Posted on 09/09/2014 7:52:23 AM PDT by RoosterRedux
In 1611, the new British state headed by King James I issued its translation of the complete Bible, "newly translated out of the original tongues, and with the former translations diligently compared and revised. By His Majesty's special command. Appointed to be read in churches." The book gave English-speaking Christians a common standard through which they could express their faith. Soon, the spread of printing technology meant that this translation above all became the definitive Bible that believers kept in their houses, and before too long, carried in their pockets.
*snip*
Even thinkers not sympathetic to the Bible's message still praise its language. Famous skeptic H. L. Mencken found in the King James "a mine of lordly and incomparable poetry, at once the most stirring and the most touching ever heard of."
*snip*
No serious study of literature in English can neglect the impact of the 1611 Bible, and that is equally true for any century from the 17th through the 20th. All the great canonical authors are immersed in that Bible, even (or especially) those who reject its fundamental religious message. To put it ironically, the Bible they reject is the 1611 version, which created the literary air we breathe. The King James language informs and inspires American literature, from Herman Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne through Ernest Hemingway and William Faulkner. It has its special power in African American tradition, from Frederick Douglass through Alice Walker.
(Excerpt) Read more at baylor.edu ...
I prefer actual history, not propaganda, thanks.
And don't you dare label what the Albigense's did "heresy."
Are we talking about the same people? The folks in southern France who taught that matter was evil, that childbirth was evil, and an acceptable way to exit this life was by ritual suicide?
You think they "loved God as the scriptures call for"?? Seriously?
... most of which refers to prohibitions on unapproved translations, and none of which documents any application of the death penalty to anyone for merely possessing a vernacular Bible.
It shows that getting approval of a vernacular translation required one to be well connected, and to sometimes need the express permission of the Pope. I doubt many shopkeepers in London could get that.
Face it: the Catholic Church, as a matter of policy, did not want vernacular translations in the hands of commoners. They were OK in the hands of a few select rich people, but they argued that commoners were too low and too vulgar to understand the Word of God.
Here are some of Tyndale’s arguments against the Catholic Church, citing what he was told by the Catholic Church:
” This was commanded generally unto all men. How cometh it that God’s word pertaineth less unto us, than unto them? Yea, how cometh it, that our Moseses forbid us, and command us the contrary; and threaten us if we do, and will not that we once speak of God’s word? How can we whet God’s word (that is, to put it in practice, use and exercise) upon our children and household, when we are violently kept from it and know it not? How can we (as Peter commandeth) give a reason of our hope; when we wot not what it is that God hath promised, or what to hope? Moses also commandeth in the said chapter, if the son ask what the testimonies, laws, and observances of the Lord mean, that the father teach him. If our children ask what our ceremonies (which are more than the Jews’ were) mean; no father can tell his son. And in the eleventh chapter he repeateth all again, for fear of forgetting.
They will say haply, the scripture requireth a pure mind and a quiet mind; and therefore the lay-man, because he is altogether cumbered with worldly business, cannot understand them. If that be the cause, then it is a plain case that our prelates understand not the scriptures themselves: for no layman is so tangled with worldly business as they are. The great things of the world are ministered by them; neither do the lay-people any great thing, but at their assignment. ‘If the scripture were in the mother tongue,’ they will say, ‘then would the lay-people understand it, every man after his own ways.’ Wherefore serveth the curate, but to teach him the right way? Wherefore were the holy days made, but that the people should come and learn? Are ye not abominable schoolmasters, in that ye take so great wages, if ye will not teach?
If ye would teach, how could ye do it so well, and with so great profit, as when the lay-people have the scripture before them in their mother tongue? For then should they see, by the order of the text, whether thou jugglest or not: and then would they believe it, because it is the scripture of God, though thy living be never so abominable. Where now, because your living and your preaching are so contrary, and because they grope out in every sermon your open and manifest lies, and smell your unsatiable covetousness, they believe you not when you preach truth. But, alas! the curates themselves (for the most part) wot no more what the new or old Testament meaneth, than do the Turks: neither know they of any more than that they read at mass, matins, and evensong, which yet they understand not: neither care they, but even to mumble up so much every day, as the pie and popinjay speak, they wot not what, to fill their bellies withal. If they will not let the lay-man have the word of God in his mother tongue, yet let the priests have it; which for a great part of them do understand no Latin at all, but sing, and say, and patter all day, with the lips only, that which the heart understandeth not.
