-pent with her foot. The truth of this appari-tion is reinforced by the presence of St.Catherine’s beautiful, incorrupt body in theChapel of the Daughters of Charity, at 140rue de Bac in Paris, of which order she wasa member. Hundreds of thousands of pil-grims visit this chapel every year to viewher body, which is on open display andwhich is a phenomenal, on-going testimonyto the truth of this apparition—and ulti-mately to the truth of the Catholic traditionthat “she,” the Blessed Mother, shall crushthe serpent’s head!

This prophecy of Genesis 3:15 is alsodepicted by millions of statues and picturesthroughout the world which represent thisprophesied event. Are we and our (at least)1600-year-old tradition wrong in this re-


gard, and are the modern biblical exegetesand translators right? Has the Churchbeen misguided on this important pointthese many centuries? Was the Holy Ghost“asleep on the job” and let this “little trans-lation error” slip by Him? Or, has AlmightyGod for His own good reasons allowed themodern translators to be led astray . . . andwith them the poor souls who have to siftfor Scripture’s meaning through the tail-ings of their translations?

“I Am the Mother of Fair Love . . .”

Now, let us consider Ecclesiasticus 24:24-31 (Sirach in the new bibles), verses theChurch has used for centuries in herSacred Liturgy for the various feasts of OurLady at Mass. The most famous part is asfollows:

“I am the mother of fair love, and of fear,and of knowledge, and of holy hope. In meis all grace of the way and of the truth, inme is all hope of life and of virtue. Comeover to me, all ye that desire me, and befilled with my fruits. For my spirit is sweetabove honey and my inheritance above


honey and the honeycomb. My memory isunto everlasting generations. They that eatme, shall yet hunger: and they that drinkme, shall yet thirst. He that harkeneth tome, shall not be confounded: and they thatwork by me, shall not sin. They thatexplain me shall have life everlasting.”(DRB).

Now, how do the other Catholic biblestranslate this passage? Well . . . you see . . . they do not exactly! Save for the JB,they leave out four verses entirely fromthis passage (the non-italicized words)! Theitalicized part is included in the NAB (’70and ’86) and the CRSV (with differentwording for each version, of course); therest is omitted in the NAB ’70 and ’86 andin the CRSV. All together, Chapter 24 ofEcclesiasticus (Sirach) has some 16 fewerverses in the NAB (’70 and ’86) and 13fewer verses in the CRSV than the Vulgateand DRB! (The JB has the full 47.) Accord-ing to these modern translators, apparentlythe Church for all these centuries waswrong for using these verses that, accord-ing to them, are not even part of authenticScripture! One is forced to ask himself,“How much do they expect us to swallow

“I Am the Mother of Fair Love . . .” 29

before we say, ‘Enough already!’ ”One is reminded of the solemn decree of

the Council of Trent issued in 1546: “Ifanyone does not accept as sacred andcanonical the aforesaid [72] books in theirentirety and with all their parts, as theyhave been accustomed to be read in theCatholic Church and as they are containedin the old Latin Vulgate Edition, andknowingly and deliberately rejects theaforesaid traditions, let him be anathema.”(Canons and Decrees of the Council ofTrent, Sess. IV, “Decree concerning theCanonical Scriptures,” April 8, 1546).

“Wheresoever the Body Shall Be . . .”

A very unusual verse appears inMatthew 24:28, which occurs in the midstof Our Lord’s description and propheciesabout the “consummation of the world.”(This verse is in the Gospel reading for theLast Sunday after Pentecost in the Tradi-tional Latin Rite Liturgy.) Our Lord hasbeen describing all the terrible things thatare to come to pass at that time, whenseemingly “out of the blue” appears thisincredible verse: “Wheresoever the body


shall be, there shall the eagles also begathered together.” (DRB). (Matt. 24:28).

What does it mean? Cast in the futuretense, it is a prophecy: “body” refers to: theEucharistic Body of Christ, which at theEnd of Time will not be found just every-where. For we know that Antichrist willtake away the Perpetual Sacrifice (cf.Daniel 8:11-14), and we know that theGreat Apostasy will have occurred that wasmentioned by St. Paul in 2 Thessalonians2:3. Also, we know that Our Lord asked theApostles, “But yet the Son of man, when hecometh, shall he find, think you, faith onearth?” (Luke 18:8), which would imply ananswer of “No” and that therefore the Masswould be very scarce. But where the Massis found, where the Eucharistic Body ofChrist is located, “there shall the eagles,”the Saints of the Catholic Church, be gath-ered together, for these people aloneunderstand spiritually, and in the eyes ofGod they soar above the rest of mankindlike eagles with sharp eyesight and a wideperspective of the true meaning of humanexistence; whereas, most people, interestedonly in the things of this world, grovelabout on the ground, hindered by a spiri-tual myopia—if not indeed being totally

“Wheresoever the Body Shall Be . . .” 31

blind to the true meaning of man’s exis-tence. (Such is also very much the gist ofSt. Alphonsus Liguori’s traditional analysisof this verse in Chapter 21 of Visits to theBlessed Sacrament. St. Alphonsus—1696-1797—was a Doctor of the Church.)

The eagle, moreover, feeds on livingflesh. And what did Our Lord say of HisEucharistic Body: “My flesh is meatindeed” (John 6:56); “I am the livingbread which came down from Heaven”(John 6:51); etc. Plus, the eagle is a warbird and the sign of the soldier. Now theCatholic Church on earth is the ChurchMilitant, the Church fighting—as soldiersof Christ.

All this meaning comes forth out of oneshort, compact verse of Scripture! And aperson can see from this one short versejust how very rich, how poetic, how incred-ibly powerful the Bible can be, even in Eng-lish . . . when properly translated!

But now, how do the new bibles translatethis beautiful and consoling prophecy ofOur Lord? Just consider the following:

“Where the carcass lies, there the vul-tures gather.” (NAB, ’70).

“Wherever the corpse is, there the vul-


tures will gather.” (NAB, ’86).“Wherever the body is, there the eagles

will be gathered together.” (CRSV, ’66).“Wherever the corpse is, there will the

vultures gather.” (JB, ’66).“Wherever there is a carcass, there the

vultures will gather.” (NIV, ’78).“Wherever the corpse is, there the vul-

tures will gather.” (NRSV, ’89).“For wherever the carcass is, there the

eagles will be gathered together.” (NKJV,’85).

“Wherever the corpse is, there the vul-tures will gather.” (NASV, ’77).

“Wherever the corpse is, there the vul-tures will gather.” (NEB, ’76).

Gone is the prophecy! Gone is the poetry!Gone the beautiful symbolism! Gone arethe consolation and the hope! And in theirplace? At best a trite little truism. Butwhen read in the context of Matthew 24,these new translations, save for the CRSV,have no meaning at all. Worded in the tra-ditional way, however, the verse is rich andredolent with meaning, as seen above.

Only the Catholic Edition of the RevisedStandard Version translates the passagecorrectly; whereas, all the others do not.

“Wheresoever the Body Shall Be . . .” 33

(However, the CRSV makes errors in otherpassages, as we shall observe furtheralong.)

St. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate translatesthis verse: “Ubicumque (Wherever) fuerit(it will be) corpus (the body) illic (there)congregabuntur (shall be gathered) et (also)aquilae (eagles).” It is pretty hard to mis-take aquilae; it simply means “eagles.” TheGreek original says: “hópou ’eán (Where-soever) �e (shall be) tò (the) ptõma (body),’ekei (there) sunachthésontai (shall be gath-ered) hoi (the) ’aetoí (eagles). Aetophóros inGreek, for example, means a “standard-bearer,” literally, the “eagle-bearer,” theone who carries the eagle (comparable toChristophóros, “Christ-bearer,” from whichwe have the name Christopher).

Ancient armies would not have beencaught dead mounting a vulture on theirstandards. If ’aetoi were “vultures,” theGreek-speaking St. Jerome would surelyhave called them “vultures.” If we todayknow what vultures are, you can be sureSt. Jerome did! He was a man so eminenthe was almost elected Pope when hisfriend, Pope St. Damasus I (366-384), died.


“Let All Your Things Be Done in Charity”

But there are other instances as wellwhich show the glaring differences betweenthe Douay-Rheims Version and the threemodern Catholic versions of the Bible. Consider the following:

The New American Bible, the JerusalemBible and the Catholic Revised StandardVersion (being new Catholic bibles) allsubstitute the word “love” for “charity,” forexample, in 1 Corinthians 16:14, St. Paulsays, “Let all your things be done incharity.” (DRB). Whereas, the otherssay,

“Do everything with love.” (NAB, ’70).“Your every act should be done with

love.” (NAB, ’86).“Let all that you do be done in love.”

(CRSV, ’66).“Let everything you do be done in love.”

(JB, ’66).“Let all that you do be done with love.”

(NKJV, ’85).“Do everything in love.” (NIV, ’78).“Let all that you do be done in love.”

(NRSV, ’89).

“Let All . . . Be Done in Charity” 35

“Let all that you do be done in love.”(NASV, ’77).

“Let all you do be done in love.” (NEB,’76). (Emphasis added to all quotes above.)

In Latin, it reads: “Omnia (all [things])vestra (your) in (in) charitate (charity) fiant(let [them] be done).” (Latin Vulgate). InGreek, it reads: “Pánta (all things) hum�on(your) ’en (in) ’’agápe (charity) ginéstho (let[them] be done).” (Liddell-Scott’s Lexicon of1889 gives “love” as the translation for’agápe, but in the sense of “esp. brotherlylove, charity; the love of God for man andof man for God. N.T.”—Page 4). Therefore,“charity” best translates this type of “love.”

