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Similar Complutensian Polyglot Bible, The text of the New Testament, Hexapla, Divino afflante Spiritu, Prayer of Manasseh | ||
The Vulgata Sixtina was a Latin edition of the Bible from 1590, prepared on the orders of Pope Sixtus V. It was the first edition of the Latin Vulgate authorised by a pope, but its official recognition was short-lived.
Contents
Three committees
On 8 April 1546 the Council of Trent required that the Vulgate be printed quam emendatissime (fewest possible faults). There was no authoritative edition at that time.
The first committee was appointed by Pope Pius IV in 1561 to undertake the work, but the committee worked slowly and ineffectively. The second committee was appointed by Pope Pius V in 1569 (Congregatio pro emendatione Bibliorum), with four Cardinals Marcus Antonius, Sirleto, Madrutius, and Antonio Carafa. The committee was resolved under the Pope Gregory XIII.
The Pope Sixtus V had appointed the 3rd committee of scholars to continue the work. The committee was under the presidency of Cardinal Carafa. The work was prepared on the basis of the edition of Robertus Stephanus from Louvain (1583) and good manuscripts were used as authorities, including notably Codex Amiatinus. Carafa presented the result of their work, in the beginning of 1589, but Sixtus rejected their work and in 18 months prepared another text he corrected to agree with the Greek and Hebrew, He used Codex Carafianus, but it was hurried into print and suffered from many printing errors, as well as serious problems reflecting the inability of the headstrong Sixtus as a Bible scholar. After his death Robert Bellarmine warned that his work was an embarrassment, and a great danger to the church. In May 1590 the completed work was issued from the press in three volumes.
The full title of edition was: Biblica Sacra Vulgatae editionnis, ad Concilii Tridenti praescriptum emendata et a Sixto V P. M. recognita et approbata. The edition was preceded by the Bull Aeternus Ille (1 March 1590), in which the Pope declared the authenticity of the new Bible, the Vulgata Sixtina. This edition was short-lived, because of its textual inaccuracy.
On 27 August Sixtus V died suddenly, and on 5 September the college of Cardinals stopped all further sales, bought and destroyed as many copies as possible. Faced with about six thousand on matters of detail, and a hundred that were important, and saving the honour of Sixtus V, Bellarmine undertook the preface, and ascribed all the imperfections of his Vulgate to being errors of the press. Some believe that the attack against the edition had been instigated by the Jesuits, whom Sixtus had offended by putting one of Bellarmine's books on the Index Librorum Prohibitorum.
Vulgata Sixtina is cited only in some present critical editions and it is designated by siglum vgs.
Some differences to the Louvain edition
In Book of Genesis 40-50 43 corrections were made (on the basis of Codex Carafianus):
Among these 43 corrections, 31 has only grammar meaning, and 6 of them are correct.
In 30 first chapters of the Book of Genesis following changes were made: