Catholic Encyclopedia

Catholic Encyclopedia

Cover of the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume 1
Publisher	Robert Appleton Company
Publication date	1907
Pages	860
Followed by	New Catholic Encyclopedia
Text	Catholic Encyclopedia at Wikisource

The Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church,^[1] also referred to as the Old Catholic Encyclopedia and the Original Catholic Encyclopedia,^[2] is an English-language encyclopedia published in the United States. The first volume appeared in March 1907 and the last three volumes appeared in 1912, followed by a master index volume in 1914 and later supplementary volumes. It was designed "to give its readers full and authoritative information on the entire cycle of Catholic interests, action and doctrine".^[3][4]

The Catholic Encyclopedia was published by the Robert Appleton Company (RAC), a publishing company incorporated in New York in February 1905 for the express purpose of publishing the encyclopedia. The five members of the encyclopedia's Editorial Board also served as the directors of the company. In 1912, the company's name was changed to The Encyclopedia Press. Publication of the encyclopedia's volumes was the sole business conducted by the company during the project's lifetime.^[5]

The encyclopedia was designed to serve the Catholic Church, concentrating on information related to the Church and explaining matters from the Catholic point of view. It records the accomplishments of Catholics and others in nearly all intellectual and professional pursuits, including artists, educators, poets and scientists. While more limited in focus than other general encyclopedias, it was far broader in scope than previous efforts at comprehensive Catholic encyclopedias, which covered only internal Church affairs.

It offers in-depth portrayals of historical and philosophical ideas, persons and events, from a Catholic perspective, including issues that divide Catholicism from Protestantism and other faith communities. Since the encyclopedia was first published starting in 1907 and has never been updated (versus the New Catholic Encyclopedia), many of its entries may be out of date either with respect to the wider culture or to the Catholic ecclesiastical world. In particular, it predates the creation of the Vatican City State (1929) and the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), which introduced changes to Catholic practice.

The writing of the encyclopedia began on January 11, 1905, under the supervision of five editors:

• Charles G. Herbermann, professor of Latin and librarian of the College of the City of New York
• Edward A. Pace, professor of philosophy at The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.
• Condé B. Pallen, editor
• The Rev. Thomas J. Shahan, professor of Church history at The Catholic University
• The Rev. John J. Wynne, S.J., editor of Messenger of the Sacred Heart

The first edition was initially printed by the Robert Appleton Company of New York City. The volumes came out sequentially, the first two in 1907 and the last three in 1912:^[6]

The editors had their first editorial meeting at the offices of the Archdiocese of New York's newspaper The Messenger, on West 16th Street, New York City. The text received a nihil obstat from an official censor, Remy Lafort, on November 1, 1908, and an imprimatur from John Murphy Farley, then Archbishop of New York. This review process was presumably accelerated by the reuse of older authorized publications. In addition to frequent informal conferences and constant communication by letters, the editors subsequently held 134 formal meetings to consider the plan, scope and progress of the multi-volumed reference work, culminating in publication ending on April 19, 1913. A first supplement was published nine years later in 1922; a second supplement in nine loose-leaf sections was published by The Gilmary Society three decades later, between 1950 and 1958.

In 1912, a special completely illustrated, commemorative volume was awarded to those patrons who contributed to the start of the enterprise in 1907 by buying multiple encyclopedia sets early on.^[7]

There was controversy over the presence of The Catholic Encyclopedia on the shelves in public libraries in the United States with nativist protests that this violated the constitutional separation of church and state, including a successful court appeal in Belleville, New Jersey.^[8]

The encyclopedia was later updated over a half-century later under the auspices of the faculty of The Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. and the successor New Catholic Encyclopedia was first published 53 years later in 1967, followed by several supplements during the next three decades. Then a revised second edition 35 years more in 2002. It too has been supplemented every few years since.

The Catholic Encyclopedia and Its Makers states that:

The work is entirely new, and not merely a translation or a compilation from other encyclopedic sources. The editors have insisted that the articles should contain the latest and most accurate information to be obtained from the standard works on each subject.

However, "from standard works" allows that some of the articles from European contributors such as Pierre Batiffol (French) and Johann Peter Kirsch (German) had previously been published in whole or in part in Europe and were translated and edited for the Encyclopedia.^[9] Those who wrote new articles in English include Anthony Maas and Herbert Thurston.

Under the copyright law of the United States, all works published in the United States before 1928 are considered in the public domain. In 1993, Kevin Knight, a 26-year-old resident of Denver, Colorado, decided, during the visit of Pope John Paul II (1920-2005, served 1978-2005), to that city for World Youth Day, to launch a project to republish the 1907-1913 original edition of the '"Catholic Encyclopedia on the Internet. Knight founded the Web site New Advent to host the undertaking. Volunteers from several countries, including the United States, Canada, France, and Brazil helped in the transcription of the original text material. The site first went online two years later in 1995, and transcription work ended after four years efforts in 1997.^{[Volumes 1]}

In 2007, Catholic Answers internet website published a watermarked version derived from page scans. This version has since been replaced with a transcription of the Encyclopedia similar to that found at the New Advent web site.^{[Volumes 2]} The Catholic Answers transcription, however, is an exact transcription of the original text, whereas the New Advent version at times modernizes certain usages (e.g., using the titles of Old Testament books found in several Protestant versions of the Holy Bible (used in Protestant churches / denominations), such as "1 & 2 Chronicles" and "Obadiah", in place of the titles traditionally used differently in the Vulgate (Latin) / Douay–Rheims (Roman Catholic) Bible versions, (such as titles of "1 & 2 Paralipomenon" and "Abdias") and Biblical citation formatting (i.e., the Catholic Answers version retains the original's usage of Roman numerals for chapter numbers [e.g., Genesis I,1], while the New Advent version uses Arabic numerals throughout [e.g., Genesis 1:1]).

Another transcription is hosted by Catholic Online internet website. Similarly to the Catholic Answers transcription, it uses an exact rendition of the original text.^{[Volumes 3]}

Scanned copies of the 1907-1913 Encyclopedia are available on Google Books, at the Internet Archive, and at Wikimedia Commons. Wikisource also hosts a transcription project backed by the scans hosted at Commons.^{[Volumes 4]}

The 1922 supplement to the Catholic Encyclopedia is also in the public domain and is available online. The New Catholic Encyclopedia of 1967, also is available online at some academic and public libraries.

• Encyclopaedia Biblica
• The Jewish Encyclopedia
• Lists of encyclopedias
• New Catholic Encyclopedia
• Orthodox Encyclopedia
• Thomas F. Woodlock – a member of the board of directors for the project and contributor of several articles within it

• Charles B. Herbermann; Edward A. Pace; Conde E. Pallen (1907). The Catholic encyclopedia ; an international work of reference on the constitution, doctrine, discipline and history of the Catholic Church. Vol. 14 voll. New York: Robert Appleton Company. Archived from the original on December 28, 2018. Retrieved December 28, 2018 – via archive.org.

• Catholic Encyclopedia at Catholic Answers
• Catholic Encyclopedia on New Advent
• Catholic Encyclopedia on Catholicity
• Catholic Encyclopedia full text via Hathi Trust