Errata of the Protestant Bible ..

Front matter

ERRATA

OP THE

PKOTESTANT BIBLE

Contents

PAGE

Preface to the Fourth Edition, . ... •■■ ••• ••• ••• ■•• * «

The Truth of Protestant Translations of the Bible examined, ... ... ... 25 — 31

Preface To The Fourth Edition

BY DR. LINGARD.

The publication of Ward's " Errata to the Protestant Bible1' has disclosed a most curious and important fact, that the scriptural church of England and Ireland was originally founded on a false translation of the scriptures. It was the boast of the first reformers, that they had emancipated their disciples from the shackles of Catholic despotism, and had restored lo them the freedom of the children of God : it now appears, that this freedom consisted in reading an erroneous version of the inspired Avritings, and in venerating as the dictates of eternal Wisdom the blunders of ignorant or interested translators. " The scriptures," they exclaimed, " are the sole rule of faith. Here they are, no longer concealed under the obscurity of a learned language, but exhibited to you in your native tongue- Here you will easily detect the errors of Popery, and learn the true doctrine of the Gospel." The credulity of multitudes accepted with joy the proffered boon ; the new teachers were hailed as apostles commissioned by heaven ; and every old woman, both male and female, that could read, became an adept, if not in the knowledge of the Bible, at least in the prejudices and errors of its translators.

It is not for man to dispute the wisdom of Providence, and arraign at the bar of his private judgment the means which God may choose for the diffusion of religious knowledge. Otherwise, I must confess, there appears to me something very unaccountable in the scriptural blunders of the apostles of the reformation. The object, they said, of their mission was the dissemination of evangelic truth. If the Holy Spirit selected them for this important office, he must also have gifted them with the true knowledge of the scriptures, and, if he gifted them with the true knowledge of the scriptures, it seems to follow that he ought also to have granted them the power to make a true translation of the scriptures. The apostles of Jesus received the knowledge of tongues, that they might instruct the different nations of the earth : the apostles of the church of England and Ireland ought to have received the knowledge of, at least, the Hebrew and Greek tongues, that they might form an accurate version of the scriptures. Such a version was as necessary to that church, as the instructions of the first apostles could be to the primitive churches of Christianity. If they were apostolical, she was scriptural. However, without speculating on the cause, the fact is certain, not only from the arguments of Ward, but even from the concessions of his adversaries, that the fathers of this scriptural church gave it a version of the scriptures abounding with errors. Arid here it may reasonably be asked, whence arose these errors ? Were they the offspring of ignorance, or design ? Dr. Ryan warmly contends for the former, and endeavours to fortify his opinion by the authority of Father Simon : (a) but then, even admitting his assertions, devoid as they are of proof, and liable to objection, what are we to think of the temerity of these men, who, incompetent to the task, and conscious of their incompetency, still presumed to violate the purity of the sacred volumes, and to obtrude on their unsuspecting disciples an erroneous version as the immaculate word of God, and as the sole and infallible guide to religious truth ? Ward, on the contrary, attempts to show that the more important of their errors were committed by design ; and a curious circumstance it is, highly corroborative of his opinion, that most of their blunders are favourable to their own peculiar doctrines, and unfavourable to those of their opponents. But, if this be true, what judgment can any unprejudiced man form of these saints of the reformation ? For my part, I know of no crime more foul in its own nature, more prejudicial in its consequences, more nearly allied to diabolic malignity, than that of designedly corrupting the holy scriptures, and, by such corruption, leading the sincere inquirer into error, and converting the food of life into the poison of death.

But, from whatever source these false renderings proceeded, whether their authors were guided by policy or misled by ignorance, this must be conceded, that if Ward has fairly established the fact, he is entitled to the gratitude of the impartial reader. The impartial reader, let him be Protestant or Catholic, will, if his object be truth, thankfully receive the truth from whatever hand may present it to him. Hence it was with no small surprise that I heard the clamour which was raised against the last edition of the " Errata," In parliament and out of parliament, in newspapers and pamphlets, it was stigmatized as an attempt to vilify the reformation, and to heap disgrace on the Established Church. " It was the work," observed an eminent senator, eminent for the only talent he possesses, that of

(<z) Ryan's Analysis, p. 5. Simon, however, in the passage referred to, does not speak of the English translator in particular, but of the Protestant translators in general. This Dr. Ryan has thought fit to conceal from his readers.

religious calumny, " it was the work of one hundred and twenty Popish priests leagued to put down Protestantism." Such nonsense hardly deserves notice. If facts are to be hidden from the eye of the public, because they reflect on the character of our predecessors, let history at once be condemned to the flames. The evangelists did not conceal the treachery of Judas : why should Protestant divines wish to conceal the blunders or the frauds of the fathers of their church ?