The Greek word for human love is philía,for sexual love is ’éros, but for divine loveit is ’agápe; now, St. Paul used ’agápe, whichSt. Jerome translated as charitas, which inEnglish is charity. The Greek philíabecomes in Latin amor and in English love.“Charity” in the Catholic sense is “divinelove”—love of God for man, love of man forGod, and love of man for his fellow men,out of love for God—and “charity,” more-over, has a connotation of being temperedwith justice and truth; and when referringto man, it includes his being in the state of


Sanctifying Grace. The English word “love,”however, simply does not convey this fullermeaning.

One has to wonder how so many versionsof the Bible can all agree to be wrong onthe translation of this one common word inthe Bible—but a word denoting the mostimportant Christian virtue, namely charity.

“Amen, Amen, I Say to You . . .”

The Hebrew word amen has beenbrought over into Greek, into Latin andinto English, because there is simply noequivalent to it in any other language. Ithas a meaning of solemnly calling thehearer to witness the truth of what isabout to be said, and in the New Testa-ment only Our Lord used it. The Douay-Rheims Version retains it, but the modernCatholic versions bend over backwards totranslate it, although it is truly untrans-latable and is already a bona fide Englishword. Witness John 8:58:

“Amen, amen I say to you, beforeAbraham was made, I am.” (DRB). Nowconsider the three new Catholic versionsand the Protestant versions:

“Amen, Amen, I Say to You . . .” 37

“I solemnly declare it: before Abrahamcame to be, I AM.” (NAB, ’70).

“Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abra-ham was, I am.” (CRSV, ’66).

“I tell you most solemnly, before Abra-ham ever was, I Am.” (JB, ’66).

“Most assuredly, I say to you, beforeAbraham was, I AM.” (NKJV, ’85).

“I tell you the truth, . . . before Abrahamwas born, I am.” (NIV, ’78).

“Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abra-ham was born, I am!” (NASV, ’77).

“Very truly, I tell you, before Abrahamwas, I am.” (NRSV, ’89).

“In very truth I tell you, before Abrahamwas born, I am.” (NEB, ’76).

“Amen, amen, I say to you” has a powerthe other translations do not even ap-proach. (By the way, notice the powerfulcontrast in the Douay-Rheims Biblebetween “was made,” regarding Abraham,and “I am,” regarding God; the other trans-lations miss this subtlety also. The Greekgenesthaí comes from gígnomai and means“to come into being,” according to Liddell-Scott, p. 164, and thus “to be made,” whichSt. Jerome translates as fieret (“to come tobe”), meaning literally, “was made.” That is


why the Douay-Rheims translates this verbas “was made.”

Now consider the 1986 version of theNew American Bible: “Amen, amen, I say toyou, before Abraham came to be, I AM.”(NAB, ’86). This new version is almostidentical to the Douay-Rheims, except totranslate genesthaí as “came to be,” ratherthan “was made.” Apparently the NewAmerican Bible translators have been lis-tening to some criticism of their work.

“Being of One Mind One Towards Another”

Now let us look at Romans 12:16 whereSt. Paul says, “Being of one mind onetowards another.” (DRB). The four newCatholic versions say,

“Have the same attitude toward all.”(NAB, ’70).

“Have the same regard for one another.”(NAB, ’86).

“Live in harmony with one another.”(CRSV, ’66).

“Treat everyone with equal kindness.”(JB, ’66).

“Being of One Mind . . .” 39

The five Protestant versions read as follows:

“Be of the same mind toward oneanother.” (NKJV, ’85).

“Live in harmony with one another.”(NIV, ’78).

“Live in harmony with one another.”(NRSV, ’89).

“Be of the same mind toward oneanother.” (NASV, ’77).

“Care as much about each other as aboutyourselves.” (NEB, ’76)

The New King James Version and the NewAmerican Standard Version are compara-ble to the Douay-Rheims and the rest areidentical to each other.

The Greek is clearer than the Latin inthis verse and is easier to translate. TheLatin is very compressed and takes a goodknowledge of that language to see themeaning, which is much clearer in theoriginal Greek. The Vulgate reads: “Idip-sum (The same thing) invicem (mutually,reciprocally, one to another) sentientes(thinking, feeling).” Just three Latinwords! In Greek it reads: “Tò (The) a’utò(same) ’eis (towards) ’all-élous (one another)


phrono�untes (being of a mind, being like-minded).”

Both the Greek original and the Latin ofSt. Jerome use a participle (“being mindedthe same,” “thinking the same”), ratherthan the imperative (or commanding) formof the verb, which is used in all the Englishtranslations above, except the Douay-Rheims, which retains the participial formof the verb (“being”). This change from theparticiple to the imperative form of the verbis a pure invention on the part of the mod-ern translators. If the original uses a par-ticiple, the translation should also use it. Ifone will look at the Greek transliterationgiven above, he will see that it matches vir-tually perfectly with the Douay-Rheimstranslation. This is an excellent example ofthe extreme precision with which theDouay-Rheims Bible is translated—not justfrom the Latin Vulgate alone, but from theGreek “original” as well. This verse is some-thing of a snarl to translate from the Latin,but the Douay-Rheims does it admirably,retaining both the meaning and the word-ing of the Greek “original.”

The three Catholic translations are alldifferent! Is it the same book being trans-lated? There is a BIG difference between

“Being of One Mind . . .” 41

our “being of one mind one towardsanother” and the other translations. Thefirst is mutual, a fact clearly indicated inthe Greek “original” and in St. Jerome’sVulgate; it pertains to the way Christiansare to behave toward each other, since weare “one body in Christ.” (Rom. 12:5).

Christians are enjoined by St. Paul inEphesians 4:3-6, “to keep the unity of theSpirit . . . One body and one spirit . . . inone hope . . . One Lord, one faith, one bap-tism. One God and Father of all . . .”(DRB). (Emphasis added). In other words,there is only One Body of Christ, only oneTrue Religion of God—there cannot bemany. Therefore, the clear meaningimplied in Romans 12:16 is that there isonly one True Church! And we Christiansshould be of “one mind, one towardsanother” because we are all of one belief,one philosophy and one theology, all mem-bers of the Mystical Body of Christ. The Douay-Rheims translation here ex-presses the concept perfectly because ittranslates the “original” Greek perfectly.From this short passage alone, one canbegin to understand the ramifications ofthese seemingly “little” changes made inthe modern English bibles.


“And the Gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail Against It.”

Most people are familiar with Matthew16:18-19 where Our Lord says, “And I sayto thee: That thou art Peter; and uponthis rock I will build my church, andthe gates of hell shall not prevailagainst it.” (DRB). Whereas the four newCatholic versions say,

“ . . . and the jaws of death shall not pre-vail against it.” (NAB, ’70).

“ . . . and the gates of the netherworldshall not prevail against it.” (NAB, ’86).

“ . . . and the powers of death shall notprevail against it.” (CRSV, ’66).

“ . . . And the gates of the underworldcan never hold out against it.” (JB, ’66).

The five Protestant versions say,

“ . . . and the gates of Hades shall notprevail against it.” (NKJV, ’85).

“ . . . and the gates of Hades will notovercome it.” (NIV, ’78).

“. . . and the gates of Hades will not pre-vail against it.” (NRSV, ’89).

“And the Gates of Hell . . .” 43

“ . . . and the gates of Hades shall notoverpower it.” (NASV, ’77).

“ . . . and the powers of death shall neverconquer it.” (NEB, ’76).

Not one of these eight versions uses theword “Hell,” substituting instead, “death,”“netherworld,” “underworld,” or “Hades”;whereas, the Douay-Rheims Bible uses“Hell” without shame or apology. If a trans-lation does not call Hell “Hell,” how arepeople supposed to know the Bible is saying“Hell”?

The Latin Vulgate reads as follows: “ . . . ét (and) portae (gates) inferi (of thelower world, or Hell) non (not) praevale-bunt (shall prevail) adversus (against) eam(it).” In Greek it reads: “ . . . kaì (and) púlai(the gates) hádou (of Hell, Hades) o ’u (not)katischúsousin (shall prevail against) a ’ut�es(it).”

The question in this passage comes downto how to translate correctly the Greekword hádou (which means, “Hell” or Hades)and the Latin inferi (“of the lower world,”or “Hell”). Obviously, it is wrong to trans-late these two words as “death,” for inGreek the word for death is thánatos, andin Latin mors, mortis (“death”). It is also


incorrect to use the word “Hades,” whichdepicts the state to which the souls of thedead go in the conception of the Greeks andRomans of the pre-Christian era; and“Hades” is definitely not an equivalent tothe Christian concept of Hell, which entailsa state of everlasting damnation, separa-tion from God forever, an unquenchablefire, and unimaginable torment at thehands of the devils.

Hades, the underworld, the netherworld,on the other hand, represent a state of gen-eral sorrow and sadness at not being aliveand at being separated from one’s lovedones in the world. The idea of Hades wasindistinct in the minds of the pre-Christian(non-Israelite) ancients, who had not yetreceived the revelation of Christ.

The Christian concept of Hell and thepre-Christian concept of Hades are vastlydifferent indeed, and whereas the Greekand Latin words for our Christian notionof Hell are the same as those which repre-sent the pre-Christian conception of theafterlife in the lower world, their transla-tion has to be taken in the Christian con-ception of Hell, because they appear in theChristian, divinely inspired Scripture.“Hádes (Vulg. infernus) in the New Testa-

“And the Gates of Hell . . .” 45

ment always designates the Hell of thedamned.” (“Hell,” Cath. Encyclopedia,1910, Vol. VII, p. 207). Therefore, the onlyway to translate these words from theGreek original and from the Latin is by theEnglish word “Hell.” It is Hell they referto and it is “Hell” they should becalled!

