Preface to the New American Bible First Edition of the New Testament
The New Testament translation has been approached with essentially the same
fidelity to the thought and individual style of the biblical writers as was
applied in the Old Testament. In some cases, however, the problem of marked
literary peculiarities had to be met. What by any Western standard are the
limited vocabularies and stylistic infelicities of the evangelists cannot be
retained in the exact form in which they appear in the originals without
displeasing the modern ear. A compromise is here attempted whereby some measure
of the poverty of the evangelists' expression is kept and placed at the service
of their message in its richness. Similarly, the syntactical shortcomings of
Paul, his frequent lapses into anacoluthon, and the like, are rendered as they
occur in his epistles rather than "smoothed out." Only thus, the translators
suppose, will contemporary readers have some adequate idea of the kind of
writing they have before them. When the prose of the original flows more
smoothly, as in Luke, Acts, and Hebrews, it is reflected in the translation.
The Gospel according to John comprises a special case. Absolute fidelity to his
technique of reiterated phrasing would result in an assault on the English ear,
yet the softening of the vocal effect by substitution of other words and phrases
would destroy the effectiveness of his poetry. Again, resort is had to
compromise. This is not an easy matter when the very repetitiousness which the
author deliberately employed is at the same time regarded by those who read and
speak English to be a serious stylistic defect. Only those familiar with the
Greek originals can know what a relentless tattoo Johannine poetry can produce.
A similar observation could be made regarding other New Testament books as well.
Matthew and Mark are given to identical phrasing twice and three times in the
same sentence. As for the rhetorical overgrowth and mixed figures of speech in
the letters of Peter, James, and Jude, the translator must resist a powerful
compulsion to tidy them up if only to render these letters intelligibly.
Without seeking refuge in complaints against the inspired authors, however, the
translators of The New American Bible here state that what they have attempted
is a translation rather than a paraphrase. To be sure, all translation can be
called paraphrase by definition. Any striving for complete fidelity will shortly
end in infidelity. Nonetheless, it must be pointed out that the temptation to
improve overladen sentences by the consolidation or elimination of multiplied
adjectives, or the simplification of clumsy hendiadys, has been resisted here.
For the most part, rhetorically ineffective words and phrases are retained in
this translation in some form, even when it is clear that a Western contemporary
writer would never have employed them.
The spelling of proper names in The New American Bible follows the customary
forms found in most English Bibles since the Authorized Version.
Despite the arbitrary character of the divisions into numbered verses (a scheme
which in its present form is only four centuries old), the translators have made
a constant effort to keep within an English verse the whole verbal content of
the Greek verse. At times the effort has not seemed worth the result since it
often does violence to the original author's flow of expression, which preceded
it by so many centuries. If this translation had been prepared for purposes of
public reading only, the editors would have forgone the effort at an early
stage. But since they never departed from the threefold objective of preparing a
translation suitable for liturgical use, private reading, and the purposes of
students, the last-named consideration prevailed. Those familiar with Greek
should be able to discover how the translators of the New Testament have
rendered any given original verse of scripture, if their exegetical or
theological tasks require them to know this. At the same time, the fact should
be set down here that the editors did not commit themselves in the synoptic
gospels to rendering repeated words or phrases identically.
This leads to a final consideration: the Greek text used for the New Testament.
Here, punctuation and verse division are at least as important as variant
readings. In general, Nestle-Aland's Novum Testamentum Graece (25th edition,
1963) was followed. Additional help was derived from The Greek New Testament
(Aland, Black, Metzger, Wikgren), produced for the use of translators by the
United Bible Societies in 1966. However, the editors did not confine themselves
strictly to these texts; at times, they inclined toward readings otherwise
attested. The omission of alternative translations does not mean that the
translators think them without merit, but only that in every case they had to
make a choice.
Poorly attested readings do not occur in this translation. Doubtful readings of
some merit appear within brackets; public readers may include such words or
phrases, or omit them entirely without any damage to sense. Parentheses are
used, as ordinarily in English, as a punctuation device. Material they enclose
is in no sense textually doubtful. It is simply thought to be parenthetical in
the intention of the biblical author, even though there is no such punctuation
mark in Greek. The difficulty in dealing with quotation marks is well known.
Since they do not appear in any form in the original text, wherever they occur
here they constitute an editorial decision.
(Divino afflante Spiritu).
Copyright © 1970, Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc., Washington, DC. All rights reserved. Neither this work nor any part of it may be reproduced, distributed, performed or displayed in any medium, including electronic or digital, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.