A SERMON PREACHED IN ST. PAUL’S CATHEDRAL AT THE SPECIAL
EVENING SERVICE, ON SUNDAY, MARCH 13, 1870
by HENRY ALFORD, D.D. - DEAN OF CANTERBURY.
“Every
scribe that is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man
that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things
new and old.” - Matt. xiii. 52.
The Scribes were the
guardians of the law, and its readers and expounders to the people. It
is related of Ezra, that he was “a ready scribe in the law of Moses
which the Lord God of Israel had given: he had prepared his heart to
seek the law of the Lord, and to do it, and to teach in Israel statutes
and judgments.” But in exercising this guardianship the Scribes were
only representing the Church of which they were members. They were a
class of persons told off for especial attention to this duty, which in
fact belonged to the whole community. To the Jews as a people, the
Apostle tells us, were committed the oracles of God: and the Church in
all times is the witness and keeper of Holy Writ, as of a sacred deposit
committed to her. The character assigned in the text to the Scribe
instructed unto the kingdom of heaven, belongs, in all its particulars,
to her, who both is the sum, and constitutes the ideal, of all such
guardians and expounders.
With these few
preliminary remarks, we may apply our Lord’s words immediately to
ourselves. The Christian Church throughout the world is now the
guardian of the Holy Scriptures. All that the Jews had, we have, with
the inestimably precious addition of the New Testament of our Lord Jesus
Christ. These Scriptures all Christians regard as the revelation of
God to man. Other works rise and are built up from below: this alone we
receive as let down upon us from above. All art, all science, all
theology, which is but a system built up by inferences from Scripture,
these are of man, and constructed on earth. They may rise higher, and
become truer, as one race is advanced in skill or in knowledge; but they
began below, and will ever carry with them the infirmity of all that is
born on earth. Whereas the sayings and the lessons of this book are
not of man, nor did they take their beginnings here. They have come to
us indeed through human words, and by means of human action; but they
did not arise originally in the breasts of men; they came from Him who
is Himself the first spring of morals and the highest fountain of
truth. Between philosophy reared up from below, and the facts, and
rules, and motives, which they disclose, there is always a gap which our
reason cannot bridge over. God’s sovereignty, man’s free will - God’s
creative agency, man’s inductions of science - God’s interference with
physical order, man’s establishment of physical law, one member of each
of these pairs will ever remain discontinuous from, and in the estimate
of human reason irreconcileable with, the other. And because this Book
is unlike all other books, because its voice comes to us from another
place, and is heard in deeper and more secret chambers of our being than
all other voices, because its sayings have for our humanity a searching
and conserving and healing power which none other possess, therefore it
is that to keep these Holy Scriptures in all their integrity as
delivered down to her is the solemn trust of the Church throughout the
world: a trust simple, direct, indefeasible.
Now when I say the
Church throughout the world, and in all I shall say in these or like
terms tonight, I am using the words in their very widest sense. I mean
by the Church no less than our Article defines it to be, “the great
congregation of faithful men in which the pure Word of God is preached,
and the Sacraments are duly administered according to Christ’s
ordinance.” I mean the whole body, wherever dwelling, however ordered
and denominated, who take the Scriptures for their rule of life and for
their ultimate appeal. On the whole of this body rests this trust, to
preserve the purity and integrity of Holy Scripture.
Now of course this
duty concerns primarily the Scripture in the form in which it was given
to man: the one sacred text, existing for us at this day in the very
language in which it was originally written. In plain words, by way of
illustration: if the universal Church were at this day commanded to lay
up a copy of this deposit, as the Law was laid up in the ark of the
Covenant, that one copy would consist of the Old Testament in Hebrew and
the New Testament in Greek.
But now comes in a
necessity for the exercise of judgment on the part of the scribe
instructed unto the kingdom of heaven: in other words, on the part of
the Church. When we speak of these two sacred texts, we speak in fact
of a store of both. These texts have been transmitted by human means.