Christ commandeth to search the scriptures. John 5. Though that miracles bare record unto his doctrine, yet desired he no faith to be given either to his doctrine, or to his miracles, without record of the scripture.
When Paul preached, Acts 17 the other searched the scriptures daily, whether they were as he alleged them. Why shall not I likewise see, whether it be the scripture that thou allegest? Yea, why shall I not see the scripture, and the circumstances, and what goeth before and after; that I may know whether thine interpretation be the right sense, or whether thou jugglest, and drawest the scripture violently unto thy carnal and fleshly purpose; or whether thou be about to teach me, or to deceive me?
Christ saith, that there shall come false prophets in his name, and say that they themselves are Christ; that is, they shall so preach Christ that men must believe in them, in their holiness, and things of their imagination, without God’s word: yea, and that Against-Christ, or Antichrist, that shall come, is nothing but such false prophets, that shall juggle with the scripture, and beguile the people with false interpretations, as all the false prophets, scribes, and Pharisees did in the old testament. How shall I know whether ye are that Against-Christ, or false prophets, or no, seeing ye will not let me see how ye allege the scriptures? Christ saith, “By their deeds ye shall know them.” Now when we look on your deeds, we see that ye are all sworn together, and have separated yourselves from the lay-people, and have a several kingdom among yourselves, and several laws of your own making; wherewith ye violently bind the lay-people, that never consented unto the making of them. A thousand things forbid ye, which Christ made free; and dispense with them again for money: neither is there any exception at all, but lack of money. Ye have a secret council by yourselves.
All other men’s secrets and counsels know yet and no man yours. Ye seek but honor, riches, promotion, authority, and to reign over all, and will obey no man. If the father give you ought of courtesy, ye will compel the son to give it violently, whether he will or not, by craft of your own laws. These deeds are against Christ.
When a whole parish of us hire a schoolmaster to teach our children, what reason is it that we should be compelled to pay this schoolmaster his wages, and he should have license to go where he will, and to dwell in another country, and to leave our children untaught? Doth not the pope so? Have we not given our tithes of courtesy unto one, for to teach us God’s word; and cometh not the pope, and compelleth us to pay it violently, to them that never teach? Maketh he not one parson, which never cometh at us? Yea, one shall have five or six, or as many as he can get, and wotteth oftentimes where never one of them standeth. Another is made vicar, to whom he giveth a dispensation to go where he will, and to set in a parish priest, which can but minister a sort of dumb ceremonies. And he, because he hath most labor and least profit, polleth on his part; and setteth here a mass-penny, there a trental, yonder dirige-money, and for his beadroll, with a confession-penny and such like. And thus are we never taught, and are yet nevertheless compelled; yea, compelled to hire many costly schoolmasters. These deeds are verily against Christ. Shall we therefore judge you by your deeds, as Christ commandeth? So are ye false prophets, and the disciples of Antichrist, or Against-Christ.
The sermons which thou readest in the Acts of the apostles, and all that the apostles preached, were no doubt preached in the mother tongue. Why then might they not be written in the mother tongue? As, if one of us preach a good sermon, why may it not be written? Saint Jerom also translated the bible into his mother tongue: why may not we also? They will say it cannot be translated into our tongue, it is so rude. It is not so rude as they are false liars.
For the Greek tongue agreeth more with the English than with the Latin. And the properties of the Hebrew tongue agreeth a thousand times more with the English than with the Latin. The manner of speaking is both one; so that in a thousand places thou needest not but to translate it into the English, word for word; when thou must seek a compass in the Latin, and yet shall have much work to translate it well-favoredly, so that it have the same grace and sweetness, sense and pure understanding with it in the Latin, and as it hath in the Hebrew. A thousand parts better may it be translated into the English, than into the Latin. Yea, and except my memory fail me, and that I have forgotten what I read when I was a child, thou shalt find in the English chronicle, how that king Adelstone caused the holy scripture to be translated into the tongue that then was in England, and how the prelates exhorted him thereto...In so great diversity of spirits, how shall I know who lieth, and who sayeth truth? Whereby shall I try and judge them?
Verily by God’s word, which only is true. But how shall I that do, when thou wilt not let me see scripture?
Nay, say they, the scripture is so hard, that thou couldst never understand it but by the doctors. That is, I must measure the meteyard by the cloth.
