Yorke

Book: The People's Proverbs Bible: The Psalms Edition. (512 pages)

Author: Milton Maye.

Publisher: WinePress Publishing, Enumclaw, Washington:

On first appearance, this 512-page neat-looking volume resembles an English Bible in every way in that it has a gilded-edge; is well stitched together; is printed on Bible paper; has a black ribbon to mark its pages-pages which are formatted in two columns and divided into verses; sports a blue shiny leather cover; and has a title to match, namely, The People's Proverbs Bible: The Psalms Edition.

In addition, we find written on the back of the dust jacket the following moving words and accompanying appeal: "dramatic, emotional, sensational yet consistent and profound; make this new experience yours."

On closer inspection, however, one immediately discovers that this volume is, in fact, a wide assortment of books and selections drawn from throughout the Protestant Bible as a whole.

That is, the volume encompasses (and in the sequence listed) not only the book of Psalms (all 150 divisions of them and as the subtitle suggests), Proverbs (all 31 chapters and as its main title implies) but also, according to the table of contents, the entire books of Ecclesiastes or that of the Preacher (12 chapters), Song of Solomon (eight chapters), Job (42 chapters) and Esther (10 chapters) - all found in the Old Testament.

This is then followed by some selected chapters taken from each of the other books of the Old Testament running from Genesis all the way up to Malachi following the contents and sequence of the canon in the Protestant Bible.

The same is also true of the New Testament in that there are some selected chapters drawn from each of the 27 books in the New Testament - ranging from Matthew to Revelation.

What is also quite noticeable about this entire volume is that a creative and commendable attempt has been made throughout to render in poetic form all the various chapters and selections which are drawn from both Testaments.

Translations

From the outset, for example, we are told that it is: "The Holy Bible related with an exciting blend of translation, transliteration, paraphrasing, commentary and proverbial extracts in the language of the heart-poetry. These features combine to make the Proverbs Bible, the People's Bible" (p.vii).

In going through the volume, this basically proved to be the case, more or less, except that, technically, one does not encounter any transliterations at all - if by that is meant the rendering in the letters or script of the English language some foreign words taken from any of the original languages of the Bible itself, to wit, Aramaic and Hebrew in the Old Testament or Greek in the New.

On the same page (p.vii), one also reads the following somewhat puzzling comment: "The text can be easily cross-referenced to all other translations of the Bible [presumably, that means English translations which is still a rather bold and, therefore, contentious claim]; however, the numbering of verses is unique to this translation and cannot be cross-referenced."

Why this system of verse division is made a unique feature of the volume is never explained.

Overall, and to repeat, this handsome Bible-looking volume is neat and tidy in appearance in every way. However, and frankly speaking, it is not at all clear to this reviewer what its precise purpose is or what the author really set out to achieve.

The book can easily deceive the unsuspecting reader into thinking that s/he has the complete Bible as the Word of God in his/her hands when in fact it's not the case. Rather, and except for the first six books already mentioned, namely, Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, Job and Esther, it is really a mixture of what appears to be some rather randomly chosen chapters of the various books of the Protestant canon or inspired collection running from Genesis all the way to Revelation.

That is, the criteria of selection used to determine which chapter(s) get chosen and which not are not at all clear.

For example, from the 50 chapters of Genesis, we have poetic renderings of only chapters 6, 8, 29, 34 and 41; from the 12 chapters of Daniel, we have only chapters 3 and 12 represented; from the 28 chapters of Matthew in the New Testament we have only chapters 5, 8, 13 and 27 and from the 22 chapters of Revelation (or the Apocalypse), we have only chapters 5, 13, 16 and 21 depicted.

Commendation

In spite of these shortcomings in terms of the lack of clarity of purpose which marks and mars it, further compounded by the rather terse comment at the very end of the book just before its dedicatory page and its afterword, to the effect that the "full edition [will be] available soon", the author of this volume (or rather, the creative and somewhat arbitrary compiler of it) must be commended for at least attempting to bequeath to all Jamaicans, the vast majority of whom, presumably, are Bible-believing, what can best be characterised as a real "labour of love".

In his words again: "I dedicate this book to my country, Jamaica - a Third-World country by development standards with many internal problems, but a people who love the Lord dearly and a country through which God shows His unrestricted ability to use anything He desires for His glory."

No doubt, the author/compiler is hoping that, indeed, God would use this handsome-looking volume "for His glory". Only time will tell.

Dr Gosnell L. Yorke is professor of religion, School of Religion and Theology, Northern Caribbean University, Mandeville.