King James Bible?

[tonyh12]

I would always prefer Catholic bible ie one with Tobit Ruth Maccabees etc what Protestants call apocrypha because these stories are essential as far as I can make out to explaining why we believe in certain things that Protestants do not agree with eg praying for the dead.

My Baptist friend once rebuked me for praying for my deceased parents praying saying it is not in the bible.

Well our Catholic tradional does make scriptural sense if you have a Catholic bible and read Maccabees within the Old Testament so I would say get a catholic bible simply to include these essential stories in their rightful place within the Old Testament.

I would however be happy to read any of the books in this bible instead of mine, but it would not be my ‘family’ bible as it were for the above reason of the serious ommisions (or mis placements).

 

[FrankF]

I bought my first bible as a freshman in college. I needed it for a class I was required to take as part of a liberal arts curriculum. It was an NAB Study Bible. Having never read the bible in any translation to that point, I didn’t understand why it didn’t sound anything like the scripture quotations I heard in movies or read quoted in other literature. I used it for class, and threw it in a drawer when it was over.

A few years later, I felt the call of the Lord. Eventually I dug out that NAB Study Bible, but it was simply too big and unwieldy. The notes were constantly distracting me from prayerful reading. I bought a much thinner NIV to read. At that time, I did not know the differences which separated Catholics and Protestants, and I certainly did not know about the missing books in the Old Testament. Still, I devoured that NIV bible.

Soon after, I felt drawn to the Catholic Church, and I eventually learned of the doctrinal differences and missing books. I bought an RSV-CE.

I was received into the Catholic Church about five and a half years ago. Today, I use the NKJV for reading and prayer. I love how it reads. If I want to pray with one of the deuterocanonical books, I use the RSV-CE. If I want to study, I use all of the versions I can… NKJV, RSV-CE, NAB, NIV, Confraternity, Knox, etc.

I guess my point is this: The best bible to read is the one that helps us to pray. So long as we allow the Church to guide our understanding, we can read with confidence.