The Press.
London, England, 1856-08-23 00:00:00

THE AUTHORISED VERSION OF THE
BIBLE.

A coxraovntsx has arisen during the week upon the
question whether a new version of the Bible be ne•
e.”4sary. 1)r. Cumming declares that King James's
version was, on the whale, admirably executed, and
that there is no occasion whatever for a new version.
Several correspondents to the Tines have protested
against this assertion. A letter signed W. G.
Cookesley says :
The errors of our translation are numerous and impor-
tant. These errors are often of vital importance—e.g ,
several texts in the Epistles of St. Paul speak of the
divinity of our Saviour in the most positive terms, yet the
force and meaning of them is entirely lost in our mis-
translation. And when Dr. Cumming justly urges against
Unitarians and others that their translations favour their
respective tenets, is he not aware that they retaliate and
charge our version, in several passages, with a leaning to
Calvinism? It is not at all surprising that there are
errors in our translation of the New Testament. It would
be much more surprising if there were none, for our vet,
lion is mainly a translation of the Latin Vulgate, which is
itself a very imperfect translation of the original Greek.
The want of a definite article in the Latin language has of
itself been the cause of a large and important class of
mistranslations in the authorised version. And does Dr.
Cumming wish to see an instance of the mischief pro-
duced by the false translation of a single word? Let me
refer him to I Cor., xi. 29, where the word xiitass is
translated damnation." But the Greek word could
hardly have been so translated ; our translators must
have had the Latin word fientnalionen before them. The
false translation of this single word has done more to
hinder the laity from partaking of the sacrament of the
Lord's Supptr than all other causes put together.

Another correspondent, signing himself "An In-
cumbent of the Province of Canterbury," refers to
Dr. Cumming's remarks ol the passage in the
Epistle to the Hebrews, translated by the Roman
Catholic writers "adored the top of his rod," and by
the Protestant writers "worshipped, leaning up,.n
th 3 top of his staff.' The "Incumbent" writes:—
The doctor's exulting comparison of the Romish and
Protestant versions in another passage (Hebrews, xi. 21)
gives an equally astonishing proof of his indifference to
facts notorious to most scholars, at any rate since the
time of Walton. The allusion of the sacred writer is, of
course, to Genesis, xlvii. 31, where it is related that Jacob,
on receiving his son's promise to carry his bones out or
Egypt, "bowed himself upon the bed's head." The aged
pat riarch,like David under similar circumstances (1 Kings,
I. 47 ), gave God thanks in prayer for the fulfilment—for
so his faith made it seem to him—of his deepest desire.
Now. the same Hebrew word, written without the vowel
points, as was formerly customary, means either " a bed "
or " a stick." according as, by supplying them, it becomes
hiniswira or hamisits. The composer of the early Greek
translation, called the Septuagint erroneously, took it fir
the latter, and accordingly rendered the original by
IrF0:111.1;lnetIV 111 Ti fiXiDY T;;; Fu/61".4 44176:d. The Sepias-
glut version, as is well known, almost entirely super-
seded the Hebrew text of the Old Testament until nearly
the middle of the fourth eentnry of the Christian era. Ac-
cmOingly. the quotation from it, carrying the error with it.
was introduced into the Epistle to the Hebrews, and like-
wise—until Jerome's time—into the early Latin versions
both of the Epistle and the l'entateueh. Jerome corrected
it, as Aquila and Symmachus had done before him ; but
the same motives which operate upon Dr. Cumming now,