Douay-Rheims Bible

Undertaken by the English Catholic bishop Richard Challoner in the mid-eighteenth century, this revision transformed the very Latinate Douay-Rheims into the form familiar to generations of English-speaking Catholics. It covers the complete Catholic Bible and takes as its base text the Douay-Rheims, revised, with Latin, Greek, and Hebrew serving as reference languages. Its translation philosophy is more idiomatic than that of its predecessor, often standing closer to the diction of the King James Version, and it is best classified as a substantial revision of the Douay-Rheims rather than a fresh translation. Its most distinctive feature is the sheer extent of that revision: modern editions published under the name “Douay-Rheims” often reflect Challoner's wording more than the 1582/1610 wording. In this form the translation served as the standard English Bible of Catholic devotion and instruction for roughly two centuries, and it remains in print today.