inspired books was completed by the end of the first century, the Jewish scribes kept on making handwritten copies of their Holy Scriptures, the thirty-nine inspired Hebrew books. In time the copy work was taken over by the Masoretic scribes, who were very scrupulous about preserving the canonized text of the Hebrew Scriptures. Masoretes, headed by Ben Naphtali of the East and by Ben Asher of the West, were active from the sixth to the ninth centuries of our common era.

16. During the Dark Ages of Christendom how were the Jews and their treasures of Hebrew Scriptures treated, but yet what copy work went on?

¹⁶ The gloom of the Dark Ages of Roman Catholic Christendom increased, and the persecution of the Jews by the Roman Catholic Hierarchy continued through its terrible crusades and religious inquisitions. Jewish synagogues were burneda with their treasures of Hebrew Scriptures, and Jews were hounded out of lands, being driven out of Spain in 1492, the year that Columbus discovered America. They were cooped up in ghettos, the Jewish Ghetto in papal Rome being broken up first in 1870 when the Italian liberators invaded the city and took the government out of the hands of the pope. In spite of all this terrible treatment of Jews by Christendom the copying of the Hebrew Holy Scriptures by Jews went on to provide copies for the Jewish synagogues and private use.

17, 18. (a) How did the Jews take advantage early of the invention of printing? (b) When and by whom did the first complete Hebrew Bible appear, and how did a Protestant reformer use a copy of a Hebrew Bible?

¹⁷ Came the invention of printing in 1450 in Germany. The first book printed was the Latin Vulgate Bible. The Jews quickly seized upon the invention to print their Bible in Hebrew, for private use, although service scrolls for synagogues still continued to be made by Jewish hand. In 1473 a Hebrew printing press was set up, an edition of 300 copies of part of the Bible being printed in 1477.

¹⁸ Then, on February 23, 1488, by the Jewish printing house of Joshua Solomon Israel Nathan at Soncino in the duchy of Milan, the first complete edition of the Hebrew Bible, with vowels and accents, was brought out. In Brescia a printing press was set up by Gerson ben Moses Soncino, and in May, 1494, it issued a complete Hebrew Bible. It was a copy of this Hebrew Bible that Martin Luther the Reformer used in making his Bible translation into German in 1534.

19. Thus what religious work do the Jews still have today, and to whom do they owe no thanks respecting this?

¹⁹ To this day the Jews have their Bible, which is identical with the Old Testament section of Protestant or non-Catholic Bibles. This preservation of the inspired text of the Hebrew Scriptures owes no thanks to the Roman Catholic Church, which claims to be the divinely commissioned owner, interpreter and preserver of the Holy Bible. This despite its shameful record for destroying Bibles.

20. To whom is to be ascribed the preserving of the inspired text of the Holy Bible, and by means of whom was it produced and for whom preserved?

²⁰ No, the preservation of the Holy Bible is to be credited to no religious organization of Christendom. It is Jehovah God to whom is to be ascribed the preserving of the inspired text of his Holy Word, for He is its sole Author. In the Isaiah scroll (Isa 40:8) he caused to be written: “The word of our God shall stand for ever.” (JP) He produced the complete Holy Bible by means of his faithful witnesses. He has preserved it for the world-wide use of Jehovah’s witnesses today. (1 Pet. 1:25) All thanks to him by Jesus Christ!

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