La Bibbia Proibita | Mauro Biglino

Good morning, Einaudi Bible, a recent editorial project, recent in the sense that it is less than two years old, commissioned by Enzo Bianchi the founder of the Bose community and one wonders: is it still necessary to translate the Bible, i. e. is it still necessary to set up publishing projects like this?

Yes it is still necessary, it is absolutely necessary and we will see it, we will see it in the changes, in some changes that are taking place. I will give you some examples taken from this new publication and I must also confess that it is so necessary that I myself have a project in mind, a completely new project of translating the Bible in a way that I have never seen done even just as a graphic setting but we'll see. But it is necessary and I am reading you some parts from the Preface which is that part of a book that no one ever reads but which often contains very important elements instead.

"What is the Bible? First of all, it must be recognized that it is not a book but a collection of books, we must say a small library. They are books generated in the space of about a thousand years, they are written by different authors in different literary genres, compiled and then written in three languages: Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek.

However, being" this is important "these books were collected by believers having faith in the One God, they became a book-scripture for the Jews" and for the Jews it is called "Tanak and the Bible for Christians who have added to it a collection of books which they call 'New Testament' or 'New Covenant'". Among other things, this editorial project saw the joint work of 12 biblical scholars and would also like to be non-denominational, in reality I must tell you that it is totally impregnated with theology, obviously, because in short it is difficult to get rid of it, however it contains aspects that we will now see in the practical examples which represent innovations compared to traditional translations. "All the authors of the books contained in the Hebrew Bible, Old Testament, are convinced that they are members of a people of believers wanted, created and called to the covenant with their God, therefore they bear witness to their relationship with the One Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob" that is, they testify to their belonging to the group founded by that God, by that divinity we have now learned to say from that Elohim, that is, that Elohim who revealed himself to Moses the man through whom that Elohim gave the law, that is, the Torah to his people".

And here some very important considerations emerge which make us understand how it is necessary to continue to study the Bible and to translate the Bible which affects the lives of hundreds of thousands, millions of men especially in West: "Certainly the Bible is always open to an infinite reading and not only for the interpretations that are always many as evidenced by all the copious literature of biblical commentaries but infinite because it becomes different starting from who reads it" that is from the concept who has approaches this book. So this book can be supported starting from a theological preconception or you can also approach it from a purely secular point of view, read it as one of the many books that humanity has written in its history. "There are different readings in the Jewish faith, different readings in the Christian faith, different readings of those who are not believers in God or in Jesus Christ".

So here too it is admitted that there are different readings within those same forms of thought which in any case start from a theological preconception, in any case there are different readings. "But let's not forget that in reading the Bible even the believer cannot do without all the human tools necessary to read, interpret and understand it. On the other hand, the churches today recognize that the Bible, while containing the word of God" but this it is an assumption, it is not absolutely proven, in fact I tend to think that exactly the opposite is proven but let's stay with what the creator of this project, that is Enzo Bianchi, writes here "after all, the churches today recognize that the Bible, while containing the word of God, it is above all human word" from my point of view it is exclusively human word "that the authors are human authors and that the Bible is a text that must be interpreted avoiding any fundamentalist reading" that is, one must get out of one's head that one possesses the truth of having a pre-established truth and to be able to read the Bible in the light of this truth.

"Today we can say that the Bible is the library that does not divide, does not separate, does not open to fundamentalisms, it asks for the affirmation of diversity, of pluralities and therefore of dialogue because it is structurally dialogical". And this is fundamental: that is, to read it without fundamentalisms, therefore without creating oppositions, without creating struggles. In reality we see that this is not the case because unfortunately there are oppositions between the various Churches, within each single Church there are struggles, there are contrasts, there are differences which fortunately today are expressed through an attempt at dialogue even if at times I have to say, for example between the Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church, there are anathemas that are launched and therefore more than dialogue it also deals with open warfare but in reality this aspect, which is fundamental, is recognized here.