It is a dreadful mistake and a terribledisservice for modern translators to use“underworld,” “netherworld,” or “Hades” torepresent the Christian concept of Hellbecause Hades (etc.) is the meaning of theword for the pre-Christian ancient peoples.And it is a travesty to call it “death.”“Netherworld” indeed! The Catholic notionof Hell reflected on even momentarily issufficient to put the fear of God into justabout anyone! “Netherworld” leaves oneunmoved. And “the gates of hell shall notprevail against it” is an open prophecy thatthe devils will try their utmost to destroyChrist’s Church, the vehicle of salvation forall mankind, but that they will fail. Yet allthis understanding is gone from the mod-ern translations of this passage. Any priestor bishop who can recommend these new“bibles,” knowing this type of glaring errorexists in them, will have to answer to Our


Lord for the souls he has thereby allowed to be deceived!

“How Shall This Be Done . . .?”

In Luke 1:34 we read, “And Mary saidto the angel: How shall this be done,because I know not man?” (DRB).

“Shall be done” in Greek is estai, a sim-ple future tense—the sentence reads: “Põs(How) ’éstai (shall be done) to�uto (this), ’epeì(because) ’ándra (man) ’oú (not) ginósko (Iknow)? St. Jerome in the Latin Vulgatetranslates it, “Quomodo (in what manner,how) fiet (shall be done) istud (this), quo-niam (because) virum (man) non (not)cognosco (I know).” (In Biblical terminol-ogy, the verb “to know” can refer to theintimate relations between a man and awoman.)

Now watch what the modern linguisticmagicians do:

“How can this be since I do not knowman?” (NAB, ’70).

“How can this be, since I have no rela-tions with a man?” (NAB, ’86).

“But how can this come about, since I ama virgin?” (JB, ’66).

“How Shall This Be Done . . .?” 47

“How can this be, since I have no hus-band?” (CRSV, ’66). (Consider the absolutesilliness of this version—especially today,when the illegitimacy rate in the U.S. isover fifty percent.)

Now let us consider the five Protestant ren-derings:

“How can this be, since I am a virgin?”(NASV, ’77).

“ ‘How will this be,’ Mary asked theAngel, ‘since I am a virgin?’ ” (NIV, ’78).

“How can this be, since I am a virgin?”(NRSV, ’89).

“How can this be, since I do not know aman?” (NKJV, ’85).

“ ‘How can this be?’ said Mary; ‘I am stilla virgin.’ ” (NEB, ’76, emphasis added).

Notice that changing “How shall this bedone” to “How can this be” makes Maryappear to doubt the Angel’s words as didZachary when told that his wife would beara son in her old age. (Luke 1:5-20). In fact,Scripture later records that St. Elizabethpraised Our Lady precisely because she didbelieve the Angel: “And blessed art thouthat hast believed, because those things


shall be accomplished that were spoken tothee by the Lord.” (Luke 1:45, DRB). Alsonote that in the “original” Greek no men-tion is made about Mary’s being a virgin,let alone, “still a virgin.” The “original”Greek simply says, “I know not man,”which means that she is a virgin and canimply that she plans to remain such.

This verse is another example of pureinvention on the part of the translators;introducing “can” for “shall” alters theentire tone of the verse. But the mostamazing aspect is that these new transla-tions all ape one another in their error ofintroducing the word “can” with nothing inthe original Greek to warrant their devia-tion from what Scripture actually says here(not to mention their adding the words“virgin,” “still a virgin,” etc.). Their con-trivances are an insult to a person’s intel-ligence and a blasphemy against AlmightyGod in His Revealed Word. (After all, it isHis Word, not theirs!) The New EnglishBible would go so far as to imply that Maryplanned some day to marry and have chil-dren; whereas, our Catholic Traditions saythat she had already made a vow of vir-ginity, and official Catholic Traditionteaches that she did in fact remain a virgin

“How Shall This Be Done . . .?” 49

all her life. What will become of ourCatholic traditions if they are implicitlycontradicted by the very Bible translationsauthorized by our bishops, for who wouldknow that these new renderings are oftenonly approximate “translations,” save onefamiliar with the original language?

Judas’ Betrayal

Let us now consider a brief passage fromthe arrest of Jesus. When Judas and thecrowd came to apprehend Jesus in theGarden of Gethsemane, Jesus asked Judasa question, as recorded in Matthew 26:50.In the Catholic Revised Standard Versionit reads, “Friend, why are you here?”(CRSV, ’66). In the New King James Ver-sion it goes, “Friend, why have you come?”(NKJV, ’85).

But in the Vulgate it is simply: “Amice(Friend), ad (to) quid (what) venisti (haveyou come)?” In Greek it reads, “ ‘Heta�ire(Companion, Friend), ’eph’ (to) hò (what)párei (are you come)?” ’Eph is a form of ’epì,used here with the accusative case (a directobject); ’epì with the accusative has a dualmeaning. It can mean “to a place or state”(“To what have you come?”), or “for a pur-


pose” (“What have you come for?”). Boththe Latin Vulgate and the Douay-RheimsBible preserve this subtle ambiguity of theGreek, leaving the symbolic meaning alsostill present—as one can well imagine theinfinite intelligence of Our Lord instillinginto this question. But the other newCatholic translations and the NIV, NRSVand NASV make this verse into an imper-ative sentence.

“Friend, do what you are here for!” (NAB,’70).

“Friend, do what you have come for.(NAB, ’86).

“My Friend, do what you are here for.”(JB, ’66).

“Friend, do what you came for.” (NIV, ’78).“Friend, do what you are here to do.”

(NRSV, ’89).“Friend, do what you have come for.”

(NASV, ’77).“Friend, do what you are here to do.”

(NEB, ’76).

Not a one of these “translations” isrendering what Scripture says! Theyare all rewording this verse into either aprosaic question or an imperative sentence

Judas’ Betrayal 51

that commands Judas to do what he camefor. One has to ask, “Where did they getthese contrivances?” They are not in theLatin Vulgate, and they are definitely notin the Greek “original.” We are not consid-ering here Hebrew or Chaldaic, over whichsome arcane argument might be intro-duced, but Greek, a language commonlytaught in most universities.

But now listen to the Douay-RheimsBible: “Friend, whereto art thou come?”(DRB). This is a two-pronged question, justas in the Greek and Latin: “Why are youhere?” and “To what a state have youcome?” Considered in the second sense,what is this question if not a moral rebukeleveled at Judas, which says in effect,“Friend, to what a state have you fallen tobetray Me, the Son of Man, your God andRedeemer?” “How low have you descendedto be able to do this to your God?”

But Our Lord can also ask the very samequestion of anyone who commits a sin andthereby betrays Him. Therefore, this is aquestion asked, not just of Judas, butof us all! To what a state, indeed, dowe descend to betray the Son of God by our sins, by our moral rebellion?A person can pause here to meditate long


and fruitfully on these five simple wordsfrom the Douay-Rheims. But in all theother versions, they become only part of anarrative—nothing to contemplate, nothingover which to call ourselves to task. No,just . . . on with the story, for more andmore bland narrative!

Whereas, in the Douay-Rheims Bible,Our Lord utters a short, verbal stab thatgoes right to the heart of every sinner—something that can be said to him aboutevery sin he commits—mortal or venial!For all sins are a betrayal of Christ, of HisPerson, of His Law, of His love. Every sinis a lie; it is also an idol—a false god—thatwe sinners place before the one, true God.In sum, it is a rejection and a betrayal ofHim—plus that which caused His bitteragony and death. All this meaning fromfive simple words of Scripture . . . butScripture faithfully translated!

“Peace on Earth . . .”

One of the most interesting examples todemonstrate how the modern translatorsoften differ from St. Jerome’s Latin VulgateBible occurs in Luke 2:14, where the Angelsat the birth of Jesus are singing in their

“Peace on Earth . . .” 53

praise:“Glory to God in the highest; and on

earth, peace to men of good will.”(DRB).

The ways this verse is translated in thevarious modern versions contain two exam-ples of typical problems the translators facewhen they depart from St. Jerome’s LatinVulgate Bible. The first of these problemsis exemplified by the translation of thisverse in the original King James Version of1611, which translation is then repeated bythe NKJV, seemingly because this versethe way the KJV rendered it is so famous.In both the KJV and NKJV it reads:

“Glory to God in the highest, and onearth peace, good will toward men.”(KJV and NKJV, emphasis added).

This translation conveys a fundamentallydifferent concept from that of the DRB andLatin Vulgate. The KJV and NKJV implythat there is now “an open divine accordand peace with mankind,” whereas theDRB, reflecting the Latin Vulgate of St. Jerome, says, “peace to men of goodwill”—with the implication of only “to menof good will.”


Which is right? How did the King JamesCommission arrive at this translation?(And is that sufficient reason for the NKJVto retain it?) For the NKJV is the only ver-sion that does retain this translationamong the 10 versions compared here. (St.Jerome in his Latin Vulgate obviously doesnot agree with this translation either.)

To answer these two questions, let usfirst consider the Latin Vulgate translationand then the edition of the “original” Greekavailable to us today:

In Latin, the words are verbatim thesame as in the DRB: “Gloria (Glory) in (in)altissimis (the highest) Deo (to God), et(and) in (on) terra (earth) pax (peace)hominibus (to men) bonae (of good) volun-tatis (will).”

And in the Greek, they are again wordfor word the same: “Dóxa (Glory) ’en (in)hupsístois (the highest) Theó (to God) kaì(and) ’epì (on) g�es (earth) ’eiréne (peace) ’en(to) ’anthrópois (men) e ’udokías (of goodwill).” (Cf. Liddell-Scott, e ’udokía, p. 324.)

