Definition of Reina-Valera

The Bible is considered the book most important in the history of mankind. Among Catholics, the official version or canon is made up of 73 books (46 of them from the Old Testament and 27 from the New Testament). However, in the Protestant world where Spanish is spoken there is a different version, the Reina-Valera.

This denomination is related to its creators: Casiodoro de Reina presented his version in 1569 and in 1602 Cipriano de Valera made a new revision of the text previous. This version of the Holy Scriptures is identical to the Catholic in the New Testament, but in the Ancient seven books are not included: Tobias, 1 Maccabees, 2 Maccabees, Judith, Ecclesiasticus, Wisdom and Baruch. Thus, the Protestant Bible contains a total of 66 books.

Jews, Catholics and Protestants do not share the same Bible

The collection of sacred books of the Old Testament is the foundation of the tradition bean. Christians assumed this legacy, but they added the New Testament writings in which Jesus Christ is presented as the true Messiah (as is known, for the

religion Jewish New Testament has no validity from a theological and doctrinal point of view).

In the first centuries of the Christian tradition the Bible was written in Hebrew-Aramaic and later it was written in Greek

Later it was translated into Latin and was known as the Vulgate. This text was for all Christians, but in the seventeenth century there was Luther's Reformation and the Christianity was divided between Catholics and different Protestant doctrines (Lutherans, Calvinists, Methodists, Anglicans ...).

To the margin of the new theological approaches, for Martin Luther the 73 books of the Old Testament that made up the Christian canon should be reduced and by this reason the seven books already mentioned disappeared (these were written in Greek and not in Hebrew-Aramaic and this circumstance was decisive when it came to eliminating them for the new Protestant canon).

In this way, the Protestants began to use a new version of the Bible, specifically one that connected with the Jewish-Palestinian tradition and that consisted of 39 books in the Old Will.

Casiodoro de Reina and Cipriano de Valera were two Spanish religious who converted to Protestantism

The Protestant Reformation It was a theological upheaval. In the seventeenth century some religious abandoned the Catholic tradition and joined the ranks of the reformists.

Casiodoro de Reina belonged to the Order of the Jerónimos, but his new theological convictions forced him to flee from Spain. He moved first to Geneva and later to England. It was there that he began to translate the version of the Bible that bears his name into Spanish.

Cipriano de Valera also belonged to the Order of the Jerónimos and was the one who revised and improved the previous version of the Bible.

Photos: Fotolia - Heritage / Chorazin

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