Tagalog Language - Religious Literature

Religious Literature

Religious literature remains to be one of the most dynamic contributors to Tagalog literature. The first Bible in Tagalog, then called Ang Biblia ("the Bible") and now called Ang Dating Biblia ("the previous Bible"), was published in 1905. In 1970, the Philippine Bible Society translated the Bible into modern Tagalog. Even before the Second Vatican Council, devotional materials in Tagalog had been circulating. At present, there are four circulating Tagalog translations of the Bible—the Magandang Balita Biblia (a parallel translation of the Good News Bible), which is the ecumenical version; the Bibliya ng Sambayanang Pilipino; the 1905 Ang Biblia is a more Protestant version; and the Bagong Sanlibutang Salin ng Banal na Kasulatan, one of about ninety parallel translations of the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures published by Jehovah's Witnesses. The latter was released in 2000. Jehovah's Witnesses previously published a hybrid translation: Ang Biblia was used for the Old Testament, while the Bagong Sanlibutang Salin ng Griegong Kasulatan was used for the New Testament.

When the Second Vatican Council, (specifically the Sacrosanctum Concilium) permitted the universal prayers to be translated into vernacular languages, the Catholic Bishops' Conference of the Philippines was one of the first to translate the Roman Missal into Tagalog. In fact, the Roman Missal in Tagalog was published as early as 1982, while not published in English until 1985.

Jehovah's Witnesses were printing Tagalog literature at least as early as 1941 and The Watchtower (the primary magazine of Jehovah's Witnesses) has been published in Tagalog since at least the 1950s. New releases are now regularly released simultaneously in a number of languages, including Tagalog. The official website of Jehovah's Witnesses also has some publications available online in Tagalog.

Tagalog is quite a stable language, and very few revisions have been made to Catholic Bible translations. Also, as Protestantism in the Philippines is relatively young, liturgical prayers tend to be more ecumenical.