They exist for us in many forms, coincident in the main, but varying
more or less from one another, principally through infirmities incident
to transcription in ancient times. The great mass of these variations
concerns matters of relatively small importance. In primitive Christian
times believers were too intensely employed about the great interests
of the Redeemer’s kingdom, to be very careful about the mere letter of
the Scripture narrative. Whether in one and the same phrase our Lord
went, or came, or journeyed, whether He said, or answered, or spoke, or
answered and said, was to them small matter: and thus we have these and
hundreds of such as these insignificant variations in the different
ancient manuscript copies of our New Testament. But there are, and in
no small number, other variations affecting the sense, modifying the
facts of the history, diverting the course of argument, changing the
tendency of exhortation. And it is with regard to these that the
Church, trusted as she is with the Scriptures, is bound to bring things
old out of her treasures: to seek back for the most ancient and best
attested of the variations, and to hold that fast as the text, rejecting
the others: or, if none can be found whose evidence sufficiently
preponderates, to publish to all the fact that it is so. Less than this
will not be a faithful discharge of the trust: cannot satisfy her
feeling of reverence for God’s word.
Now before we can
proceed to any application of what has already been said, we must
advance further in the duty of the Church as the Guardian of Scripture.
The Word of God was not given to be laid up and hidden, but to go forth
and to be understood. That faith which is to save the nations, cometh
by hearing, and hearing cometh by the Word of God. But the nations are
not able to understand the Scriptures as they were given. And therefore
it was very early recognised as a duty of each Church to provide the
Scriptures for her members in their own language: to bring out of her
stores not only things old, the genuine and venerable text of the word,
but also things new, the new garment or vehicle of that sacred text, its
expression in her vernacular language. And here let it never be
forgotten, that though we believe Scripture to be a thing divine, a
version, every version, of Scripture must of necessity be a thing human;
must be liable to imperfection and error, and capable of correction and
improvement. It is in fact, after all, little more than a comment or
speculation upon Scripture. A few of the simplest considerations serve
to shew this. Take but these. In almost every sentence where there is
fervour of feeling, or precision of argument, or graphic description, we
are totally unable to give in the version the living force of the
original. We are obliged to enquire what is the general sense of that
which is vividly represented, and to devise some English words which
will as nearly as possible convey it to the mind: and thus the power and
charm are lost. Again, where an original word may have two or more
meanings, giving to the sentence where it occurs a corresponding variety
of applications to life or doctrine; in our rendering we are obliged,
because there is no corresponding word of ours alike fertile in
signification, to exclude all but one of these senses. On the other
hand, where the original employed some word of but one perfectly plain
sense, we are often constrained to use a term in our tongue which,
bearing an ambiguous meaning, weakens that sense, or even obliterates it
altogether. Any one may see, from even these scanty hints, how
difficult, how unsatisfactory at the best, must be the discharge of this
portion of the trust: how utterly impossible it is that there should
ever be a perfect or final version of the Scriptures: how the Church,
the Scribe entrusted with the custody and provision of God’s word for
the souls of her members, is bound to bring out of her stores ever from
age to age things new, fresh and more accurate renderings of such
phrases of Scripture as time and use may prove to have been inaccurately
represented.
And observe, before
we pass on to the account of our own situation in these respects, that
this duty incumbent on the Church is to be performed quite
irrespectively of any beauty or aptness of outward form which such
rendering may happen to possess. An erroneous rendering of a Scripture
phrase may have been so well put into words, may carry a sound so terse
and epigrammatic, as to have sunk deep into the mind of a nation and to
have become one of its household sayings. But who would accept the
excuse of beauty or aptness in the case of anything else wrongly come
by? It is strange that in this case only has any such argument been
used and allowed.
Now we in this land
possess a version of the Holy Scriptures which may challenge comparison
for faithfulness, for simplicity, and for majesty, with any that the
world has ever seen. Perhaps its chief defect is that it admits of
being too highly praised. Its pure use of our native tongue, the
exquisite balance and music of its sentences, the stately march of its
periods, the hold on the memory taken by the very alliterations and
antitheses, which were the manner of writing when it was made, these and
a hundred other charms which invest almost every verse, make us love it
even to excess.
And when we
intensify all these claims to our affection by the fact that it has been
for centuries, and is now, the vehicle to this great English race of
all that is pure and holy and lovely and of good report, the first
lesson of infancy, the guide of mature life, the comforter of sickness
and death, we can hardly be surprised that many, and some of the best
among us, refuse to see its faults, and are unable to contemplate with
any content the prospect of their being corrected. It is a spirit for
which we ought to be deeply thankful, this earnest and affectionate
cleaving to the English version of the Scriptures.