The difference in translation in the KJVand NKJV from the DRB and all othermodern translations cited here, plus in theLatin Vulgate, comes down to the “case” of


the Greek word e ’udokías, which is a pos-sessive (i.e., genitive) case form, as givenhere. But some Greek texts have e ’udokíasas e ’udokía, which is a nominative caseform, i.e., the case of the subject of a sen-tence. The KJV and NKJV are based onthis other Greek version. Therefore, theKJV and NKJV are considering e ’udokíaeither an appositive of the subject of thesentence (i.e., a repeat), or the second halfof a compound subject: “. . . peace, good willtoward men.” The DRB translates e ’udokíasas “of good will,” which is how St. Jerometranslates it (bonae voluntatis).

However, one should note well that boththe KJV and NKJV translate e ’udokías (i.e.,e ’udokía to them) as “good will.” Thisagrees with the DRB, but it is in con-tradistinction to all the other moderntranslations compared here, other than theDRB. (This is an important point which weshall discuss later in this section.)

This discrepancy in the Greek text is anexample of the reason the Douay-RheimsBible translators adopted a policy of trust-ing St. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate over theGreek versions when there occurs a differ-ence in the ancient texts, because in theirwords, the Vulgate is “more pure then the


Hebrew or Greeke now extant” and “thesame Latin hath bene farre better conservedfrom corruptions.” (Preface to the Douay OldTestament). (This greater fidelity in the Vul-gate was due in large part to there being farmore copies made of the Vulgate than of theGreek and Hebrew bibles.)

Here, it seems to this writer, we need todefer to St. Jerome and to trust in God’sprovidence that the Greek text he trans-lated from was correct and that he trans-lated it correctly. From numerous passagesin both the Old and New Testaments, forexample, one can clearly see that God dis-tinguishes between the “just” (the good,those “in the state of sanctifying grace”)and the “unjust” (mortal sinners) in Hisrelationship to human beings. He does nothold out open “good will” to mortal sinners,but dire warnings (and even threatenedpunishments) that they should changetheir ways. From this fact alone—i.e., thedisagreement between the message of“peace, good will to men” (KJV, NKJV) andthe warnings to and strictures against sin-ners in the rest of the Bible—it would seemfar wiser to accept St. Jerome (and hiswording of “peace to men of good will”), forhe was Greek-speaking from birth, was


closer than we to the writing of the NewTestament by (now) some 1,600 years, andhad many manuscripts to work from thatare no longer extant.

The point is not really hard; it comesdown to this: trusting St. Jerome and theHoly Spirit—St. Jerome because he wasGreek-speaking, a genius, a Saint (he trans-lated on his knees in prayer and humilityand was obviously singled out by God to dowhat he did) and the Holy Spirit becauseHe allowed THIS translation to stand from409 to 1611, before it was challenged by theProtestants with the KJV. One has to askhimself: “Were all those Catholic centurieslost in the darkness of ignorance about thisScripture passage until enlightened by theProtestants?” Or, did the Catholic Churchhave it right all along?

Now let us consider the second problem:what the other versions do with e ’udokías(“of good will”) in this verse.

Every other version in English cited here has something quite different from “ofgood will” that we find in the Douay-Rheims, the Latin Vulgate, and the Greek“original”—and even from the KJV andNKJV. Here are these modern transla-


tions:

“Glory to God in high heaven, peace onearth to those on whom his favor rests.”(NAB, ’70, emphasis added).

“Glory to God in the highest, and onearth peace to those on whom his favorrests.” (NAB, ’86, emphasis added).

“Glory to God in the highest heaven, andpeace to men who enjoy his favour.” (JB,’66, emphasis added).

“Glory to God in the highest, and onearth peace among men with whom he ispleased.” (CRSV, ’66 and NASV, ’77,emphasis added).

“Glory to God in the highest heaven, andon earth peace among those whom hefavors!” (NRSV, ’89, emphasis added).

“Glory to God in the highest, and onearth peace to men on whom his favorrests.” (NIV, ’78, emphasis added).

“Glory to God in highest heaven, and onearth his peace for men on whom his favorrests.” (NEB, ’76, emphasis added).

What leads to the wide disparity amongtranslations of this passage between theDRB on the one hand and all these othersis that the Greek noun e ’udokía(s) is


just plain hard to translate. The Greek-English Lexicon by Liddell-Scott gives twomeanings for e ’udokía: “satisfaction” or“approval.” However, neither one of thesefits the context of the sentence, nor do theyagree with the Latin Vulgate, the Douay-Rheims Bible, or even the King James Ver-sions. To translate the verse “. . . peace tomen of satisfaction” or “. . . peace to men ofapproval” would be stupid, so the moderntranslators did not do this. It is the opin-ion of this writer that they were stumped,that the correct English translation for theword as used in this passage simply is notfound in today’s Greek-English lexicons,and therefore, as an intelligent way out oftheir problem, they would seem to havegone to those famous passages in the NewTestament where God the Father, at Jesus’baptism and transfiguration, says, “This ismy beloved Son, in whom I am wellpleased” (Matt. 3:17, and Matt. 17:5, DRB),plus other similar passages, and built up ameaning out of the verb form of e ’udokías—which they knew the meaning of.

The Greek form of the verb for “am wellpleased” is e ’udókesa, which is very similarin form to the noun e ’udokía. Thus, in theopinion of this writer, they improvised


translations such as “. . . on whom his favorrests” (NAB, ’70 and ’86, NIV, ’78 and NEB’76), “. . . who enjoy his favor” (JB, ’66), “. . . with whom he is pleased” (CRSV andNASV), and “. . . among those whom hefavors” (NRSV, ’89).

One has to admit that this is very inge-nious of the translators because they canthereby render an approximate meaningthat fits the context of the sentence, thegeneral meaning of the Vulgate and thetraditional English of the DRB. There isonly one problem, however: This is notwhat the Bible says—not in the Greektext nor in the Vulgate! These modernversions are putting words into the mouthof St. Matthew—and in turn, of AlmightyGod, who inspired the Scriptures—wordsthat are just not there and in turn that arechanging the meaning of the verse. (Notice,e.g., that “peace on earth” is entirely gonefrom the JB.)

What does the Greek say? “. . . kaì (and)’epi (on) g�es (earth) ’eiréne (peace) ’en (to)anthrópois (men) e ’udokías (‘of good’ some-thing or other)” . . . “will,” according to St.Jerome, but definitely not “satisfaction” or“approval,” as Liddell-Scott gives the trans-lation). We know that e ’udokías is the pos-


sessive form of the noun and that theGreek prefix e ’u- means “good” or “well.”(We still use this prefix in English, as in“eulogy,” “eugenics,” “euphemism,” etc.)Therefore we know two of the three com-ponents of e ’udokías, namely, “of ” and“good.” It comes down to this, then: whatdoes the -dokías part mean?

The answer is really not very hard: Wejust need to accept St. Jerome’s render-ing—“of good will.” The KJV did—at leastthe “good will” part. What is the problemwith accepting St. Jerome? It is the opin-ion of this writer that today’s Greek lexi-cons and dictionaries have lost the “goodwill” meaning of e ’udokía; probably it was a4th or 5th meaning of the noun, or maybea 10th or 12th, and its meaning has beenlost to the scholars who have had to assem-ble their mighty, brilliant lexicons from themany usages of the words found in all ofancient literature. But did they capture forposterity all the meanings in all the pas-sages? This would seem hardly likely! Onlyan army of scholars in our own time, usinga capacious computer system, could evenapproach this objective . . . and that onlyafter many years of work.

The reader will perhaps forebear a


homely, first-hand example to illustrate thepoint: Recently in this writer’s office, heused a common word no one had ever heardused that way. The unabridged Webster’sDictionary gave this usage as the 13thmeaning of the word. Sixteen hundredyears from now, will scholars still knowthis 13th meaning of that word? Probablynot! The correct meaning of e ’udokías isprobably in that same situation vis-a-visthe modern translators. But if it is a bonafide 4th or 6th or 8th or 10th meaning ofthe word, do you suppose the Greek St.Jerome knew it? The safer bet is that hedid. Just look at what he did with it: “ofgood will” is simple, straight-forward andintelligible; also, it fits—not just linguisti-cally, but with the entire theology of theBible! Plus, it has lasted 16 centuries reallyunchallenged, even by the original KJV.(The King James Commission also called it“good will.”) Should not modern scholarsthen also accept it today—trusting that inthe mind of that ancient Greek Saint theprecise meaning of e ’udokías was surelyand safely stored away, so that, in God’sprovidence, he could give it to us?

Then too, let us consider that the intel-lectuals of St. Jerome’s day throughout the


Roman Empire all knew Greek and Latin,and they all accepted his translation. Ifthe whole Greco-Roman intellectual worldaccepted it, why do modern translatorshave a problem with it? What is afoot here?Are the modern translators uncircumspectas to ask us to accept their contrived trans-lation—because their lexicons do not trans-late e ’udokías as “of good will” (bonaevoluntatis)—when the whole Greek-and-Latin-speaking ancient world did accept it?Which side has the greater probability foraccuracy? If a person’s life depended on thechoice, there is not a doubt which way hewould decide. (In this writer’s experience,learned people can often get bollixed up bynot carefully thinking through all theimplications of what they are doing or writ-ing when it flies in the face of tradition.)

The Latin Vulgate definitely does notsay, “peace, good will toward men,” as theKJV and NKJV version would have it,implying thereby an equal good will to “allmen.” St. Paul, before his conversion, wastruly a man on whom God’s favor rested,but can we believe that, while he was per-secuting the Church, God would wish him“peace,” rather than a very disturbed con-science, until such time as he would


become “of good will”? (Christ knocked himoff his horse and temporarily blinded himto wake him up!) There is truly a differencebetween “God’s favor” on the one hand and“good will” in one’s heart on the other. Arewe to imagine that the Angels, with theirpure, untrammeled intellects, did not seethe truth in such an elementary matter?