Therefore there must be freedom of reading for everyone because an absolute truth cannot be derived from it. Then here the text tells us what the difficulty was and what the story has been over the centuries, the story of this book, the story of how it was treated and how it was recognized, for example it says "How is it told in chapter 8 of the book of Nehemiah, after the return to the land of Israel of the exiles in Babylon the priest Ezra presented the Torah to the people, i. e.

the law written in a scroll" but since there was a problem that the Jews returned from Babylon no longer knew the Hebrew by now they spoke only Aramaic then Ezra needed to have translators so that all the people could understand could understand the Torah which was read when the Temple - the first Temple we know was completely destroyed - when the second Temple was not still being rebuilt and so there was this problem of reading the bible. "Something analogous happened only very late in Christianity. The Western Church having received the scriptures in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek, immediately translated them into Latin but when Latin developed into vernacular languages ​​the Catholic Church waited a few centuries before to make the sacred text usable in those languages" because we know well that whoever has the knowledge holds the power and therefore waited for many centuries.

"This situation meant" in our case also "for Italy a long exile of the word from the Christian people and therefore a fall in interest and practice of contact with the Bible. . .

Jerome in the fourth-fifth century after Christ learned the Hebrew and translated the Old Testament from the original texts into Latin , as well as the New Testament from the Greek. As for the relationship between the people of God and the Holy Scriptures" as you can see the whole work is marked by a theological vision "the situation became difficult again in the centuries of the emergence of vulgar languages, between the 12th and 14th centuries, therefore they began to translate some biblical books, etc. .

. . The great revolution, however, came with the invention of printing which made available a large quantity obviously translated books.

. . However, this spring" this obviously re-flowering of the diffusion of the book through the invention of printing "should have come to a sudden freeze.

In 1559, under the pontificate of Paul IV , the index librorum 'Index of forbidden books, which placed severe limits on the possibility of printing, possessing, distributing and reading the Bible" i. e. the Bible considered as one of the forbidden books.

Let's think about it: God would have spoken to men through this book and men have assumed the right to say that this book is part, was part, should have been part of an index of forbidden books, i. e. not accessible to all "From that moment, in fact, also by virtue of the division that has now taken place between Protestants and Catholics the Catholic Church harbored suspicions and distrust of the Bible: was it not the Bible itself that was one of the foundations of the reform desired by Luther according to the principle of 'sola scriptura'?

". That is, Luther says the truth is found in scripture, only in scripture, but this did not go well with the Catholic Church because it wanted to impose its magisterium as an equally important teaching element. " Therefore, also for reasons of controversy towards the Protestant heresy, the Bible entered into those who, as regards its presence in the Catholic Church, we could define dark ages.

Catholics were forbidden to read the Bible in vulgar languages. . .

However, it was then disseminated in Italy in a clandestine form and met with opposition from the Catholic side. . .

Then more than a century later the abbot Antonio Martini made a translation of the Bible in Italian this translation was approved by Pius Sixth himself who declared it compliant with the norms of the Index. It had a great diffusion but in 1820 Pius VII with a decree condemned it together with all the other existing versions in the vernacular languages". So this Bible, word of God is a very troubled book, it is a book that has been condemned in the sense of impediment to reading by the Pontiffs themselves, that is, by the representatives of God.

Therefore God gives, would give, would have given his word to men but his representatives on Earth have forbidden its reading and therefore have assumed this right to forbid the reading of the word of God However , "a new dynamic" in this very troubled relationship "was reborn in the last century: a publication was edited with a translation of the four Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles from the Greek text. . .

Attacks by 'La Civiltà Cattolica' still followed , which is the Jesuit magazine , in 1903 and 1904, and then attacks by Pius X himself in 1907 which converged into a request for correction of this work against possible modernist tendencies". That is, one should not have allowed oneself to give modern interpretations because those of the magisterium had to apply exclusively and if "between 1921 and 1930 a new translation appeared in a Protestant environment edited by a Waldensian pastor. .

. Catholic condemnation in this regard was immediately unleashed and the renewed ban on reading a translation of the Bible by non-Catholic authors". That is , they wanted to forbid knowing, forbidding knowledge of the word of God.

the need for a new Italian version of the Bible arose". So you understand that all these needs to always have new versions tell us one thing that is certain, an indubitable thing: we do not have the truth about the Bible, there is a right to continue translating, which is why I was telling you before that I have a project in mind. very original about the Bible and sooner or later I'll get to grips with it.

