Replies

“Of course, it also helps that you could not even own or read a Bible on your own unless you had permission to do so by a Bishop.”

In England, after 1408, yes. Elsewhere that was not the case.

“The cost of putting together a Bible, whether in Latin or English, is the same,”

False. It was more expensive to publish an English Bible for three reasons: 1) Latin Bibles abounded and were thus relatively inexpensive to copy, 2) English Bibles did not exist in complete form and a translator would have to work on such a project for years. That’s expensive., 3) Latin is a more compact language than English which can mean fewer pages and less cost.

“so it does not follow that this is a real excuse for the RCC forbidding translations in the common language for people to actually understand.”

There NEVER was a general prohibition against “translations in the common language for people to actually understand.” I know of two regional prohibitions - not comprehensive by any means - and both were in regard to specific heretical movements.

“A Latin Bible belched out by a Priest is meaningless to 99 percent of the congregation, and they have to rely on the Priest’s interpretation and translation on the spot, instead of reading an English or other scripture in the common language.”

You - unless you know Hebrew or Greek - rely on a Protestant translator. So?

“Of course, thanks be to God, we no longer have to get permission from the Bishop or the RCC to even use a Bible!”

Unless you were English after 1408 or in France during the Albigensian heresy you never needed anyone’s permission in the first place. But why let reality interfere with someone’s anti-Catholic fantasy, right?

“Unless you were English after 1408 or in France during the Albigensian heresy you never needed anyone’s permission in the first place. But why let reality interfere with someone’s anti-Catholic fantasy, right?”

Or, if you are a Papist, you wouldn’t want anyone to interfere with your fantasy, right? On the general prohibition of reading the scripture in the vernacular, limited to the permission of the church:

“It is only in the beginning of the last five hundred years that we meet with a general law of the Church concerning the reading of the Bible in the vernacular. On 24 March, 1564, Pius IV promulgated in his Constitution, “Dominici gregis”, the Index of Prohibited Books . According to the third rule, the Old Testament may be read in the vernacular by pious and learned men, according to the judgment of the bishop, as a help to the better understanding of the Vulgate. The fourth rule places in the hands of the Bishop or the Inquisitor the power of allowing the reading of the New Testament in the vernacular to laymen who according to the judgment of their confessor or their pastor can profit from this practice. Sixtus V reserved this power to himself or the Sacred Congregation of the Index, and Clement VIII added this restriction to the fourth rule of the Index, by way of appendix.

Benedict XIV required that the vernacular version read by laymen should be either approved by the Holy See or provided with notes taken from the writings of the Fathers or of learned and pious authors. It then became an open question whether this order of Benedict XIV was intended to supersede the former legislation or to further restrict it.
This doubt was not removed by the next three documents: the condemnation of certain errors of the Jansenist Quesnel as to the necessity of reading the Bible , by the Bull “Unigenitus” issued by Clement XI on 8 Sept., 1713 (cf. Denzinger, “Enchir.”, nn. 1294-1300); the condemnation of the same teaching maintained in the Synod of Pistoia, by the Bull “Auctorem fidei” issued on 28 Aug., 1794, by Pius VI; the warning against allowing the laity indiscriminately to read the Scriptures in the vernacular, addressed to the Bishop of Mohileff by Pius VII, on 3 Sept., 1816.” (The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on ..., Volume 13, edited by Charles George Herbermann, Edward Aloysius Pace, Condé Bénoist Pallen, Thomas Joseph Shahan, John Joseph Wynne, Pg. 640)

“False. It was more expensive to publish an English Bible for three reasons: 1) Latin Bibles abounded and were thus relatively inexpensive to copy, 2) English Bibles did not exist in complete form and a translator would have to work on such a project for years. That’s expensive., 3) Latin is a more compact language than English which can mean fewer pages and less cost.”

The other Papist on this thread just got done lauding all these Catholic translators, and even gave the printing press to the glory of Catholicism. So, which is it? Was it too expensive to produce an English Bible, or wasn’t it? Were there no translators who could do it, or were there? Or was there a bunch of English Papist Bibles about that the evil Tyndale sought to replace, because there was no demand for an English Bible at all? So which is it?