But good as it is,
there is one thing better. And that is, the humble reverence for God’s
word, rendering a man willing to make any sacrifice for the sake, if it
may be, of nearer approach to His truth. And as the public mind has
lately been and now is stirred regarding this matter, I think it may not
be a wrong use of our time tonight, if I venture to speak to you of
that part of the subject which especially belongs to the pulpit:
avoiding details, and trying to remind you in our own case of the need
for thinking of the duty at this time, and of our own means of
performing it; taking into account, by the way, the principal objections
urged against our putting it in hand.
The necessity of
thinking of the duty at this time arises from two causes, setting in
contrast our own circumstances with those under which our version was
made: one relating to the things old, the other to the things new.
When that version
was made, rather when it was constructed and amended out of former ones,
the available sources whence the sacred text was to be derived were
very few indeed, and those for the most part not of a high order. In
almost every case where the real text is matter of doubt, and has to be
ascertained by evidence, our translators had not that evidence before
them. By far the greater and more important part of it was not brought
to light in any trustworthy form till within the memory of living men.
Nay, one of its most ancient and principal witnesses has been within the
last few years discovered and given to the Church. And the consequence
is that, setting aside all cases of indifferent or unimportant
variations, there is by this time an immense weight of responsibility
pressing on the Church with regard to these varieties of reading: a
weight which it seems to me only those can be contented to rest under,
who are not aware of its magnitude. We, the Churches of Christ in this
land, are causing to be read to our people, to take but a single very
solemn instance, words respecting one of the foundation doctrines of the
faith which are demonstrably no part of Scripture at all. And we of
the Church of England are doing worse: we are reading those words by
special selection, implying that they convey a proof of that doctrine,
on the Sunday set apart by its name. This is perhaps the most prominent
example: but there is no lack of others: we might quote instances where
the text found in our English Bibles, which passes current with
millions for the word of God, has but the very slenderest, if any
authority to rest upon, and where other words, which very few of those
millions ever heard of, really are, according to the Church’s own belief
respecting Scripture, the message of God to men. We might produce
examples again, where the evidence of the great authorities is so nearly
balanced, that to the end of time, if no more witnesses are discovered,
the question never can be decided which of two or more is the true
reading.
Now there is no
reason to think that there was any fault in our translators as regards
this matter. Where they in their time knew of an important variation,
they noted it in their margin, or indicated it by the type of their
text. But in the great majority of cases, the fact was not, and could
not be, within their knowledge at all. Upon us in our own time has it
fallen to carry out their principles with the vastly extended light
which God has shed upon us.
But, it is asked,
are we able to do this ? As regards the text of the New Testament,
where these variations principally occur, certainly we are. The whole
ground has been of late years thoroughly and repeatedly worked over, and
the evidence is well known. In many of the most important of varying
passages, the decision of biblical scholars would be shortly and easily
made, which reading to adopt or reject, or whether to take the middle
course of fairly representing the uncertainty. The number of such
important variations is but limited; and in most of them, the voice of
ancient testimony is all one way. So that it seems to me there would be
no formidable difficulty, as regards the things old, in setting right
at this time the unavoidable errors, and supplying what were the
necessary defects, of our English Bible.
We
now come to the second of the reasons which seem to press on the Church
at this time the duty of reviewing her stewardship of the Holy
Scriptures; and that reason concerns the things new, the form in which
those Scriptures are represented in the vernacular tongue. In the main,
as has been already said, we have in this respect nothing to regret,
and but very little that we should be compelled to change. The
character and spirit of our version are all that we can desire. But it
is utterly impossible for any one capable of judging to deny, that it is
disfigured by numerous blemishes, far too important to be put by or
condoned. The gravest of these are due to manifest errors in rendering;
errors, about which there could be but one opinion among biblical
scholars of all religious views. Others have arisen from principles
adopted and avowed by the translators themselves: as, for instance, from
the unfortunate one of allowing a number of apparently equivalent
English words an equal right to represent one and the same word in the
original, whereby very important passages have been disguised and
confused. Others again owe their source to causes which have come into
operation since the version was made. Certain words have, as time has
gone on, passed into new meanings. Others, which could formerly be read
without offence, have now, by their very occurrence, become
stumbling-blocks, and tend to remove all solemnity, and even all chance
of fair audience, from the passages where they occur. Some few
blemishes may also be due (and it is hardly possible altogether to put
by this source) to doctrinal or ecclesiastical bias on the part of the
translator. Of the various elements which were wisely united in the
body of men entrusted with the preparation of our version, one was much
weakened during the work by the death of two of its leading members: and
some apparently forced or inconsistent renderings have been thought to
be not altogether unconnected with this circumstance.
