Translators Revived By Alexander McClure FORWARD THE YEARS SINCE McCLURE’S “TRANSLATORS REVIVED” When Alexander McClure wrote “The Translators Revived” in 1858, he could not possibly have foreseen the coming events which began when the 1881 translation first appeared. This version was the joint effort of the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and the revision committee was headed up by Brooke Foss Westcott (Regius professor of Divinity at Cambridge), and Fenton John Anthony Hort (Lecturer on New Testament at Cambridge), and had its origin in an action taken by the Convocation of the Province of Canterbury in February 1870. There were two revision companies in England and eventually two were formed in America. In May of 1870, the Convocation of Canterbury laid down some basic rules which were to be observed by the translation groups. These rules were as follows: [1] To introduce as few alterations as possible into the text of the Authorised Version. [2] To limit, as far as possible, the expression of such alterations to the language of the Authorized and earlier English Versions. [3] Each company to go twice over the portion to be revised, once provisionally, the second time finally, and on principles of voting as hereinafter is provided. [4] That the Text that is to be adopted be that for which the evidence is decidedly preponderating; and that when the Text so adopted differs from that from which the Authorised Version was made, the alteration be indicated in the margin. [5] To make or retain no change in the Text on the second final revision by each Company, except two thirds of those present approve of the same, but on the first revision to decide by simple majorities. [6] In every case of proposed alteration that may have given rise to discussion, to defer the voting thereupon till the next meeting, whensoever the same shall be required by one third of those present at the meeting, such intended vote to be announced in the notice for the next meeting. [7] To revise the headings of chapters and pages, paragraphs, italics, and punctuations. [8] To refer, on the part of each Company, when considered desirable, to Divines, Scholars, and Literary Men, whether at home or abroad, for their opinions. THE RESOLUTIONS OF THE CONVOCATION OF CANTERBURY In addition to the rules just mentioned, the Convocation also passed five resolutions that were to govern the actions of the translation Committees. These resolutions are as follows: [1] That it is desirable that a revision of the Authorised Version of the Holy Scriptures be undertaken. [2] That the revision be so conducted as to comprise both marginal renderings and such emendations as it may be found necessary to insert in the text of the Authorised Version. [3] That in the above resolutions we do not contemplate any new translation of the Bible, or any alteration of the language, except where in the judgment of the most competent scholars such change is necessary. [4] That in such necessary changes, the style of the language employed in the existing Version be closely followed. [5] That it is desirable that Convocation should nominate a body of its own members to undertake the work of revision, who shall be at liberty to invite the cooperation of any eminent for scholarship, to whatever nation or religious body they may belong. WHAT WAS INTENDED WAS NEVER DONE! What the Convocation set out to do, and what was finally published have some grave differences, which will be pointed out in the pages to follow. First of all, it should be noted that Bishop Westcott did not conform to the desires of the Convocation, in that he insisted upon one particular Text to the exclusion of the Texts used by the translators of the KJV. That Text, he frankly admitted, was Codex Aleph, or Sinaiticus. The other manuscript which was highly esteemed by Westcott and Hort was Code B, or Vaticanus. This Text (Codex Aleph) is a single Greek manuscript which was copied about 400 A.D. and is not the best available Scriptural evidence. Read the words of Prebendary Scrivener, who was also on the Revision committee, as he writes of this choice of manuscripts. “..entirely destitute of historical foundation..” Westcott made the assumption that “oldest” was “best”, which, in the case of Biblical manuscripts, is simply not so! Upon making this decision, he and Hort set aside a mountain of evidence that had come to light since the 1611 Authorized Version, and had this material been consulted they would have found that most of the intrusions into the Text were unwarranted, unnecessary and unscriptural! In addition: by inserting the words “many ancient authorities omit...” or “the best manuscripts read thus...” they automatically put themselves in the place of judge as to what actually constituted God’s Word, and in many cases they chose an inferior reading to that which is in the Authorized Version. What the Convocation desired, and explicity stated in both the resolutions and rules portion, was simply set aside or excused, and insertions were made into the text which were based upon manuscript evidence that was less reliable than the Textus Receptus. WHAT IS GOD’S WORD? If thought is expressed in words, then to know the mind of God we must know his Word. It has been very popular in the 20th century to hold any version that