RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Bible Versions
" He took on him the nature of angels " (correct reading " he took not "); another (Edinburgh, 1816) has Luke vi 99 " Forbid [not] to take thy coat also "; and a London Bible 'of 1817 reads, John xvii, 25, " O righteous Father, the world hath [not] known thee." On the other hand an Edinburgh edition of 1761 makes the Psalmist's prayer (cxix 35) " Make me not to go in the path of thy commandments." The errors of an Oxford Bible of 1804 include Num. xxxv, 18, " The murderer shall surely be put together " (for " to death "), I Kings viii, 19, " out of thy lions [loins]," and, Gal, v, 17, " For the flesh lusteth after [against] the Spirit." A Cambridge Bible of 1819 reads in Mai iv, 2, " shall the son [sun] of righteousness arise . . . and shall [for ye shall] go forth." An Oxford Bible of 1820 ha« Isa. lxvi, 9, " Shall I bring to the birth and not cease [cause] to bring- forth? " A Cambridge Bible of 1826 has " heart " for " hart " in Ps. xlii, 1, and the error was repeated in an edition of 1830. A Bible printed at Utica, N. Y., in 1829 begins Jas. v, 17, " Elias was a man possible like unto us " ("subject to like passions as we are "). One of Jesper Harding's early editions, published at Philadelphia, has in I Kings i, 21, " The king shall dagger sleep with his fathers " (the copy read " The king shall t sleep with his fathers "). A Bible published at Hartford in 1837 makes II Tim. iii, 16, read, " All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable . . for destruction [instruction] in righteousness." An edition printed for the American Bible Society in 1855 has in Mark v, 3, " Who had his dwelling among the lambs [tombs]." The Great Bible in 1539 introduced the mistranslation " fold " for "flock" in John x, 16, and it was not corrected till the Revised Version. Some of the renderings in the early versions are extremely quaint. In Gen. xxxix, 2, Tyndale has, " And the Lord was with Joseph and he was a lucky fellow," and in Matt, vi, 7, " When ye pray, babble not much." Coverdale renders Judges xv, 9, " Then God opened a gome tooth in the cheke bone so the water went out," and I Kings xxii, 34, " Shott the King of Israel between the mawe and the lunges."
English-speaking Jews have used freely the Authorized Version, also, since its appearance in 1885, the revised Old Testament. The Jewish School and Family Bible (4 parts, London, 1851-61) has a new translation by A. Benisch, and The Jewish Family Bible (London, 1884) has a revision of the Authorized Version by M. Friedlander; the latter was sanctioned by the chief rabbi of the British Jews. Isaac Leeser, a pioneer Jewish rabbi and founder of the Jewish press in America, published a translation of the complete Old Testament at Philadelphia in 1854, giving practically new versions of the Prophets, Psalms, and Job and following the Authorized Version in other parts. In 189S the Jewish Publication Society of America (Philadelphia) took in hand the preparation of a complete revision, with M. Jastrow, Sr., as editor-in-chief and K. Kohler and F. de Sola Mendes as associate editors. In 1905 Dr. Kohler's translation of the Psalms was issued (cf. the JE, iii, 194-195).
