Click2Religion - The Bible - Chapter 6

<body link="0000ff" alink="ff0000" vlink="000000" bgcolor=000033> <table width="100%" bgcolor=000033> <tr> <td align=center valign=top> <table width=90% bgcolor=ffffff> <tr> <td align=center valign=top> <tr> <td> <div align=center><p><b><font face="arial, helvetica" size=5 color=000000><b>THE BIBLE:<br> HOW IT CAME TO US<br><br> <font size="4">CHAPTER 6 - THE LATIN BIBLE</b></font></p> <center> <table width="90%"> <tr> <td align="left" valign="top"> <div align="justify"> <p><font face="arial, helvetica" color="000000" size="3">In the 4th Century A.D., the Bishop of Rome wanted to have both the Old and the New Testament translated. Most people in the Roman Empire didn’t speak Greek and Hebrew. They spoke Latin.</p> <p>Knowing he needed a scholar who understood Hebrew and Greek as well as Latin, the Bishop of Rome (<a href="http://www.divine.org/testament/christian/jerobio.htm" target="_blank"><b>Pope Damasus</b></a>) gave translating responsibility to his secretary Jerome. (Follow this link to a <a href="http://www.cptryon.org/compassion/mary/jeromebio.html" target="_blank"><b>brief biography</b></a> of this important church figure.)</p> <p>Jerome moved to Palestine and worked there as he translated both testaments. Often pictured <a href="http://www.glyphs.com/art/durer/jerome.jpg" target="_blank"><b>with a lion</b></a> (this link takes you to a 1514 engraving by Albrecht Durer), Jerome tamed the animal when he pulled a splinter from its paw, according to legend.</p> <p>Before Jerome began to translate the Bible, there was scholarly disagreement over which books to include. Because he had worked so closely with Jewish rabbis, Jerome wanted to follow the canon of the Hebrew Old Testament (also followed by protestant Bibles). On the other hand, Jerome’s contemporary - <a href="http://www.kfki.hu/~arthp/html/c/carpacci/schiavo1.html" target="_blank"><b>Augustine of Hippo</b></a> - (be sure to click on the image to enlarge it) thought the new Latin version should include the deuterocanonical books (also sometimes referred to as the Apocrypha).</p> <p>Augustine (who wrote the still-popular <a href="http://www.konbib.nl/100hoogte/hh-im/hh009.html" target="_blank"><b><i>City of God</b></i></a>) won the argument. The decision to include the deuterocanonical books was made by Pope Damasus I and confirmed by the Council of Rome in 382 A.D. Jerome completed his translation in 404; his work was published for the first time in 405 A.D. Follow this link to a searchable, online edition of the <a href="http://diderot.uchicago.edu/Bibles/VULGATE.form.html" target="_blank"><b>Vulgate</b></a>.</p> <p>Jerome was made a <a href="http://www.frick.org/html/pntg30df.htm" target="_blank"><b>saint</b></a> by the Catholic Church. (The link takes you to a beautiful painting of St. Jerome by El Greco. Note his hands resting on the most important work of his life: The Latin Bible.)</p> <p>Within a century after <a href="http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/jod/jerome.html" target="_blank"><b>St. Jerome’s</b></a> translation, there were hundreds of vernacular translations of the Bible. It wasn’t long before the Catholic Church ruled that the Vulgate was the only authorized translation, however. Stunning copies of the authorized Vulgate remain today. The links will take you to a <a href="http://www.konbib.nl/100hoogte/hh-im/hh009.html" target="_blank"><b>rare</b></a> bound copy of the Latin Bible used at St. Servaas in Maastricht and to one of the few surviving <a href="http://rylibweb.man.ac.uk/data1/dg/text/dg009.html" target="_blank"><b>Gutenberg Bibles</b></a>, (the first book ever printed on the famous press).</p> <p>By the 14th century, scholars wanted to translate the Bible into their own languages so the average person could understand it better. A thousand years had passed since Jerome’s translation. Rome no longer ruled the world. People did not speak Latin. But the Catholic church strongly opposed such thinking. Scholars and the church were about to enter an era of intense debate and persecution.</p> </div> <p align="center"><font size="2"><a href="bible_story_ch5.htm">GO TO LAST CHAPTER</a>     <a href="bible_story_ch1.htm">BACK TO FIRST CHAPTER</a>     <a href="bible_story_ch7.htm">GO TO NEXT CHAPTER</a></p><br> </font> </td> </tr> </table> </center> </td> </tr> </table> </td> </tr> </table> </body>