Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 December 1879 — Revising the Bible. [ARTICLE]

Revising the Bible.

A call for a meeting in the interest of the revision which is now being effected in the English translation of the Holy - Scriptures by leading Biblical scholars in England and this country was the cause of filling the greater part of the pews of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the Holy Trinity, Nineteenth and Walnut streets, last evening. The Right Rev. Dr.. Lee, Bishop of Delaware, presided. After an opening prayer and the singing of a hymn, Bishop Lee spoke to show how important the subject of Bible revision should be to every Christian heart. Being the ultimate standard of appeal in all matters of faith, the Bible should be free from any foreign admixture. It held a position unrivaled and incapable of being reached by any other book, and it was of the highest importance to give an accurate rendering of its every part. It was for the purpose of attaining* this end that the revisers in England had been engaged’since 1870 and the American revisers (acting in conjunctiqiKwith the European) since 1871. It } was hoped that the revised edition oi'the New Testament would appear next year, which would be just five hundred years after the publication of the Bible of Wickliffe, who made the first great effort to place the Holy Scriptures in the hands of English-speaking people. The Rev. Dr. Philip Schaff, President of the American Committee of Revision, began an address by remarking that when Walter Scott drew nigh to death he called for the readiig of the Book, and when asked what book hd meant he significantly said: “ There is but one Book, and that is the Bible." “The Bible,” said the speaker, “being of more importance to the people than are all the libraries of the world, the utmost care should he taken to give that book in its purity and integrity. Next year the semi-millennium of Wickliffe’s Bible will probably be celebrated throughout the Christian world. The present version did its work most admirably, and it does it still. The movement in which we are engaged now is not to make a new version, but a revision cf the present one, whose idiom and vocabulary, of course, must be retained, Some people will be astonished to see how much like the old will be the new revision, anil others will notice how numerous are the improvements made in the old. Some words have become obsolete, and others have changed their meaning. The same may be said of phrases. But far more important changes have taken place in Biblical scenes. Manuscripts of great value, bearing upon the Bible, have been brought within the reach of every scholar in Christendom, and these; with all the ancient translations, have been examined with a view' to obtaining all possible light upon the subject. Hundreds of scholars in Europe and this country have devoted their lives to the study of the Bible in all its particulars, and the very earth. has ‘ given up its treasures to confirm and illustrate the Holy Bible. The only real objection to this revision lies in the question whether we might not lose more than would be gained. The spirit of God, however, gave to the Mother Church of England the courage to start this movement-. That ehnrcli associated with itself distinguished Biblical scholars from other countries, and the revisers have been sitting together in Westminster Abbey. The old Bible was made when the other denominations had not ‘branched oft from the English Church, but now a chance is given for them all to say: ‘ This is our Bible.’ Whatever Providence undertakes will succeed and must succeed, and if the hand of Providence is in any movement I believe that it is in this. Like every good work, it may have to stand the test of martyrdom, but it will come out triumphant. As the New Testament will probably be finished next year, and the Old one three or four years afterward, the committee thought it well to ihform the Christian community of the fact in order that the work might be assisted by the prayers of the people.” The Rev. Dr. Hare, of the Episcopal Divinity School, West Philadelphia, for the sake of illustrating the imperfections resulting from' the exercise of mere interpretation instead of accurate translation, called attention to several passages in the Bible. One of these was the Verse: “Moses went out and saw an Egyptian smiting a Hebrew, and Moses slew the Egyptian.” “Smiting” in the present sense of the word, might not seem sufficient warrant for the 5 action of Moses, but the reader

of the Bible would see the matter in a different light when he was informed that the word translated into “ smiting” meant “slaying.” Examples like the four or five to which the speaker called attention could be found, he said, at least once in every five chapters of the Old Testament. The necessity for a removal of these imperfections was obvious. It was also important to bear in mind that, while the old version ' originated with private individuals, the reused edition originated in a general ecclesiastical tribunal. The Rev. Dr. Green, of Princeton College, did not expect that the revisers could remove all imperfections, for like the greatest master-pieces of other literature, the Bible in its original form possessed a. beauty that must suffer more or less by translation. But the best that could be done was being done. - Not every commentator's propositions would be accepted, and no change would bo made except where general scholarship was agreed The rule observed was to preserve the style and character of the existing version, •while bringing out the spirit of the original text as accurately, clearly ami distinctly as, possible. —Philadelphia Times.