Mary and Genesis

[cyberwolf001]

I I couldn’t find this referenced elsewhere so I’m asking here.

Why is it that the Douay-Rhimes Bible differs from all others in Gen?

This is the part I mean:

14 And the Lord God said to the serpent: Because thou hast done this thing, thou art cursed among all cattle, and beasts of the earth: upon thy breast shalt thou go, and earth shalt thou eat all the days of thy life. 15 I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel.

But every other translation Gen 3:15 says HE shall crush thy head I’ve also taken 3:15 to be a prefiguring for Jesus and Mary.

Can someone explain why there is a difference?

 

[teachccd]

15 “She shall crush”… Ipsa, the woman; so divers of the fathers read this place, conformably to the Latin: others read it ipsum, viz., the seed. **The sense is the same: for it is by her seed, Jesus Christ, that the woman crushes the serpent’s head. **

 

[Todd_Easton]

The rendering in the Douay-Rheims Bible is a translation of a variant reading found in many manuscripts of the Latin Vulgate, which probably originated in the error of an early copyist of the Latin Vulgate. This variant was favored by St. Ambrose (d. 397) and St. Augustine (d. 430).

 

[Evan]

I have read that the original hebrew left the gender unknown. So both/neither is correct. There is no implication in the original word as to what gender the person would be.

 

[Joe_5859]

Can someone explain why there is a difference?

The original Hebrew word ipsa was used differently at different times in different centuries. Sometimes it was used to mean “he”, sometimes it was used to mean “she”. This leaves it rather ambiguous for us today. St. Jerome’s Vulgate translates the word as “she” (which the D-R follows). Most other modern translations seem to go with “he”.

You might notice that much religious art tends to follow St. Jerome’s translation of “she”. Many paintings and sculptures depict Mary crushing the head of the serpent.

Personally, the ambiguity doesn’t bother me. In fact, just the opposite. It reaffirms in my mind that Mary’s will so closely follows that of her Son that any action she may do could rightly be said to be an action of Jesus.