comes along with the same veneration and belief as the King James Bible. Words are of extreme importance, for God used the language of men to express Himself... first in the language of the Hebrew nation, then in the Aramaic and Greek of the New Testament. That language has been translated into almost every language on earth, and it is remarkable that each rendering has remained as close to the original autographs as it has. Because God only dealt with one nation in the Old Testament, the language of that people was used, but when we come to the New Testament we find that there was a language in use that was as close to being universal as any language had ever been, and that language is Greek. Every time a translation is done from one language to another, something is inevitably lost. In many cases a Greek word requires an entire sentence in English, and yet the translators of the King James Version were adept enough to be able to find just the right word to express the fullest, richest meaning of the Greek Text. Surely reason would tell us that every version that has been printed cannot be God’s Word! Many of the so-called versions are not translations at all, but merely personal interpretations, and even the plain meaning of simple versions are obscured and mutilated to the extent that they often mean just the opposite of the intended Word of God. As said before: language is the expression of thought, and to know what God transmits from His mind to ours, we have to know what God’s Word really is. Alexander McClure’s “Translators Revived” was not written to begin a KJV cult, nor was it his intention to proclaim the KJV as a faultless production. The purpose of McClure was to show the nature of the translation, and the character of the men who participated in the actual work of translation. In this there can be no doubt that he succeeded, and the evidence can be weighed by all who care to read his writings. IS THE KJV GOD’S WORD? Much derision and scorn is heaped upon those who hold in high esteem the work of the King James translators. One group, made up of mostly younger men who are fairly recent graduates of Bible Colleges or Seminaries, even use the term, “The King Jimmy Bible”, which ought to tell us something of the lack of concern over which Bible is, indeed, the very Word of God! As has been, and will be, pointed out, there are numbers of books which have “BIBLE” printed on the cover, but what is inside may often be as far from the truth as the east is from the west. For that reason, the reader is encouraged to thoroughly read the next few pages before getting into the main body of McClure’s outstanding little treatise, for there are some things said that may cause a change of mind when carefully weighed in the scales of TRUTH. THE TRANSLATORS REVIVED A BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIR OF THE AUTHORS OF THE ENGLISH VERSION OF THE HOLY BIBLE BY Alexander W. McClure, D.D. PREFACE This little volume has been long in preparation. It is more than twenty years since the Author's attention was directed to the inquiry, What were the personal qualifications for their work possessed by King James' Translators of the Bible? He expected to satisfy himself without difficulty, but found himself sorely disappointed. There was abundance of general testimony to their learning and piety; but nowhere any particular account of the men themselves. Copious histories of the origin, character, and results of their work have been drawn up with elaborate research; but of the Translators personally, little more was told than a meagre catalogue of their names, with brief notices of such offices as a few of them held. The only resource was to take these names in detail, and search for any information relative to each individual. For a long time, but little came to hand illustrative of their characters and acquirements, except in relation to some of the more prominent men included in the royal commission. The Author quite despaired of ever being able to identify the greater part of them, by any thing more than their bare surnames. But devoting much of his time to searching in public libraries, he by degrees recovered from oblivion one by one of these worthies, till only two of them, Fairclough and Sanderson, remain without some certain testimonial of their fitness for the most responsible undertaking the in the religious literature of the English world. In regard to some of them, who for a long time eluded his search, the revived information at last seemed almost like a resurrection. As the result of his researches, which he has carried, as he believes, to the utmost extent to which it can be done with the means accessible on this side of the Atlantic, he offers to all who are interested to know in regard to the general sufficiency and reliable-ness of the Common Version, these biographical sketches of its authors. He feels assured that they will afford historical demonstration of a fact which much astonished him when it began to dawn upon his convictions, --that the first half of the seventeenth century, when the Translation was completed, was the GOLDEN AGE of biblical and oriental learning in England. Never before, nor since, have these studies been pursued by scholars whose vernacular tongue is the English, with such zeal, and industry, and