And how the NAB can go so far as not totranslate ánthropois as “men” displays afreedom with the text that simply fails torespect what the Bible says. Every adultcan see that our word “anthropology,” “thestudy of man,” comes etymologically fromthe Greek word anthropos, “man.” Grantedthe translators of the NAB may want touse terms “inclusive” of men and women,yet clearly that is not what Scripture says.

A translation that takes such liberties istruly only an approximation of what theBible actually says. And yet it is the NABthat outsells all other Catholic Bibles com-bined, because the clergy and teachers pro-mote it. Also, it is the version usually usedin the new Catholic liturgy in English inthe U.S. It is the version most Catholicschool children are sent off to procure. Butwhat if a person were to attempt to do St.Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises using the New


American Bible; would he ever arrive at apenetration of what the Bible really means,or would he derive only some vague approx-imation of the meaning—if even that?

Are we to discard the time-honored useof “man” and “men” to refer in a genericsense to all mankind, now that the fad ofmodern feminism has been foisted on theworld—as if Jesus Christ did not truly lib-erate women 2000 years ago and raisethem to a dignity in many ways superior toman’s . . . from which current women’s lib-eration has only dragged them down?

“What Does It Profit . . .?”

In Matthew 16:26 there occurs one of themost arresting and sobering statementsever uttered by Our Lord—one that, in asingle verse, casts man’s entire existenceon this earth into stark and clear perspec-tive. He said: “For what does it profit aman, if he gain the whole world, andsuffer the loss of his own soul? Orwhat exchange shall a man give for hissoul?” (DRB).

In Latin this passage reads: “Quid(What) enim (for) prodest (does it profit)homini (a man), si (if) mundum (the world)


universum (entire) lucretur (he gain), ani-mae (of soul) vero (but) suae (his own)detrimentum (loss) patiatur (he suffer)? Aut(Or) quam (what) dabit (shall he give)homo (a man) commutationen (in exchange)pro (for) anima (soul) sua (his)?”

In Greek it reads: “Tí (What) gàr (for) ’-ophel -eth-ésetai (does it profit) ’ánthropos (aman) ’eàn (if) tón (the) kósmon (world)hólon (whole) kerd-ésé (he gain), tèn (the) dè(but) psuchèn (soul) aùto�u (of himself) z -

emi-oth�e (suffers the loss of)? ’E (Or) tí (what)d -ósei (shall give) ’ánthropos (a man) ’antál-lagma (as exchange for) tãs (the) psuchãs(soul) a ’uto�u (of himself)?

Now consider what the new Catholicbibles do with this gem:

“What profit would a man show if hewere to gain the whole world and destroyhimself in the process? What can a manoffer in exchange for his very self?” (NAB,’70).

“What profit would there be for one togain the whole world and forfeit his life? Orwhat can one give in exchange for his life?”(NAB, ’86—emphasis added).

“For what will it profit a man if he gainsthe whole world and forfeits his life? Or

“What Does It Profit a Man . . .?” 67

what shall a man give in return for hislife?” (CRSV, ’66—emphasis added).

“What then will a man gain if he winsthe whole world and ruins his life? Or whathas a man to offer in exchange for his life?”(JB ’66—emphasis added).

Now consider the Protestant versions:“For what will it profit them if they gain

the whole world but forfeit their life? Orwhat will they give in return for their life?”(NRSV, ’89, emphasis added). (The trans-lators of the NRSV do not even use the sin-gular in this version, substituting “they”for “he”.)

“What will a man gain by winning thewhole world, at the cost of his true self? Orwhat can he give that will buy that selfback?” (NEB, ’76).

“For what is a man profited if he gainsthe whole world, and loses his own soul? Orwhat will a man give in exchange for hissoul?” (NKJV, ’85).

“What good will it be for a man if hegains the whole world, yet forfeits his soul?Or what can a man give in exchange for hissoul?” (NIV, ’78).

“For what will a man be profited, if hegains the whole world, and forfeits his


soul? Or what will a man give in exchangefor his soul?” (NASV, ’77).

It is very interesting that three of theProtestant versions cited here (NKJV, NIVand NASV) all translate this passage basi-cally correctly, but the three Catholic ver-sions and the NRSV and NEB all get itdead wrong! The Greek word for “life” isbios, but for “soul,” it is psyche (pronounced“psuchay”). From bios we get biology, biog-raphy, biosphere, etc. From psyche wederive psychology, psychosis, psychic, etc.The first means “life”; the second means“soul.” No one has to study Greek to under-stand this; he just has to go to a basic Eng-lish dictionary! The etymology is rightthere. As a professor-friend has commentedon this passage:

“What these ‘translators’ are doing ispretending to know Hebrew better than theEvangelists. If Jesus was speaking Hebrewor Aramaic, he used nephesh or naphsh-a.These words do mean either ‘soul’ or ‘life.’The Evangelist picked the ‘soul’ meaningwhen he translated the Lord’s saying intoGreek. Why assume that he picked thewrong meaning? Wasn’t he inspired? More-over, picking the ‘life’ meaning gives the

“What Does It Profit a Man . . .?” 69

saying a morally false meaning . . .”What the modern Catholic translators

(and those of the NRSV and NEB) havedone with this passage is simply lie to peo-ple. This passage is not mistranslated;it is forged! And the forgery needs to beexposed. People need to take these Catholic“bibles” back to where they bought themand demand a refund. It is unconscionablefor the Catholic clergy and hierarchy—ifthey know these things—to recommend anyof these so-called Catholic “bibles” whenthey betray the very words of Our Lordwith a patent, outright lie. In the newCatholic versions, this verse orients man tothe world, to self-preservation—at any cost!In the Douay-Rheims, in the Latin Vulgate,in the “original” Greek, this verse orients aperson toward Heaven, no matter what!

(Oh yes, the word psyche is onomatopo-etic—sounds like its meaning—and in itsancient use represented “breath,” which inturn represented “life,” and therefore“soul,” for when the breath goes out of aperson at death (“psoooochaaaay”), the lifeof man has gone out along with his soul.But what student or even well-educatedadult is going to see the remote, antiquar-ian, etymological connection of these two


concepts? At the time the New Testamentwas written, the Greek word psyche hadachieved, after many hundreds of years,the specific meaning “SOUL”! The transla-tors have simply lied to their readers inthis case!

From this and other evidence presentedhere, it would appear that these moderntranslators have a preconceived set of ideas(or even an agenda), and they are trans-lating their ideas into the bibles they areproducing—this despite what the “original”Greek says, and clearly means. It wouldseem that if no one calls their number, theywill just go on deceiving!

“Power To Be MadeThe Sons of God”

In St. John’s Gospel, Chapter 1, Verses 9to 12, we read the following:

“That was the true light, which enlight-eneth every man that cometh into thisworld. He was in the world, and the worldwas made by him, and the world knew himnot. He came unto his own, and his ownreceived him not. But as many asreceived him, he gave them power to

“Power to Be Made . . .” 71

be made the sons of God, to them thatbelieve in his name.” (DRB). (John 1:9-12,emphasis added).

This last emphasized verse of St. Johncontains in a pithy microcosm the entiretheology of grace for the conversion of sin-ners. For actually, man does very little inhis own conversion; it is mostly God’s(actual) grace at work to bring man to justification. (The reader should note that“justification” equals “conversion,” whichequals “receiving Sanctifying Grace,” whichequals “becoming an adopted child ofGod”—all of which takes place at Baptism.)Hear what the Council of Trent says, inthis regard:

It is furthermore declared thatin adults the beginning of thatjustification must proceed fromthe predisposing grace of Godthrough Jesus Christ, that is,from His vocation, whereby, with-out any merits on their part, theyare called; that they who by sinhad been cut off from God, may bedisposed through His quickeningand helping grace to convertthemselves to their own justifica-


tion by freely assenting to and co-operating with that grace; so that,while God touches the heart ofman through the illumination ofthe Holy Ghost, man himself nei-ther does absolutely nothing whilereceiving that inspiration, sincehe can also reject it, nor yet is heable by his own free will and with-out the grace of God to move him-self to justice in His sight. Hence,when it is said in the Sacred Writ-ings: “Turn ye to me,. . . and Iwill turn to you” [Zacharias 1:3],we are reminded of our liberty;and when we reply: “Convert us, OLord, to thee, and we shall be con-verted” [Lamentations 5:21], weconfess that we need the grace ofGod. (Canons and Decrees of theCouncil of Trent, 6th Sess., Chap-ter V, “Justification.” Emphasisadded.)

The Council of Trent goes on to say thatin performing a grace-filled act, the will ofman is free to accept or reject God’s preve-nient grace, which, if he accepts it, thenmoves him to accept Baptism.


Now listen again to the 12th Verse ofJohn 1: “But as many as received him,he gave them power to be made thesons of God, to them that believe in hisname.” (Emphasis added).

The Latin Vulgate reads: “Quotquot (asmany as) autem (But) receperunt (theyreceived) eum (Him), dedit (He gave) eis (tothem) potestatem (the power) filios (thesons) Dei (of God) fieri (to be made).” Andthis translation is literally the same as theGreek “original.”

The Greek “original” reads: “Hosoi (Asmany as) dè (but) ’élabon (received) ’auton(Him) ’édo–ken (he gave) ’auto�is (to them)’exousían (power) tékna (sons) Theo�u (ofGod) genésthai (to be made).”

