Samuel Newth

THE FURTHER GROWTH OF THE ENGLISH BIBLE.

The accession of Elizabeth, November 17th, 1558, conveniently marks the date of a fourth stage in the growth of the English Bible. The former translations and revisions had been done in troublous times, in the midst of harassing opposition, and under circumstances which forbade the full use of such aids as the scholarship of the times could furnish. The versions now to be mentioned were carried on in open day, and with free access to all that was then available for the correction and explanation of the original texts.

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Amongst the many earnest men driven into exile by the Marian persecution was William Whittingham, some time Fellow of All Souls’, Oxford, and subsequently Dean of Durham.[23] Along with others he found a refuge, first at Frankfort, and afterwards at Geneva. On the 10th day of June, 1557, there was published, in the last mentioned city, a small volume, 16mo, entitled “The Newe Testament of our Lord Jesus Christ. Conferred diligently with the Greke, and best approved translations. With the arguments aswel before the chapters, as for every Boke and Epistle, also diversities of readings, and moste proffitable annotations of all harde places; whereunto is added a copious Table.” This translation, there is reason to believe, was the work of Whittingham alone. It may be noted, in passing, that it was the first English New Testament which contained the now familiar division into verses, and the first also to indicate by italics the words added by the translator in order to convey more fully or more clearly the sense of the original.

Three years afterwards (1560) there was published in the same city, “The Bible and Holy Scriptures conteyned in the Olde and Newe Testament. Translated according to the Ebrue and Greeke, and conferred with the best translations in divers languages. With moste profitable annotations upon all the hard places, and other things of great importance as may appeare in the epistle to the reader.” This is the celebrated Genevan version, which for nearly a century onward was the form of Bible most largely circulated in this country. It differed in several respects from its predecessors. It was a convenient quarto instead of a cumbrous folio. It was printed in Roman letters instead of the heavy Gothic or black letters. It marked by a different type all words inserted for the completion of the sense, and the chapters were divided into verses. But what was of more importance, it was, as stated in the title, compared throughout with the original texts. Both in the Old and New Testaments it largely reproduces the words of Tyndale. Sometimes it gives a preference to the version of Coverdale; but often it departs from both in order to give a more exact rendering of the Hebrew or the Greek. It seems that several of the Genevan refugees consecrated their enforced leisure to “this great and wonderful work,” as they justly term it, moved thereto by the twofold consideration that, owing to “imperfect knowledge of the tongues,” the previous “translations required greatly to be perused and reformed,” and that “great opportunities and occasions” for doing this work were presented to them in the “so many godly and learned men” into whose society they had now been brought.

The names of Miles Coverdale, Christopher Goodman, Anthony Gilby, Thomas Sampson, William Cole, and William Whittingham are given as those who, with some others, joined in this undertaking. On the accession of Elizabeth most of the exiles returned home, conveying with them, for presentation to the Queen, the Book of Psalms as a specimen of the work on which they were engaged.[24]

Wittingham only, with one or two others, remained behind for a year and a half in order to complete the work. According to the statement given in the address to the reader, the entire period spent upon the preparation of this version was a little more than two years. It will hence be seen that whatever may have been the part taken in the work by Coverdale and others, by far the chief share in it devolved upon Whittingham and the one or two referred to, who were probably Gilby and Sampson. How weighty was the obligation which in the view of these self-denying men rested upon them to give the word of God to their country in the form that would best and most truly present it, and with what reverent care they laboured to attain unto this, is shown by the fact that although Whittingham had so recently published his version of the New Testament, he is not content with a simple reproduction of this, but subjects it to a thorough and very careful revision. A comparison of the introduction to Luke’s gospel as it appears in the Genevan Bible of 1560 with the same passage in Whittingham’s version of 1557 will help our readers in some measure to realize the nature and extent of this revision.

In the earlier version the passages read thus:

“For asmuch as many have taken in hand to write the historie of those thynges, wherof we are fully certified, even as they declared them unto us, which from y^e begynnyng saw them their selves, and were ministers at the doyng: It seemed good also to me (moste noble Theophilus) as sone as I had learned perfectly all thynges from the beginnyng, to wryte unto thee therof from poynt to poynt: That thou mightest acknowlage the trueth of those thinges where in thou hast bene broght up.”