success. This remarkable fact is such a token of God's providential care of his word, as deserves most devout acknowledgment. That the true character of their employment, at the precise stage where those good men took it up, may be properly understood by such as have not given particular attention to the subject, a condensed "Introductory Narrative" is given. In its outlines, this follows the crowded octavos of the late Christopher Anderson. He has gleaned out the very corners of the field so carefully, as to leave little for any who may follow him. To his work, or rather to the skillful abridgement of it, in a single octavo volume, by Rev. Dr. Prime, all who desire more minute information on that part of the subject are respectfully referred. The writers to whom the author of this book is most indebted for his biographical materials are Thomas Fuller and Anthony A. Wood. The former, the wittiest and one of the most delightful of the old English writers,--and the latter one of the most crabbed and cynical. What has been obtained from them was gathered wherever it was sprinkled, in scattered morsels, over their numerous and bulky volumes. Beside what was furnished from these sources, numerous fragments have been collected from a wide range of reading, including every thing that seemed to promise any additional matter of information. The work is, doubtless, quite imperfect, because after the lapse of more than two centuries, during which no person appears to have thought of the thing, the means of information have been growing more scanty, and the difficulty of recovering it has been constantly increased. Critical inquisitors may be able to detect some inaccuracies in pages prepared under such disadvantages; but it will require no great stretch of generosity to make due allowance for them. The general result, to which the Author particularly solicits the attention of any who may honor these pages with their perusal, is the ample proof afforded of the surpassing qualifications of those venerable Translators, taken as a body, for their high and holy work. We have here presumptive evidence of the strongest kind, that their work is deserving of entire confidence. It ought to be received as a "final settlement" of the translation of the Scriptures for popular use,--at least, till the time when a body of men equally qualified can be brought together to re-adjust the work, --a time which most certainly has not yet arrived! If that time shall ever come, may there be found among their successors the vast learning, wisdom, and piety of the old Translators happily revived! INTRODUCTORY NARRATIVE The translation of the Bible into any language is an event of the highest importance to those by whom that language is spoken. But when such a translation is to be read for successive centuries, by uncounted millions scattered over all the earth, and for whose use so many millions of copies have already been printed, it becomes a work of the highest moral and historical interest. Thus the translation and printing of the Bible in English forms a most important event in modern history. Far beyond any other translation, it has been, and is, and will be, to multitudes which none can number, the living oracle of God, giving to them, in their mother tongue, their surest and safest teaching on all that can affect their eternal welfare. Many attempts had been made, at various times, to put different portions of the Scriptures into the common speech of the English people. Of these, one of the most noticeable was a translation of John's Gospel into Anglo-Saxon, made, at the very close of his life, by the "Venerable Bede", a Northumbrian monk, who died in his cell, in May, A.D. 735. A most interesting account of his last illness is given by Cuthbert, his scholar and biographer. Toward evening of the day of his death, one of his disciples said, "Beloved teacher, one sentence remains to be written." "Write it quickly, then," said the dying saint; and summoning all his strength for this last flash of the expiring lamp, he dictated the holy words. When told that the work was finished, he answered, "Thou sayest well. It is finished!" He then requested to be taken up, and placed in that part of his cell where he was wont to kneel at his private devotions; so that, as he said, he might while sitting there call upon his Father. He then sang the doxology, -"Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost!" and as he sang the last syllable, he drew his last breath. (See Neander, Denjwurdigkeiten, &c., III. 171-175; and Fuller, Church History, I. 149-151.) The admirable King Alfred, who ascended the throne two hundred years after the birth of Bede, translated the Psalms into Anglo-Saxon. But the first complete translations which can be said to have been published, so as to come into extensive use, was that made by Wiclif, about the year 1380. It was not made from the "original Hebrew and Greek of the Holy Ghost;" but from the Vulgate, a Latin version, chiefly prepared by Jerome during the latter part of the fourth century. John Wiclif was born in Yorkshire, England, in the year 1324. He was a priest, and a professor of divinity in the University of Oxford. His ardent piety was nursed by the Scriptures which gave it birth. He is commonly called "the morning-star of the