John xii. 27. Now is my soul troubled and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour? But for this cause I came to this hour. Father, glorify thy name. Here the I. V. follows those respectable interpreters who make the second clause interrogative; q. d. "Shall I say, Father save me, &c.?" This punctuation is founded, we believe, on the opinion that the simple petitionary form would be derogatory from the perfection of our Lord's character; a solicitude, in our estimation, very superfluous. See Matt. xxvi. 39, 42. Heb. v. 7:To understand the clause as pointed in the Common, Translation, appears to us incomparably more suited to the occasion. It conveys all the tenderness and simplicity which so sweetly adorned the Man of Nazareth. It is the language of extreme agitation and distress: feelings which are so far from being inconsistent with the perfect holiness of the Sufferer, that we should more correctly say that they were the necessary. feelings of a mind whose exquisite sensibility, never blunted by the debasement of sin, must have exceeded our utmost conception, The general predilection for the interrogatory form 1 confirms an observation of Michaelis *, (an observation, by, the way, which he himself exemplified) that the habits of cri. ticism and theological disquisition are unfavourable to the true, and natural principles of taste. III. On the mode adopted in the I. V. of translating the Jewish Idioms and other peculiar Terms and Expressions of the N. T. An interpreter of the N. T. has a task to perform, not only more difficult than that of one who undertakes to translate any other ancient work, but in some characteristic respects essentially opposite to it. When the translator of Plato, Aristotle, or Longinus, is conscious of competently understanding both the idioms of the language, and the Technology of the Grecian philosophy and rhetoric, and when he has satisfactorily ascertained the equipollent expressions in his own tongue, he proceeds in his work with freedom and ease. He transfuses the ideas and the reasonings of his original into a style and habitude as completely English as he can command; and he is under no fear of having his judgement or his fidelity impugned, because he has, substituted the idioms of his countrymen for the dialects and the grammar of ancient Greece. Not such is the situation of the scriptural translator. Of him it is required to be literal almost to servility, and yet to be perspicuous and faithful. To attain the latter qualities and not to depart from the former, is often impossible; and in his painful efforts to satisfy the incompatible claims, he may incur the revilings of the half-learned and the bigoted, or the gentler but weightier censure of the true scholar. We are, however, fully aware that, in the present divided state of the Christian world, it is necessary that vernacular translations of the Scriptures should be as literal as the idioms of languages widely remote will admit, rendering by equivalent modern phrases only those which are universally acknowledged by philolologists to be merely grammatical or national peculiarities. When the O. T. is translated upon this plan of liquidating only the class of idioms just mentioned, (of which we cannot mention a model superior to Bp. Lowth's Isaiah,) and especially the Pentateuch and the poetical books; there remains a character of simplicity and majesty, the most venerable and commanding; a character whose beauty and grandeur are transferable into all other languages, and with which we in England are happily so familiarized, that it has become incorporated into our habits of speech, it is generally understood and felt, and it forms in a measure what may be called our Sacred Language. * In his admirable Preface to the Gottingen edition of Bishop Lowth de S. Poesi Hebr. In this sublime diction the N. T., if we except the Apoca lypse, does not abound. Its manner, as might be expected from the circumstances of the age, partakes of the lower Grecian character, which prevailed after the Macedonian conquest, and of which Polybius and Josephus are our best examples. Its language is that of the septuagint and the Jewish school of Alexandria, but, in the writings of St. Paul and of St. Luke, chastised and improved by an acquaintance with better Greek models. Hence the most peculiar and difficult idioms of the N. T. are those derived from the Hebræo-Chaldaic synagogue. It is farther to be remarked, that a set of words, and some phrases, have descended to us through the medium of the Latin church, which are almost universally accepted as the representatives of those idiomatical terms by which the N. T. designates its capital and leading subjects. On the establishment of the Protestant Reformation, this vocabulary was employed in the translations of the scriptures, and has ever since maintained its place in books and sermons. Thus has our Theological Dialect been formed: and, in common with every other technical system of words, it has its advantages and inconveniences. In the pure and the mixed mathematics, in chemistry, and in every other science, a seclusive nomenclature is acknowledged to be an advantage of the first importance; it secures the distinctness, and regulates the comprehension of ideas; it abridges the processes of thought, and it facilitates their communication. Why should not these advantages be possessed by divine science, which are universally felt in human? Is there any thing in the former which makes it a singular instance, and requires it to be an exception from the other cases ?