Part II: The NAB v. The Lectionary

Thanks to Robert for this extensive guest post. You can read part one here.

Twelfth Sunday of Ordinary Time 

In the last episode (covering the weekday mass for the feast of St. Mark the Evangelist), we saw that the 1970/1986 NAB matches nearly perfectly with the lectionary readings, whereas the ICEL translations of the antiphons and alleluia verse are quite free and different from any full bible translation.

Today we will look at a Sunday mass with all the bells and whistles and second readings. Differences between texts will be bolded. In curious expectation for the change in lectionary text in 8-10 years, NABRE Old Testament renderings are included for the curious, as well as pertinent chunks of the Revised Grail Psalms, which are already in use and some places and may (or may not) become the normative psalms for the liturgy of the American Church in the coming years. I encourage you to compare what is there to your translation of choice and charitably highlight some salient differences.  Insights on the source languages would be quite welcome, as I do not pretend to have any understanding of Hebrew and Greek. Many thanks again to Timothy for running this labor of love and putting up with our bickering in the comment section.

Entrance Antiphon

Cf. Psalm 28: 8-9

Lectionary (ICEL translation):

The Lord is the strength of his people,

A saving refuge for the one he has anointed.

Save your people, Lord, and bless your heritage,

And govern them for ever.

NAB 1970/1986:

The Lord is the strength of his people,

the saving refuge of his anointed.

Save your people, and bless your inheritance;

feed them, and carry them forever.

(For contrast)

NABRE psalter:

Lord, you are a strength for your people,

the saving refuge of your anointed.

Save your people, bless your inheritance;

pasture and carry them forever.

Revised Grail Psalter:

The LORD is the strength of his people,

a saving refuge for his anointed.

Save your people and bless your heritage.

Shepherd and carry them forever.

These antiphons are adaptations rather than translations of the text from which they are drawn, which can be seen in the Ps 28:9b.  Neither the ICEL antiphon nor the original NAB psalter contain the shepherd imagery which is, to me, the lasting image of the NABRE and Revised Grail Psalter rendition of this chunk.  The verb “to pasture” that is found in the NABRE psalter here is especially vivid to me.  The work of a shepherd is fairly abstract to a first world city dweller like me, but the image of God taking us to a place of safety in which we may flourish is a strong one.  I am at times numb to the shepherd/sheepfold images and scripture, but in times of great need I find it a source of great comfort.  I feel a desire to make the bible “strange” again—to break out of my preconceived notions and accept its challenges and consolations on their own terms.  Even as I type this, being reminded of that metaphor is enough to fill my heart with great peace.  What a gift the lectionary is!

First Reading

Jeremiah 20:10-13

Lectionary:

Jeremiah said:

“I hear the whisperings of many:

‘Terror on every side!

Denounce! let us denounce him!’

All those who were my friends

are on the watch for any misstep of mine.

‘Perhaps he will be trapped; then we can prevail,

and take our vengeance on him.’

But the Lord is with me, like a mighty champion:

my persecutors will stumble, they will not triumph.

In their failure they will be put to utter shame,

to lasting, unforgettable confusion.

O Lord of hosts, you who test the just,

who probe mind and heart,

let me witness the vengeance you take on them,

for to you I have entrusted my cause.

Sing to the Lord,

praise the Lord,

for he has rescued the life of the poor

from the power of the wicked!”

NAB 1970/1986:

Yes, I hear the whisperings of many:

“Terror on every side!

Denounce! Let us denounce him!”

All those who were my friends

are on the watch for any misstep of mine.

“Perhaps he will be trapped; then we can prevail,

and take our vengeance on him.”

But the Lord is with me, like a mighty champion:

my persecutors will stumble, they will not triumph.

In their failure they will be put to utter shame,

to lasting, unforgettable confusion.

O Lord of hosts, you who test the just,

who probe mind and heart,

Let me witness the vengeance you take on them,

for to you I have entrusted my cause.

Sing to the Lord,

praise the Lord,

For he has rescued the life of the poor

from the power of the wicked!

NABRE:

Yes, I hear the whisperings of many:

“Terror on every side!

Denounce! Let us denounce him!”

All those who were my friends

are on the watch for any misstep of mine.

“Perhaps he can be tricked; then we will prevail,

and take our revenge on him.”

But the Lord is with me, like a mighty champion:

my persecutors will stumble, they will not prevail.

In their failure they will be put to utter shame,

to lasting, unforgettable confusion.

Lord of hosts, you test the just,

you see mind and heart,

Let me see the vengeance you take on them,

for to you I have entrusted my cause.

Sing to the Lord,

praise the Lord,

For he has rescued the life of the poor

from the power of the evildoers!

