From Wikipedia:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Douay-Rheims_Bible
Challoner Revision
Translation
The Douay-Rheims Bible, however, achieved little currency, even among English-speaking Catholics, until it was substantially revised between 1749 and 1752 by Richard Challoner, an English bishop, formally appointed to the deserted see of Debra. Challoner’s revisions borrowed heavily from the King James Version (himself being a convert from Protestantism, and thus familiar with its style) whose translators had borrowed a few terms from the original Rheims NT of 1582. Challoner not only addressed the odd prose and the latinisms, but produced a version which, while still called the Douay-Rheims, was little like it.
The same passage of Ephesians in Challoner’s revision gives a hint of the thorough stylistic editing he did of the text:
Code:
That the Gentiles should be fellow heirs and of the same body: and copartners of his promise in Christ Jesus, by the gospel, of which I am made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God, which is given to me according to the operation of his power. To me, the least of all the saints, is given this grace, to preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ: and to enlighten all men, that they may see what is the dispensation of the mystery which hath been hidden from eternity in God who created all things: that the manifold wisdom of God may be made known to the principalities and powers in heavenly places through the church, according to the eternal purpose which he made in Christ Jesus our Lord: in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him.
For comparison, the same passage of Ephesians in the King James Bible:
Code:
That the Gentiles should be fellowheirs, and of the same body, and partakers of his promise in Christ by the gospel: whereof I was made a minister, according to the gift of the grace of God given unto me by the effectual working of his power. Unto me, who am less than the least of all saints, is this grace given, that I should preach among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ; and to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ: to the intent that now unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places might be known by the church the manifold wisdom of God, according to the eternal purpose which he purposed in Christ Jesus our Lord: in whom we have boldness and access with confidence by the faith of him.
Publication
The extensive notes and commentary of the original were drastically reduced, resulting in a compact one-volume edition of the Bible, which contributed greatly to its popularity. Gone also was the longer paragraph formatting of the text; instead, the text was broken up so that each verse was its own paragraph. The three apocrypha, which had been placed in an appendix to the second volume of the Old Testament, were dropped.
This Challoner version, officially approved by the Church, remained the Bible of the majority of English-speaking Catholics well into the 20th century, and has remained in active printing in America since 1971. It was first published in America in 1899 by the John Murphy Company of Baltimore, Maryland, and is formally known as the “Douay-Rheims Challoner Revision”. A new, revised version of the Douay-Rheims was also published in America in 1899, known as the “Douay-Rheims American Edition”, but it is no longer in-print. In 1941 the New Testament and Psalms of the Douay-Rheims Bible were again heavily revised to produce the New Testament (and in some editions, the Psalms) of the Confraternity Bible, however so extensive were these changes, that it was no longer identified as the Douay-Rheims.
