Dangerous modernism of Ratzinger?

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po18guy said:
The modernist-influenced commentators pay far less attention to the Old Testament than to the new. I find that, at the same time, both unusual and telling.
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Do you mean Catholic modernist-influenced commentators? I had the impression that, unlike Protestant commentators, Catholic commentators (whether modernist or not) had concentrated almost exclusively on the NT until quite recently, and that their present-day interest in the OT was a comparatively recent development.
 
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BartholomewB said:
OT was a comparatively recent development.
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It certainly was very recent. As an example, the editorial committee for the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (first published 1968 and current critical text for the OT) had no Catholics (or Jewish scholars for that matter).

The successor to the BHS, the BHQ (Quinta), soon to be published this year God-willing, has Catholic and Jewish scholars. One familiar name I see is Stephen Pisano who also does work for the critical text of the Greek NT, and there are a large number of scholars from traditionally Catholic regions (Madrid, Rome, Dublin).
 
Exposure of Catholic massgoers to the OT, in the form of the Biblical readings in the Lectionary, grew exponentially in the years following Vatican 2. I’ve been looking at some statistics on Fr. Felix Just’s website. It’s not an easy site to find your way around, and I’m not sure that the figures he quotes from one source are always strictly comparable with those he quotes from a different source, but what follows is a fair summary, I hope, of what he says about the readings before and after Vatican 2.

The number of verses in the pre-Vatican 2 Roman Missal that were read in the course of the liturgical year added up to 1,564, of which 1,309 verses were taken from the New Testament, compared with only 255 verses from the Old Testament (excluding the Psalms).

The corresponding figures for the present-day Lectionary are 5,689 verses from the NT plus 3,378 verses from the OT, adding up to 9,067. Thus the number of NT verses has quadrupled, while the number of OT verses multiplied thirteenfold.

http://catholic-resources.org/Lectionary/Roman_Missal.htm

http://catholic-resources.org/Lectionary/Statistics.htm
 
Yes, for this reason, Pope Benedict XVI specifically addressed modernism via the historical-critical method of exegesis in his first volume of Jesus of Nazareth. I have not delved too far into the authorship, but whomever penned the footnotes and book intros in the “bible currently in use” was decidedly modernist. I am assuming that they weee primarily Catholic.
 
po18guy said:
A certain bible in current use has introductions and footnotes with the distinct flavor of historical-critical in them.
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I’m not sure what Bible you’re hinting at here, and I’m not going to press you to spell it out if you don’t want to, but my go-to Bible for footnotes is the first Jerusalem Bible, published in English in 1966, which often attracts quite severe criticism of this kind. However, I have found it to be the Bible that gives me quick and easy answers to my questions! As a translation, I should add, I don’t care for it so much. The footnotes are what I use it for.
 
I have the 1966 Jerusalem bible. I have not before consulted the notes, but I shall have a peek. The bible of which I speak is considered to be new and American. If I type out the usual abbreviation, it seems to attract its most vociferous supporters in opposition to anything I might have to say. Life is indeed too short.

EDIT: Correcting chemo-fingered typos.
 
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Absolutely horrid in places. The argument seems to center on those comments being either a symptom of, or a cause of some of the current malaise in the US Church.
 
Don’t you think “vociferous supporters” should refute anti-Catholic comments when they are posted here?
 
Please define “anti-Catholic.” Do you mean:
  1. Anyone who differs with your opinion? Guilty!
  2. Anyone who differs with the content of notes that are clearly identified as opinion? Guilty again!
  3. Anyone who disagrees with the abruptly introduced and novel opinions of authors who clearly are modernist influenced? Guilty!
  4. Do you mean disagreement with the notes which assert that Luke fabricated portions of His Gospel? Guilty!
  5. Disagreement with the assertions that Mary never uttered a single word of the Magnificat? Definitely guilty!
  6. Disagreement with the claim that the Magnificat was inserted where it was as it helped make a good story? Guilty!
  7. Disagreement with the claim that we have absolutely no idea whose teaching was behind the Gospel which is called, “for the sake of convenience” Matthew? As trite as it sounds, guilty!
Do I disagree with those innovations in the faith?

Yes!
 
