Here it is, reason #666, on why the USCCB is a highly flawed institution filled with the (unholy) Spirit of Vatican II:
This past Sunday in the Novus Ordo US Lectionary (both a USCCB invention), the Bible verse used in the Gospel was the Gospel of St. Mark 9:35 (36)…
RSV (Catholic Edition)
And he took a child, and put him in the midst of them; and taking him in his arms, he said to them,
Douay-Rheims
And taking a child, he set him in the midst of them. Whom when he had embraced, he saith to them:
NAB
Taking a child he placed it in their midst, and putting his arms around it he said to them,
Does anyone, especially Catholics, ever refer to a baby as an "it"?
[Via CVSTOS FIDEI]
Before I knew better I made the mistake of picking up the NAB Study Bible. I remember really being happy obtaining a Catholic study Bible. That happiness did not last very long as I read the study notes. I am convinced these study notes were written by Statler & Waldorf, the two critics on the balcony from The Muppet Show. It seemed their whole purpose was skepticism and undermining the Biblical text, a kind of Biblical fisking. Not that all of the notes were this way, but they definitely steered that way. Lousy translation, lousy notes. What a package.
25 comments
This past Sunday, I happened to be in the Outer Banks on vacation and at Mass I learned that “to scandalize the little ones” actually means “to put down the disenfranchised”. Very lucid, don’t you think?
I remember hearing “it” when referring to the child this past Sunday. I thought, “How odd.” My wife and I make a conscious effort to speak of our in-utero children with gender-specific pronouns, even when we are waiting to find out the sex of our child at birth.
Now, if the translation had used “kid” instead of “child,” and the “it” was left intact, we could assume that Jesus was referring to young goats, and not human children.
Don’t ya know that referring to a little boy as an “it” increases the dignity of little girls? Thankfully we have the USCCB to correct all of God’s injustices.
“Unholy” spirit of Vatican II? Wow! Someone has big issues. *Giggle*
You know instead of being worried about an “it” in your Sunday lectionary, maybe you should be worried about pedophile priests, which given the recent news story about a republican congressman, which would certainly be more timely.
Kim, are you Catholic?
Try my favorite (so far) translation: the Community Bible (Catholic Pastoral Edition). Here’s the Amazon link. I don’t think I’ve scoured all the footnotes on it, but I’ve read through a lot of it and I haven’t found any reason to complain as yet.
What is your profession, Kim?
Ok. If I care about the lectionary, that means I don’t care about priest abuse. Am I reading that correctly?
You know instead of being worried about an “it” in your Sunday lectionary, maybe you should be worried about pedophile priests, which given the recent news story about a republican congressman, which would certainly be more timely.
Oh no, not the “time better spent” fallacy again! Kim, shouldn’t you also be worried about more important things than a bunch of Catholics on a blog complaining about the lectionary? There are starving children out there!
Actually, calling little children “it” has a long history in English, as well as other languages. If you read some books from a hundred years ago (I recommend E. Nesbit), you’ll find that babies are standardly called “it.” Also, German does a similar thing. Most importantly, though, the Greek word for “child” used here is “to paidon,” which any Greek scholar will be happy to tell you is a neuter noun, thus making “it” the most literal rendering. Perhaps it’s not good English, but it’s impeccable translating.
The current Lectionary translation is pitiful in my opinion. It has some of the most awkward “English” I have ever read. It also has odd choices for the translations of some words. Ever notice how many times Jesus “came out” when the actual word should be translated “went out?” Don’t believe me, check the Latin.
I caught part of a homily transcript where the “it” thing was discussed; the gospel starts out calling the child “it,” and then Jesus teaches a subtle lesson in dignity by referring to the child as a person rather than a neuter pronoun.
Sounds nice, although it doesn’t fit Mark 9 very well.
This past Sunday in the Novus Ordo US Lectionary (both a USCCB invention)
Sunday is a USCCB invention? No wonder I can’t understand all the radtrad complaints.
Perhaps it’s not good English, but it’s impeccable translating.
Indeed. I did a commentary about it here.
Perhaps it’s not good English, but it’s impeccable translating.
If it isn’t good English, it isn’t good translating.
Unless, of course, one is translating for a Greek class and its more important to show that you understand Greek than to put it into idiomatic English.
I’m just an idiot so take this for what it’s worth, Tony. The Greek is neutral (can be he, she, it) but St. Jerome while translating into the Latin Vulgate (which is what the Church canonized if I understand correctly) attributed “he” (puerum) even though he could have said “it”. It seems to me the appropriate translation in such matters should be with the mind of the Church (not to mention that St. Jerome would be far more familiar with how to take the Greek). But again…I admit that my reasoning could be WAY wrong. I am neither a linguist, theologian or scripture scholar.
Ed Pie,
I was referring to the lectionary AND the Bible, not Sunday. My English writing skills aren’t great, but I try.
Koine Greek aficianados,
Could it be that the USCCB purposely changed it to ‘it’, but ironicaly got it right? Something along the lines of a broken clock can be right twice a day.
“Could it be that the USCCB purposely changed it to ‘it’, but ironicaly got it right? Something along the lines of a broken clock can be right twice a day.”
Perhaps, but it is neither necessary nor charitable to make such a suggestion. Better to explain translators’ decsisions in terms of the text than other motives when there’s a clear way to do so.
“If it isn’t good English, it isn’t good translating. … Unless, of course, one is translating for a Greek class and its more important to show that you understand Greek than to put it into idiomatic English.”
There’s a valid point here, and one could indeed use this clunky translation as evidence that the NAB is not the best translation on the market. However, one should make the argument on the basis that it’s overly literal at the expense of sounding right to English readers, not by suggesting peculiar political motives.
The Greek word for “child” which is used in the text is “paidion.” It is gender neutral. Likewise, the word the NAB translates as “it” (Greek; autos) is also gender neutral as Rick noted. Since the personal pronoun (autos=it) clearly refers to the paidion (Child) they should have simply used the word “child” when translating “autos”. They were probably trying to avoid the non-inclusive language reflected in the text. It should be noted that the next verse continues this: “a child SUCH AS THIS.” The uppercase words translate a single gender neutral Greek word “toioutos” which is related to “autos” as the ending shows. From a linquistic standpoint “it” is a proper translation, but not the only one possible. From a Catholic philosophic point of view it is misleading; or at least can be.
Tito,
I figured as much, but I couldn’t resist the joke. 🙂 I hope you don’t mind.
Our priest at Rice gave a great homily over this passage two weeks ago on Sunday by noting that the child may well have been referred to as “it” in the ancient sources…children weren’t exactly high on the social ladder back then, and they certainly weren’t coddled and made the center of family life as they are today.
Jesus’ point here then is that the powerless deserve our care and attention just as much as the rich. Our priest then said that to really understand Jesus’ point today, consider not a young child but an unborn child, who have no rights and no protections before the law, just like children 2000 years ago.
And yes, that was a priest bringing up abortion on a secular college campus. Last week he made a wonderful call to come to Confession. Fr J is awesome.
Yes ‘to’ is a neutral indicator and possibly a word for word translation would give ‘it’ for the Greek ‘to’ but a Greek speaker would never speak of a child as ‘to’ i.e. ‘it’. A Greek speaker would either say ‘to paidi’ or just ‘paidi’. ‘to paidi’ just means ‘child’ in spoken Greek.
The pronoun here is auto which is grammatically neuter. Autos is masculine, not neuter. Proper English usage should trump trying to transfer the idea of engendered nouns from Greek to English.
There is always a component of laziness in sin. The NAB is just that–a shoddy, “screeching-chalk-on-blackboard” translation that should be forever junked along with the USCCB.
rjak134,
yes, I’ve noticed that too, but not in literature produced in the last 50 years.