Here be twenty cloths of divers lengths and of divers breadths: how shall I be sure of the length of the meteyard by them? I suppose, rather, I must be first sure of the length of the meteyard, and thereby measure and judge of the cloths. If I must first believe the doctor, then is the doctor first true, and the truth of the scripture dependeth of his truth; and so the truth of God springeth of the truth of man. Thus antichrist turneth the roots of the trees upward. What is the cause that we damn some of Origen’s works, and allow some? How know we that some is heresy and some not? By the scripture, I trow.
How know we that St Augustine (which is the best, or one of the best, that ever wrote upon the scripture) wrote many things amiss at the beginning, as many other doctors do? Verily, by the scriptures; as he himself well perceived afterward, when he looked more diligently upon them, and revoked many things again. He wrote of many things which he understood not when he was newly converted, ere he had thoroughly seen the scriptures; and followed the opinions of Plato, and the common persuasions of man’s wisdom that were then famous.
They will say yet more shamefully, that no man can understand the scriptures without philautia , that is to say, philosophy. A man must be first well seen in Aristotle, ere he can understand the scripture, say they.
Aristotle’s doctrine is, that the world was without beginning, and shall be without end; and that the first man never was, and the last shall never be; and that God doth all of necessity, neither careth what we do, neither will ask any accounts of that we do. Without this doctrine, how could we understand the scripture, that saith, God created the world of nought; and God worketh all things of his free will, and for a secret purpose; and that we shall all rise again, and that God will have accounts of all that we have done in this life! Aristotle saith, Give a man a law, and he hath power of himself to do or fulfill the law, and becometh righteous with working righteously. But Paul, and all the scripture saith, That the law doth but utter sin only, and helpeth not: neither hath any man power to do the law, till the Spirit of God be given him through faith in Christ.
Is it not a madness then to say, that we could not understand the scripture without Aristotle? Aristotle’s righteousness, and all his virtues, spring of man’s free will. And a Turk, and every infidel and idolater, may be righteous and virtuous with that righteousness and those virtues. Moreover, Aristotle’s felicity and blessedness standeth in avoiding of all tribulations; and in riches, health, honor, worship, friends, and authority; which felicity pleaseth our spiritualty well. Now, without these, and a thousand such like points, couldst thou not understand scripture, which saith, That righteousness cometh by Christ, and not of man’s will; and how that virtues are the fruits and the gift of God’s Spirit; and that Christ blesseth us in tribulations, persecution, and adversity! How, I say, couldst thou understand the scripture without philosophy, inasmuch as Paul, in the second to the Colossians, warned them to ‘beware lest any man should spoil them’ (that is to say, rob them of their faith in Christ) ‘through philosophy and deceitful vanities, and through the traditions of men, and ordinances after the world, and not after Christ?’
By this means, then, thou wilt that no man teach another; but that every man take the scripture, and learn by himself. Nay, verily, so say I not.
Nevertheless, seeing that ye will not teach, if any man thirst for the truth, and read the scripture by himself, desiring God to open the door of knowledge unto him, God for his truth’s sake will and must teach him...
But now do ye clean contrary: ye drive them from God’s word, and will let no man come thereto, until he have been two years master of art. First, they nosel them in sophistry, and in benefundatum . And there corrupt they their judgments with apparent arguments, and with alleging unto them texts of logic, of natural philautia , of metaphysic, and moral philosophy, and of all manner books of Aristotle, and of all manner doctors which they yet never saw...
When they have thiswise brawled eight, ten, or twelve or more years, and after that their judgments are utterly corrupt, then they begin their divinity; not at the scripture, but every man taketh a sundry doctor; which doctors are as sundry and as divers, the one contrary unto the other, as there are divers fashions and monstrous shapes, none like another, among our sects of religion. Every religion, every university, and almost every man, hath a sundry divinity...Man’s wisdom is plain idolatry: neither is there any other idolatry than to imagine of God after man’s wisdom. God is not man’s imagination; but that only which he saith of himself. God is nothing but his law and his promises; that is to say, that which he biddeth thee to do, and that which he biddeth thee believe and hope. God is but his word, as Christ saith, John 8 “I am that I say unto you;” that is to say, That which I preach am I; my words are spirit and life.
God is that only which he testifieth of himself; and to imagine any other thing of God than that, is damnable idolatry. Therefore saith the hundred and eighteenth psalm, “Happy are they which search the testimonies of the Lord;” that is to say, that which God testifieth and witnesseth unto us.