Protestant reformation," and was one of the brightest of those scattered lights of the Dark Ages, who are often spoken of as "reformers before the reformation." Like Martin Luther, his opposition to popish errors and corruptions was at first confined to a few points; but prayer, study of the Bible, and growing grace, led him on a constant advance toward the purity of truth. He became in doctrine what would now be called a Calvinist; and in church discipline his views agreed with those which are now maintained by Congregationalists. After encountering many prosecutions and persecutions, having however a powerful protector in John of Gaunt, (or Ghent, in Flanders, his native place,) the famous old Duke of Lancaster, Wiclif peacefully closed his devout and laborious life, at his rectory of Lutterworth, in 1384. Fourty-one years after, by order of the popish Council of Constance, his bones were unearthed, burned to ashes, and cast into the Swift, a neighboring brook. "Thus," says Thomas Fuller, "this brook has conveyed his ashes into Avon, Avon into Severn, Severn into the narrow seas, they into the main ocean. And thus the ashes of Wiclif are the emblem of his doctrine, which is now dispersed the world over." (This noble passage from a favorite author, Wordsworth has finely versified in one of his Ecclesiastical Sonnets: "As though these ashes, little brook, wilt bear Into the Avon, Avon to the tide Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas, Into main Ocean they, this deed accurst An emblem yields to friends and enemies, How the bold Teacher's doctrine, sanctified By Truth, shall spread throughout the world dispersed." Wiclif's translation of the Bible was made before the invention of the printing machines; and the manuscripts, though quite numerous, were very costly. Nicholas Belward suffered from popish cruelty in 1429, for having in his possession a copy of Wiclif's New Testament. That copy cost him four marks and forty pence. This sum, so much greater was the value of money then than it is now, was considered as a sufficient annual salary for a curate. The same value at the present time would pay for many hundred copies of the Testament, well printed and bound. Such are the marvels wrought by the art of printing, which Luther was wont to call "the last and best gift" of Providence. (Summum et postremum donum.) It has become the "capacious reservoir of human knowledge, whose branching streams diffuse sciences, arts, and morality, through all ages and all nations." (Darwin's Zoonomia, I. 51.) Let us hope, with an old writer, "that the low pricing of the Bible may never occasion the low prizing of the Bible." Limited as the circulation of the English Bible must have been in its manuscript form, it still made no little trouble for the monkish doctors of that day. One of them, Henry de Knyghton, said, "This Master John Wiclif hath translated the gospel out of Latin into English, which Christ had intrusted with the clergy and doctors of the Church, that they might minister it to the laity and weaker sort, according to the state of the times and the wants of men. So that, by this means, the gospel is made vulgar, and made more open to the laity, and even to women who can read, than it used to be to the most learned of the clergy and those of the best understanding! And what was before the chief gift of the clergy and doctors of the Church, is made for ever common to the laity." If the publication of an English Bible in manuscript caused such popish lamentations, we need not wonder that the multiplication of a similar work in print should afterwards awaken such a fury, that Rowland Phillips, the papistical Vicar of Croyden, in a noted sermon preached at St. Paul's Cross, London, in the year 1535, declared; "We must root out printing, or printing will root out us!" Manuscripts of Wiclifs complete version are still numerous. His Bibles are nearly as numerous as his New Testaments; and there are besides many copies of separate books of the Scriptures. They are quite remarkable for their legibility and beauty, and indicate the great care taken in making them, and in preserving them for nearly five hundred years. The New Testament of this version was printed in the year 1731, or three hundred and fifty years after it was finished. The whole Bible by Wiclif was never printed till two or three years since, when it appeared at Oxford, with the Latin Vulgate, from which it was translated, in parallel columns. Contemporary with Wiclif, was John de Trevisa, born of an ancient family, at Crocadon in Cornwall. He was a secular priest, and Vicar of Berkeley. He translated several large works out of Latin into English; and chiefly the entire Bible, justifying himself by the example of the Venerable Bede, who had done the same thing for the Gospel of John. This great, and good, and dangerous task he performed by commission from his noble and powerful patron and protector, Lord Thomas de Berkeley. This nobleman had the whole of the book of Revelation, in Latin and French, which latter was then generally understood by the better educated class of Englishmen, written upon the walls and ceiling of his chapel at Berkeley, where it was to be seen hundreds of years after. Trevisa, notwithstanding his translation of the Bible made him obnoxious to the persecutors