Description
The New Community Bible (NCB) is a revised edition of the popular Christian Community Bible translated by Late Bernardo Hurault. One of the strong points of The Christian Community Bible was the Commentary that ran all along the text of the Bible. A group of Indian Bible scholars came together in 1990 under the leadership of the SOCIETY OF ST PAUL (ST PAULS) to revise and adapt The Christian Community Bible for India. The scholars felt that any serious and contextualized Commentary on the Sacred Text, made especially for India, could not ignore the rich cultural and religious heritage of this land. Reference had to be made, therefore, to the Biblical values found also in other religions of India. The commentary was therefore completely re-written. A careful revision of the text too was carried out in some instances. The project took off with great enthusiasm, but difficulties along the way (some of them unavoidable) delayed the work. After a decade and a half of hard work,The New Community Bible (NCB) was born. The first edition of the NCB had received numerous accolades but also a couple of brickbats. The text of the bible was lauded as one of the best translations available today, in simple and easily readable language and faithful to the original texts. A small group of ultra-conservatives took objection to the commentary that made references also to the scriptures of other religious traditions. So on advice from the ecclesiastical authorities, all scholars who worked on the first edition carefully reviewed the commentary and decided to edit it again, avoiding all objectionable portions. Literary Features: A brief but accurate and authoritative Introduction opens each of the major divisions of both the Old and the New Testaments – the Pentateuch, the Historical Books, the Wisdom Books, the Prophetic Books in the Old Testament, and the Gospels, and the Letters of Paul, in the New Testament. In addition, each Book of the Bible has a brief Introduction concluding with the structure of the Book itself.
A typical page of the NCB has three items, viz., the text, the commentary, and a box placed between the text and the commentary containing helpful cross-references. Sub-titles are provided throughout the text. As far as possible the same sub-titles are maintained in the Commentary so that one can easily identify the section of the text that is commented upon. Explicit quotations from the Old Testament are printed in italics.
The NCB follows the same order of the presentation of the various Books as in other Catholic Bibles.
Imprimatur: The NCB with the revised commentary now carries the Imprimatur from 5 bishops representing the three different rites in India.
International Editions St Paul Publications, Australia, published an international edition of the NCB which became an instant best-seller. Various other editions in different types of binding followed. Today, it is the fastest selling bible in Australia, Nigeria, and other African countries.