In the version of 1560 the same passage is given thus:

It will be seen that in this short passage the changes made from the earlier form of the work are as many as ten in number. As this, however, may be deemed a somewhat exceptional passage, let us take an ordinary chapter in the Gospels, presenting no special difficulty, as for instance Matt. xvii. A collation of the two versions will show that in this chapter of twenty-seven verses the revision of 1560 departs from Whittingham’s earlier work in no fewer than forty places.[25] Thus persevering was the endeavour of these faithful men to do their very best, and with what success may to some extent be seen in the fact that of these forty changes twenty-six were confirmed in after years by the judgment of King James’ translators.

“So earnestly,” says Strype[26] in his Life of Archbishop Parker, “did the people of the nation thirst in those days after the knowledge of the Scriptures, that that first impression was soon sold off.” So earnestly also did the translators seek to perfect their work, that about the beginning of March, 1565, they had finished a careful review and correction of their translation in preparing for a fresh issue.

Popular as was the Genevan Bible amongst the mass of the English people, the decidedly puritanic cast of its annotations stood in the way of its universal acceptance, while its manifest superiority as a translation to the Great Bible made it almost an impossibility that the latter could be maintained in its place of pre-eminence as the Bible appointed by authority to be read in churches. Steps were accordingly taken by Matthew Parker, Archbishop of Canterbury, to prepare a Bible, by the aid of “diverse learned fellow-bishops,” that would accord with the ecclesiastical sympathies of the party to which he belonged.[27] He distributed portions to twelve of his episcopal brethren, and to other Church dignitaries;[28] one portion he took under his own charge. The completed work was presented to Elizabeth within a few weeks of the completion of the tenth year of her reign, October 5th, 1568.

The rules laid down by Parker for the guidance of his colleagues were these: 1. “To follow the common English translation used in the churches, and not to recede from it but where it varieth manifestly from the Hebrew or Greek original. 2. To use sections and divisions in the texts as Pagnine[29] in his translation useth; and for the verity of the Hebrew, to follow the said Pagnine and Munster specially, and generally others learned in the tongues. 3. To make no bitter notes upon any text, or yet to set down any determination in places of controversy. 4. To note such chapters and places as contain matter of genealogies, or other such places not edifying, with some strike or note, that the reader may eschew them in his public reading. 5. That all such words as sound in the old translation to any offence of lightness or obscenity be expressed with more convenient terms and phrases.” From the first of these rules it is clear that the work then undertaken was intended to be a revision of the Great Bible. Some of the revisers seem to have observed this rule in a most rigid manner, and have followed the Great Bible so closely as to retain its words, even in places which had been more correctly rendered in the Genevan. There appears to have been no co-operative action on the part of the several revisers, and to this cause we may attribute much of the irregularity that attaches to the execution of their work. In many respects they laid themselves open to adverse criticism, and a paper was sent to Parker by Thomas Lawrence, Head Master of Shrewsbury School, and an eminent Greek scholar, entitled, Notes of Errors in the Translation of the New Testament out of the Greek.[30] He points out fifteen passages in which the words are not “aptlye translated,” eight in which “words and pieces of sentences” are “omytted,” two in which superfluous words are inserted, two in which, owing to mistranslation, an “error in doctrine” is involved, and two in which the moods and tenses of verbs are changed. These passages, except one from the Colossians, are all taken from the Gospels; and we may hence not unreasonably infer that the writer intended the passages named to be regarded, not as an exhaustive list, but as illustrations simply of the kind of defects which called for correction. Moved, as would seem, by these criticisms, Parker set on foot a revision of his former volume; and in 1572 this Bible was, as his biographer expresses it,[31] “a second time by his means” “printed with Corrections and Amendments and other improvements, more than the former Editions.”