of his day, lived and died unmolested, though known to be an enemy of monks and begging friars. He expired, full of honor and years, being little less than ninety years of age, in the year 1397. (Fuller's Church History of Britain, I. 467.) Little else is known of him, or of his translation, which did not supersede the labors of Wiclif. The first book ever printed with metal types was The Latin Bible, issued by Gutenberg and Fust, at Mentz, in the Duchy of Hesse, between the years 1450 and 1455, for it bears no date. It is a folio of 641 leaves, or 1282 pages, in two volumes. Though a first attempt, it is beautifully printed on very fine paper, and with superior ink. At least eighteen copies of this famous edition are known to be in existence; four of them on vellum, and fourteen on paper. Twenty-five years ago, one of the vellum copies was sold for five hundred and four pounds sterling; and one of the paper copies lately brought one hundred and ninety pounds. Truly venerable relics! Thus the printing-press paid its first homage to the Best of Books; the highest honor ever done to that illustrious art, and the highest purpose to which it could ever be applied. The first Scripture ever printed in English was a sort of paraphrase of the seven penitential Psalms, so called, by John Fisher, the popish bishop of Rochester, who was beheaded by Henry VIII, in the year 1535. This little book was printed in 1505. The first decided steps, however, toward giving to the English nation a Bible printed in their own tongue, were the translations of the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, made by William Tyndale, and by him printed at Hamburg, in the year 1524; --and a translation of the whole of the New Testament, printed by him partly at Cologne, and partly at Worms, in 1525. After six editions of the Testament had been issued, he published Genesis and Deuteronomy, in 1530; and next year the Pentateuch. In the year 1535 was printed the entire Bible, under the auspices of Miles Coverdale, who mostly followed Tyndale as far as he had gone; but without any other connection with him. Of Coverdale, further mention will be made. But in the year 1537 appeared a folio Bible, printed in some city in Germany, with the following title,--"THE BYBLE, which is the Holy Scripture; in which are contayned the Olde and Newe Testament, truely and purely translated into Englysh--by Thomas Matthew.--MDXXXVII." This is substantially the basis of all the other versions of the Bible into English, including that which is now in such extensive use. It contains Tyndales' labors as far as he had gone previous to his martyrdom by fire about a year before its publication. That is to say, the whole of the New Testament, and of the Old, as far as the end of the Second Book of Chronicles, or exactly two-thirds of the entire Scripture, were Tyndale's work. The other third, comprising the remainder of the Old Testament, was made by his friend and co-laborer, Thomas Matthew, who was no other than John Rogers, the famous martyr, afterwards burnt in the days of "bloody Mary"; and who, at the time of his immortal publication, went by the name of Matthew. William Tyndale, whose vast services to the English-speaking branches of the Church of God have never been duly appreciated, was born in the Hundred of Berkeley, and probably in the village of North Nibley, about the year 1484. His family was ancient and respectable. His grandsire was Hugh, Baron de Tyndale. From an early age, he was brought up at the University of Oxford. Here, during a lengthened residence in Magdalen College, he became a proficient in all the learning of that day, and in the latter part of his time read private lectures in divinity. He was ordained a priest in 1502; and became a Minorite Observatine friar. His zeal in the exposition of the Scriptures excited the displeasure of the adversaries, and "spying his time," says Foxe, "he removed from Oxford to the University of Cambridge, where he likewise made his abode a certain space." This place he had left by 1519. In total independence of Luther, he arose at the same time with that great translator of the Bible into German; being equally moved with him to resist the corruptions and oppressions of a priesthood, which sought to imprison and enslave the minds of all nations, by keeping from them "the key of knowledge". Returning from Cambridge to his native county, he spent nearly two years in the manor- house of Little Sodbury, as tutor to the children of Sir John Walsh. On the Sabbath he preached in the neighboring parishes, and especially at St. Austin's Green, in Bristol. At Sir John's hospitable board, the mitred abbots, and other ecclesiastics who swarmed in that neighborhood, were frequent guests; and Tyndale sharply and constantly disputed their mean superstitions. At the first, Sir John and his lady Anne took the part of the "abbots, deans, archdeacons, with diverse other doctors and great-beneficed men;" but after reading a translation of Erasmus' "Christian Soldier's Manual", which Tyndale made for them, they took his part. Upon this, those "doctorly prelatists" forbore Sir John's good cheer, rather than to take with it what Fuller calls "the sour sauce" of Tyndale's conversation. A storm was now gathering over his head. Not only the ignorant hedge- priests