Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
Rome (Agenzia Fides) - Fr. Giovanni Rizzi, Docent of Sacred Scripture at the Pontifical Urban University, has completed a major study on the editions of the Bible preserved in the Library of the Pontifical Urban University, with the title “Edizioni della Bibbia nel contesto di Propaganda Fide”. (Editions of the Bible in the Context of Propaganda Fide). The work in Italian, is in three volumes: Vol. I - Editions in the constitutive languages of the Bible; Vol. II - The Continent of Europe; Vol. III - Asia, Oceania, Africa, the Continent of America. Here is the presentation written by Prof. Rizzi himself.
“The Bible, as a whole or in parts, has been translated into 2,377 different languages, not discussing possible distinctions between a language and a dialect, or considering new translations under way.
Since it belongs to the S. Congregation de Propaganda Fide, the Biblioteca Urbaniana is at the service of the missions and for the formation of clergy and pastoral workers in mission territories and for mission territories. The patrimony of editions of the Bible documented in the Biblioteca Urbaniana consists of 1,291 volumes, involving 160 languages which reveal various paths of how the faith has been inculturated. The editions of the text of the Bible involve not only different Christian confessions but also Judaism, in its four millennia of history from the biblical epoch down to our day. Therefore interaction among Christian and Jewish editions become a phenomenon concerning not only the establishing of the Hebrew text of the Old Testament but also with regard to the interpretation of the text.
The Biblioteca Urbaniana contains documentation on 104 volumes relative to editions of the Bible or distinct parts of it in Greek: modern reproductions of Codes and papyri, editions in modern Greek and bilingual Greek/Latin editions. The Library documents 208 volumes relative to editions of the Bible in Hebrew, including a few Rabbinic Bibles, early versions of the NT in biblical Hebrew, modern Hebrew and Yiddish. There are 10 volumes of Bible texts in Aramaic; 30 volumes relative to Polyglot editions of the Bible, involving 9 languages: Hebrew, Samaritan, Aramaic, Greek, Syrian, Arab, Ethiopian, ancient Persian (Farsi) and Latin. With regard to Europe, there are 782 volumes involving 25 languages, including Latin editions up to the most recent Neo-Vulgate, in Gothic, Anglo-Saxon, and in Slavonic, which are cultural and well as religious archetypes for the different European areas. For Asia there are 533 volumes involving 67 languages. For the Near and Middle East there are 124 volumes in: Samaritan, Syrian, Armenian, Georgian, Arab, Turkish and Persian. For Oceania there are 3 volumes, involving 2 languages. For Africa there are a total 180 volumes involving 46 languages; 27 volumes in Copt, 24 volumes in Ethiopian (Ge’ez and Amaric). For the north American continent there are 50 volumes involving 10 languages and 21 volumes involving 9 languages for south America.
This patrimony relative to biblical texts often supplies important information about local Churches: the way the Biblical text was read in the Liturgy and privately, the way it was interpreted, technical and scientific knowledge of the Bible text, in recent times and from the very beginning. In many cases the edition of a Book of the Bible, or several Bible Books or the whole Bible depends on one or more editions from other local Churches, either because missionaries from other Churches shared their own Biblical patrimony, or because the local clergy studied with the Bible in other local Churches.
Not rarely editions of the Bible reveal missionary work by a number of different Christian confessions in the same local Church area: in many mission territories the reformed Churches, Lutheran, Anglican, Methodist etc., preceded the Catholic Church in the work of producing new Bibles; in some areas the reformed Churches and even the Orthodox Christianity have been the only ones to have translated the Bible in a certain language and local Church. In a number of cases Bible editions produced by other Christian confessions differ in many points in the lesson and interpretation; whereas more recently an emerging principle of collaboration among the different Christian confessions has led to various forms of Bible co-publishing. (Giovanni Rizzi) (Agenzia Fides 27/2/2007; righe 51, parole 704)