Although this Bible received the sanction of Convocation, and every Archbishop and Bishop was ordered to have a copy in his hall or dining-room for the use of his servants and of strangers; and although some editions bear on their title-page the words, “Set forth by Aucthoritie” (meaning thereby the authority of Convocation), it never came into anything like general use, nor did it even establish itself as the Bible exclusively read in churches. The Genevan Bible was still used by many of the clergy in their sermons and in their published works; and in 1587, though nineteen years had then passed since its first publication, we find Archbishop Whitgift complaining that divers parish churches and chapels of ease had either no Bible at all, or those only which were not of the translation authorized by the Synods of Bishops. Between 1568, when this Bible was first published, and 1608, when the last New Testament of this version was issued, there were sent forth altogether twenty editions of the Bishops’ Bible and eleven of the New Testament. In the same period there were published seventy-nine editions of the Genevan Bible, and thirty of the Genevan New Testament.[32]

Besides the Genevan and the Bishops’, another Bible made its appearance (so far, at least, as the New Testament was concerned) in the reign of Elizabeth. In the year 1582 there was printed at Rheims a translation of the New Testament,[33] made by certain scholars connected with the English seminary for the training of Catholic priests, formerly established at Douai, in Flanders. The translators, in their preface, candidly confess that they did not publish from any conviction “that the Holy Scriptures should alwaies be in our mother tonge,” or that they ought “to be read indifferently of all,” but because they had compassion to see their “beloved countrie men with extreme danger of their soules, to use only such prophane translations;” viz., as the Protestant Bibles previously referred to, “and erroneous men’s mere phantasies, for the pure and beloved word of truth;” and because, also, they were “moved thereunto by the desires of many devout persons,” and whom they hoped to induce to lay aside the “impure versions” they had hitherto been compelled to employ. Quite apart from the polemical purpose thus distinctly avowed, this translation was a retrograde movement. It did not profess to translate the original texts, but only the “vulgar Latin;” and the translators justify their procedure by this plea, amongst others, that “the holy Council of Trent ... hath declared and defined this onely of al other Latin translations to be authentical, and so onely to be used and taken in publike lessons, disputations, preachings, and expositions, and that no man presume upon any pretence to reject or refuse the same.”

In the accomplishment of their work the Rhemish translators have very faithfully observed the rule which they laid down for themselves, to be “very precise and religious in folowing our copie, the old vulgar approved Latin; not only in sense ... but sometime in the very wordes also, and phrases;” that is to say, they have given a very literal and exact translation of the Vulgate, in many parts extremely Latinized in its diction. A considerable number of words they virtually left untranslated, boldly venturing to transfer the unfamiliar, and in many cases unintelligible, vocables into their English text. Some of these Latinized words have obtained a permanent place in our language, but the larger number have failed to commend themselves.[34]

Such then were the chief forms through which, at the close of the sixteenth century, the English Bible had passed. The devout and earnest scholars who from time to time sought to “open the Scriptures” to their fellow-countrymen were for the most part moved by a burning desire to give to God of their very best. They grudged no labour to render their work more complete. They allowed no spirit of self-satisfaction to blind them to a perception of defects. They were too humble and too well convinced of the greatness and manifoldness of their work to fancy that they had reached perfection, but were persevering and self-denying in their endeavours to attain unto it. And they have left behind them for us to follow a noble example of patient continuance in well doing.

How in their hands the English Bible has grown, from the first attempt to set it forth in the language of our country to the form in which we are most familiar with it, can be fully learnt only by a careful comparison of the successive revisions to which it has been subjected. To aid my readers in forming some approximate idea of it I append Psalm xxiii., as it appears in the principal Bibles which have been mentioned in this and the preceding lecture.

1. WYCLIFFE’S, 1382. (?)

The Lord gouerneth me, and no thing to me shal lacke; in the place of leswe[35] where he me ful sette. Ouer watir of fulfilling he nurshide me; my soule he conuertide. He bro?te doun me upon the sties of ri?twisnesse; for his name. For whi and if I shal go in the myddel of the shadewe of deth; I shal not dreden euelis, for thou art with me. Thi ?erde and thi staf; tho han confortid me. Thou hast maad redi in thi si?te a bord; a?en hem that trublyn me. Thou hast myche fattid in oile myn hed; and my chalis makende ful drunken, hou ri?t cler it is. And thi mercy shal vnderfolewe me; alle the da?is of my lif. And that I dwelle in the hous of the Lord; in to the lengthe of da?is.