But hear now how the new CatholicBibles and the Protestant Bibles translatethis verse:

“Any who did accept him he empoweredto become children of God.” (NAB, ’70,emphasis added).

“But to those who did accept him he gavepower to become children of God.” (NAB,’86, emphasis added).

“But to all who received him, whobelieved in his name, he gave power to


become children of God.” (CRSV, ’66,emphasis added).

“But to all who did accept him he gavepower to become children of God.” (JB, ’66,emphasis added).

“But as many as received Him, to themHe gave the right to become children ofGod.” (NKJV, ’85, emphasis added).

“Yet to all who received him, to thosewho believed in his name, he gave the rightto become children of God.” (NIV, ’78,emphasis added).

“But as many as received Him, to themHe gave the right to become children ofGod.” (NASV, ’77, emphasis added).

“But to all who received him, whobelieved in his name, he gave power tobecome children of God.” (NRSV, ’89,emphasis added).

“But to all who did receive him, to thosewho have yielded him their allegiance, hegave the right to become children of God.”(NEB, ’76, emphasis added).

Cassel’s Latin-English and English-LatinDictionary gives “to be made” as the literaltranslation of the Latin passive infinitivefieri, and only a remote meaning of “tobecome.” And genésthai is the second aorist


Greek infinitive of gígnomai, whose primarymeaning is “to be made,” which is always apassive infinitive, and in English is trans-lated “to be made” (a passive infinitive). Yetevery one of the nine translations cited immediately above translates fieriand genésthai as “to become.” Only theDouay-Rheims says “to be made,” which isthe primary, literal meaning of fieri andgenésthai. Notice also that four Protestantversions (NKJV, NIV, NASV and NEB)translate the Greek ’exousían and Latinpotestatem (“the power”) as “the right,”another gratuitous, “creative” translation.

Some may argue that this discussionappears to be “straining out the gnat.”However, just the opposite is the case: farfrom being trivial, the poor translation ofthis passage from John 1:12 in all the non-Douay-Rheims versions shows, it wouldseem, both a certain arrogance toward theactual wording of the Bible, on the onehand, and on the other, an absence ofregard for the precise theology of grace thatSt. John is expressing in this verse.

Both the Greek word genésthai and theLatin word fieri are passive infinitives,which mean precisely, “to be made.” Now


the Douay-Rheims Bible translates thesetwo passive infinitives with the Englishpassive infinitive “to be made.” The exactmeaning of the Greek “original” and theLatin Vulgate translation thereof areretained perfectly by the Douay-Rheims.However, this verse is skewed by everyother English version cited here. All nineof these popular English translations usean active infinitive (“to become”), ratherthan the passive infinitive (“to be made”),which is used by the original Greek, as ifwe could—after Christ’s initial help—change ourselves into children of God!

Granted, “he gave them power to be madethe sons of God” (DRB) at first sight doesnot seem to make sense. Rather, it appearsto be a self-contradictory statement. Pre-sumably, that is why all the other popularmodern English translations cited here say“power [or right] to become.” At firstglance, they would appear to be correct—from the easy flow of the English sentence.However, two powerful objections to thistranslation (“to become”) can be made.

First of all, it is not what Scripture says!And secondly, it opens the door to thePelagian heresy (5th century), or at leastto the Semipelagian heresy (which was con-


demned by the Second Council of Orange in529). Pelagianism, among other teachings,held that by nature man can perform goodworks that merit salvation, without thegrace of God; that the role of Christ is onlythat of “example” or “instruction,” whichman freely accepts; that the prompting ofGod’s grace is not necessary, either for thebeginning or the accomplishment of a mer-itorious act; and that man chooses virtueby his own natural power. Semipelagian-ism held that grace is necessary for theaccomplishment of good works, but not fortheir initiation or beginning, which maninitially chooses by his free will unaided byGod’s grace.

Now these are the very errors thatthe Protestants of the 16th centuryaccused the Catholic Church of havingfallen into. However, the correct andCatholic teaching on divine grace and jus-tification says that God prompts man byHis divine assistance (grace) not only tocommence but also to accomplish (or fin-ish) virtuous acts and that man respondsby co-operating with God’s promptings ofgrace by means of his free will. God sus-tains man at every step of the process ofjustification; He does not hand over to us


“the power to become sons of God,” as theinaccurate modern translations state it.

Again, we cite part of the dogmatic defi-nition of the Council of Trent:

. . .while God touches the heartof man through the illuminationof the Holy Ghost, man himselfneither does absolutely nothingwhile receiving that inspiration,since he can also reject it, nor yetis he able by his own free will andwithout the grace of God to movehimself to justice in His sight.(Canons and Decrees of the Coun-cil of Trent, 6th Sess., Chapter V,Justification. Emphasis added.)

In contrast to this balanced doctrine, theProtestant teaching that man contributesnothing to his justification led to the deter-minism of John Calvin (1509-1564) and tothe false Calvinistic teaching on predesti-nation. Man’s free will was thereby denied.

But, the inaccurate translation of John1:12 opens the door to the idea that man’sfree will is sufficient by itself to performacts meritorious of salvation (the con-demned heresy of Pelagianism or Semi-


pelagianism). Therefore, whereas the cor-rect translation in the Douay-RheimsBible—“he gave them power to be madethe sons of God”—appears at first sight tobe self-contradictory, it in fact reveals theprecise truth of how justification occurs:i.e., God initiates it by the promptings ofHis prevenient grace (that grace which“goes before”), plus helps man to accom-plish it by the on-going promptings of Hiscontinuing grace, all the way through theact. The role of man’s free will is to acceptand respond to God’s grace . . . or to rejectit. To repeat: God sustains man at everystep of the process of justification; He doesnot hand over to us “the power to becomesons of God,” as the inaccurate moderntranslations state it.

The manner in which God’s grace works,in co-operation with man’s free will isadmitted by all theologians to be the mostdifficult part of theology. It is understand-able, then, why the correct translation ofJohn 1:12 would appear at first to be so dif-ficult as to be unintelligible and thereforepresumably wrong. But that is not a reasonto adapt Scripture by a smoother but inac-curate translation and thereby open theway to heresy.


One has to wonder how the many trans-lators of these modern versions can so con-sistently agree to disagree from theoriginal Scripture in this instance. Arethey—in some effort to make the Bible readmore simply—so arrogant as to disregardwhat the original Greek text actually says?Or are they ignorant of the Catholic theol-ogy of the grace of justification—expressedso perfectly here by St. John, and else-where by St. Paul?

Whatever may be the reason for theirmistranslation, the exactitude and fidelityof the Douay-Rheims Bible to the Greekoriginal of the New Testament is once moredemonstrated by John 1:12. A person med-itating on this passage of St. John will beawe-struck by the smallness of man’s partin his own justification and the major,major role played by the grace of God—i.e.,by God, the Holy Spirit, acting on the soul.And such is exactly what our Catholic the-ology of the grace of justification teaches,as borne out in the passage cited from theCouncil of Trent.


“I Will Begin To Vomit TheeOut of My Mouth”

There exists in the Apocalypse (Revela-tion), Chapter 3, Verses 15 and 16, one ofthe most powerful and frightening passagesin all of Sacred Scripture. Our Lord here isspeaking to the “angel of the church ofLaodicea,” i.e., to the bishop of that diocese.But His words have a general reference toall people, and during all times. He says:“I know thy works, that thou art nei-ther cold, nor hot. I would thou wertcold, or hot. But because thou artlukewarm, and neither cold, nor hot, Iwill begin to vomit thee out of mymouth.” (DRB).

The other versions are generally quitesimilar to each other in their transla-tion of these verses, as well as to theDouay-Rheims translation, except for twokey words: 1) “vomit”—evomere in Latin,meaning literally “to vomit forth”; and ’emé-sai in Greek, translated, again, literallyand only, “to vomit”; plus, 2) “I will beginto”—incipiam in Latin, meaning literally,“I shall begin”; and méllo in Greek, mean-ing literally, “to be about to.” However,translating these two words incorrectly


makes all the difference in the world to themeaning of this incomparable passage.

Following is how the other versionstranslate these verses:

“I know your deeds; I know you are nei-ther hot nor cold. How I wish you were oneor the other—hot or cold! But because youare lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I willspew you out of my mouth.” (NAB, ’70,emphasis added).

“I know your works; I know that you areneither cold nor hot. I wish you were eithercold or hot. So, because you are lukewarm,neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out ofmy mouth.” (NAB, ’86, emphasis added).

“I know your works: you are neither coldnor hot. Would that you were cold or hot!So, because you are lukewarm and neithercold nor hot, I will spew you out of mymouth.” (CRSV, ’66, emphasis added).

“I know all about you [?]; how you areneither cold nor hot. I wish you were one orthe other [?], but since you are neither, butonly lukewarm, I will spit you out of mymouth.” (JB, ’66, emphasis added).

“I know your works, that you are neithercold nor hot. I could wish [?] you were coldor hot. So then, because you are lukewarm,

“I Will Begin to Vomit Thee . . .” 83

and neither cold nor hot, I will spew youout of My mouth.” (NKJV, ’85, emphasisadded).

“I know your deeds [?], that you are nei-ther cold nor hot. I wish you were eitherone or the other! [?] So, because you arelukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I amabout to spit you out of my mouth.” (NIV,’78, emphasis added).

“I know your works; you are neither coldnor hot. I wish that you were either cold orhot. So, because you are lukewarm, andneither cold nor hot, I am about to spit youout of my mouth.” (NRSV, ’89, emphasisadded).

“I know your deeds [?], that you are nei-ther cold nor hot; I would that you werecold or hot. So because you are lukewarm,and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you outof My mouth.” (NASV, ’77, emphasisadded).

