New Bible Translation Completed, Released
1. Where was the above-published information on the Bible first publicly given out, when and by whom?
THE preceding articles on The Holy Bible were delivered at 3 p.m., Saturday, June 18, 1960, by the president of the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania to the District Assembly of Jehovah’s witnesses, who were convening for four days at Manchester City Football Ground, Manchester, England. After he delivered the above-published material, he went on to say:
2. (a) What corporation have the modern witnesses of Jehovah used as their publishing agency? (b) Since when has it printed on its own presses Bibles or portions of the Bible, and what were the first two of such?
2 What is today the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society of Pennsylvania was incorporated in Allegheny, Pennsylvania, in 1884 as Zion’s Watch Tower Tract Society. Ever since its legal incorporation Jehovah’s witnesses of modern times have been using it as their publishing agency. In harmony with its Charter the Society has distributed Bibles in many languages. Since 1926 it has even undertaken to print Bibles on its own presses. The Emphatic Diaglott, of which it owns the copyright and plates, was first run off its presses in 1926. Since then 166,244 copies have been printed. In due time the Society bought the plates for printing the Authorized or King James Version of the Holy Bible, which is the first English Bible that was translated, not from the Latin Vulgate, but from the original Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. The Society began printing it in 1942, and has since produced 1,396,701 copies.
3. (a) What other complete Bible edition did it next publish, and to what extent? (b) How has this Bible society spread the Bible in many languages?
3 Later the Society paid for the privilege to use the plates of the American Standard Version Bible, which is a revision of the King James Version Bible of 1611. Copies of this American Revision the Watch Tower Society began producing in 1944, and has since printed 888,837 copies in two sizes. Over 2 million copies of all three of these Biblical editions from its own presses the Society has distributed world-wide through its eighty-five Branch organizations. By means of these Branches the Society has also spread the Bible in many languages, as it has been able to obtain these foreign-language Bibles from other Bible societies.
4. What, in brief, are the facts concerning the printing and release of the New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures?
4 In 1948 the Watch Tower Society became aware of the existence of the New World Bible Translation Committee, formed for the purpose of producing a modern translation of the entire Bible from its original languages, with features that would be most suitable for accurate Bible education today. The Committee agreed to turn over its translation to the Watch Tower Society to hold as its property and to publish as part of its Bible educational work. On September 3, 1949, the Society’s president had the pleasure of introducing to a meeting of associate directors the completed translation, in typewritten form, of the Christian Greek Scriptures, which the Translation Committee had then recently turned over to the Society. On August 2, 1950, it was my privilege to address the international assembly of Jehovah’s witnesses in Yankee Stadium, New York, and to release to the 82,075 there present the New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures fresh from the Society’s own presses in Brooklyn, New York. The first edition was 480,000 copies. In ten years our Society has printed 1,408,668 copies of the New World Translation of the Christian Greek Scriptures.
5. Whose edition of the Hebrew text did the Committee mainly use for translating the Hebrew Scriptures, and how has the translation thereof been furnished for publication?
5 Then the efforts of the New World Bible Translation Committee turned to rendering the canonical Hebrew Scriptures into modern English. As the Hebrew text for translation the Committee used principally the edition known as the Biblia Hebraica produced by the late Rudolf Kittel and his surviving colleagues and published in a number of editions by the Privilegierte Wuerttembergische Bibelanstalt of Stuttgart, Germany. In this edition the endeavor has been made to get back to the Biblical text by Moses ben Asher, considered to be the greatest Masoretic scribe in preserving the traditional form and pronunciation of the Hebrew text. (See photograph, page 597.) The translation of the Hebrew Scriptures by the Committee has gradually been furnished for publication in volume after volume.
6-9. What are some interesting items about Volume I? About Volume II? About Volume III? About Volume IV?
6 Volume I of the New World Translation of the Hebrew Scriptures was printed in 1953 and was released at the second international assembly of Jehovah’s witnesses in Yankee Stadium. It contains the first eight books of the Bible. The first edition was of a half million copies. To date our Society has printed 731,065 copies.
7 Volume II was released in 1955 in Chicago, Illinois, at the first of a series of thirteen five-day assemblies. This volume, with a first edition of 300,000 copies, contains the next nine books of the Bible. To date our Society has printed 444,553 copies.
8 Volume III was released in 1957 as the feature of a series of District Assemblies of Jehovah’s witnesses that summer. This volume contains the five poetical books of the Bible, and had a first edition of 350,000 copies. Our Society has now printed 372,890 copies.
9 Volume IV was released in 1958 at the largest international assembly of Jehovah’s witnesses on record, in Yankee Stadium, when 150,282 auditors hailed the presentation of this volume. It contains the three prophetic books of Isaiah, Jeremiah and Lamentations. To date our Society has printed 288,254 copies.
10. (a) How was the release of Volume V brought about, and what does its publication mean for this translation? (b) What, then, is the Society’s record to date as to Bible printing?
10 Fourteen prophetic books, from Ezekiel through Malachi, were yet to be translated. Jehovah God the Author of the complete Holy Bible preserved the Translation Committee, enabling it to attain the desired goal. So, by Jehovah’s loving-kindness, ten years after releasing the first product of the New World Bible Translation Committee, I am greatly privileged to release to this District Assembly here in Manchester, England, the fifth volume of the New World Translation of the Hebrew Scriptures, containing those final fourteen books of the Hebrew canon. The publication of this long-desired volume makes complete the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures, from Genesis to Revelation. Today is therefore a day for rejoicing and thanksgiving on the part of Jehovah’s witnesses the wide world over! At present 280,000 copies of the first edition of this final volume are being printed. All summed up, then, our Society has printed 2,565,538 copies of the complete Bible in English; or, 5,977,210 copies of the complete Bible and parts of the Bible text in English. And the end is not yet!
11. What are the featured contents of this final volume?
11 This final and concluding volume contains, in addition to the modern English translation of this portion of the Hebrew canon, other valuable features. It contains an Appendix of ninety pages that offers unusual information on all the Hebrew Scriptures in particular; also a list of outstanding Bible subjects and proper names, with the initial Scripture text, from which text a minister can follow up a progressive chain of Bible references on such subjects and names; also an alphabetic index of Bible words by means of which a minister can quickly find even the new and unusual words found in the entire New World Translation, each word being accompanied by a chosen number of Scripture verses by the use of which any witness of Jehovah could build up an extemporaneous sermonette for the occasion; also a Table of the Books of the Bible, and valuable maps and diagrams especially adapted to this final volume.
12. In its translation work, to what does the Translation Committee adhere, and so what has it not put in Volume V?
12 This final volume contains none of the apocryphal books, as these are not inspired by the Bible’s Author Jehovah God. The New World Bible Translation Committee adheres, not to the catalogue of the religious Council of Carthage of 397, but to the catalogue of sacred books that have been proved to be Scripturally canonical, in agreement with divine truth, from first to last.
13 To what has the Translation Committee now set itself, and what is our prayer in this regard?
13 Although completing this task of over ten years’ duration, the New World Bible Translation Committee does not feel that it should now dissolve. We are informed that it now sets itself to go over the entire translation and work out certain refinements in it and bring it all together in one volume, without the copious footnotes and appendixes. Then it can be easily carried in one hand, for efficient use in the world-wide field of Jehovah’s witnesses’ ministry, as they obey Christ’s command to preach the good news of God’s kingdom in all the inhabited earth for a witness to all the nations before this old world ends at Armageddon. May the Translation Committee have the blessing of Jehovah God; and may we Bible lovers use His provision through the Committee to His honor and to the salvation of many who call upon His holy name.