CHAPTER XIV

THE AUTHORISED VERSION-CHARACTER OF THE

TEXT

1. The Authorised Version a revision rather than a translation. 2. Dependence on earlier versions. 3. General excellence and reception of the Authorised Version.

FROM the foregoing general account of the Authorised Version we must turn to the character of the text, and notice briefly one or two points that bring out its peculiar excellences.

§ 1. The Authorised Version a Revision rather than a Translation.-From the inscription on the title-page, "Newly translated out of the Originall Tongues," we might be led to think that the Authorised Version was an altogether independent translation; but the words must be understood as directly qualified by what follows, "with the former Translations diligently compared and reuised." Our received version was in fact, like its immediate predecessors, a revision rather than a translation. The King himself showed that he contemplated nothing else when in his opening instruction he laid down: "The ordinary Bible, read in the Church, commonly called the Bishops' Bible, to be followed, and as little altered as the truth of the Original will permit.' While the men engaged in the work bear testimony to the same effect: "Truly, good Christian Reader, we never thought from the beginning that we should need to make a new translation, nor yet to make of a bad one a good one . . . but to make a good one better, or out of many good ones one

principal good one, not justly to be excepted against; that hath been our endeavour, that our mark."

So far, therefore, from being dissociated from previous versions, the Authorised Version only represents a fresh stage in the process of polishing and correcting which our English version of the Scriptures had been undergoing from the days of Tindale. Based upon the Bishops' Bible, it reached back through that to the Great Bible of 1539, and thence to Matthew's Bible of 1537; this in its turn was derived from the Coverdale Bible of 1535, in the composition of which Tindale's versions played so large a part. In other words, the Authorised Version is a revision five times revised.

In this work of revision King James' translators naturally depended in the first instance upon a careful comparison of the Bishops' renderings with the original Hebrew and Greek. "These," in their own words, "are the two golden pipes, or rather conduits, wherethrough the olive branches empty themselves into the gold. . . . If truth be to be tried by these tongues, then whence should a translation be made, but out of them ?" In consequence we find in the Authorised Version many exact and literal renderings now introduced for the first time, as when in Isa. liii. 12 the Hebrew verb in the first clause is translated "divide " instead of as in the Bishops' Bible "give"; or in Heb. iv. I the participial clause gets its true meaning “a promise being left us," not "forsaking the promise," as in the earlier versions. Apart too from the correction of actual errors the translators show their clear grasp of the original by many graphic turns of expression, as in this same Epistle to the Hebrews-" Captain of their salvation" (ii. 10); "Let us labour, therefore, to enter into that rest" (iv. II); and "The sin which doth so easily beset us" (xii. 1).

§ 2. Dependence on earlier Versions. · On the whole, however, to return to the relation of the Authorised Version to earlier English versions, its points of agreement with them, considered collectively,

Wherever

are more noticeable than its divergences. King James' translators found what seemed to them a specially happy rendering they appropriated it, so that their work became a kind of mosaic of the best results of previous versions. In doing this they were again only carrying out the King's wishes, for his fourteenth instruction especially provided: "These translations to be used when they agree better with the text than the Bishops' Bible: Tindale's, Matthew's, Coverdale's, Whitchurch's [the Great Bible, so named from one of its printers], Geneva." And one of the most interesting exercises of the study in which we have been engaged is to take a passage of the Authorised Version, and to trace back its words and phrases to their different sources. The short extracts scattered 'through our pages will provide the reader with a certain amount of material for doing this; but it may be well again to draw pointed attention to two versions, which, though not occupying places in the direct line of descent of the Authorised Version, were largely made use of by its translators. These were the Genevan and Rhemish versions.

It may appear strange that the Genevan Bible should have exercised any influence on the new version when we remember that the King had already condemned it as the worst of all translations; but the fact is beyond dispute. Thus, for example, Dr. Westcott has pointed out that of the variations from the Bishops' Bible in Isa. liii. "about seven-eighths are due to the Genevan version," either alone or in agreement with one of the Latin versions. And though he warns us that this is an extreme instance, he adds that it "only represents on an exaggerated scale the general relation in which the Authorised Version stands to the Genevan and Bishops' Bibles in the Prophetical books." In the Historical books of the Old Testament the influence of the Genevan is less marked; but in the New Testament it supplies us with many familiar phrases, such as

Luke ix. 33, "It good for us to be here" ("It is good being here for us,” Tindale and subsequent versions).

Acts xiv. 15, "Men of like passions with you ("Mortal men like unto you," Tindale, etc.)

I Cor. xiii. 12, "We see through a glass darkly " ("We see in a glass even in a dark speaking,” Tindale, etc.)

2 Cor. v. 20, "Ambassadors for Christ" ("Messengers in the room of Christ," Tindale, etc.)

Heb. iv. 13, "The eyes of him with whom we have to do" ("The eyes of him of whom we speak," Tindale, etc.)

In the same way, although at the opposite pole doctrinally and ecclesiastically from the Genevan, and not mentioned at all in the King's instructions, the Rheims New Testament has left its mark in many unsuspected ways on our English Bible. Examples have already been given, but a few more may be of interest. It will be understood that the second rendering within brackets represents the general rendering in versions other than the Rhemish.

Matt. xxvi. 26, "Jesus took bread and blessed it" ("gave thanks").

John ix. 22, "He should be put out of the synagogue" ("excommunicate").

Acts xiv. 23, "When they had ordained them elders" ("ordained by election ").

2 Cor. v. 18, "Hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation" ("the office to preach the atonement").

Heb. xii. 16, “Profane person as Esau ("unclean ").

We cannot carry this comparison farther, but on the whole question of the pedigree of the Authorised Version we may sum up in the concise words of Dr. Eadie : "The Authorized Version has in it the traces of its origin, and its genealogy may be reckoned. For while

it has the fulness of the Bishops' without its frequent literalisms or its repeated supplements, it has the graceful vigour of the Genevan, the quiet grandeur of the Great Bible, the clearness of Tyndale, the harmonies of Coverdale, and the stately theological vocabulary of the Rheims. It has thus a complex unity in its structure —all the earlier versions ranging over eighty years having bequeathed to it contributions the individuality of which has not been in all cases toned down."

§ 3. General Excellence and Reception of the Authorised Version.-While, however, the work of King James' translators was thus mainly one of revision, we must not fail to accord to them the full praise to which they are entitled for the care which they exercised. "Neither did we disdain," they tell us, "to revise that which we had done, and to bring back to the anvil that which we had hammered . . . fearing no reproach for slowness, nor praise for expedition.' Their method, too, of working in companies prevented their version from showing those marks of individuality by which certain previous translations had been disfigured; while their combined responsibility for the whole, and not merely for their own several parts, gave a general smoothness and consistency to the work, in which the Bishops' Bible, for example, was sadly lacking. To other points connected with the Authorised Version, such as the appropriateness of its vocabulary, the beauty of its style, its subsequent influence upon our language and literature, and the part it has played in forming the national character, it is impossible to refer at length here; but it is necessary to emphasise what has been more than once alluded to, that the new version, notwithstanding all its excellences, did not at once meet with general acceptance. On the contrary it had to work its way slowly and gradually in the face of much bitter criticism, One eminent scholar went the length of saying that he "had rather be rent in pieces with wild horses than any such translation, by my consent, should be urged on poor churches." Other