Wanted: 4,546 translators

Francis X. Rocca

October 10, 2008 at 5:13 p.m. ET

The Bible, as everyone knows, is the world’s all-time bestseller. So you might be excused for thinking that there is no shortage of it.

But according to tomorrow’s edition of the official Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano, after all these millennia the Good Book has still been translated into only 2,454 of the world’s 7,000 existing languages, and editions of the entire text are available in a mere 438.

So in a prudent cost-cutting move that could also yield significant ecumenical benefits, work will soon begin to define a text acceptable to the Catholic as well as the Orthodox churches, as the basis for common translations.

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