But how shall I that do, when ye will not let me have his testimonies, or witnesses, in a tongue which I understand? Will ye resist God? Will ye forbid him to give his Spirit unto the lay as well as unto you? Hath he not made the English tongue? Why forbid ye him to speak in the English tongue then, as well as in the Latin?
Finally, that this threatening and forbidding the lay people to read the scripture is not for the love of your souls (which they care for as the fox doth for the geese), is evident, and clearer than the sun; inasmuch as they permit and suffer you to read Robin Hood, and Bevis of Hampton, Hercules, Hector and Troilus, with a thousand histories and fables of love and wantonness, and of ribaldry, as filthy as heart can think, to corrupt the minds of youth withal, clean contrary to the doctrine of Christ and of his apostles: for Paul saith, “See that fornication, and all uncleanness, or covetousness, be not once named among you, as it becometh saints; neither filthiness, neither foolish talking nor jesting, which are not comely: for this ye know, that no whoremonger, either unclean person, or covetous person, which is the worshipper of images, hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.” And after saith he, “Through such things cometh the wrath of God upon the children of unbelief.” Now seeing they permit you freely to read those things which corrupt your minds and rob you of the kingdom of God and Christ, and bring the wrath of God upon you, how is this forbidding for love of your souls?”
http://www.godrules.net/library/tyndale/19tyndale7.htm
How would they know it was inaccurate?
“And yes, ADDING the word “alone” to Saint Paul IS a big, big deal.”
Not if you are translating into GERMAN, as Luther explained back in 1530:
“I know very well that in Romans 3 the word solum is not in the Greek or Latin text — the papists did not have to teach me that. It is fact that the letters s-o-l-a are not there. And these blockheads stare at them like cows at a new gate, while at the same time they do not recognize that it conveys the sense of the text — if the translation is to be clear and vigorous [klar und gewaltiglich], it belongs there. I wanted to speak German, not Latin or Greek, since it was German I had set about to speak in the translation. But it is the nature of our language that in speaking about two things, one which is affirmed, the other denied, we use the word allein [only] along with the word nicht [not] or kein [no]. For example, we say “the farmer brings allein grain and kein money”; or “No, I really have nicht money, but allein grain”; I have allein eaten and nicht yet drunk”; “Did you write it allein and nicht read it over?” There are countless cases like this in daily usage.
In all these phrases, this is a German usage, even though it is not the Latin or Greek usage. It is the nature of the German language to add allein in order that nicht or kein may be clearer and more complete. To be sure, I can also say, “The farmer brings grain and kein money,” but the words “kein money” do not sound as full and clear as if I were to say, “the farmer brings allein grain and kein money.” Here the word allein helps the word kein so much that it becomes a completely clear German expression. We do not have to ask the literal Latin how we are to speak German, as these donkeys do. Rather we must ask the mother in the home, the children on the street, the common man in the marketplace. We must be guided by their language, by the way they speak, and do our translating accordingly. Then they will understand it and recognize that we are speaking German to them.
For instance, Christ says: Ex abundatia cordis os loquitur. If I am to follow these donkeys, they will lay the original before me literally and translate it thus: “Aus dem uberfluss des hertzen redet der mund” [out of the excessiveness of the heart the mouth speaks]. Tell me, is that speaking German? What German could understand something like that? What is “the excessiveness of the heart”? No German can say that; unless, perhaps, he was trying to say that someone was altogether too generous, or too courageous, though even that would not yet be correct. “Excessiveness of the heart” is no more German than “excessiveness of the house, “excessiveness of the stove” or “excessiveness of the bench.” But the mother in the home and the common man say this: “Wes das hertz vol ist, des gehet der mund über” [What fills the heart overflows the mouth]. That is speaking good German of the kind I have tried for, although unfortunately not always successfully. The literal Latin is a great obstacle to speaking good German.”
http://www.bible-researcher.com/luther01.html
“By that reasoning, a Jehovah Witness New World Translation would be better than none at all.”
The Jehovah Witnesses deliberately distorted the translation to teach theology that the text did not teach, as did the D-R. When the D-R translates ‘repent’ as ‘do penance’, it is deliberately distorting the Word of God to insert its theology where the text does not support it.
When both the D-R and KJV insert “bishop” for a word that does not mean bishop, they did so deliberately to create a Hgh Church organization where it was not found in the text.
This is quite unlike Tyndale, or the New American Standard or the English Standard versions, which translated the text.
“I’d rather have a vulgate and learn the Latin.”