“I know all your ways; you are neitherhot nor cold. How I wish you were eitherhot or cold! But because you are lukewarm,neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out ofmy mouth.” (NEB, ’76, emphasis added).

The NIV and the New American Stan-dard Version translate opera, “works” (in


Greek, erga—“works”), as “deeds,” not“works”; the NEB calls them “ways.” TheNAB, the JB, the NIV, the NASV and theNEB say “spit” for “vomit,” and the otherssay “spew”; whereas, the word used is“vomit” (evomere in Latin and ’emésai inGreek). (The Greek verb ptúein means “tospit.”) Our Lord says, “I will begin” (mélloin Greek and incipiam in Latin, both mean-ing literally, “I will begin”) “to vomit”(evomere in Latin, “to vomit forth,” and’emésai in Greek, “to vomit”). But the NAB,CRSV, JB, NKJV, and NASV all drop offthe “I will begin”; only the NIV and theNRSV have this element, but nonetheless,they use “spit,” rather than “vomit.”

Now “to vomit” is a disgusting act, one ofthe most disgusting to human beings. Itmeans to eject partially digested food fromthe stomach, from the inner part of a per-son. Christians are part of Christ’s Mysti-cal Body, part of His mystical inner being.To be vomited forth is to be rejected byChrist, to be ejected from Him. A persononly vomits when he can no longer holddown the food that is upsetting his stom-ach. Rather than vomit, a person would ahundred times sooner settle his stomachand have the food digest. From this verse


of Scripture we learn that the same is trueof Christ relative to the lukewarm. Hewould seem to want to retain them, butsimply cannot stomach them. And He isabout to vomit them forth.

But one should notice the use of “I willbegin to,” meaning that He has not done ityet, but is about to—sort of like the spon-taneous action of vomiting. For vomiting ispreceded by a certain period of nausea orupset before it occurs. During this time thesick person “is about to” vomit. Thus, thisentire passage is perfectly suited to thesubject and is a warning to the lukewarmto change or else to be rejected by Christ.These subtleties are missed by all theversions, except by the NIV and NRSVwith regard to “I am about to.” Yet everysingle one of the nine non-Douay-Rheims versions fails to use theextremely powerful word “vomit,”which is the key word to this entire pas-sage, giving it the power and characterthat make it one of Scripture’s most strik-ing and memorable statements.

Most of us, after all, are lukewarm, ortend toward lukewarmness, and are nei-ther cold nor hot in our relation to Christ.From these verses we see starkly that this


quality of our lukewarm affection forChrist is so revolting to Him that He can-not assimilate (digest) us into His MysticalBody, and He is so “upset” by our attitudethat He will begin to “vomit” us out of Hismouth.

A little meditative reflection on the sym-bolism of this passage yields results rich inmeaning—if the passage is correctly trans-lated. But “spit” and “spew” give nothingnear the same meaning as “vomit.” “I willspit [or ‘spew’] you out of my mouth” leavesno hope for the lukewarm; whereas, “I willbegin to” and “vomit” actually leave somehope that a person, by changing, canrepent, can amend his life and becomeagreeable and acceptable to Christ andthus can remain within His Mystical Body.The image used in these verses is profoundand perfect; it is ripe with meaning—if theverses are properly translated!

Considering, only this one passage, a per-son can see most graphically how theDouay-Rheims Bible is filled with life,while the other translations are relativelydead and time and again simply mistrans-late the Bible. All this power, all these finedistinctions and meanings come from justa few common words of Scripture . . . but


from a few words properly translated!

Conclusion

Many other examples could be broughtforward to buttress the conclusion of thiswriter that the four modern Catholic Biblesin English reviewed here are simply not literally accurate and therefore are nottrustworthy; plus, that the Protestant trans-lations reviewed are not much better. Theyare not careful, word-for-word translationsof Scripture, but rather, and at best, some-what loose, colloquial “approximations” ofthe meaning of the Bible—in many in-stances as filtered through the minds of thetranslators.

The point, of course, is this: What trans-lator—or translators taken even collec-tively—can possibly outguess God on allthe meanings He has inspired into the textof Scripture? When a person reads slowlyand carefully the one literal and accurateEnglish translation of the Bible, the Douay-Rheims, and especially if he will meditateon the passages, he can pick up these sub-tle meanings. And often these meaningscontain the clues and the answers to thevery problems he has been seeking to solve.


Consider also the priest in preparing hissermons: If he has meditated deeply uponvarious Scriptural passages—after the man-ner of St. Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises—then he will be like the “scribe instructed inthe kingdom of heaven” mentioned by OurLord, who “is like to a man that is a house-holder, who bringeth forth out of his trea-sure new things and old.” (Matt. 13:52). Inother words, his study and meditation onScripture and the Divine Revelation of Godgives him a “treasure” to use in preachingand in instruction, because he has carefullyprobed Scripture and has plumbed many ofthe profound meanings secreted there byAlmighty God. But if these meanings havebeen inadvertently (or purposely) translatedout of the text, because the translators areusing wrong methods of translating, howare we, or how is that priest, even to sus-pect those meanings were there to beginwith? Especially will the priest be crippledin his work as teacher and preacher if thesubtle and profound meanings implanted inthe Sacred Text under the inspiration of theHoly Ghost have been translated away, forthe priests leads the flock and most prieststoday do not study Latin and Greek, as theyformerly were required to do.

Conclusion 89

The million-dollar question is this: Howdid all this happen? How have these mod-ern translators gotten away with theirbogus translations for so long? Why havenot the priests and bishops said somethinglong ’ere this?

The explanation of how it happened wasgiven earlier: The translators of the mod-ern Catholic bibles, according to the thesisof this little book, make three errors:1) they trust texts other than St.Jerome’s Vulgate, texts that are not soreliable as his in every instance; 2) theyemploy translations of certain words thatare true meanings of the words, but mean-ings that do not always fit the useemployed in the particular passages ofthe Bible in question and/or are not thetraditional meanings; and 3) they often fallinto the error of translating their under-standing of the meaning of the Bible,instead of what the Bible actually says.

Our priests and bishops, by and large,are extremely busy men and have littletime for close research into such a techni-cal matter as biblical study—a study, more-over, that requires expertise in Hebrew,Greek and Latin. How many of us can come


to competence in even modern French,Spanish or German, let alone in three deadlanguages, and that to a degree sufficientto dispute with the “authorities”?

It would appear that, in the interest ofhaving a newer version of Scripture, thehierarchy accepted what was given them as“newer” without having been prepared toexamine carefully the revolutionary textsthey were given. Archbishop Dwyer of Port-land, Oregon claimed, for example, that thebishops were not even consulted on whichversion of Scripture would be employedwhen the New Mass was first introduced inthe late 1960’s. It was presented as anaccomplished fact, with the “salve” that thetranslation was “only experimental” andwould be improved.

The New Testament has now been totallyredone, as of 1986, but one can see from thefew examples cited here that the changeswere minor and not enough! The Old Tes-tament is currently also being “improved”and is due out in 2003. Will they get it rightthis time? It does not look too prospective,based on what we have seen they did withthe “new” New American New Testament.

Are we going to trust these translatorswith another try . . . especially when so

Conclusion 91

much is at stake? For while they have beenbungling away, what sort of tragedy hasbeen worked in the minds and lives and,yes, undoubtedly, in the eternal destiny ofthe many poor souls who have been mis-guidedly studying these corrupted Bibletranslations? And what about young people,who by and large have no idea that there isany problem with what they read in thesemodern bibles? Is it not high time that anend were put to this on-going disaster andthat we return to the one truly safe andaccurate translation of Scripture in English,namely, the Douay-Rheims Bible?

From just the little evidence brought forthin this tract, it is obvious that these manywrong translations should simply bescrapped, and the sooner the better. With-out injuring anyone’s faith, we could easilyreturn to the Douay-Rheims version ofScripture. It is, after all, English—and quiteexcellent English at that. In fact, the newertranslations are steadily coming closer andcloser to the Douay-Rheims in many verses;and the closer they come, the more accuratethey become. (All these modern translatorsreally need to do to create a truly excellentEnglish bible is to use the Douay-Rheims asa trot.) We take for granted that high school


students will read Shakespeare (1564-1616).Why in the world cannot the rest of us beexpected to read Challoner’s Douay-Rheims(1749-1750), updated by Bishop Kenrick(1859)—especially when the salvation of oursouls is at stake?

“But the Douay-Rheims is hard!” it willbe objected. “People can’t understand it.The new Catholic versions at least enablemany people to read the Bible who other-wise could not.”

This entire line of argument is false: It is not the Douay-Rheims that is hard. It isthe Holy Bible that is hard! As a Scriptureprofessor-friend exclaimed to this writer:“The Bible is difficult in Hebrew! The Bibleis difficult in Greek! The Bible is difficultin Latin! The Bible is just plain difficult!!”Because the Douay-Rheims Bible isalso difficult, we have, by that factalone, a positive indication that it is afaithful translation of the original—which has exactly the same character-istic! If the Bible in English is notsomewhat difficult, you can be sure theBible has not been accurately rendered intoEnglish. RIGHT! If it is not hard, it isNOT the Bible! But rather, it is some“gloss,” where the subtle and powerful

Conclusion 93

meanings that lie imbedded in the text ofSacred Scripture have been “creamed over,”like some French dish covered with a saucethat obscures the flavor of the original!

Regarding the difficulty of Sacred Scrip-ture, Saint Augustine, one of the two great-est Doctors of the Church, has observed:

I am convinced this whole situ-ation was ordained by God inorder to overcome pride by workand restrain from haughtinessour minds, which usually disdainanything they have learned easily. . . The Holy Ghost, therefore,has generously and advanta-geously planned Holy Scripture insuch a way that in the easier pas-sages He relieves our hunger; inthe ones that are harder to under-stand, He drives away our pride.Practically nothing is dug outfrom those unintelligible textswhich is not discovered to be saidvery plainly in another place . . .(On Christian Doctrine. Bk. 2,Chap. 6, Par. 8).