But, after all, we
are asked, of what character are these blemishes. Do they, do any of
them, affect points of Christian doctrine? Now let it be observed, my
brethren, that this question is in itself a fallacious one. For what is
Christian doctrine? Is it a hard dry tabular statement of dogmas, to
be proved by a certain number of texts? or is it the conviction of the
great truths expressed by those dogmas carried into the hearts and lives
of men? If it be the former, then might we, according to the
objector’s argument, dispense with nine-tenths of Scripture altogether.
If the latter, then we can spare nothing which may make it clearer or
more forcible, better apprehended or more warmly felt. I am persuaded
that no one can estimate the benefit which may be done to the souls of
men by casting light on any one saying of our Blessed Lord, by making
evident a sentence before obscure in the writings of prophets or
apostles. And that this may be now done, done in very important
instances, done with easy consent and effectually, I am also persuaded.
The great principles of biblical translation have in our time engaged
many able men both here and on the Continent; and to most of the
passages in which our version has gone astray, our chosen revisers would
come with their minds firmly made up, and ready at once to apply the
remedy. With regard to some other blemishes which I ventured to
mention, its application would be easier still. Few would fail to note,
or be desirous to retain, an obsolete word; and in the case of
expressions of the other kind, the only desire would be, while removing
the offence, to leave unimpaired God’s testimony against sin, or
whatever might be the solemn sense of the passage. As regards the last
class of blemishes mentioned, those few which may be due to doctrinal or
ecclesiastical bias, the task might seem likely to be a hard one. But I
should be unwilling hastily to think this. In many such instances, the
question, as it would be raised among our modern scholars, would never
enter the region of opinion at all. It would be simply one of faithful
and consistent rendering, to which the occurrence of the word elsewhere
would furnish an easy and safe guide. I trust it may be said of the
Church in our land, that the longer she lasts, the more she becomes
aware of the futility of forcing into the sacred text any foregone
conclusions: the more she sees the importance of keeping pure from all
later alloy the water which men are to draw from the wells of salvation.
We have thus
advanced in our very hasty and incomplete sketch of this subject, to the
last branch of enquiry which we proposed: by whom, and how, this review
of the Church’s stewardship may be carried out.
In asking “By whom?”
we are in fact putting two questions: under what sanction, and by what
instruments. To the former enquiry it might be answered, that inasmuch
as uniformity in the use of a Scripture text is of the first importance,
it would be desirable that the version when amended should be put forth
by authority. But there can be little doubt that such an answer would
be an inconsiderate one. The procedure would defeat the very end it has
in view. On only one of the Christian bodies in this country would
such authority, even if complete in her sense, be binding. And if the
amended version were thus bound upon her, we should be departing from
the precedent set us in the case of our present version, which, whatever
might be the intention of the notice that it is “appointed to be read
in churches,” appears to have made its way to universal acceptance by
its intrinsic excellence, and without any binding authorisation at all.
There might be various conceivable ways of undertaking the revision.
It might be entrusted to a body of men selected and commissioned by the
highest power in the land. Or the action might begin, as it is now
beginning, with one of the religious bodies among us, and might proceed,
not confined to that body alone, but extended so as to take in such of
the rest as might be willing to aid. But, however undertaken, the
result should be put forth to make its way simply and entirely on its
merits, and as approving itself to the conscience and judgment of the
Churches of Christ. And we are thus brought to answer the second member
of this enquiry, By what instruments should the revision be carried
out? Our last sentence has anticipated the reply. Such a work should
no more be done by one section of the Christian Church than by one man.
The same concurrence and conflict of thought, the same variety of
experience, the same differing shades of feeling and apprehension, which
render many men requisite for the work, render also many Churches
requisite. There is in the lay mind a natural and well-founded distrust
of men who are enlisted in the warm advocacy of particular systems: and
nothing but a fair balance of the English Churches in the work would
command public confidence.
