Curt, Clear, Complete

THE BIBLE

The Rev. Alexander Jones regards the time-hallowed imagery and metaphoric prose of the King James Version of the Bible with deep admiration and a touch of whimsy: "It would be impossible to do the Times's crossword puzzle without it." Like most other scriptural scholars, Roman Catholic Father Jones, professor of divinities at Liverpool's Christ College, also believes that the Bible is in danger, precisely because of the King James's language, of becoming incomprehensible--"a beautiful mummy embalmed in Elizabethan English." To help the Bible "do its job" afresh, Father Jones and a team of 27 English Biblical experts spent ten years on a new translation that makes even the 1952 Revised Standard Version seem a bit archaic.

Published in the U.S. last week, Jones's Jerusalem Bible (Doubleday; $16.95) is the first complete translation of Scripture from the original languages into English ever made by Roman Catholics. It is Catholic only in its sponsorship; scholars of other faiths wholeheartedly admire it. A reviewer in the Anglican Church Times predicted that in future histories of English Christianity, 1966 will be a date to remember along with 1611--when the King James was published. Old Testament Scholar Samuel Terrien of Manhattan's Union Theological Seminary calls the Jerusalem Bible "one of the major achievements in the Biblical scholarship of the past decades." Its only generally criticized aspect is its choice of "Yahweh" for "Lord." Jones defends the word on grounds of accuracy, defining it as "the incommunicable name of God."

French Forebear. Unlike Ronald Knox, who put the whole Bible into a consistent, personal style of timeless English, Editor Jones and his collaborators--among them J. R. R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings)--tried to capture the individual literary qualities of the Biblical books. Successful in grasping the racy, newspaper-narrative style of Mark, the translators, in the judgment of some scholars, have also done well in what may be the stiffest test of any modern translation: re-creating the dark poetry of Jeremiah and Isaiah. Although Jones preserved a few classic lines from the King James Version

Ecclesiastes' "vanity of vanities," for example--most had to be sacrificed on the altar of accuracy (see box).

The name Jerusalem Bible is in itself a tribute to still another much-praised modern version of Scripture: France's bestselling (1,000,000 copies so far) Bible de Jerusalem, which was published between 1948 and 1956 by Dominican scholars from L'Ecole Biblique in Jordanian Jerusalem. Although the English Jerusalem Bible was made from the original Hebrew and Greek rather than the French, Father Jones and his collaborators followed the text as established by L'Ecole Biblique, constantly referred to the French for guidance on interpretation, and kept the Bible de Jerusalem's introductions and notes.

Study Meant Damage. It is not surprising that the Bible de Jerusalem has become something of a standard for modern translations: scholars of all faiths freely acknowledge that L'Ecole Biblique is one of the world's most authoritative centers for scriptural study. The school was founded in 1890 by French Dominican Marie Joseph Lagrange, who was a pioneer in countering the age-old Catholic position that to study the Bible was to damage it. Although knowledgeable Protestant and Jewish scholars had long admired the careful work of L'Ecole Biblique's scholars in the field of archaeology, the school came to secular fame only in 1949, when the Jordanian government entrusted it with collecting the Dead Sea Scrolls. One of its professors, French Dominican Roland de Vaux, is head of the international committee translating the scrolls into modern languages. De Vaux also headed the 36 scholars who prepared the Bible de Jerusalem, the first translation to take advantage of the scrolls' discoveries, including an early script of Isaiah. Located near the Damascus Gate, on the spot where Christianity's first martyr, St. Stephen, was stoned to death, L'Ecole Biblique currently has 42 postgraduate scriptural students enrolled. Most of them are Catholic priests, but Protestants are always welcome to use its facilities. The scholars of L'Ecole Biblique are proud that their own Bible de Jerusalem has been used and praised by Protestants and Jews, feel that scriptural study is the key to ecumenical progress. "By studying the Bible together," says Father Pierre Benoit, the director of the school, "we can immediately establish common ground. If we can establish an understanding in the field of Biblical studies, then perhaps we can achieve a similar understanding in theology."

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