To me, it appears, that none among the adversaries of Ward have had the courage, or the honesty to do justice to that writer. His object in compiling the " Errata," was twofold : firstly, to prove that the versions of the scripture on which the established creed was originally founded, were extremely corrupt : and secondly, to show that though many errors have been since corrected, there still remain many others to correct. All this however they prudently overlook ; and by an artful confusion of times and persons, by referring to modern Bibles the charges which he makes against those of a former age, and by affecting to consider his accusation of the clergy of Queen Elizabeth as directed against the clergy of the present reign, they pretend to convict him of misrepresentation and calumny. In this, perhaps, they may act wisely ; they certainly act unfairly. Could they have shown that Ward had attributed to the ancient English Bible errors which it did not contain, or that he had attributed to the present Bibles errors which have been corrected in them, they might have substantiated their charges against him. But this they have not attempted. They content themselves with exclaiming that many of the former corruptions have been corrected, and therefore should not have been mentioned. But why should they not ? The very fact of their having been corrected is an unanswerable proof of Ward's assertion. It shows beyond the possibility of a doubt, that the church of England, however scriptural it may pretend to have been in its origin, was in reality founded on a false version of the scriptures ; a version which was a very Babel of confusion, which spoke sometimes the language of God and often the language of men, which had attempted to improve the lessons of eternal truth by the addition of the whims, the ignorance, the prejudices, and the falsehoods of Tyndal, Coverdale, Cranmer, &c, &c.

Among the opponents of Ward, the fiercest and the only one who has attempted a full refutation of the " Errata," is Dr. Ryan. His attempt is a consequence of the grant of Ireland which Adrian IV. made to Henry II. Nay, start not, gentle reader ; the most important events may often be traced to remote and almost imperceptible causes. The attempt of Dr. Ryan is a consequence of the grant of Ireland by Adrian IV. to Henry II. By that grant the Ryans lost an extensive property ;(a) and the present Dr. is the champion reserved by heaven

FOURTH EDITION.

to revenge on Popery the injuries which she inflicted on his ancestors six centuries ago. An awful lesson this to the ambition of princes ! But let us see, how the Dr. proceeds in the work of vengeance. He has divided his treatise into different sections, corresponding with those of the " Errata." In reviewing it, I shall follow the same order.

THE CHURCH.

Under this head Ward has adduced no less than seven texts in which the English translators had substituted the word congregation for church ; to which Dr. Ryan replies, " that the former mistranslations of these seven texts, having been corrected in the present Bible, should have been excluded from the catalogue of the ' Errata.' "(b) This plea has, I trust, been sufficiently refuted in the preceding observations. That the correction has taken place, is indeed an improvement in the present Bible ; but it is at the same time a condemnation of its predecessors. After the correction, Ward should not have imputed these errors to the corrected copies ; neither has he done so : he should have imputed them to the more ancient copies, and in doing so, he is justified by the very concession of his adversary. " But," continues the Dr., " he produces an eighth text to show that we have been guilty of misconstruction to injure his church. In the Romish version it is written : my dove is one ; (Cant. xi. 8 :) in ours, my dove is but one ; a <Heurious proof of malice to his church ! Many of his errata are of this kind ; frivolous in themselves ; and affording no proof or but feeble proofs of the propositions he maintains."^) Now, reader, what canst thou infer from this passage, but that Ward had censured the Protestant version for having adopted the reading, my dove is but one ? The reverse, however, is the truth. Ward did not censure, he approved that reading. His censure was levelled against the more ancient reading in the English Bibles, my dove is alone. " But this," he adds, "is also amended." Such was the candour of Ward, that he carefully pointed out to his reader every correction. Of the candour of Dr. Ryan I wish I could speak with equal commendation. But he has begun his analysis with an artifice, which it will be impossible for him to palliate, much less to justify. He has suppressed the real assertion of his adversary, which he could not controvert, and has substituted in its place an assertion so palpably absurd that it could not fail to make an impression on the mind of the uninformed reader highly prejudicial to the character of Ward. Nor has the Dr. left his artifice to work its own effect. He has aided it by his own observations : and has of consequence charged the author of

(c) Ibid.

the " Errata " with labouring to create disagreements where there was perfect harmony ; and wishing to widen instead of contracting the breach between the two churches, (a) Such is the honesty of our biblical Aristarchus. But if he cannot claim the praise of honesty, he may claim at least that of consistency. The fraud with which he has commenced his controversial career, he has been careful to repeat in every stage of it. He was fully aware that in works of the imagination, according to the masters of the art, perfection cannot be attained, unless character be preserved throughout.

