Natural Law, thank you for the thought you gave to your reply. It helps me better understand the Catholic mind. I especially appreciate your description of Latin, as a dead language, being used as a “baseline.”
I will not pretend that I fully agree with you ... you know I don’t, or that I agree with the Catholic position. But I do appreciate your helpful reply.
If you are willing to go a step further. Would that mean then that the reason the Catholic Church saw no need to replace Jerome’s Latin translation for so long time (and would tend thereafter to translate into the vernacular Bibles based on the Vulgate, e.g., the Douay-Rheims, rather than on the preserved Hebrew and Greek manuscripts), and in a very sense still is of such a mind?
Again, I am asking this for the sake of clarity, because I think non-Catholics have a very difficult time grasping where Catholics are coming from on this matter.
Peace.
I will take this as far as you want to take it, within my capabilities. Please remember that I do not speak for the Church, but only as a Catholic who has done a significant amount of study in this area.
I think the Catholic position is based upon Scripture being but one component of the Revealed Word and infallible interpretation is entrusted to the Magisterium which is guided by the Holy Spirit and facilitated by relying on the accompanying Tradition. It was this same Magitserium that formed the Canon of Scripture from the Sacred Tradition.
A good analogy is the baseball term "chin music". To those who love the game like I do chin music has a very specific meaning; it is a high inside fast ball intended to move a batter back off the plate. It is more than an a threat, it is a warning. An English professor in Oxford, a so-called expert in the language, reading an American newspaper might surmise that it is a musical term or have something to do with the noise one's whiskers make when scratched. A "magisterium" of baseball players and fans would soon correct his misinterpretation.