published at Rheims in 1582. The university was moved back to Douai in 1593, where the Old Testament was published in 1609-10. This completed what is known as the original Douay Bible. There are said to have been two revisions of the Douay Old Testament and eight of the Douay New Testament, representing such an extent of verbal alterations and modernized spelling that a Roman Catholic authority says, The version now in use has been so seriously altered that it can be scarcely considered identical with that which first went by the name of the Douay Bible," and further that "it never had any episcopal imprimatur, much less any papal approbation." Dr. Richard Challoner, coadjutor to the Vicar Apostolic of London, in his revision of the Rheims and Douai text made so many changes that his work is said to have represented a practically new translation. He published several editions between 1750 and 1781, in which latter year he died in the ninetieth year of his age. The Catholic Encyclopedia says: Although the Bibles in use at the present day by the Catholics of England and Ireland are popularly styled the Douay Version, they are most improperly so called; they are founded, with more or less alteration, on a series of revisions undertaken by Bishop Challoner in 1749-52. His object was to meet the practical want felt by the Catholics of his day of a Bible moderate in size and price, in readable English, and with notes more suitable to the time. . The changes introduced by him were so considerable that, according to Cardinal Newman, they "almost amounted to a new translation." So also, Cardinal Wiseman wrote, "To call it any longer the Douay or Rhemish Version is an abuse of terms. It has been altered and modified until scarcely any verse remains as it was originally published." The Douay or Roman Catholic Bible from which the Gospel text herein used has been taken, is said to be based upon the Clementine (Pope Clement VIII) Version which is now the standard of the Roman Catholic Church, and it bears the following approval by Cardinal Gibbons: "We hereby approve of the publication of the Catholic Bible, which is an accurate reprint of the Rheims and Douay edition with Dr. Challoner's notes. The sacred volume is printed in an attractive style. J. Card. Gibbons. Baltimore, Sept. 1, 1899." Comment on Bible Versions. The law of Bible development appears to require that the individual work, which always comes first, shall be reviewed and revised, re-reviewed and re-revised as knowledge and standards of scholarship advance, the constant effort being to more nearly comprehend and rightly express the divine message to the generations of men as they come and go. NOTE I. The Authorized Version has been placed in the first column and made the basis of the Gospel subject-index because it is the oldest English Bible in general use by Protestant Christendom, and the dominant Christian faith of the United States, and among English speaking people generally, is Protestant. Christian Unity in Effort gives as the number of communicants and adherents in the important religious denominations in the United States, based upon a census estimate as of December 31, 1908, Protestant communicants 21,887,812 and adherents 65,600,000; while the Catholic totals were 12,394,731 communicants and 14,600,000 adherents. NOTE 2. In the Douay Version the numbers of verses in several of the chapters differ from the numbers in the same chapters in the other versions; for example, the Douay Version consolidates Matthew 17: 14, 15 of the other versions into Matthew 17: 14, making twenty-six verses in the Douay, there being twenty-seven verses in each of the other versions. NOTE 3. The English and the American Revision companies respectively responsible for the English Revised and the American Standard Revised versions, decided that the evidence before them required the omission of the following verses which appear in the Authorized Version and in the Douay Version; namely, Matthew 17:21; 18:11; 23:14; Mark 7:16; 9:44; 9:46; 11:26; 15:28; Luke 17:36; 23:17; John 5:4. In addition to the omissions in the Holy Gospel as specifically noted, other similar omissions occur in the remaining books of the New Testament. NOTE 4. Titles and publishers of the Bibles from which the Gospel text has been taken:— The Holy Bible (King James or Authorized Version) Oxford University Press, American Branch, New York The Holy Bible (English Revised Version) Oxford University Press, American Branch, New York The Holy Bible (American Standard Version) Thomas Nelson & Sons, New York The Holy Bible (Douay Version) H. L. Kilner & Co., Philadelphia 12 |