NAB Footnotes: Help or Hinderance?

[Fidelis]

What do you think of the introductions and the footnotes to the New American Bible? Do you find them helpful? Unhelpful? Do you read them assiduously, and with great benefit , or do you skip over /and or ignore them?

 

[Stylteralmaldo]

I find them generally helpful.

 

[csr]

CAI has published an article very critical of the NAB footnotes.

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“It is absolutely wrong and forbidden, either to narrow inspiration to certain parts only of Holy Scripture, or to admit [into discussion] that the sacred writer has erred.” *

 

[Andreas_Hofer]

While I find them helpful when they clear up idiom or provide historical context (which is why I went with generally helpful) I still come across some suspicious things every now and then. With my fours years of personal interaction with Scripture scholars at ND, as well as in reading their colleagues, I’d have to say that taken as a whole modern scripture scholars are some of the worst theologians we have.

 

[pnewton]

I compare it with watching the news. Only very simplistic facts can be relied on. Most everything else is conjecture and best ignored.

Things like language and basic customs are good to know in the NAB notes. I ignore everything concerning authorship because I have already noticed a bias against the miraculous in sripture and the veracity of scripture.

 

[Stylteralmaldo]

pnewton:

…Things like language and basic customs are good to know in the NAB notes. I ignore everything concerning authorship…

I noticed this too. I mostly like the notes for their counter-reference to other areas of the Bible…although sometimes it is incomplete. I also like the golossary (sp?) in the back that explains some Catholic beleifs and references the Bible and where it can be found.

From what I’ve learned on the Catholic Answers web site, it looks like there is more evidence supporting that Matthew was the first Gospel. However the NAB does say that it is possible that Mark was first and I think it leans towards this opinion. So I agree that relying on the hisitorical accuracy of the authorship could be much to be desired.

 

[Stylteralmaldo]

csr:

CAI has published an article very critical of the NAB footnotes.

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“It is absolutely wrong and forbidden, either to narrow inspiration to certain parts only of Holy Scripture, or to admit [into discussion] that the sacred writer has erred.” *

Critical indeed.

If the NAB needs to be replaced by the CAI version, then we all need to pray that the Holy Spirit moves the Church in this direction. In the meantime, I’ll continue to use my NAB version.

Thanks for the information.

 

[Faithful_2_Rome]

Glad I got the NAB online for FREE… I like spending my money on Bibles with Commentaries backed up by Church Fathers & saints and their teachings, ie… Navarre and St Ignatius Bibles, who BELIEVED in the Bible…with the exception of a few, I have no use for todays so called “theologian scholars”

 

[twf]

The NAB notes have disturbed me and induced indignation in me a number of times. They have a lot of helpful stuff…but also a lot of dangerous liberal scholarship assumptions. Has not the Church infallibly defined that the Gospels were written by apostolic men and that they are historically accurate? True, the NAB does not deny the moral truth contained the Gospels, nor that the major events happened…but they question whether Jesus actually said this or that, or whether he actually was in such and such a place when he did that, etc. I’m sure its even worse in the OT, I haven’t had my copy for long. (I’m an Evangelical convert).
Sure, when Scripture is written as a parable, take it as a parable…but there is a big portion of Scripture that is written as history, so by the Church’s own exhortation, should we not take history as history?

 

[Annunciata]

Stylteralmaldo:

I find them generally helpful.

I do as well…almost nothing beats my Douay-Rheims by Haydock though! Annunciata

 

[Gottle_of_Geer]

Stylteralmaldo:

I find them generally helpful.

I think they are very helpful - one doesn’t have to agree with them ​

 

[tkdnick]

I have never really been able to use the footnotes for any Bible. I find it distracts me from the actual reading. Course, maybe if I took the time to look through them, then maybe some things wouldn’t be so confusing.

 

[Psalm45_9]

There are not enough footnotes in the NAB. And they usually do not talk about passages that mention a sacrament. The Haydock bible is much better on these points. I still haven’t read the Navarre Bible yet.

 

[4_marks]

I wish that Catholics had a study bible that was as user-friendly and easy to read as the Quest Study Bible. In that Bible, there are questions in the side columns and references. Responses are in the form of “Most understand this passage to say…” rather than giving a particular interpretation based principally upon modernist historical-critical scholarship of the early 20th century like the NAB does.

Since returning to the RCC, I purchased an NAB “Catholic Answer Bible,” but I still prefer my old Quest NIV. I am also not thrilled with the re-interpolation of scripture in the new lectionary, where words are added that were not there in the original text in an attempt to be more politically correct and relevant. Must we sacrifice the integrity of God’s Word so as not to “offend” anyone?

Anybody else here rely more upon evangelical Protestants when it comes to scriptural nourishment and turn to Catholics when it involves sacraments and particular elements of our Christian heritage and tradition?

Is there a movement of catholic laypersons, who gather weekly, for bible study, reflection, and prayer, either in a parish hall or in individual homes? I am not talking about charismatic prayer groups and the like, but something similar to what evangelical Protestants have? I think it would be quite helpful to those of us who sincerely desire to grow in their faith.

 

[Axion]

Unfortunately the NAB notes are a real hindrance and stumbling block to faith, belief and catholic teaching. The bible notes fail entirely to teach Catholic doctrine.

I must agree with the cited article that they are the product of liberal-critical scholarship and present the theories of this movement as fact.

In doing so, they present the gospel and Old testament writers as being essentially frauds and liars who made up, misattributed and re-arranged most of their material. anyone reading and trusting these notes is sure to find their faith in the truth of the gospel accounts destroyed.

If these people had any proof for their theories it would at least partially justify this assault. But in fact the whole basis of their pontificating - in direct opposition to church teaching - is the unsupported theorising of 19th century Liberal protestant academics.

Is there any wonder there is such a drop in the belief level of young Catholics, in mass attendance, and in vocations with a bible like this.

 

[Vox_Borealis]

I find the notes very helpful, and unlike a number of posters to this thread, I am not scared or threatened by “liberal-critical” biblical scholarship. We are not fundamentalists, and the Church has a long tradition of trying to determnine which passages of the scriptures are meant to be interpreted literally, allegorically, etc. Many of the fine discussions on Catholic Answers pages are rooted in understanding the historical contexts in which the scriptures were composed. So I embrace scholarship such as goes into the NAB.

In any case, no translation is adequate for all purposes, and none captures fully the original Hebrew and Greek (the NT itself is a “translation” of tachings that likely was in Aramaic). When I want to read an aesthetically pleasing Bible, it certainly is not the NAB. If I want a more “critical” tranlation with historical and linguistic notes, I use my NAB. When I need to, I look at the Greek or its Latin translation. Finally, I also embrace scholarships and scholarship that challenge my understanding of my own faith–I find my faith is only strengthed as a result.