Addresses on the Revised Version of Holy Scripture Part 5

{10c} On July 22, 1856, Mr. Heywood, one of the members, I think, for North Lancas.h.i.+re, in rather an interesting speech, moved for an Address to the Crown to issue a Royal Commission on the subject. The motion was rejected, Sir George Grey expressing his conviction that the feeling of the country was not in accordance with the motion.

{12} Preface to the Revision of the Authorised Version of the Gospel according to St. John by Five Clergymen, p. xii. As I remark afterwards, this preface proved to be very attractive, and by its moderation greatly helped the cause. The book has long since gone out of print, but if any reader of this note should come across it, this preface will be found well worth reading, as it will show what was in the minds of many beside the Five Clergymen five and forty years ago.

{13} See Schaff, _Companion to Greek Testament and English version_, p.

367, note (New York, 1883).

{21} The _Expositor_ for October, 1892, pp. 241-255. The article was answered by me in the same periodical two months later.

{22} The account of the discussion in the Convocation of York (Feb. 23, 1870) will be found in _The Guardian_ of March 2, 1870. In the comments of this paper on the action or rather inaction of the Northern Convocation a very unfavourable opinion was expressed, in reference to the manner in which the Southern Convocation had been treated. But these things have long since been forgotten.

{35} It may be interesting to give this list, as it slightly affects matter that will be alluded to afterwards in reference to the Greek text.

The attendances were as follows: The Chairman, 405; Dr. Scrivener, 399; Prebendary Humphry, 385; Princ.i.p.al Newth, 373; Prof. Hort, 362; Dean Bickersteth (Prolocutor), 352; Dean Scott, 337; Prof. Westcott, 304; Dean Vaughan, 302; Dean Blakesley, 297; Bishop Lightfoot, 290; Archdeacon Lee, 283; Dr. Moulton, 275; Archdeacon Palmer, 255; Dean Stanley, 253; Dr.

Vance Smith, 245; Princ.i.p.al Brown, 209; Princ.i.p.al Angus, 199; Prof.

Milligan, 182; Prof. Kennedy, 165; Dr. Eadie, 135; Bishop Moberly, 121; Bishop Wordsworth (St. Andrews), 109; Dr. Roberts, 94; Archbishop Trench, 63; Dean Merivale (resigned early), 19; Dean Alford (died soon after commencement), 16; Bishop Wilberforce, 1.

{36} This letter will be found in a very valuable _Historical Account of the Work of the American Committee of Revision_ (New York, 1885), p. 30.

This _Historical Account_ was prepared by a special Committee appointed for the purpose in May, 1884, and was based on doc.u.ments and papers arranged with great care by Dr. Philip Schaff, the President of the American Committee, and printed privately. These two volumes, the _Historical Account_ and the _Doc.u.mentary History_, contain the fullest details of the whole transactions between the American Committee and the English Companies and also the University Presses.

{41} Talbot W. Chambers, _Companion to the Revised Old Testament_ (Funk and Wagnalls, New York and London, 1885), Preface, p. ix.

{42a} A full account of the negotiation and copies of the letters which pa.s.sed between the American Revisers and our own Revisers will be found in Part 2, p. 81 sqq. of the _Doc.u.mentary History_, above referred to in the note at p. 36.

{42b} A full account of this agreement and copies of the correspondence with the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge will be found in Part 3, p.

91 sqq. of the _Doc.u.mentary History_.

{44} Since the above was written, information reaches me that an _American Standard Revision of the Bible_ either just has been, or shortly will be, published, which though not simply an incorporation of the recorded American preferences, as long specified in our copies of the Revision, is a publication resting on authority, and likely to put a stop to what is unauthorised. As the reader may like to know a little about this _American Standard Revision of the Bible_, I will, at the risk of a long note, mention what I have ascertained up to the present time. The survivors of the Old Testament Company (Dr. Osgood and others) with the three surviving members of the New Testament Company (Dr. Dwight, Dr.

Riddle, and Dr. Thayer--very powerful helpers) have co-operated in bringing out a new edition of the Revision as it has been hitherto current in America. It will contain about _twice as many_ deviations from the English Revised Version as appear in the original Appendices; but, in regard of them, the survivors give this important a.s.surance, that "the survivors have not felt at liberty to make new changes of moment which were not favourably pa.s.sed upon (_sic_) by their a.s.sociates, at one stage or another of the original preparation of the work." They specify that the original Appendix was prepared in haste and did not, in a satisfactory manner, express the real views of the Committee. They claim to have drawn up a body of improved marginal references, to have wholly removed archaisms, to have supplied running headings, to have modified what they consider unwieldy paragraphs, to have lightened what they regard as clumsy punctuation, and by typographical arrangements, such as by leaving a line blank, to have indicated the main transitions of thought in the Epistles and Apocalypse. These and other characteristics will be found specified in the American _Sunday School Times_ for August 11, 1901, in an article apparently derived from those interested. Till we see the book we must suspend our judgement.

{50} See an article by Rev. J. F. Thrupp in Smith's _Dictionary of the Bible_, vol. ii. art. Old Testament.

{53} Since the above was written a critical edition of the four Pes.h.i.+tto Gospels has been published by the Oxford University Press, based on the labours of the late Philip Edward Pusey, and Rev. G. H. Gwilliam, of Hertford College.

{55} The t.i.tle of the pamphlet, which contains twelve letters from distinguished German Professors, with translations, is _The Revision of the Old Testament_ (New York, Scribner's Sons, 1886).

{59} The t.i.tle of Dr. Salmon's interesting volume is _Some Thoughts on the Textual Criticism of the New Testament_ (Murray, London, 1897).

{60a} Salmon, p. 157.

{60b} Ibid., p. 12.

{96} See below, pp. 98, 120.

{97} See the Preface to Dr. Rutherford's _Translation of the Epistle to the Romans_, p. xi sq. (Lond. 1900).

{98a} Hodder & Stoughton (Lond. 1897).

{98b} Page 18.

{106} See page 32.

{109} _Bible Studies_, by Dr. G. Adolf Deissmann, Authorised Translation (Clark, Edinburgh, 1901).

{110a} Page 175.

{110b} London, Macmillan, 1898.

{111} _Theologische Literaturzeitung_, xix (vol. for 1894), p. 338.

{112} _Bible Studies_, p. 84 Transl. See, however, the translator's note, p. 173, where the use of the term is explained.

{114} _Grammar of New Testament Greek_, section 38. 5, p. 118 (Transl.).

{122} See _Chronicle of Convocation_ for February 10, 1899, p. 71 sqq.

{123} At the May Meeting of the present year.