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I was just looking at Luke in the JB to see what they say about the Magnificat, to compare it with the other translation. As far as I can see, the Introduction to Luke (pp. 13-14) doesn’t mention the Magnificat at all, while the footnote on p. 93 has just this:

Not ‘Elizabeth’ , a var. with only slight MS support. Mary’s canticle is reminiscent of Hannah’s, 1 S 2: 1-10, and of many other O .T. passages. Apart from the main textual similarities noted in the margin there are two characteristic O.T . ideas: 1. God comes to the help not of the rich and powerful but of the poor and the simple, Zp 2:3+ , cf. Mt 5:3 + . 2. Ever since Abraham received the promises, Gn 15:1 + : 17:1 + , Israel has been God’s favoured one, cf. Dt 7:6 +, etc.

Does this meet with your approval, @po18guy?
 
My approval? Ha, you’re killing me! Yes, those make perfect sense, as Hannah is a “type” for Mary in that she expected no child, yet was blessed with a son (Samuel) who played a major role in Judaism - foreshadowing Christ.

But the modernist-influenced notes in the oh-so-popular NAB, which can be corrosive to faith, which drain the supernatural out of the faith, which suggest that crucial portions of the Gospels are simply pleasing tales - well, they really chap my hide.
 
Compare the Jerusalem Bible’s notes with these from even the latest revision of the NAB/RE regarding Mary’s Magnificat:
“the Magnificat (with the possible exception of v. 48) may have been a Jewish Christian hymn that Luke found appropriate at this point in his story. Even if not composed by Luke, it fits in well with themes found elsewhere in Luke:”
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So, Luke, rather than being inspired by the Holy Spirit; rather than interviewing the living eyewitnesses, was simply a talented composer of pious fables? AYKM? “Even if not composed by Luke” - what??? There is a slight chance that Mary might have spoken the Magnificat? AYKM2.0! Such comments, IMO, have no place whatsoever in the “approved” and universally available bible for American Catholics.

If you happen to have any of the 1941-1969 Confraternity bibles on hand, compare the footnotes and book introductions. Solid. Inspiring. 100% Catholic with zero modernist nonsense.

Fortunately, we have Christ’s assurance that the Church will weather all storms - including this very trendy flirtation with modernism. It is the theology of the prodigal son - we can only pray that they regain their senses and cease their deconstructing of the faith.
 
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po18guy said:
I have not delved too far into the authorship, but whomever penned the footnotes and book intros in the “bible currently in use” was decidedly modernist. I am assuming that they weee primarily Catholic.
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I define anti-Catholic as opposed to what Catholics teach. That seems to be how you are identifying yourself here, as someone who is opposed to what Catholics teach. At least, that is how the hyperpartisaned “vociferous supporters” would probably judge you.
 
Bait? I am just tryimg to understand what you are trying to say.
 
I am trying to say that I try to be a faithful Catholic - the faith that has been handed down to us: Scripture, Tradition and Magisterium.

Perhaps your faith is built up by the notes in the NAB. If so, God bless you!

But, taken at face value they strike me as being done by agnostics. To claim knowledge, accuracy and honesty by consulting exactly 1/3 of the deposit of faith…well, if I did that, I would be considered stupid, or arrogant.

I may be entirely wrong here, but that is not the Catholic faith.
 
po18guy said:
If you happen to have any of the 1941-1969 Confraternity bibles on hand, compare the footnotes and book introductions. Solid. Inspiring. 100% Catholic with zero modernist nonsense.
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I suspect that the Confraternity Bible has weaknesses of its own. Take a look, for instance, at these two paragraphs from the introduction to Matthew:

Writing for his countrymen of Palestine, St. Matthew composed his Gospel in his native Aramaic. Soon afterwards, about the time of the persecution of Herod Agrippa I in 42 A.D., he took his departure for other lands. Another tradition places the composition of his Gospel either between the time of this departure and the Council of Jerusalem, i.e., between 42 A.D. and 50 A.D., or even later. Definitely, however, the Gospel itself, depicting the Holy City with its altar and temple still existing, and without any reference to the fulfillment of our Lord’s prophecy, shows that it was written before the destruction of the city by the Romans (70 A.D.).

The Gospel was soon translated into Greek—possibly during the lifetime of St. Matthew or a little later; certainly before the close of the first century. The original has been lost in the course of time. The Greek text, however, is in substantial conformity with the original.

Does the author of this Introduction explain on what evidence he is basing his assertion that the Greek text “is in substantial conformity with the original”?
 
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By comparing, not with written texts, but with the apostolic Tradition as well as parallel manuscripts not in Aramaic(?) The Greek apparently reveals from its structure that it was a translation from a Hebrew dialect, almost assuredly Aramaic.

However, compare and contrast the positivity of the Confraternity notes with the doubts cast by the NAB notes. Did our Lord leave us orphans?
 
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