THE BLESSED SACRAMENT, AND THE SACRIFICE OF THE MASS.

Dr. Ryan commences his strictures on this section by observing, that five of the texts produced by Ward having been corrected in the modern Bibles, should have been excluded from the " Errata." I shall not fatigue the patience of the reader by repeating what I have already said on the subject of these concessions : but shall content myself with reminding him how extremely corrupt that version must have been, the defence of which is thus abandoned by its warmest advocate. He proceeds : " The other three texts have no relation to the sacrament even in his own translations, as will appear by exhibiting them. Whom heaven truly must receive — let us cast wood upon his bread — -for he was the priest of the Most High. These three texts are thus rendered by us : Whom heaven must receive — let us destroy the tree with the fruit thereof— and he was the priest of the Most High, {b) These texts are no more for or against the sacrament than a treatise of astronomy : yet we are accused of misconstruing them from prejudice against it !" Softly, good Doctor ! There may be more in some of these texts than you seem to be aware of. Let us examine them separately.

1st. Whom heaven must receive. In exhibiting this text, (to borrow the Doctor's expression,) I fear he has had recourse to his favourite artifice, which I have exposed in the preceding section. He has suppressed the text, which Ward really condemns, and substituted in its place one which he approves. Ward did not condemn the corrected reading of the modern Bibles, which Dr. Ryan has exhibited : but he condemned the corrupted reading of the ancient Bibles, which the Dr. very prudently has forgotten. That reading hath, whom heaven must contain ; a rendering which the correction, it has since received, sufficiently proves to have been false. But Dr. Ryan, by suppressing it, and substituting the corrected passage, states two advantages : he conceals the ancient corruption from the eye of his reader, and represents Ward as a man of weak intellects, who could thus refer to the sacrament a text which has no relation to it. In the corrected copies I acknowledge it has not ; but in the more ancient it had. Ward had told us that it was so rendered by Beza, according to that reformer's own confession, in order to exclude the presence of Christ from the sacrament ; and Dr. Ryan must have known that Protestant controvertists in England have often alleged the same text for the same purpose. Ward then was perfectly correct.

2d, The second passage is very differently rendered in the Catholic and Protestant versions : in the former, Let us cast wood upon his bread .- in the latter, Let us destroy the tree with the fruit thereof. It must be acknowledged that the Catholic rendering is not conformable to the present Hebrew : 7»rfta y» nmrros. But then it is conformable to the more ancient versions, the Greek, the Vulgate, and the Arabic, and the consent of these versions proves that the modern reading of the Hebrew is false, (c) The Protestant translators, on the contrary, have chosen to follow that reading, and accordingly have rendered 75 nmrros, let us destroy the tree ; but then, to make sense, they have been compelled to give to orb a meaning, which, I believe, it has not in any other part of scripture, and under yarfc the fruit thereof, instead of his bread. Ward, therefore, was justified in numbering this in his catalogue of errata. If it be asked why he placed it under the head of false translations against the sacrament, he answers because he suspected it to have been adopted in order to elude the force of a passage in the works of St. Jerom, who had referred the original text to the holy Eucharist, (d)

3rd. The difference in the third text, Gen. xiv. 18, depends on the meaning which ought to be given to the Hebrew particle ]. The Vulgate and the English Catholic version have rendered it for ; and that it is susceptible of this meaning is evident from the Protestant translators themselves, who in similar passages have rendered it in the same manner. (Gen. xx. 3 : Thou art but a dead man for the woman which thou hast taken ; byo nj>$5 tnrr] for she is a man's wife. And Isaiah lxiv. 5 : Behold thou art wroth, nxms] for we have sinned.) In the present instance, they have rendered it and, which Ward ascribes to their wish to elude the argument that Catholic theologians had been accustomed to draw from Melchizedeck's typical sacrifice of bread and wine.

Dr. Ryan proceeds to instance another text, which, as he vainly flatters himself, will yield him an easy victory. " In the Protestant translation (Heb. x. 10,) it is said, we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." " Ward says that our translators added the words for all, to take away the daily oblation of Christ's body and blood in the mass.

(c) It was probably frmOT in the more ancient copies.

(d) Errata, No. II.