In a similar vein, the great Pope Leo XIII


comments in his 1893 Encyclical On HolyScripture (Paragraph 5): “For the SacredScripture is not like other books. Dictatedby the Holy Ghost, it contains things of thedeepest importance, which in many in-stances are most difficult and obscure. Tounderstand and explain such things, thereis always required the ‘coming’ of the sameHoly Spirit; that is to say, His light andHis grace; and these, as the Royal Psalmistso frequently insists, are to be sought byhumble prayers and guarded by holiness oflife.”

Even St. Peter, in commenting on the dif-ficulty of St. Paul’s Epistles, mentions howdifficult they are in particular and how dif-ficult Scripture is in general: “As also in allhis [St. Paul’s] epistles, speaking in themof these things; in which are certain thingshard to be understood, which the unlearnedand unstable wrest [turn from the propermeaning], as they do also the other scrip-tures, to their own destruction.” (2 Peter3:16).

If St. Peter (who wrote part of Scripture),St. Augustine (who was one of the twogreatest Doctors of the Church), and PopeLeo XIII (prophesied by St. Malachy—1095-1148—as “a Light in the Heavens”

Conclusion 95

because of his brilliance)—if these three allhad difficulty understanding Scripture,what about the average person today?Scripture is hard to understandbecause Scripture is HARD! And nomodern translator is going to make iteasier for you by translating God’smeaning out of it and his own into it!He is only thereby going to make itimpossible for you to understand theBible because he is keeping it fromyou!

To conclude on this point, let us considerthe statement of Pope Pius XII in his 1943encyclical The Promotion of Biblical Stud-ies (Divino Afflante Spiritu), where herefers to biblical interpreters (which canalso be applied to translators): “Let themtherefore by means of their knowledge oflanguages search out with all diligence theliteral meaning of the words . . .” (Para-graph 23).

It is the thesis of this little book that thishas all been very beautifully accomplishedin the Latin Vulgate, the “official” Bible ofthe Catholic Church, and in the Douay-Rheims Bible, the classic, time-honored andonly faithful English translation of the Vul-


gate. For without the Douay-Rheims,the Bible in English simply does notexist in one completely accurate andtrustworthy translation! Fortunately, westill have the Douay-Rheims Bible availableto us yet today.

A Synopsis 97

97

A Synopsis

• The Douay-Rheims Bible is the only tra-ditional Catholic Bible in the Eng-lish language.

• It was translated with scrupulous accu-racy from the Latin Vulgate Bible of St.Jerome (340-420 A.D.), which was a care-ful translation from the original Greekand Hebrew.

• The Latin Vulgate Bible was used uni-versally in the Catholic Church (LatinRite) for over 1500 years.

• The Vulgate was proclaimed “authentic”by the Council of Trent in 1546.

• That Council also proclaimed: “No one[may] dare or presume under any pretextwhatsoever to reject it.” (4th Ses., April8, 1546).

• Pope Pius XII declared that this meansit is “free from any error whatsoever inmatters of faith and morals.” (1943).

• The Douay-Rheims Bible received rela-tively minor revisions by Bishop Chal-loner in 1749-1752.


• It was approved by the Church manytimes over, including by Cardinal Gib-bons in 1899.

• The Douay-Rheims Bible was the onlyCatholic English translation of Scripturecommonly in use for over 200 years.

• It was used in the Catholic liturgythrough approximately 1960.

• It is respectful, reverent, beautiful and apleasure to read!

• It contains no inclusive language!

• It is the best, safest and most accuratetranslation of the Bible in English!

• The Douay-Rheims Bible is so packedwith meaning that a single phrase canyield profound insight—because it wastranslated with great respect for everyword.

• The footnotes in the Douay-Rheims Bibleare totally Catholic and are definitely notthe opinions of modern biblical scholars.

• The Douay-Rheims Bible contains thosepowerful, familiar Bible passages—such as “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is

A Synopsis 99

with thee” (Luke 1:28)—that are sub-stantially different in most modernBibles.

• Catholic literature for the past 250 yearsis replete with quotes from the Douay-Rheims Bible.

• The solemnity, profundity and penetrat-ing truth of the Word of God really comethrough in this version of the Bible!

• After reading The Douay-Rheims Bibleall other English versions will seem like “approximations” of what Scripturereally says.

• The Douay-Rheims Bible is a joy to read,is full of surprises and really makes theBible come alive!

• The Douay-Rheims Bible contains thosefamiliar, profound and commandingBible passages which say to all:

“THIS is Sacred Scripture!”

Which Bible Should You Read?

100

LET’S PASS ON OUR CATHOLICSCRIPTURAL TRADITION!

As a Catholic, you may not realize howthe Catholic Scriptural tradition is engravedin your mind and heart. If you have a goodmemory, or if you are a young person raisedin a Catholic family that cherishes theCatholic Scriptural traditions, the followingverses (see below) will immediately “ring abell” of familiarity the moment you hearthem. These beloved words are from theDouay-Rheims Bible, which means they arean exact translation from St. Jerome’sLatin Vulgate of the 4th century. TheCatholic Scriptural Tradition IS theDouay-Rheims Bible.

But in modern Bibles, the wording is usu-ally different—or even missing. As soon asthe wording of these famous quotes ischanged (and weakened), our hold on thetruths they convey is loosened. The Douay-Rheims Bible speaks to us with authority,like Our Lord Himself: “Heaven and earthshall pass away, but my words shall notpass away.” (Luke 21:33). For example:

“For dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return.” (Gen. 3:19).

“Lazarus, come forth.” (John 11:43).

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“Go, and now sin no more.” (John 8:11).

“Amen I say to thee, this day thou shalt be with me in Paradise.” (Luke 23:43).

“What therefore God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.”(Matt. 19:6).

“Silver and gold I have none; but what I have, I give thee: In the name of JesusChrist of Nazareth, arise, and walk.”(Acts 3:6).

“What manner of man is this, for the winds and the sea obey him?” (Matt.8:27).

“Thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hellshall not prevail against it.” (Matt.16:18).

“For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss ofhis own soul?” (Matt. 16:26).

“Did you not know, that I must be about my father’s business?” (Luke 2:49).

“Could you not watch one hour with me?” (Matt. 26:40).

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“For many are called, but few chosen.” (Matt. 20:16; omitted from 8of 9 modern Bibles reviewed here).

“Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not extinguished.” (Mark. 9:43;omitted from 7 of 9 modern Biblesreviewed here).

“For we are the children of saints, and we must not be joined together likeheathens that know not God.” (Tobias8:45; and other marriage instructionsfrom the book of Tobias: omitted from9 of 9 modern Bibles reviewed here).

“For he is risen, as he said.” (Matt. 28:6).

What Can You Do?

If you want to know, love, and help passon the Catholic Scriptural traditions, youneed to have and read the Douay-RheimsBible. Everyone who understands the veryimportant message of this little book needsto own a copy of the Douay-Rheims Bible.

And what about the young Catholics, theupcoming generations of Catholics?

Everyone who understands the messageof this little book needs to obtain a copy of

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the Douay-Rheims Bible for each of theirchildren and each of their grandchildren.Even if these young people do not appreci-ate the Douay-Rheims Bible now, they willthereby have a copy for a future rebirth ofour Catholic Scriptural traditions. For now,they will at least treasure their Douay-Rheims Bible because it was given to themby Mom and Dad, or by Grandma andGrandpa—and later they will have thebasic tool to rediscover their CatholicScriptural heritage.

Our Catholic Scriptural tradition is partof our Catholic culture and is somethingthat must be handed on to the next gener-ation as a living tradition—along with ourliving Catholic traditions of doctrine, moralteaching, liturgy and devotions. All theseelements form a bond of unity amongCatholics today, and between us and ourCatholic forebears, the Saints. If the conti-nuity of our Scriptural tradition gets bro-ken (as it has, in many cases), how will itever get re-established?

Let’s keep our Catholic Scripturaltradition alive and strong. PASS ITON!

The clergy and hierarchy have theirhands full with many other battles in thissecular time. But the laity can play an

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essential role in preserving and handing onour Catholic Scriptural tradition. The firststep is:

1. Get a DOUAY-RHEIMS BIBLE foryourself.

2. Give a DOUAY-RHEIMS BIBLE toevery one of your children.

3. Give a DOUAY-RHEIMS BIBLE toevery one of your grandchildren.

4. Give a DOUAY-RHEIMS BIBLE to any-one else who should have one!

Let us as Catholics look forward to theday when the Catholic world will redis-cover the treasure it possesses in theDouay-Rheims Bible. Let us work towardthe day when the Douay-Rheims Bible willbecome once again the universal heritageof Catholics throughout the entire English-speaking world.

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Contains those familiar, profound and commanding Bible passages which say to all, “THIS IS SACRED SCRIPTURE!”

Order now—A great gift for every occasion!!

• Very Legible Typeface. FamilyRecord Section.

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• We maintain this is the best,safest and most accurate version of the Bible in English.

• This is the only traditional 1-volume Catholic Bible avail-able in the world. Used in the Catholic liturgy throughapproximately 1960.

• The footnotes in the Douay-Rheims Bible are totallyCatholic, and are definitely notthe opinions of modern biblicalscholars.

• No inclusive language!

• Reverent, beautiful!

The Classic Catholic Bible in English!!

After reading The Douay-Rheimsall other English versions will seem like “approximations”

of what Scripture really says.

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Which Bible Should You Read?

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