at their ale-houses, but the dignified clergymen in the Bishop's councils began to brand him with the name of heretic. In 1522 he was summoned, with all the other priests of the district, before the bishop's Chancellor. In their presence he was very roughly handled. In his own account, he says, "When I came before the Chancellor, he threatened me grievously, and reviled me, and rated me as though I had been a dog." It was not long after this, that in disputing with a diving reputed to be quite learned, Tyndale utterly confounded him with certain texts of Scripture; upon which the irritated papist exclaimed, --"It were better for us to be without God's laws, than without the Pope's!" This was a little too much for Tyndale, who boldly replied, "I defy the Pope, and all his laws; and if God spare my life, ere many years, I will cause a boy that driveth the plough to know more of the Scripture than you do!". A noble boast; and nobly redeemed at the cost of his life! He now clearly saw, that nothing could rescue the mass of the English nation from the impostures of the high priests and low priests of Rome, unless the Scriptures were placed in the hands of all. "Which thing only," he says, "moved me to translate the New Testament. Because I had perceived by experience, how that it was impossible to establish that lay people in any truth, except the Scripture were plainly laid before their eyes in the mother tongue." When he could no longer remain at Sir John Walsh's without bringing that worthy knight, as well as himself, into danger, Tyndale went to London, with letters introducing him, as a ripe Greek scholar, to the patronage of that Dr. Tunstall, then bishop of London, who afterwards burned so many of Tyndale's New Testaments. The courtly and classical bishop refused to befriend him; and he who had hoped in that prelate's own house to translate the New Testament, was obliged to seek a harbor elsewhere. For nearly a year, he resided in the house of Humphrey Munmouth, a wealthy citizen of London, and afterwards an alderman, knight, and sheriff. During this time, he used to preach in the Church of St. Dunstan's in the West. By this time, he was convinced that no where in all England would he be permitted to put in act the glorious resolve he had formed at Little Sudbury. In January 1524, with a heart full of love and pity for his native land, Tyndale sailed for Hamburg, being "helped over the sea" by the generous Munmouth, who also assisted him during his fifteen months' abode in that city. Here he so improved his time, that in May, 1525, he went to Cologne, and began to print his New Testament in quarto form. Ten sheets had hardly been worked off, before an alarm was raised, and the public authorities forbade the work to go on. Tyndale and his amanuensis, William Roye, managed to save those sheets and to sail with them up the Rhine to Worms, where they finished the edition of three thousand copies in comparative safety. A precious relic, containing the Prologue and twenty-two chapters of Matthew, is all that is known to exist of this memorable edition, which is in the German Gothic type. In the same year and place, there was printed another edition, in small-octavo, of which one copy is extant in the Bristol Museum. During the subsequent ten years of the Translators unquiet life, spent in labor and conceal- ment from foes, more than twenty editions of this work, with repeated revisions by himself, were passed through the press. These, through the agency of pious merchants and others, were secretly conveyed into England, and there with great privacy sold and circulated, not without causing constant peril and frequent suffering to those into whose hands they came. Many copies fell into the grasp of the enemy, and were destroyed; but very many more were secretly read and pondered in castles and in cottages, and powerfully prepared the way for the liberation of England from the yoke of Rome. This New Testament has been separately printed in not less than fifty-six editions, as well as in fourteen editions of the Holy Bible. Besides all these impressions of the work as Tyndale left it, it has been five times revised by able translators, including those appointed by King James; and still forms substantially, though with very numerous amendments, the version in common use. The changes made in these revisions, though generally for the better, were not always so. The substitution of the word charity, where Tyndale had used love, was not a happy change; neither was that of church, where he had employed congregation. Still, large portions of his work remain untouched, and are read verbally as he left them, except in the matter of spelling. The fidelity of his rendering is such as might be expected from his conscientious care. "For I call God to record," he says, in his reply to Lord Chancellor More, "against the day we shall appear before our Lord Jesus, to give a reckoning of our doings, that I never altered one syllable of God's Word against my conscience; nor would this day, if all that is in the earth, whether it be pleasure, honor, or riches, might be given me." Not only was this holy man faithful in his great work, but he was fully qualified for it by his scholarship. His sound learning is evident enough on reading his pages. Certain historians,