Hearing from the confessions of Jeremiah is always a treat for this solipsistic young Catholic who is aware of the difficulties and not just the joys of having joined the Church.  This part of Jeremiah 20 is bookended by two of the most brutally honest complaints of suffering in the whole of scripture.  We at mass get only the section of consolation here.  The 1970/1986 NAB is near exactly the same as the lectionary in this case.  The comparison between the 1970/1986 NAB and the NABRE seems especially interesting to me, though.  There is an assumption that the NABRE is more literal and very different from the previous NAB, and while that is true, at times the text is very much the same, as is the case here.  It is a good reminder to us that “more literal” does not always mean we should expect “bible English”.  The marketing of the KJV family of translations (including the good ole RSV-CE and RSV-2CE) has given that idea to even NAB lovers like me, but it isn’t necessarily true.  Someone with knowledge of Hebrew will need to speak to this, but it seems to me that the NABRE has retreated from some words in this passage that seem very scripture-y—vengeance, triumph, probe, wicked—and revealed some parallelisms: the repetition of the word “prevail”, Jeremiah “seeing” his own vindication just as God “sees” into the human heart and mind.  The NABRE Old Testament seems much more vigorous translation than its predecessor, but that certainly doesn’t always mean they are cribbing words from the King James Bible vocabulary.

Responsorial Psalm

Psalm 69:8-10, 14, 17, 33-35

Lectionary:

R: Lord, in your great love, answer me.

For your sake I bear insult,

And shame covers my face.

I have become an outcast to my brothers,

A stranger to my children,

Because zeal for your house consumes me,

And the insults of those who blaspheme you fall upon me

I pray to you, O Lord,

For the time of your favor, O God!

In your great kindness answer me

With your constant help.

Answer me, O Lord, for bounteous is your kindness;

In your great mercy turn toward me.

“See, you lowly ones, and be glad;

You who seek God, may your hearts revive!

For the Lord hears the poor,

And his own who are in bonds he spurns not.

Let the heavens and the earth praise him,

The seas and whatever moves in them!”

1970 NAB Psalter:

Since for your sake I bear insult,

And shame covers my face.

I have become an outcast to my brothers,

A stranger to my mother’s sons,

Because zeal for your house consumes me,

And the insults of those who blaspheme you fall upon me.

But I pray to you, O Lord,

For the time of your favor, O God!

In your great kindness answer me

with your constant help.

Answer me, O Lord, for bounteous is your kindness;

In your great mercy turn toward me.

“See you lowly ones, and be glad;

You who seek God, may your hearts be merry

For the Lord hears the poor,

And his own who are in bonds he spurns not.

Let the heavens and the earth praise him,

The seas and whatever moves in them!”

NABRE Psalter:

For it is on your account I bear insult,

That disgrace covers my face.

I have become an outcast to my kindred,

A stranger to my mother’s children.

Because zeal for your house has consumed me,

I am scorned by those who scorn you.

But I will pray to you, Lord, at a favorable time.

God, in your abundant kindness, answer me

With your sure deliverance.

Answer me, Lord, in your generous love;

In your great mercy turn to me.

“See, you lowly ones, and be glad;

You who seek God, take heart!

For the Lord hears the poor,

And does not spurn those in bondage.

Let the heaven and the earth praise him,

The seas and whatever moves in them.

Revised Grail Psalter:

It is for you that I suffer taunts,

that shame has covered my face.

To my own kin I have become an outcast,

a stranger to the children of my mother.

Zeal for your house consumes me,

and taunts against you fall on me.

But I pray to you, O LORD,

for a time of your favor.

In your great mercy, answer me, O God,

with your salvation that never fails.

LORD, answer, for your mercy is kind;

in your great compassion, turn towards me.

The poor when they see it will be glad,

and God-seeking hearts will revive;

for the LORD listens to the needy,

and does not spurn his own in their chains.

Let the heavens and the earth give him praise,

the seas and everything that moves in them.

The original NAB psalter and the lectionary psalm are very close, with instructive differences.  The lectionary lops off some of the connecting tissue which links parts of the bible to their surrounding context.  This is, of course, a necessity for streamlined oral proclamation of parts of the bible.  You can see this in the many places where the NAB text is transferred without change to the lectionary except for a missing word like “but”, “therefore”, or “yet” at the beginning of the passage.

The differences between the NABRE psalter and the Revised Grail Psalms are fascinating to me, as they were the last time I compared the NAB to the lectionary.  Once again, the NABRE seems to retain some of the rough edges and otherness of the world of the psalms while the Revised Grail version is buffed clean and ready to be used in prayer by a 21

st century American.  The Revised Grail rendition of this psalm hits me in all the right places: lacking the word “whatever” in the last line (which as a 30 year old who grew up in the 1990s still smacks of dismissiveness to me), the smoother English style as in phrases like “taunts against you fall on me” and “does not spurn his own in their chains”, as well as the vocabulary of “mercy”, “compassion”, and “salvation.”  The psalms are songs and prayers.  This version seems most to be the one I would sing and pray.   I strongly suspect, though, that of the related renditions we see here it is the least like the psalm and prayer of the ancient Israelite whose inspired words bless us today.

Second Reading

Romans 5:12-15

Lectionary:

Brothers and sisters: Through one man sin entered the world, and through sin, death, and thus death came to all men, inasmuch as all sinned—for up to the time of the law, sin was in the world, though sin is not accounted when there is no law.  But death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin after the pattern of the trespass of Adam, who is the type of the one who was to come.

