Origin of GR1974 Introit verses
  • Felipe Gasper
    Posts: 804
    Has anyone else noticed before that the Introit verses in the Graduale Romanum 1974 are given according to the old Vulgate text, while the preface to the same book instructs to use verses from Nova Vulgata for Communion verses?

    Ash Wednesday’s Introit’s psalm verse is, for example:
    Miserere mei, Deus, miserere mei: quoniam in te confidit anima mea.

    … while Nova Vulgata translates that passage thus:
    Miserere mei, Deus, miserere mei, quoniam in te confugit anima mea.

    (Note the difference: “confidit” vs. “confugit”.)

    This seems a pretty strange disparity: I was under the impression that Nova Vulgata is meant to replace Jerome’s Vulgate throughout the liturgy except where preexisting melodies make that substitution a nontrivial matter.
  • rarty
    Posts: 96
    As far as I can tell, the OCM/GR1974 doesn't actually say to use the Nova Vulgata for the text of the verses for the Communion antiphons, but it does explain exactly what it means with the references (since giving a reference for psalm verses can otherwise be quite ambiguous):

    1. The numbering of the psalms and the verses are from the Nova Vulgata (actually the 1969 edition of the psalter).
    2. The divisions of the verses († and *) are from the Liturgia Horarum (1st ed., 1974).

    I don't personally think it makes much sense to use the Nova Vulgata with existing Gregorian chants any more than using St. Jerome's Versio juxta Hebraicum or the Versio Piana of the 40's. Especially for the Introit.
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