2. PURVEY’S, 1388. (?)

The Lord gouerneth me, and no thing schal faile to me; in the place of pasture there he hath set me. He nurschide me on the watir of refreischyng; he conuertide my soule. He ledde me forth on the pathis of ri?tfulnesse; for his name. For whi thou? Y schal go in the myddis of schadewe of deeth; Y schal not drede yuels, for thou art with me. Thi ?erde and thi staf; tho han coumfortid me. Thou hast maad redi a boord in my siyt; a?ens hem that troblen me. Thou hast maad fat myn heed with oyle; and my cuppe, fillinge greetli, is ful cleer. And thi merci schal sue me; in alle the daies of my lijf. And that Y dwelle in the hows of the Lord; in to the lengthe of daies.

3. COVERDALE’S, 1535.

The Lorde is my shepherde, I can want nothinge. He fedeth me in a greene pasture; and ledeth me to a fresh water. He quickeneth my soule, and bringeth me forth in the waye of rightuousness for his name’s sake. Though I shulde walke now in the valley of the shadowe of death, yet I feare no euell, for thou art with me; thy staffe and thy shepehoke comforte me. Thou preparest a table before me agaynst mine enemies; thou anoyntest my heade with oyle, and fyllest my cuppe full. Oh let thy louying kyndnes and mercy folowe me all the dayes off my life that I maye dwell in the house off the Lord for euer.

4. GREAT BIBLE, 1539.

The Lorde is my shepherde, therefore can I lacke nothing. He shal fede me in a grene pasture and lead me forth besyde the waters of coforte. He shal conuerte my soule and bring me forth in the pathes of righteousnes for his name’s sake. Yea, though I walke thorow y^e valleye of y^e shadow of death, I wyl feare no euell, for thou art w^t me: thy rod and thy staff confort me.

Thou shalt prepare a table before me, agaynst them that trouble me: thou hast annointed my head w^t oyle, and my cup shal be ful. But (thy) louing kyndnes and mercy shal folowe me all the dayes of my lyfe: and I wyll dwel in the house of the Lord for euer.

5. GENEVAN, 1560.

1. The Lord is my shepheard, I shall not want.

2. Hee maketh mee to rest in greene pasture, and leadeth me by the still waters.

3. He restoreth my soule, and leadeth me in the paths of righteousnesse for his Names sake.

4. Yea, though I should walke through the valley of the shadow of death, I will feare no euill, for thou art with me: thy rodde and thy staffe, they comfort me.

5. Thou doest prepare a table before me in the sight of mine adversaries: thou doest anoynt mine head with oyle, and my cup runneth over.

6. Doubtlesse kindnesse and mercy shall follow mee all the dayes of my life, and I shall remaine a long season in the house of the Lord.

6. BISHOPS, 1568.

1. God is my shephearde, therefore I can lacke nothyng: he wyll cause me to repose myselfe in pasture full of grasse, and he wyll leade me vnto calme waters.

2. He wyll conuerte my soule; he wyll bring me foorth into the pathes of righteousnesse for his name sake.

3. Yea, though I walke through the valley of the shadowe of death, I wyll feare no euyll; for thou art with me, thy rodde and thy staffe be the thynges that do comfort me.4. Thou wylt prepare a table before me in the presence of myne aduersaries; thou has annoynted my head with oyle, and my cup shalbe brymme full.

5. Truely felicitie and mercie shal folowe me all the dayes of my lyfe: and I wyll dwell in the house of God for a long tyme.

7. DOUAI, 1610.

1. The Psalme of Dauid.

2. Our Lord ruleth one, and nothing shal be wanting to me: in place of pasture there he hath placed me.

3. Upon the water of refection he hath brought me vp: he hath conuerted my soule.

He hath conducted me upon the pathes of iustice for his name.

4. For, although I shal walke in the middes of the shadow of death, I will not feare euils: because thou art with me, Thy rod and thy staffe, they haue comforted me.

5. Thou hast prepared in my sight a table, against them; that truble me.

Thou hast fatted my head with oyle; and my chalice inebriating how goodlie is it!

6. And thy mercie shal folow me al the dayes of my life; And that I may dwel in the house of our Lord, in longitude of dayes.