Advice for Bible reading, both how to systematically read through the entire Bible and how to pray daily with the Scriputres.
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I. Some thoughts on daily Bible
reading and praying with Scripture
I recommend the daily readings of
the Novus Ordo Mass as a way of having a small bit of daily Bible reading. The
continuous reading of the text as well as the variety of Old or New Testament
reading, Gospel, and Psalm is helpful. For a bit more daily Bible reading, the
“first reading” from Office of Readings in the Liturgy of the Hours is often
related to the Liturgical season and covers a lot of both the Old and New
Testaments.
The daily Mass reading (Novus
Ordo) and the readings from the Office of Readings are available for free with
the iBreviary app or the DivineOffice app.
II. Some thoughts on the study of
the Scriptures and the systematic reading of the Bible
Which translation to use? In may
ways, I like the Douay-Rheims as the most traditional translation, but I
believe that the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) Catholic Edition is the
easiest to read while still keeping faithful to the original text.
When reading the Gospels, it is
very helpful to have a simple Bible commentary.
My first recommendation is the “Catena Aurea” or “Golden Chain” of St
Thomas Aquinas, in which he compiles the commentaries of the Church Fathers on
each verse of the four Gospels. This
four volume work can be purchased for around $160 online (sometimes it can be
found for only $110 at Preserving Christian Publications, which has many other
traditional Catholic books as well); however, it is readily available for free
on many websites and apps. As this is mainly used as a reference work for
questions that come up when reading the Gospels, I’d recommend downloading the
iPieta App which has this work as well as over 100 others. Also, the commentary
is fully available at various websites: eCatholic2000 and many others.
What commentary should I use for
the rest of the Bible? The Haydock
Commentary by Fr George Leo Haydock is a popular option for a fairly succinct
English language commentary on the whole Bible. This is also available online
for purchase as a commentary with the Douay-Rheims translation for around $150
through Loreto Publications, but is also readily found online for free (again
at eCatholic2000 or HaydockCommentary.com, etc) and also is in the iPieta app.
The commentary of Fr Cornelius a
Lapide is partly translated and available on iPieta (only the Gospels, some of
St Paul’s Letters, and the Letters of John). This is a substantial commentary,
and is one of the classic Catholic commentaries.
Another helpful tool for
understanding the Scriptures better is to read the “Introductions” to the
various books found in the Douay-Rheims Bible or in the Haydock Commentary as
well as the articles from the old Catholic Encyclopedia (published in 1913) on
each of the books and/or on the main biblical characters. The full text of the
old Catholic Encyclopedia is found online easily (for example, at New Advent or
Catholic Answers) and also is on the iPieta app.
Also, take advantage of solid
Catholic Bible study courses which are available on Formed, also many which
Father Ryan has done and posted to the parish site (Kings of the Old Testament,
Revelation, John, St Paul’s Letters). Last year, Father taught a series between
the Sunday Masses going through the entire Bible (he does this every five
years). Also, many homilies cover the themes of the various books and also
discuss various figures of the Scriptures – a simple search on the parish
website will often bring up homilies on the different books of the Bible.
III. Ideas of how to read the
entire Bible:
An Option: Start with 1-2 Samuel,
then 1-2 Kings, Jeremiah, Daniel, 1-2 Maccabees. Then to the New Testament with
all the Gospels and Acts. Then back to Old Testament with all the prophetic
books not yet read. Then back to New Testament with all the Letters. Then back
to the Old Testament with all the books of Wisdom Literature (Job through
Sirach). Then forward to New Testament for the book of Revelation. Then back to
Old Testament with Genesis through Deuteronomy, and read all other books not
yet read. Conclude by re-reading the Gospels.
The basic outline of how Fr Mike
Schmitz goes through the Bible in a year:
Genesis through 1 Samuel, John’s
Gospel, 2 Samuel through 2 Kings along with 1 and 2 Chronicles and some minor
prophets, Mark’s Gospel, Major prophets, Matthew’s Gospel, Ezra/Nehemiah and
Maccabees with Wisdom literature and minor prophets, Luke’s Gospel, Acts,
Letters, Revelation.
IV. Yearly Bible readings after
having read every book at least once.
After getting through the entire
Bible once, these books contain the “biblical narrative”:
Genesis (50 chapters), Exodus (40
chapters), Numbers (36 chapters), Joshua (24 chapters), Judges (21 chapters), 1
Samuel (31 chapters), 2 Samuel (24 chapters), 1 Kings (22 chapters), 2 Kings
(25 chapters), Ezra (10 chapters), Nehemiah (13 chapters), 1 Maccabees (16
chapters), Luke (24 chapters), Acts (28 chapters)
total: 364 chapters
On average, one could read the
“biblical narrative” or the “story of the Bible” in much less than forty hours.
If the goal is to read the narrative story of the Bible in a year, that is
significantly less than one hour per week! Less than 10 minutes a day! (no one is going to tattle on you if you skip
over some of the genealogies in the Old Testament, or some of the parts with
lots of laws or numberings of tribes etc)
In addition, some other books –
these could be read every year or so:
Deuteronomy (34 chapters), Tobit
(14 chapters), Job, chapters 1-3 and 38-42 (8 chapters)
Ecclesiastes (12 chapters), Song
of Songs (8 chapters), Isaiah (66 chapters) or Jeremiah (52 chapters) or
Ezekiel (48 chapters), Two or three of the twelve “minor prophets” – Hosea,
Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai,
Zechariah, Malachi (from 1 to 14 chapters, each), Matthew (28 chapters), Mark
(16 chapters), John (21 chapters), Romans (16 chapters), Three other letters of
St. Paul or of the other New Testament Letters (about 22 chapters, for 3
letters together), Hebrews (13 chapters), 1 John (5 chapters), Revelation (22
chapters)
total: 285 chapters
Thus, to read both the “story of
the Bible” and also a selection of the additional books of special importance
in a year would almost certainly take less than 70 hours, for about 649
chapters. That is still less than an hour and a half per week, and less than 14
minutes a day! Combine with the daily
readings from the Novus Ordo Mass, and you will be covering a lot of Scripture
every year!
Many sources online indicate that
indeed the entire Bible could be read by the average person in less than 80
hours – this gives us quite a perspective!
That’s less than 15 minutes per day!