Then there is the final approach to the Bible published by the Italian Episcopal Conference which since 2008 has essentially remained the commonly accepted Bible "and the Italian panorama of biblical translations is still unsatisfactory" we will try to make a contribution to make it a little bit more satisfying perhaps with a new project "and in Italy after the official edition of the CEI Bible in fact other translations have dwindled numerically while the others already in place have inevitably aged". So here it says "we hope that this new version published by Einaudi can help bring as many people as possible closer to the inexhaustible source of the word of God". So the only difficulty that I see with this large diffusion is the cost because the cost is very demanding but on the other hand, I mean, the editorial work also requires it due to the commitment of all the authors who have worked on it both for the production and for the apparatus of notes which is very interesting and which enriches the translation.

Now let's see some examples of what's new in this one Bible translation. We begin to see A small variation that is in Genesis 35 when Jacob meets the Elohim and the Elohim say to Jacob, the group of Elohim "Arise, go up to Bethel and reside there then build an altar there to the Elohim who appeared to you when you fled from Esau your brother. " I have already said other times that appeared is a verb that is in the form 'nifal' i.

e. passive reflexive and therefore it is not "he appeared to you" as we understand it but "he showed you" therefore as we do not say to a friend " how many years has it been since you appeared to me", we say to a friend "how many years it has been since you show up" and the meaning is exactly this. So they tell him to remove the tents, go to Bethel and build an altar to that Elohim there, not to the one, universal God, to that Elohim there.

The interesting, shall we say, difference from other earlier translations is this "As they moved forth a God-sent terror came upon the cities that were around them so that they did not pursue the sons of Jacob. " Now in the previous translations it was written, let's take for example this one from Famiglia Cristiana, where it is written "Then they raised the camp and a very strong terror assailed the peoples who were around them so that they did not pursue the sons of Jacob" . Here there is no "mandate from God", it is a very strong terror as well as in the translation of the CEI it says "Then they left and a great terror attacked the cities around".

Actually in Hebrew there is "terror of the Elohim", therefore in this "mandate from God" there is a "mandate" which is in addition, however, recognizes the fact that this terror has an origin, it comes from the Elohim and therefore already allows us to ask ourselves a question: what is this terror that the Elohim sent on the cities, let's say on the surrounding population centers so that they would not attack Jacob's group that was taking his way? Of course we don't know but this allows us to ask ourselves questions: what did the Elohim do to instill this terror? Because it is one thing to say that there is fear that grips, panic that spreads, an almost unjustified panic, here he says no: panic is not unjustified, panic originates from the Elohim.

So what did they send upon those cities to keep them from attacking Jacob's train? We don't know but they certainly did something. So here is this reading, this translation which is closer to the biblical text because it mentions the Elohim even if obviously being conditioned by the theological tradition, on the other hand Father Enzo Bianchi is a Christian monk, and therefore it is clear that everything is marked by this kind of reading but this acknowledges that this terror originates in the Elohim.

So this God who would be the God of humanity is a God who sends terror on the potential enemies of the people who have been assigned to him and who he must follow and cure to complete his mission. A very important change has finally occurred in the so-called prophecy of Isaiah which according to some concerns the coming of the Messiah, it would even concern the birth of Jesus Christ. Do you remember that this prophecy is always told to us, I have already spoken about it other times but finally we find it here, we are told that Isaiah says that a virgin will conceive and give birth to a child and this vision of the virgin would prophetically recall the birth of Jesus Christ from Mary Virgin.

In reality I have already explained other times that the Hebrew term "almah" does not mean virgin but means girl and here finally - after the translation that I had already shown you of the German Bible - finally we also have this translation in Italian: when men ask for a sign says "At this point the gentleman himself will give a sign, here it is: the girl will become pregnant and give birth to a son, his name will be Immanuel". So finally we no longer speak of a virgin but we take into account the true meaning of the Hebrew term "almah". Alas, unfortunately the steps here are taken bit by bit and therefore this idea still remained of the future "she will get pregnant".