Sad, but I believe you would. The actual text of the Word of God is challenging for Catholic theology.
Luther’s insults don’t change the fact that he added a word that wasn’t there. St. John’s Apocalypse, I understand, is not well rendered in the Greek, but it is better rendered translating it from out Greek manuscripts into Aramaic. In the likely event that a translator was employed, (even John himself), accuracy was more important than linguistic effect.
I had not read the cites from Luther you provided, but it is consistent with the worst I had read of the man. I’d rather read the Word of God unfiltered through such a vain petty man.
“Luther’s insults don’t change the fact that he added a word that wasn’t there.”
He added it to make the sentence GOOD GERMAN. When you translate, you always change it some because you are changing languages. If you seek what is now called “dynamic equivalence”, then you add and subtract more, because you are trying to translate the thought instead of just the words.
A word for word translation isn’t generally considered very readable, certainly not for longer passages. For example:
“14 `And as Moses did lift up the serpent in the wilderness, so it behoveth the Son of Man to be lifted up,
15 that every one who is believing in him may not perish, but may have life age-during,
16 for God did so love the world, that His Son — the only begotten — He gave, that every one who is believing in him may not perish, but may have life age-during.
17 For God did not send His Son to the world that he may judge the world, but that the world may be saved through him;
18 he who is believing in him is not judged, but he who is not believing hath been judged already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.”
While reasonably literal, it is not truly literal - and yet it is awkward to read in English. As a study tool, it is great. As a devotional bible, it is lacking.
“I had not read the cites from Luther you provided, but it is consistent with the worst I had read of the man.”
I gather, then, you haven’t bothered to read Sir Thomas More either. It was the style of the day, regardless of which side one supports. If you think the Catholics of the day dripped with politeness, you would be sadly mistaken.
James Swan also had a written debate with a Roman Catholic on Luther's use of the word "alone." That can be found here.
You mean as long as he could and did obtain the special permission required.
See parallel debate here. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/3201983/posts?page=192
In your numerous cites of Catholic writers, it is not that they are “correcting” the vulgate, they are emphasizing the works are not sufficient. Certainly Bellarmine was no Lutheran, and to pretend that he is buying into Luther’s bad translation is disingenuous. If you are going to open up your book (on my word, I have only used my head for my major points), then this discussion will unravel, as St. Thomas has a great deal to write about justification, and to take a phrase out of such a discussion is a parlour trick.
The word isn’t in there. Luther added it. If it were just to make for better German, Germans wouldn’t have to lean on it for a radically different theology. Scads of literate Germans read the Latin, and didn’t come up with Luther’s version.
Every year, when the reading turns to 2nd Corinthians, and the term “bowels” is used in a way unfamiliar to most modern Americans, our priest explains what is meant. That is preferred to changing the word to something that might be more in tune with modern idiom, but NOT what God inspired the Sacred writer to write.
I agree. The KJV was instrumental in the actual development of the English language and was one of the primary resources brought to this country that made us an English speaking nation.
Hey, weren't you just advising, Everyone needs to check the facts.??? I hope you realize that Luther had NOTHING to do with the KJV. His was a GERMAN translation of Greek and Hebrew texts done nearly a century BEFORE the KJV. And, as with ALL translations, some words can be and some cannot be brought over word for word. So, even that part of your post was without facts.
Is this a "we hate Luther" week? "Cuz it sure seemed that y'all liked him last week when he talked about Mary.
Me, too! ;o)
The spring has sprung,
The grass is ris.
I wonder where the boidies is?
The boid am on the wing.
But that's absoid.
I always thought the wing was on the boid!
I remember it from grade school. ;o)
Ping
My point was not that all these other writers subscribed to sola fide (nor that that excludes the necessity of a faith that will effects work), or that the word was there, any more than many other words are not actually in the Greek when translators add them in conveying what they see as the meaning, but simply that others saw “alone” as warranted, though i myself oppose such additions here and in general.
The interpretation hinges on whether “works of the law” only refers to those, versus all such systems of justification based upon being actually moral worthy, with the Law being used for if man could be justified by any such system then it would be the Law.
“for if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law.” (Galatians 3:21)
Obviously since Abraham was counted as righteous before the Law, then that in conversion one is justified by faith is what is being taught. Yet as faith without works is dead, so one can be said to be justified by works, as the latter vindicates one as having faith, but not as if his works make him actually holy enough to be with God.
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