A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture

✠

editorial committee

Dom Bernard Orchard M.A. (Cantab.)

General Editor and New Testament Editor

Rev. Edmund F. Sutcliffe S.J., M.A. (Oxon.), L.S.S.

Old Testament Editor

Rev. Reginald C. Fuller D.D., L.S.S.

Secretary of the Catholic Biblical Association

Dom Ralph Russell D.D., M.A. (Oxon.)

Hon. Secretary and Treasurer

WITH A FOREWORD BY

THE CARDINAL ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER

דְּבר־אֱלֹהֵינוּ יָקוּם לְעוֹלָם

The word of our God endureth for ever

Isaias 40:8

Thomas Nelson & Sons

toronto ∙ NEW YORK ∙ edinburgh

Copyright 1953 by Thomas Nelson & Sons

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 53-9447

Acknowledgment

of the copy of the Catholic Commentary presented to Pope Pius XII

segreteria di stato di sua santita

No. 308185

Dal Vaticano, li

January 29, 1954

Dear Dom Orchard

I have the honour to acknowledge, at the august direction of the Holy Father, the copy of A Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture which you in the name of the Editorial Committee presented to Him in the Audience of August 26th last, and also the specially bound copy of the same volume which was subsequently received by His Holiness.

The Sovereign Pontiff would have me convey to you and to all those associated with you in the preparation and publication of this volume, His sentiments of paternal gratification. In the accomplishment of the difficult task of editing a scientific commentary, in small compass, on the entire Bible, you have succeeded in producing a most useful work for all English-speaking countries. It is to be presumed that scholarly research and the zeal for accuracy of the Editorial Committee will further enhance this usefulness by the incorporation of necessary or opportune improvements in the future editions of so valuable a publication.

With the prayer that this Commentary may serve through its diffusion among English-speaking Catholics as an aid towards an increased knowledge and love of the Sacred Scriptures, the Sovereign Pontiff imparts to you, to the members of the Editorial Committee, and to all your associates, His special Apostolic Blessing.

With sentiments of esteem, I remain,

Devotedly yours in Christ,

J. B. Montini

Prosecr.

The Reverend

Dom Bernard Orchard, O.S.B.

Ealing Priory

London W. 5

Foreword

WHEN shortly after my appointment as Archbishop of Westminster at the end of 1943 I learned that some members of the Catholic Biblical Association were contemplating the preparation in one volume of a Catholic Commentary on Holy Scripture, I readily gave this ambitious venture my full approval and blessing. I was well aware of the need of such a work, and I was confident that those who proposed setting about this task were encouraged to do so largely by what our Holy Father, Pope Pius XII, had written earlier that year in his encyclical Divino afflante Spiritu. After dealing with the improved conditions for biblical study, His Holiness had written: ‘Now, therefore, that textual criticism has attained such a high level of ...