Cloverdale Psalter

Discussion in 'Faith, Devotion & Formation' started by bwallac2335, Jan 3, 2020.

  1. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    The BCP 2019 has a reading of the Psalter in a month. It also says that the Cloverdale Psalter is numbered different than most are used to. Why is this?
     
  2. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    Did you mean Coverdale Psalter, the Psalter in BCP 1662? Much preferable text for poetic effect and singing, (though inaccurate in translation), to even the KJV, in my opinion. Better still than any modern translations.
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  3. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    Yes the Coverdale.
     
  4. Rexlion

    Rexlion Well-Known Member

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    I hear they took Coverdale with a grain of Psalt...

    :halo:
     
  5. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    Yes I do too when it comes to pin point Hebrew to contemporary English translation but no modern translation can beat Coverdale for:
    "God is gone up with a merry noise : and the Lord with the sound of the trump".
    "The heathen make much ado, and the kingdoms are moved : but God hath shewed his voice, and the earth shall melt away."
    "He maketh wars to cease in all the world : He breaketh the bow, and knappeth the spear in sunder, and burneth the chariots in the fire."

    The defects can be tolerated. One of the most glaring is Psalm 121:1.
    "I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills : from whence comest my help."

    His help NEVER came from the hills. That was exactly David's problem. He was standing in Jerusalem looking UP at the surrounding hills, thinking to himself, "We're stuffed, the enemy has all the high ground, who can help me now"? . . . . "My help cometh even from the Lord" : so who needs the high ground? We've got God."

    But Coverdale didn't put a question mark after help, because Hebrew has no question marks. Thus we have the false statement that David's help came from the hills. Followed and immediately contradicted by the following verse, "My help cometh even from the Lord" : From whence David believed his help actually came.
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  6. AnglicanAgnostic

    AnglicanAgnostic Well-Known Member

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    Can I just ask a silly question? What exactly is a psalter? I have read that it is just the collection of all the psalms from the O.T. I have also read it is only the psalms attributed to David.
     
  7. bwallac2335

    bwallac2335 Well-Known Member

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    In the 2019 BCP they fix that problem with Psalms 121:1
     
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  8. Magistos

    Magistos Active Member Anglican

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    I'm enjoying this discussion and even learning about this psalter that I have been using. (I'm enjoying the ACNA 2019 BCP.)

    But I must admit to a bit of dark humor. I saw Cloverdale and thought "Ah, the Yog-Sothoth translation."
     
  9. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    I know. But the poetic impact somehow isn't there now, in my opinion, (which may not count for much I admit), in spite of the literally improved accuracy.

    Accuracy in translation is not necessarily, it sems to me, efficacy in spiritual impact.
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  10. Andrew Evans

    Andrew Evans New Member

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    If I may jump in here with a question concerning Psalm 80:1: Why does the New Coverdale Psalter (2019) read, “...that lead Joseph like a sheep” and not “...that lead Joseph like a flock”, as in previous versions?
     
  11. Fr. Brench

    Fr. Brench Well-Known Member Anglican

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    There used to be a bunch of files available online which gave lots of specific re-translation notes which might have answered your question, @Andrew Evans. I've contacted the website admins to see if I can get that back to look into that sheep/flock question. It's been annoying me in the back of my mind, too...

    To @bwallac2335 's original question, the versification is different because the original BCP (Coverdale) Psalter was published before verse numbers were invented. So it was broken into verses in one way, and the mainstream line of Bible translations ended up landing on a slightly different breakdown. This is confused further when you consider that the Roman Catholic Bibles versify the Psalms (as well as number them) in yet a third way - often counting the superscriptions as verse 1.
     
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  12. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    Psalm 80:1.
    Give ear, O Shepherd of Israel, you who lead Joseph like a flock. (ESV)
    צאֹן
    STRONG’S NUMBER:h6629
    Dictionary Definitionh6629. צֹאן ṣô’n; or צְאוֹן tsaown (Psalm 144:13), tseh-one«; from an unused root meaning to migrate; a collective name for a flock (of sheep or goats); also figuratively (of men): — (small) cattle, flock (+ -s), lamb (+ -s), sheep((-cote, -fold, -shearer, -herds)).

    (AV (274) - flock 138, sheep 110, cattle 15, shepherd + h7462 2, lamb + h1121 2, lamb 1, sheep + h4480 1, sheepcotes + h1448 1, sheepfold + h1448 1, sheepfold + h4356 1, sheepshearers + h1494 1, shepherd + h7462 1;)

    small cattle, sheep, sheep and goats, flock, flockssmall cattle (usually of sheep and goats) of multitude (simile) of multitude, (metaphor).

    Apparently the hebrew word can mean many things both lieterally and metaphorically. Used 274 times in Authorised King James Bible. Flock seems the most likely in Ps.80:1, but considering Eccl 12:11-12 and John 10:11-14, sheep could be just as appropriate in the context of the rest of the verse in that psalm.
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  13. Andrew Evans

    Andrew Evans New Member

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    More than the word “sheep” in Psalm 80:1, it is the phrase “a sheep” that puzzles me.
     
  14. Fr. Brench

    Fr. Brench Well-Known Member Anglican

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    Oh, yes. Sheep, like moose, is a noun with identical singular and plural forms. Most of the time it's plural, so "a sheep" is strange to the ear, despite being grammatically correct.
     
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  15. Andrew Evans

    Andrew Evans New Member

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    But even so, it is still puzzling to me that the editors of the 2019 Psalter would not have preferred “a flock” over “a sheep”, as is found in the 1928 and 1979 versions. I am not familiar with older versions; perhaps “a sheep” is how it appears in some of them. Anyway, I don’t want to make too much of this. Thank you for your feedback.
     
  16. Moses

    Moses Member

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    While we're sharing our favorite Coverdalisms, I particularly how Psalm 137:7 goes in the BCP:
    "Remember the children of Edom, O LORD, in the day of Jerusalem; how they said, Down with it, down with it, even to the ground."

    Most translations have "rase it," which sounds unfortunately identical to "raise it" despite opposite meanings.
     
  17. Tiffy

    Tiffy Well-Known Member

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    It also shows how such expressions as 'Down with it, down with it', have crept into the English language with an added meaning of 'depose and throw it out', as in "Down with Trump" or "Down with White Supremacy".
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