Our Orthodox monastic Father writing under the nom de plume (or should that be nom du clavier?) of Felix Culpa at Ora et Labora has posted another installment of his review of the OSB: Orthodox Study Bible, My Turn: II. He has found some further failings in the volume, most significantly the favorable quotation of authors whose writings are condemned by the Church in synod!
Our entirely ananonymous Orthodox friend Esteban Vázquez has also provided us with a convenient roundup of links to some various posts on the Orthodox Study Bible, some pro, some con. We can also look forward to some undoubtedly interesting review posts from Esteban once his copy arrives, which will hopefully be soon.
Because this volume is being viewed as a major event in the Orthodox Church in the United States, and its significant drawbacks really need to be addressed, if even only cursorily, I’ve been persuaded to continue reviewing it. So you may (or may not!) look forward to further reviews here of Orthodox Study Bible: Ancient Christianity Speaks to Today’s World.
Are there any cradle Christian Orthodox involved in the current round of debate about the OSB, either for or against? All of the voices I can identify are converts. And I gather the editors of the OSB are all converts.
One can understand that converts, with their exceptional zeal, would take a keen interest in Orthodox publications of the Bible, and actively express their desire to distinguish Christian Orthodoxy from their former denominations (or, in some cases, to keep what they see as the best of their former denominations).
But still, the one-sidedness is striking.
I don’t think many people even have the OSB yet. Apparently the hardbacks are only just now shipping. I think there will be more reviews coming along in short order.
It’s also sometimes hard to differentiate between Cradle and Convert. Felix Culpa is cradle, I and Esteban are converts, me from Catholic and him from Protestant (which I think would be funny to some, judging by our surnames! Okay, funny to me). Others commenting are a mixture, too. So, it’s not completely one-sided. People don’t tend to advertise whether they’re cradle or convert, either, and it’s not exactly polite to ask, so one picks it up along the way. Still, I’ve noticed that the internet Orthodox convert presence is all out of proportion to the real world (or whatever you want to call it). In my blogroll there, among the Orthodox blogs there’s only a few cradle Orthodox bloggers that I know of, but they’re there (Ora et Labora, Paradosis, Second Terrace, Symeon’s Journal), and there used to be others I regularly read, but they gave up blogging a while ago.
Anyhow, now that the OSB is shipping everything, there should be more reviews coming out. I’m sure there’ll be much more discussion on it soon. I think it was pretty much a fluke that I got my copy so early. I probably should’ve sat on my hands….
In my experience of 20 years as a Priest (Orthodox) few cradle Orthodox know the basic faith. To say that they know the Sacred Scriptures…that even worse. Oh, the majority think they do; but like Our Lord said: “You shall know them by the fruits they bear.”
As to the OSB; there are always faults in translations. This book with have flaws. Even when we look to the Greek Old/New, it whose Greek translation…
Certainly I am praying that this work will be a blessing for the Faith. God grant it so. Amen!
I would like to apologize for arguing with you in the past about this. I just read what Esteban had to say about the original translation of the OSB as being a really good fresh translation. Only to have it scrapped for a hybrid NKJV-LXX version.
I didn’t know about this before, and feel that Thomas Nelson cheated us out of something that was better than what we ultimately got.
I next edition should be published by a different company, or the original translations should be published by a different company.
JNORM888
I didn’t remember you arguing about it. Apology accepted, though. I think you understand my position that the change in direction of the “translation” project was unfortunate and more. People put years of work into the initial project, only to have it all scrapped and for the end result to be something completely contrary to the original plan. Yet, all the names of the original translators, annotators and consultants have been retained, so as to add a certain lustre to the OSB. That is dishonest, as the editorial work has changed their original submissions to a degree that they are no longer to be considered the works of those orginal translators, most patently in the case of the lightly altered NKJV OT texts, which is frankly disgusting.
If you want a good translation of the Septuagint, buy the Oxford one, the NETS.