A Problem With Numbers
A peculiar problem that you may have noticed with the Psalms is their numbering. If you compare
two translations of the Bible, for example the King James version and the Douay-Reims version, you will find that certain psalms are
numbered differently according to their translation. Thus, psalm 23 in the King James version (“The Lord is my shepherd… “) is numbered
22 in the Douay-Reims version. Why is this so?
During the second century before Christ, the Jews living in Alexandria of Egypt
decided to translate the book of Psalms from the original Hebrew into Greek. Why? At that time, Greek was what English is today: a
kind of universal language. Everyone around the
In the fourth century of our own era, Latin had become the
common language of the Western part of the
In the sixteenth century, Martin Luther, the
father of the Protestant reformation, decided to translate the book of psalms into German. He also decided to use the original Hebrew
version instead of the Greek version which had been used in the Church from the beginning. But the copies of this original version
had deteriorated over the centuries. Small errors had slipped into the copyists’ work. One of these small errors was the separation
of psalm 9 into two parts. So what Catholic Bibles present as psalm 9 becomes psalms 9 and 10 in Protestant Bibles; which leads to
a misalignment of the numbers for all the other psalms, until close to the end of the book. The Hebrew version combines psalms
146 and 147 into one, so that both Protestant and Catholic Bibles end up with one hundred and fifty psalms. You just have to be aware
that they don’t line up together from psalm 9 to psalm 147.
During the coming months, I’ll be following the Greek numbering of
the psalms, the one the authors of the New Testament used, which is also followed by the Catholic liturgy. But I’ll indicate the Hebrew
number of the psalm between parentheses. You’ll understand why, in next week’s column, I’ll invite you to read “psalm 9 (9-10).” Most
contemporary Bibles, both Catholic and Protestant, follow the Hebrew numbering. So check the number between the parentheses. If my
commentary doesn’t seem to apply, try the number outside the parentheses. You shouldn’t have too much trouble figuring out which psalm
is being studied that week. And good luck!