Actually in Hebrew there is the adjective not even the verb there is the adjective "harah" which means pregnant, i. e. the girl is already pregnant so this idea that this event must occur in the future I have to say unfortunately it is once again wrong because at the time this verse is written the girl is already pregnant.

Moreover, in the notes the author writes "It is the mother of Hezekiah son of Ahaz who constitutes the sign given by God to signify his protection" and then he says precisely that the term "alma" means girl, young woman and that Christians have wanted to see in this the Messiah, the son of Mary of Nazareth, but the Christians wanted to see, there is not in the Old Testament, in the Old Testament there is a girl who is already pregnant who is the mother of Hezekiah, she is the consort of King Ahaz and therefore we have already taken a considerable step forward here. The discourse of the virgin has disappeared because in fact in the Old Testament the discourse of the virgin does not exist: there is "almah" and there is no "betullah" and therefore we recognize this is an important step forward. I say it like this: they could have completed this step and instead of writing "she will get pregnant" they could have written as it is in Hebrew "she is pregnant", but we are already happy and we are optimistic because we are going on the right path.

But this makes us understand how the Bible is still to be translated and more will come out in the future, beyond what my project is, because actually elements are gradually being inserted which free themselves from the old translation and from the old theological tradition which instead it aimed to present certain aspects according to what were the preconceived, preconceived ideas that were supposed to serve to demonstrate what Jesus would be but, we have already seen and we will see again, he is not. We come to another very important passage, a passage from Ezekiel, we are in chapter 3. Here too it is a passage that we have already seen because it is one of the fundamental ones, but let's see what is new in this book.

Let's read it in traditional translations. So the first one I would say is definitely, definitely wrong, this is now recognized by all exegetes, it's this one: "Then a spirit lifted me up" in Hebrew there is the term "ruach" instead of spirit and to this I have dedicated even a whole video together with Paul Wallis on the meaning of "ruach". "Then a spirit lifted me up and behind me I heard a great crash" and then it says "Blessed be the glory of the Lord where he dwells".

Here is this "Blessed be the glory of the Lord" comes from a misreading of the Hebrew term because here in this case it is read as "baruch" instead the original Hebrew term is "berun" and in fact in other translations this aspect is recognized and he says "then a spirit rose up and I heard behind me a great earthquake roar as the glory of the Lord rose from that place". Now let's see how this brand new version edited by Einaudi renders this verse. Attention we have read up to now "Then a spirit, a spirit, "ruach" is always translated with spirit and is understood as the Spirit of God.

Here it says "Then a force lifted me up and I heard a roar behind me of great earthquake while the glory of the Lord moved from that place" therefore the term spirit disappears and is replaced by force. Now we have already seen and I won't go back to it what the "ruach" could have been so I refer you to those videos of mine, also to the one done with Paul Wallis, to understand what it is about when the Jews speak on certain occasions of "ruach" and here it is finally recognized that it is not the spirit but a force, that is, something that exerts a force and that lifts Ezekiel and is repeated in the next verse. "This force lifted me up and carried me away" then this force takes Ezekiel and carries him away.

Then it says "while the glory of the Lord he moved from that place" now he moved has a precise meaning, it doesn't convey exactly what he did because the exact translation is the one I read here: "berun" is he "got up" from that place but this is already another big step forward because "moved" means that this glory was something spatially defined and moving has a precise meaning: it means occupying a space then leaving this space to occupy another and then another and then another. of the movement the spaces that are occupied are different and therefore this is identifying that it is not the spirit of God, the spirit (glory) of Yahveh which would obviously be omnipresent, all-encompassing and therefore would not need to move because it is not something spatially defined. So as you can see this new Einaudi version contains some steps forward and therefore we are optimistic because it means that we are moving in a direction that leads us to understand better and better the literalness of the Hebrew text.

But the authors will obviously allow me to express this humble thought of mine: it is still not enough we need to have more courage, we need to go further, but I'm sure we will do this I said: I have a project in mind that sooner or later I will however, in the meantime, we take note and then we will also examine other parts of this of this new publication but we take note that already now we are moving towards a further approach to the concrete literality of the Hebrew text. Bye, thank you and see you next time.