-We fear that there is. Mathematicians and philosophers use their terminology in a sense defined and known, cautiously refraining from reducing, or amplifying, or altering the comprehension of ideas under each sign. Happy would it have been, had divines been equally cautious. But the fact has been the reverse; and the appropriate terms of Christian Theology have been used in so many, so various, and so contradictory significations, that their utility has been destroyed, and they have really ceased to designate any thing except what may be deduced from collateral information. Further: religion is the equal concern of every man; and, if it be expressed in the language of common life, the poor and illiterate are likely to understand it; but, if these humble yet not less worthy disciples have to acquire a list of terms which to them are in effect a new language, few of them, it is to be feared, can escape the abuses of mysticism and confusion. These remarks have run to an unexpected length, and we must check their progress: hoping, however, that they may suggest some hints not unprofitable to the serious reader of the Holy Scriptures. It is too obvious to need being insisted on, that the character of any translation of the N.T.must greatly, or rather principally, depend, on the judgement and accuracy employed on this part of its composition. To assist the opinion of our readers, we shall present a selection of instances, in some of the most important words and phrases; and for the sake of brevity, we shall forbear from comments except when strongly called for. 1. GOD, 6. In several instances of the connection of this term, it appears to us that the spirit of theological predilection has led the Archbishop, or his improvers, to violate strict impartiality, by adopting a mode of translation which an honest, disinterested, and competent Greek scholar would not have chosen. John i. 1. and the word was a god." We object to this rendering, that in the two or three passages, in which the N. T. uses os in a metaphorical sense, that signification is marked by other words with such a plenitude of caution as to prevent any possible ambiguity. Here the context supplies no such corrective aid, and no Grecian would say that the plain construction implies or requires it. Had it been the evangelist's intention to convey that lower or generic sense, he could not have rejected various modes of exact expression with which the language would have furnished him, and have adopted one which would necessarily lead to a total and capital misappreheusion of his meaning. St. John's style is remarkable for extreme simplicity and perspicuity. He might have said Ottó T (as Plato, Apol. Socr. 19.) or even leós ris, or deños.-The editors, in their note, glance with a wishful eye at the late Mr. Cappe's translation, though it would make the words false Greek; and at the violent conjecture of Samuel Crellius, which against the faith of criticism they dignify with the epithet "plausible." These weak attempts are, in effect, acts of homage to the justness of the common version, "the Word was God." "Samuel Crellius was a Socinian and a leader of that party. He is still quoted as one of their strongest advocates; but the endless mercy of our Lord was also manifest in him. He not only rejoiced to see his daughters bow their knees to the Crucified; but he himself turning to that Lord, called upon Him as his Lord and his God, and found, at the latter end of his life, no consolation but in the atonement by the blood of Jesus, and wished that all his books could die with him. This has been testified, not only by his daughters, but by all who were with him before his end." Note by the late Rev. B. Latrobe, in Crantz's Hist, of the Moravian Brethren ; P2 201. . What, but the pertinacious spirit of party and preconceived opinion, can have led the modern adversaries of the Deity of Christ, to reject, in the face of abundant evidence, a Rule of Greek construction which, applied to the N. T., furnishes some cogent testimonies to that doctrine On this subject we made some remarks in vol.iv.p.771. We may justly add, that if a rule deduced from the universal usage of the language, and of so much importance in construction, had not borne an unfavourable aspect on the Socinian doctrine, some persons who have manifested their policy in neglecting, or their ignorant temerity in denying it, would have been forward to class it with the happiest observations of Ruhnkenius or the metrical canons of Porson. From a long-continued and, we trust, impartial examination, we are not only conscious of sincerity, but persuaded that we stand on the rock of solid evidence, in maintaining that both K. James's and this Improved Version have adopted a false rendering of the three following passages. We shall cite them in what we firmly believe to be their faithful translation. Eph. v, 5. "the kingdom of [Him who is] the Christ and God." Tit. ii. 13. 66 -our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ." 2 Pet. 1. " Our God and Saviour Jesus Christ." Phil. ii. 6, 7. "Christ Jesus; who being in the form of God, did not eagerly grasp at the resemblance to God; but divested himself of it, and took on him the form of a servant,' &c. This conveys the true sense of the original, though the construction might have been closer. The error of the common version seems to have arisen from the translators considering the whole sixth verse as the catasceue of the protasis in the fifth; a construction which would have required a copulative and a second participle, thus, καὶ ουχ ἁρπαγμὸν ἡγησάμενος x. T. λ. To any one who impartially considers the words, it will appear evident that the catascene lies in the words ἐν μορφή Θεοῦ ὑπάρχων, and that the apodosis then immediately commences. This amendment, however, does not affect the true bearing of this text as a testimony to the Deity of Christ. The force of that testimony lies in the expression "existing in the form of God,' compared with the subsequent clause, taking the form of a servant," &c. If the former be denied to attribute to our Lord real and, proper divinity, it must, in consistency, be held that he had no real and proper humanity, as was taught by the Doceta " Heb. i. 8. God is thy throne, for ever and ever." We may fairly place this translation, also, among the offspring of Socinian prejudices. It attributes grossly false Greek to a book," which is, at least, one of the purest and most classical in the whole N T. Yet to such desperate measures we in't must be reduced, if we will not admits to be the Attic vo |