This topic is old, 2017... just wanted to say that the most used Bible version in Latin America is the Reina-Valera 1960.
The Baptist Publishing House has an editorial called "Mundo Hispano" and they produced the "Reina-Valera Actualizada 2105" version text of the Bible based on the RV1960.
Here is there official communication about this version translated to english:
Source Link:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/2ceem1j6mp8dx3d/RVA 2015.pdf?dl=1
REINA VALERA UPDATED 2015
The Casa Bautista de Comunicaciones / Editorial Mundo Hispano has always been, 110 years,
closely related to the Bible.
He has produced many Bible study resources; but now we want to highlight the
production of Bibles of different versions.
We want to present the RVA 2015
I. The translations
1. Translations: A headache?
• We have to approach reading the Bible with an open mind.
o We do not have the original manuscripts.
o So any contemporary translation has used a copy of copy of
these manuscripts.
o For 1500 years the Bible was transcribed manually.
o Just the last 500 years by mechanical and electronic means.
• Many translations of the Bible into Spanish have been made.
o They all give us help, but none exhausts all the meaning.
o There is no perfect translation.
o Every version of the Bible is perfectible.
o There is no inspired version.
• Every translator is the result of his culture, his environment, his theology and his limitations.
• The Reina-Valera tradition
o They were two flesh and blood characters: It is not the wife of King James.
o Casiodoro de Reina did it in 1569, the Bear Bible.
o It was revised by Cipriano de Valera in 1602, the Bible of the Pitcher.
o Then multiple revisions have been made.
o Reina made the translation of it, and in it it says:
"With all this, we understand that we have not achieved everything... The other mistakes... the
Cristiana Caridad knows how to excuse and suffer, and when the opportunity presents itself,
amend them with all smoothness…” (Admonition, p. XXIX).
"First of all, having faithfully done all that we could,
no sane judgment will scold us for what our forces did not reach. Who
could and would like to do better, our present work will not hinder you, rather
It will help even with the same faults and errors that it may have. Secondly, in that neither
We intend to set a rule for the Church, which of necessity has to graduate and canonize
for infallible (I say how much is from our version). We only intend to help with
that we can, short or long, until God gives more abundant provision to the Church.
Thirdly, in that (for those who want to correct us with charity) by the grace of
God, we are not the number of those who, rightly or wrongly, boast so much of themselves that
consider finished what once comes out of their hands, that nothing can be added or
remove..." (Reprimand, p. XXVIII).
2. Classes of translations
• According to the text on which they are based
According to the way of translating
• Remember: we do not have the original texts
• We have to talk about transmission of the text
• The transmission of the texts of the AT and NT are two different cases, each one with its
complexities
o AT was copied by professionals
o NT was copied, the first centuries, by people of the church, and from the fourth century
by professionals.
• TA case:
o Those who used the Masoretic Text (6th-7th century AD)
o Those who used the TM, the Dead Sea Scrolls and other ancient translations
(Septuagint, Peshitta, etc)
• Case of the NT:
o Those who used the "Received Text"
§ There are several myths about this text:
§ "Received Text" was a term used by the publisher at the time to
that it be accepted... A marketing maneuver.
§ Erasmus of Rotterdam, a Catholic, elaborated this NT based on 6 manuscripts.
§ It was elaborated in the 16th century, using manuscripts from the 10th-12th century.
§ He used Latin texts, translated almost all of Revelation from Latin, and incorporated
text that to this day have not been found in Greek, such as Acts 9:5-6
§ It was the basis for Reina Valera
o Those that use the critical text
§ Those that use manuscripts from the first three centuries.
§ Today we have about 5,700 manuscripts of the New Testament
§ Textual critics have verified the accuracy of 98.33% of the text.
1.67% of the text is subject to questioning, so the New
Testament is the best preserved ancient text known to man.
It is only the remaining 1.67% that affects the different translations
of the New Testament available today.
§ No variant is fundamental for the elaboration of any doctrine
§ Most contemporary translations, including the VMH.
• Summary
• According to the way of translating.
o There are several ways to understand this:
o They go from “Formal”, “Dynamic Equivalence” to “Free”; each with
different degrees.
§ Formal: Reina-Valera, RVA
§ Dynamic equivalence: NVI
§ Free: A message of hope
o Every translation has something or a lot of “Formal Equivalence”, because it is
impossible "formally" everything.
o Let's see an example: Romans 5:1
II. The Bible and CBP/EMH
1916 The New Covenant
1966 The New Testament Way of Life
1977 Spanish-American version
1977 Hispanic World Study Bible
1979 RVA project is born
1989 KJV Bible
1999 XXI Century Study Bible
2006 New RVA Edition
2011 Hispanic World Study Bible, RVA
2015 New King Edition