Bibliography: The most complete view of the literature on the subject is given in S. G. Ayres and C. F. Sitterly, The History of the Eng. Bible, New York, 1898 (a bibliography almost exhaustive, arranged in rubrics). The most complete account up to the time of its publication is J. Eadie, The Eng. Bible, an External and Critical Hist, of Eng. Translations, 2 vols., London, 1876. The most recent, and worthy of confidence, is H. W Hoare, Evolution of the English Bible . 1882-1885, London, 1902 (exceedingly handy). Consult further: T. J. Conant, Popular History of the Translation of the Holy Scriptures into the Eng. Tongue, New York, n.d.; The English Hexapla, published by Bagster, London, n.d., has a valuable preface; The Bible of Every Land, pp. 189-205, ib. 1861 (contains specimen paragraphs from several versions); C. Anderson, Annals of the Eng. Bible, new ed. by H. Anderson, ib. 1862; Anglo-American Bible Revision, by Members of the American Revision Committee, New York, 1879; J. Stoughton, Our Eng. Bible, its Translations and Iranslatcrs, London, 1879; B. Condit, Hist, of the Eng. BMe, New York, 1882; W F. Moulton, Hist, of the Eng. «,London, 1882; B. F. Westcott and F. J. A. Hort, 1 he New Testament in the Original Greek, vol. ii, Introduction and Appendix, London, 1881, New York, 1882; J. I. Mombert, Handbook of the Eng. Versions, London, 1907 (valuable); A. S. Cook, The Bible and Eng. Prose Style, ■Boston, 1892; idem, Biblical Quotations in Old Eng. Prose
Writers . . Introduction on Old Eng. Versions, New York, 1904 (the work of a master, minute and exact); J. Wright, Early Bibles of America, ib. 1892 (on printed editions); R. Lovett, Printed Eng. Bibles 1525-1885, ib. 1894; T. H. Pattison, Hist, of the Eng. Bible, ib. 1894; G. Milligan, The Eng. Bible, a Sketch of its Hist, Edinburgh, 1895; P. Schaff, Companion to the Greek Testament and the Eng. Version, 4th ed., New York, 1896 (deals with the A. V and R. V.); J. W. Beardslee, Bible among the Nations; Study of the great Translators, ib. 1899; G. L. Owen, Notes on the Hist, and Text of our Early Eng. Bible, London, 1901; E. H. Foley, The Language of the Northumbrian Gloss to the Gospel of St. Matthew, New York, 1903; R. Demans, W Tindale: A Biography. Being a Contribution to the Early History of the English Bible, London, 1904; Anna C. Paues, Fourteenth Century Eng. Version A. Prologue and Parts of the N. T now first edited from the MSS., London, 1904; B. F. Westcott, General View of the Hist, of the Eng. Bible, ib. 1905 (the latest ed. of Bishop Westcott's scholarly work); J. R. Slater, The Sources of Tyndale' s Version of the Pentateuch, Chicago, 1906; S. Hemphill, Hist, of the R. V of the N. T., London, 1906; I. M. Price, Ancestry of our Eng. Bible, Philadelphia, 1907. The Gospels in West Saxon, ed. J. W. Bright, are appearing in Boston, Matthew, 1904, Mark, 1905, Luke, 1906, cf. The Gospels, Gothic, Anglo-Saxon, Wycliffe, and Tyndale Versions, London, 1907.
V. Finnish and Lappish Versions : Although Swedish was formerly the principal language of Finland, which remained a Swedish province till the year 1809, during the period of the Reformation the land acquired a Finnish ecclesiastical language. A young Finn, Michael Agricola (see Finland, § 2) became acquainted with Luther at Wittenberg. Having returned to his native land in 1539, he began to translate religious books into Finnish. His translation of the New Testament was published first in 154S; the Psalms and some of the Prophetical books in 1551-52. In 1642 the entire Bible in Finnish by E. Petraeus, M. Stadius, H. Hofman, and G. Favorin was published in Stockholm, Finland having at that time no printing establishment. There were new editions in 1683-85 by H. Florinus, and in 1758 by A. Litzelius; a new translation by A. V Ingman appeared in 1859.
The Lappish and Finnish languages are cognates, the former having several dialects. The Lapps (q.v.) were nominally Christians early in the Middle Ages, but had little real knowledge of Christianity. Thomas von Westen (q.v.) did much for Christian instruction among them during the years 1714-23. Some Christian works were published in Lappish; parts of the Bible were translated and sent to Copenhagen, where they were destroyed by a fire. The Norwegian Bible Society having resolved in 1821 to publish a Lappish translation of the Bible, Provost Kildahl offered his services in 1822 in conjunction with a teacher named Gundersen. Kildahl died the same year, but the work was continued by Gundersen and later by Niels Stockfleth. The first two Gospels were printed in 1838, and the complete New Testament in 1840 (new eds. 1850 and, revised, 1874). Stockfleth translated also parts of the Pentateuch (1840), and the Psalms (1854). A Lapp, Lars Hatta, translated the whole Old Testament, which, after being revised by Prof. J. A. Friis and Seminary-Director Quigstad in Tromso, was printed in 1875. All these are in the Norwegian-Lapp dialect.
In the Swedish-Lapp dialect a handbook containing the lessons from the Gospels and the Epistles for
Bible Versions