But the gift is not like the transgression.  For if by the transgression of the one the many died, how much more did the grace of God and the gracious gift of the one man Jesus Christ overflow for the many.

1970/1986 NAB (which is currently the up-to-date New Testament):

Therefore, just as through one person sin entered the world, and through sin, death, and thus death came to all, inasmuch as all sinned—for up to the time of the law, sin was in the world, though sin is not accounted when there is no law.  But death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who did not sin after the pattern of the trespass of Adam, who is the type of the one who was to come.

But the gift is not like the transgression.  For if by that one person’s transgression the many died, how much more did the grace of God and the gracious gift of the one person Jesus Christ overflow for the many.

Here is an interesting case of the light gender neutrality of the 1986 Revised New Testament of the NAB, which was carried through to the whole text with the advent of the NABRE. You don’t need

me to tell you that this is a third rail among the folks who hold opinions on bible translation.  I’m of the opinion that “one man” sounds more poetic and more biblical (whatever that means) than “one person”, but that this is simply due to force of habit.  It sounds like the bible because that’s what bibles have sounded like, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that it is the only or even the proper understanding of the text.  No matter what you think of the translation wars of the last 30 years, it is plain to see that what is important here is Adam and Jesus’ shared personhood, not their common male-ness.  As I’ve read both aloud in preparing this article, I actually think the NAB version is a bit clearer, as having two uses of the word “the” in such close proximity in the phrase “if by the transgression of the one the many died” seems clumsy.  Paul’s arguments and sentences are knotted as it is—to further pretzel them in the interest of removing the word “person” seems a bit perverse, especially in light of the great need for us Catholics to understand St. Paul’s writings.  They are widely ignored in preaching.  Perhaps being beaten over the head with them the first 500 years of Protestantism has made us collectively shy away from Paul’s epistles, but the Church Fathers were no strangers to Paul and I’m only now realizing that I shouldn’t be either.  I am part of an informal group of folks about my age that meet biweekly to discuss the next day’s Sunday readings.  When we discussed this reading it was plain to us who poorly we understood what Paul was trying to tell the first century Roman church, never mind what he was trying to tell us!  Especially opaque to me is his point that the Law in some way causes sin.  The New Collegeville Commentary on Galatians and Romans has been a great help to me in this way the past few days.  If you have a good resource on Paul, feel free to comment with a suggestion!

Alleluia Verse

John 15:26b, 27a

Lectionary (ICEL translation):

The Spirit of truth will testify to me, says the Lord; and you also will testify.

1970/1986 NAB:

…the Spirit of truth that proceeds from the Father, he will testify to me.  And you also testify…

Not much to see here.  The ICEL version is an adaptation rather than a direct use of the text.  I think I understand now why the Eastern Church got so bent out of shape over the Filioque.  Of course the section of John we hear on Divine Mercy Sunday seems to show the Spirit proceeding from the Son as well, but I will leave that one for the theologians.  May Christ complete the reunion of his Churches in East and West.

Gospel

Matthew 10:26-33

Lectionary:

Jesus said to the Twelve: “Fear no one.  Nothing is concealed that will not be revealed, nor secret that will not be known.  What I say to you in the darkness, speak in the light; what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops.  And do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, be afraid of the one who can destroy both soul and body in Gehenna.  Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin?  Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father’s knowledge.  Even all the hairs of your head are counted.  So do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.  Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father.  But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father.”

1970/1986 NAB:

“Therefore do not be afraid of them.  Nothing is concealed that will not be revealed, nor secret that will not be known.  What I say to you in the darkness, speak in the light; what you hear whispered, proclaim on the housetops.  And do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather, be afraid of the one who can destroy both soul and body in Gehenna.  Are not two sparrows sold for a small coin?  Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father’s knowledge.  Even all the hairs of your head are counted.  So do not be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.  Everyone who acknowledges me before others I will acknowledge before my heavenly Father.  But whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father.”

The lectionary adds an incipit and changes the first sentence to remove the pronoun which lacks an antecedent once this passage is taken from its place in Matthew’s missionary discourse.  This is beautiful and clear, in my opinion.  Living this way, of course, is much harder than admiring the work of translation.

Communion antiphon (two choices)

Psalm 145:15

Lectionary (ICEL Translation):

The eyes of all look to you, Lord,

And you give them their food in due season

1970/1986 NAB:

The eyes of all look hopefully to you,

And you give them their food in due season

NABRE Psalter:

The eyes of all look hopefully to you;

You give them their food in due season.

Revised Grail Psalms:

The eyes of all look to you,

and you give them their food in due season.

John 10:11, 15

Lectionary (ICEL Translation):

I am the Good Shepherd,

And I lay down my life for my sheep, says the Lord

1970/1986 NAB:

I am the good shepherd...and I will lay down my life for the sheep

Just a bit of tinkering here.  Ho-hum.  Maybe next time I will ignore the antiphons and alleluia verse.