Customer Reviews

The Parallel Apocrypha: Greek · Douay-Rheims · King James Version · New Revised Standard Version · New American Bible · New Jerusalem Bible · Today's English Version · The Holy Bible by Ronald Knox

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

So often we act as if the only Bible canon dispute was between Catholics and Protestants. We leave the Orthodox with no complete Bible as the editions of "Bible with Apocrypha" have only the Catholic/Protestant books. This book includes texts for both Greek and Slavonic Orthodox and the one "appendix" accepted by the Greek Orthodox.

So the articles prefacing the texts are written as dogma rather than history or theology ... who cares? At least now I can have a truly complete parallel Bible for Bible studies.

Footnote: I am not Orthodox but some texts accepted only by the Orthodox as canonical appear as antiphons in Catholic liturgy.

This Parallel Text volume by Oxford covers eight versions of the Apocryphal texts:

The Greek Text
The King James Version
Douay Old Testament
Holy Bible by Ronald Knox
Today's English Version
New Revised Standard Version
New American Bible
New Jerusalem Bible

What most people who hold fast to the King James Version of the Bible don't realise is that the Authorised Version of 1611 contained the books of the Apocrypha between the Old and New Testaments, and that these were later removed by printers and denominational/sectarian leaders for various reasons. Apart from Roman Catholic bibles in the United States, most bibles did not contain the apocryphal books, and Protestants in particular are only now coming to rediscover these hidden treasures. Indeed, the word 'apocrypha' comes from the Greek word meaning 'hidden things'.

The Apocrypha consists of 18 texts, books or additions to other books (such as Daniel or the Psalms). The ambiguity of their status comes from the disparity of ancient Hebrew versus Greek copies of the scriptures, the Judaic/Hebrew canon as opposed to the Septuagint. There are introductory essays (each only a few pages in length) that give the Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Anglican, Protestant and Evangelical views of the apocryphal texts, written by scholars from each of those traditions, which range from automatic acceptance/inclusion (Orthodox) to fairly clear rejection (most Protestant and Evangelical).

John Kohlenberger, the general editor of the volume, also includes an essay he wrote about the texts and translations. Kohlenberger includes a chart that shows the spectrum of deuterocanonical/apocryphal acceptance across the 'big three' lines of Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox; he also gives an introduction to sources of the English bible, discussion of the Vulgate and detail on each of the major translations incorporated.

All of these texts are included in this book, laid out in quadrant format, four to a page, with all eight texts/translations laid out in each two-page spread. Because of the space requirements, the text is very small, and there are few if any notes throughout the text (hence, while it is good for study to have the parallels, this is not in fact a study bible).

A good aid for scholars.