But it must be admitted that the compound Greek word, which Romanists render once should be rendered once for all ; only once and for a short time : that the words for all are improperly omitted in the Popish translations, and without serving the cause for which Catholics contend. "(a) He is an unskilful or an unfortunate champion, who cannot aim a stroke at his adversary without inflicting a wound on his friends. When Dr. Ryan condemns the Catholic, his censure bears still more heavily on the Protestant translators : and he chooses to praise them at the very moment when they condemn him. The Greek word ecpcxTTaS occurs frequently in the New Testament : (b) yet in no one instance can I discover that the Protestant translators have rendered it once for all, except in this passage, Heb. x. 10. If then, as the Doctor asserts, the words for all are improperly omitted in the Popish translations, I trust, he will acknowledge that they are also improperly omitted in the Protestant translations; and thus contribute his mite towards completing Ward's catalogue of errata. The truth, however, is, that the Protestant translators, instead of thinking the words for all improperly omitted, were conscious that they formed no part of the sacred texts, and therefore printed them in italics, as an indication that they occurred not in the original, but were useful to form a right notion of the apostle's meaning. Thus is Dr. Ryan condemned by his own clients. But, continues the Doctor, " The term once without the addition of the words for all, would not justify a daily oblation : for where we are sanctified through the offering of Jesus Christ once, it must be unnecessary to repeat it : it does not follow that, because Christ's body was offered once for sinners, it should be daily offered for them." (c) Is not this a controversial stratagem, a ruse de guere, to draw off the attention of the reader from the real state of the question ?

Ward did not say that because Christ's body was offered once, it follows that it ought to be offered daily. He was not so weak a logician. But he did say, that the Protestant translators added the words for all, in support of their favourite doctrine that he was not to be offered daily : and I confess, I think he is not mistaken : for on no other ground can I account for their having added the words for all in this passage, and having omitted them in every other in which the Greek term ecpanaZ occurs. As to the assertion that, " where we are sanctified by the offering of Jesus Christ once, it must be unnecessary to repeat it," I beg leave to refer Dr. Ryan to the commentary of St. Chrysostom on this very epistle, a writer who probably understood the Greek language as well as modern translators. From that ancient father he will learn, that though Christ was offered once, and his offering sufficeth for ever, yet we offer him daily : but that it is one and the same sacrifice, because we offer one and the same victim. Ana% 7Too(rr}vs%8t],' xai itg to aii ijqy.sos . . . ri ovv ; f[[iEtg

FOURTH EDITION.

qov, aXV &si to avio. dors ftcu ioxiv \Tvaia. In Epist. ad Heb. c. ix. horn. xvii.

THE BLESSED SACRAMENT, AND THE ALTAR.

Dr. Ryan opens his remarks on this section in his usual maner. " Ward charges us with misrendering three texts ; this is a curious charge, when our last translation of two out of the three agrees exactly with the Popish ; and when we have no translation of the third." It will not be a difficult task to unravel the web of his sophistry. Ward did not charge the last but the more ancient Protestant translations with misrendering the three texts, and that his charge is true, is evident from Dr. Ryan's attempts to shift the question from one version to another. As to the assertion that there is no translation of the third ; it can only mean that by Protestants it is not accounted part of the inspired writings, but occurs in one of the books which they have classed among the Apocrypha. He proceeds thus : " Nor need our first translators have been afraid of using the word altars ; as there is no evidence that the Popish altars resembled those of the apostolic age." Did ever writer trifle more egregiously with the judgment and the patience of his readers ? There is no evidence that the Popish altars resembled those of the apostolic age : therefore, the first Protestant translators need not have been afraid of using the word altars ! But is Dr. Ryan then willing to admit that Christians made use of altars as early as the apostolic age ? For what purpose did they make use of them ? It must have been for sacrifice : otherwise there could have been no more need of altars among Christians in the apostolic age, than among Protestants in the present. But if it were for sacrifice, that sacrifice would have been no other in substance than what Catholics call the sacrifice of the mass.

" The first Protestant translators need not have been afraid of the word altars .'" Why then did they substitute temple in its place 1 Dr. Ryan cannot here have recourse to his former plea of their ignorance of the original languages. The veriest smatterer in the Greek tongue could have informed them that dvaiacrjqiov meant not a temple but an altar. Their own conduct in falsifying these texts shows, that they were afraid of the word. For what but fear, and that too of a very urgent nature, could have impelled men, who had assumed the office of apostles, and whose existence as such depended on their reputation, to pollute that office, and hazard that reputation, by thus wilfully and deliberately corrupting the sacred volumes ?

The truth is, the first teachers of Protestantism had reformed religion ; they found it also necessary to reform the inspired writings. They had created a scriptural church without a sacrifice : it was prudent to have an edition of the scriptures without any honourable mention of altars. Altars and sacrifice are correlative terms : the one naturally leads to the other. When the Christian saciifice was abolished, altars were unnecessary. They had, of course, treated them with every species of indignity, and were too cautious politicians to permit them to be commended in the scriptures. But after the lapse of a century, circumstances were changed : the generation which had witnessed the altars and the sacrifice of the Catholic worship, had passed away. A new race of men, with new habits and new prejudices, had succeeded, no danger could arise from the adoption of the term : and the word altar was silently permitted to resume its former place in the sacred writings.

