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In July 1952, a few months before the RSV (Revised Standard Version) of the Bible came out, the journal RELIGIOUS EDUCATION published a symposium featuring some of the translation committee members. [THREAD] 1/
The chair of the cmte, Luther Weigle, ex-dean of Yale Divinity School, published the preface to the RSV, which signaled the conservative intentions of the group: it was in direct continuity w previous "authorized" translations & designed for pious educational use 2/
2 (!) essays on the use of " Versions" (LXX, Vulgate, Peshitta, Targum, Aquila) in RSV; Harry Orlinsky ( only Jewish member of cmte, later NJPS ed.) asserted continuity & dismissed utility of new "St. Mark's Scroll" (DSS Isaiah). 3/
(Orlinksy also seems to assume that there was a singular "Septuagint" that just didn't survive from its composition). 3b/
(Orlinsky was later called upon by Yigael Yadin to authenticate the Dead Sea Scroll that Mar Samuel had brought to the U.S. in the 1940s.) 3c/
Fleming James (ex-Dean, U of the South) also wrote on "the Versions," with slightly less ridigity than Orlinsky and w/ seemingly more openness to the Dead Sea Scrolls. 4/
Herbert May, OT prof. from Oberlin's School of Theology (!) wrote on the educational value of RSV--not only is it more accurate and "authorized," but it's very existence will educate a biblically illiterate populace. 5/
James Muilenburg, rhetorical critic at Union (later at SanFran Theo Sem.) wrote on literary merits of the RSV, indulging in some redolent Orientalism about the OT. 6/
Finally John Trever, who was involved with Dead Sea Scrolls in 1940s but was now at Natl Council of Churches of Christ in US (sponsors of RSV) wrote on "recent mss." in RSV. The familiar stories: Tischendorf 7/
... the Sisters of Sinai (Agnes Lewis & Margaret Gibson)... 7b/
Chester Beatty, the Cairo Genizah, of course the Dead Sea Scrolls with which he had close familiarity... 7c/
Trever also delights in the story of Grenfell & Hunt, & frustrated "local native" workers accidentally finding crocodile mummies filled w/papyri (new to me!) 7d/
Of all the participants in the symposium, Trever is the most willing to acknowledge the novelty--in a positive way--of the RSV 7e/
The project was begun in the 1930s w fairly conservative intentions; by the time it was published in the 1950s, it struck fundamentalist readers as going too far--esp. when it translated "alma" in Isa 7:14 as "young woman" instead of "virgin." 8/
the RSV remained popular among mainline Protestants (until the NRSV came along in 1990), but inspired more evangelical translations in the following decades, the most successful of which was Zondervan's NIV. Lines were drawn. /fin
