Chap. iii. The first independent German Luther, Zurich Bible. Testament edited by Ben Chayim (1525) is substantially good. Indeed as Hebrew Manuscripts all belong to a comparatively late recension the extent of real variation between them is limited. The Latin texts accessible in the first half of the 16th century were indifferent. The Greek texts of the New Testament, and this is most important, were without exception based on scanty and late manuscripts, without the help of the oriental versions and the precious relics of the Old Latin. As a necessary consequence they are far from correct, and if the variations are essentially unimportant as a whole, yet the errors in the text of our English Testament inherited from them are considerably more important than the existing errors of translation. Such were the materials which the first great Reformers found to help them in their work of rendering the original Scriptures into their own languages. Before the English labourers entered the field it was already occupied. Numerous students in Germany had translated separate books when Luther commenced the work which he was enabled to carry to a successful end. Luther's New Testament appeared in 1522 as the fruit of his seclusion in the Wartburg, and, like Tyndale's, anonymously. The Pentateuch followed in 1523. The Historical books and the Hagiographa in 1524. The Prophets at various intervals (Jonah in 1526) afterwards; and the whole work in 1534. The second revised edition did not appear till 1541. But in the meanwhile a band of scholars at Zurich, including Zwingli, Pellican and Leo Juda, had taken Luther's work as the basis of a new translation up to the end of the Hagiographa, and completed it by an original translation of the Prophets and the Apocrypha. This was published Chap. iii. Bible. in fragments from 1524-1529, and first completely in two forms in the latter year. It was republished in History. 1530, and with a new translation of the Hagiographa in 1531, and often afterwards'. Another German Bible Worms with an original translation of the Prophets appeared at Worms in 1529. The French translation of Lefèvre French (Faber Stapulensis) was made (1523-1530) from the tions. Vulgate, and was not an independent work: that of Olivetan (Neuchâtel 1535) is said to have been based in the Old Testament on Sanctes Pagninus, and in the New on Lefèvre3. The works of the first German translators, or at least of Luther, must then be added to those previously enumerated as accessible to Tyndale' during the execution of his version of the New Testament. Luther's name was indeed at the time identified with the idea of vernacular versions of Scripture, and it is not surprising that More affirmed that Tyndale's work was a translation of Luther's, an assertion in which he has been followed by writers who have less excuse. What Tyndale's version really was we have now to inquire. The editions which I have used are those of 1530 and 1534. I have not been able to consult the small edition of 1529 with glosses; nor have I collated the two editions or determined how far the translation in the earlier books differs as a whole from Luther's. The difference in isolated passages is very considerable. This edition I have not used. 3 I have not examined Lefèvre's translation; and am ignorant also of the real character of Bruccioli's Italian version (1530-1532), which is said to have been made from the original. The Wycliffite Versions do not seem to have exercised any influence on the later English Versions, unless an exception be made in the case of the Latin-English Testament of Co verdale mentioned above. The coin- As far as Tyndale is concerned- Hallam's account is so amazing transla Chap. iii. Tyndale acquainted and Hebrew. All external evidence goes to prove Tyndale's originality as a translator'. He had, as we have seen, formed his purpose of translating the New Testament before with Greek he could have heard of Luther's, and in the year in which that appeared (1522) went up to London with a translation from Isocrates as a proof of his knowledge of Greek. His knowledge of Hebrew and Greek is also incidentally attested by the evidence of Spalatinus, of his opponent Joye, and yet more clearly by the steady confidence with which he deals with points of Hebrew and Greek philology when they casually arise. Thus after defending his renderings of presbyteros (elder), charis (favour), agape (love), &c. against Sir T. More he says (1530): 'These things to be even so 'Mr More knoweth well enough: for he understandeth 'the Greek, and he knew them long ere I". Again in an earlier work he writes (1528): 'The Greek tongue 'agreeth more with the English than the Latin. And the properties of the Hebrew tongue agree a thousand 'times more with the English than the Latin.' Tyndale's Version compared with Vulgate and Luther. of which he thus summarily disposes. 1 For the part which Joye had in the work of preparing the transla tion see Preface to the Parable of the Wicked Mammon. But the translation of the New Testament itself is the complete proof of its own independence. It is impossible to read through a single chapter without gainfrom the complication of blunders which it involves that it deserves to be quoted as a curiosity. From this translation [Luther's], and from the 'Latin Vulgate, the English one of Tyndale and Coverdale, published in 1535 or 1536, is avowedly taken ...That of 1537, commonly called Matthew's Bible, from the name of the printer, though in substance the same as Tyndale's, was superintend'ed by Rogers...' (Introd. to Lit. 1. 373.) It is impossible that he could have examined any one of the books p. 2 See above, p. 26. p. 148. Answer to Sir T. More, III. Prologue to St Matthew, 1. ing the assurance that Tyndale rendered the Greek text directly while still he consulted the Vulgate, the Latin translation of Erasmus, and the German of Luther. Thus taking a chapter at random we find in Eph. iv. the following certain traces of the peculiarities of the Greek which are lost in the Vulgate and the translations made from it. 2 in...longsuffering, forbearing one another...cum patientia supportantes...with patience supporting each other... (Wycliffe, Rheims). 4 even as...sicut...as (Wycliffe, Rheims). 8 and hath given...dedit...he gave... (Wycliffe, Rheims). 27 backbiter...diabolo...the devil (Wycliffe, Rheims). but that which is good to edify withal when need And so again Tyndale's rendering of vv. 5, 12, 14, 22 might come from the Greek but hardly from the Latin. On the other hand it is evident that he had the Vulgate before him, and that he owed to it the rendering 'blindness of their hearts' (cæcitatem), which has wrongly retained its place in the authorised version. From Luther the same chapter differs in the entire complexion of the rendering and unequivocally in the interpretation of the following passages: 5 Let there be but one Lord... Ein Herr... 13 Till we every one, in the unity of faith...grow up unto a perfect man...bis dass wir alle hinan kom Chap. iii. History. Chap. iii. The Vulgate, Eph. ii. 13 22. men zu einerlei glauben...und ein vollkommener Mann werden... 21 as the truth is in Jesus......wie in Jesu ein rechtschaffenes Wesen ist. 24 in righteousness and true holiness...in rechtschaffener Gerechtigkeit und Heiligkeit... A continuous passage will place the substantial independence of Tyndale in a still clearer light'. VULGATE. 14 Ipse enim est. pax nostra, qui fecit utraque unum, et medium parietem maceriæ solvens, 15 inimicitias in carne sua, legem mandatorum 16 ut duos condat TYNDALE (1525). 13 But now in Christ Jesu ye which a while ago were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ. 14 For he is our peace which hath made of both one, and hath broken down the wall in the midst that was a stop between us, 15 and hath also put away through his flesh the cause of hatred, that is to say, the law of commandments contained in the law written, 16 for to make of LUTHER. 13 Nun aber die ihr in Christo Jesu seyd und weiland ferne gewesen, seyd nun nahe geworden durch das Blut Christi. 14 Denn er ist unser Friede, der aus beiden Eines hat gemacht, und hat abgebrochen den Zaun der dazwi schen war, 15 in dem dass er durch sein Fleisch wegnahm die Feindschaft; nemlich das Gesetz, so in Geboten gestellet war, 16 auf dass er aus 1 The Italics in Tyndale mark of 1525 and 1534 is the omission in what is preserved in the Authorised the latter of the words in the midst Version. The only difference which in v. 14. I have observed between the editions |