Before I close my remarks on this section, I must observe that Ward has noticed another corruption of the text, which Dr. Ryan has thought it prudent to overlook. In 1 Cor. xi. 27, the apostle says, Whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink this cup of the Lord unworthily , rj mvn shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord : from which disjunctive proposition Catholic controvertists have been accustomed to draw an argument in favour of communion in one kind. This is a matter of such notoriety that a divine like Dr. Ryan could not be ignorant of it. In the first Protestant Bibles this text was faithfully translated : but in the more modern it has been corrupted by the substitution of the copulative particle and, for the disjunctive particle or : a substitution of which Ward most justly complains. Now, in what manner does Dr. Ryan defend it ? He is silent ; he does not even remotely "hint that such a corruptinn has been noticed by his adversary. Is he then conscious of the fraud, but unwilling that it should come to the knowledge of his Protestant readers ? I fear this is the only consistent explanation, which his conduct will admit. It certainly is not manly : but it would, perhaps, be too much to expect that every writer should have the honesty to make confessions, which would go to criminate himself. However, he may draw this lesson from it : that he, who stands in need of so much indulgence himself, should be cautious how he condemns with severity the imaginary blemishes, which he may fancy that he discovers in others.

PRIESTS, PRIESTHOOD, AND HOLY ORDERS.

On this subject Dr. Ryan observes : " According to Ward we misconstrued six texts, by rendering the Greek word elder instead of priest : he says, we did so, lest the term priest should 2 reflect honour on the Catholic clergy." (a) Reader, consult Ward, and thou wilt find he says no such thing. Ward attributes the suppression of the word priest to the suppression of the sacrifice of the mass. Where there is no altar or sacrifice, there is no need of a priest. But Dr. Ryan has forged the reason which he here gives to Ward, as an introduction to the sarcasm against the Catholic clergy, which immediately follows it. " Elder," he also tells us, " is a more literal translation of the Greek word than priest, and presbytery than priesthood : so that the Protestant translators are not chargeable with a mistranslation of these words, (b) He will, however, allow me to ask, what kind of men they were, whom the sacred writers designate by the term nqea^vTeqoi 1 Were they not ministers of religious worship ordained for that purpose by the apostles 1 As a minister of the Established Church, he must answer in the affirmative. But if they were, what is the proper term by which such ministers are described in the English language ? Not only common usage, but the very language of the Church of England decides in favour of the word priest. If then the translators of the Bible meant to speak a language intelligible to their readers, they ought to have translated the Greek word priests and not elders. Were I to. request the favour of Dr. Ryan to translate the following Latin sentence : " Episcopus Londinensis cum majon civitatis et duobus ecclesiae presbyteris visitav.il universitatem Oxoniensem," would he prefer as more literal such a version as this : the overseer of London, with the greater of the city, and two elders of the church, visited the generality of Oxford 1

He proceeds : " Ward asserts that these translators were so conscious, that their bishops had no grace to confer a sacred character, by the imposition of hands, that they put out the word grace and substituted gift in two passages of St. Paul." When will Dr. Ryan cease to deceive his reader ? No such reason, as he here relates, occurs in Ward. That writer ascribes the substitution of the term gift, to the doctrine which the reformers preached, that order was no sacrament, (c) Whoever is conversant with the sacred writings will agree with him that xagio-fta is not properly rendered, by gift. In scriptural language it always meant grace, or a supernatural gift.

I cannot follow him through all his mistakes in this section. The last seems to prove that he had hardly looked at the book he pretends to refute. " We are charged," he says, " with mistranslating the Greek word signifying deacon : though all the Protestant versions of it agree with the Popish without the slightest variation !" (d) The truth, however is, that Ward does not charge them with mistranslating the passage in question, 1 Tim. iii. 12. He only notices that in this verse it was translated properly : and yet in the fourth verse preceding it

(a) Anal., p. 14. (c) Errata, No. V.

(*)Ibid. id) Anal., p. 15.

was rendered in the more ancient versions, minister. He only wishes to know why the same word, with the meaning attached to it in the Greek, should in the short space of four verses be rendered by a different word in English ? In itself this is not a matter of great consequence : but I thought proper to notice it to expose the artifices of Dr. Ryan, who can thus condescend to calumniate his adversary, that he may enjoy a short and dangerous triumph.