Los Salmos en rima española, 1

I have just received the new edition of a Spanish-language version of the Genevan Psalter, titled Los Salmos en rima española. This is a collection of metrical psalms set to verse by Jorge Ruiz Ortiz according to the melodies of the Genevan Psalter. This volume replaces an earlier version of the collection published by Faro de Gracia in 2010.

Here is the author's preface translated into English:

It has been thirteen years since the completion of the first version of the Psalter (Los Salmos metrificados en lengua castellana), and eleven since its publication. During this time, in which we have learnt to sing these texts with the music of the Genevan Psalter, we have been able to see in which places they could be improved, and this in two ways: on the one hand, to facilitate singing, and, on the other, above all to make them more faithful to the biblical text.

This is how, with time, the need for a second edition of the Psalter became evident, which, based on the text used since 2010, would conform to as high a degree as possible of literalness to make it suitable for singing in the church.

A revision of the text has thus been carried out. All of the Psalms, in one way or another, have been revised. The revised Psalms of the Reina-Valera Bible carried out in 1909 by the Trinitarian Bible Society from the original Hebrew have been used as guide and reference. In our revision of the Psalms, we have tried to take special care not to introduce any ideas not found in the original. Instead, we have relied on repetition or redundancy, because it is preferable to repeat ideas present in the original than to introduce new ideas. Furthermore, such repetition is a feature generally found in poetry. In this way, when it is necessary to choose, literary flourishes have been rejected so as to adhere more faithfully to the original.

The result of this, we hope, is this version of the Psalms for singing--for personal and family use as much as in the church--in which the original Psalms are collected in a more compact and integrated way.

The work required for this revision, together with the first edition of the Psalter, cannot be counted in hours, but in years of life. We do not contemplate returning to carry out another future revision, and we hope that this will be the definitive version of the Psalms in Spanish according to the Genevan melodies.

During these years, we have also experienced first hand the extent to which Psalm-singing can become a source of change in our personal, familial, and congregational lives.

Convinced that singing the Psalms, which are the word of God, is a powerful means of grace, we therefore present this version of the Psalter with the prayer that the Lord will use it powerfully to advance his kingdom and the establishment of the Reformation in our Spanish-speaking countries.

Jorge Ruiz Ortiz, Terrassa, Barcelona, November 2021

Los Salmos en rima española, 2