And then, how should
the work be done? I do not mean, by what kind of process or machinery:
the necessarily arduous details would be best judged of by those
engaged in it: but I mean, guided by what maxims, in accordance with
what rules? The task may fairly be compared to the mending and
restoration of a goodly piece of ancient mosaic work. And such a
comparison may guide us to one leading rule which should dominate the
whole process. Nothing should be touched of the fair fabric which can
possibly remain: and all that is of necessity new should be in strictest
harmony with the old. So that the ear, while of course missing from
the altered sentence the expression so long familiar, should find it
superseded, not by a startling modernism, but by words worthy to stand
beside those which remain. Those who are acquainted with the history of
our present version will recognise in this rule the repetition of one
which its compilers had before them.
On this matter, I
conceive there need be no alarm whatever. Any body of English biblical
scholars, with the responsibility upon them of purifying our version,
would be at least as anxious to preserve its characteristic excellences
as any could be, who were not so deeply aware what those excellences
are. And let it be observed, that in this matter a version for public
and general use would of necessity differ from such as may have been put
forth for private benefit by individual scholars. In those, it may
have been desired to give to the English bible-student some idea of the
niceties and precise constructions of the original. In the amended
version, there should be no such design, unless where our ordinary
English will fully and freely admit of it: no merely grammatical changes
of tense or inference, which might give awkwardness or stiffness to
what was before plainly and conventionally expressed.
From what has
already been said, it will be clear that this revision of the Church’s
stewardship cannot be brought about merely by the insertion of marginal
notices or varieties. We all know how little chance the margin has of
being observed or known: and it would be a still more fatal objection
that, in the great majority of Bibles, the requisite of cheapness
precludes any marginal printing at all. There might indeed with
advantage be an addition of marginal notices in matters of secondary
importance: but all necessary substantial revision must be made in the
text itself, or it seems to me we are exceeding and not fulfilling our
duty.
There remains but
one more consideration, without which we can hardly dismiss our
subject. Will not, it has been asked, the varying of expressions in our
version tend to disturb that confidence and reliance with which its
words are generally regarded among English Christians? First I would
observe that this argument, as against the discharge of a solemn trust,
is worthless; and secondly, that I have no dread of the consequence
apprehended. The Church of England has used for two centuries and a
half, two distinct versions of the Psalms, varying to a degree but
little appreciated, and with no such disturbing result. It is not a
little remarkable, that a precisely similar objection was raised at the
time of the undertaking of our present version, but it was by the
Romanists. They complained of the unsettling effect of these frequent
changes, and of the marginal readings as leaving men in doubt what was
the truth of Scripture. With what reason, let the firm hold which that
amended version has kept be witness.
And now in drawing
to an end, let us ask ourselves, why it is that the conscience of the
Church is moved about this matter? why it is that, a desire which not
long since stirred only in a few breasts, has now become ripe for
practical settlement as to by whom and how it is to be satisfied?
And the answer is to
be sought in that conscience itself. It brings to light the estimation
in which this Christian people have come to hold the precious deposit
entrusted to them. It is a result of the awakened enquiry, the honest
fearless research which have been and are being widely spent upon every
point connected with Holy Scripture: a higher value set, not in spite of
but because of that inquiry and research, on a treasure now no longer
wrapped in the disguise of mere conventional reverence, but opened and
sparkling to every eye. It is the old confession over again, no longer
from the mouth of one standing in the prophetic front of his age, but in
the hearts of Churches walking in the fear of God and in the comfort of
the Holy Ghost, - “Thy law is tried to the uttermost: therefore thy
servant loveth it.”
In this spirit, and
in the depth of this affection, let us contemplate the work which is
proposed, let us undertake it if undertaken it is to be: refusing to
yield our reverence for God’s word to any overweening love for that to
which we have been accustomed, or to let go our present trust in His
guiding Spirit for any timid apprehensions of the peril of change: but
on the other hand doing nothing rashly, nothing uncharitably; respecting
the opinions of our brethren, and dealing tenderly with their
prejudices.
And let us who are
anxious for this national work remember above all things, that it is not
by our professions of esteem for God’s word, but by our proof of them,
that distrust will be removed and confidence inspired: by that word
being seen to be the source of our own motives, and the rule of our
life.
