THE REVISED NEW TESTAMENT FOR TEACHERS.* MANY books will be
written, and much time must pass, before the Revised Version can take its proper and accepted place. Individuals will form their own views, but it will be long before general opinion finally either accepts this in place of the old Version, or retains it for reference only, or demands a new re- vision in its place. Meantime, Professor Newth recalls us to the immediate and practical question. Much of the discussion and criticism now current is based upon the assumption that the Revised Version is set forth for use in place of the old. We do not complain of this. On the contrary, such discussion and criticism are necessary, in view of the ultimate decision of the question. But for the present, at all events, this is not the practical question. If we were asked at once to admit a great change in the Lord's Prayer, as we use it in private and public devotion, we might well hesitate. If we were called upon to decide whether Dr. Vance Smith is right in protesting against the translation of Treirtece. by a word implying personality, most of us would have to wait some time for the united judgment of scholars and divines. So in regard to less important, yet far from insignificant points ; the frequent changes in diction are, by some, said to be often unnecessary and occasionally misleading ; and this controversy also must be settled, before the public can form a final judgment. Bat penciente We, we can make that use of the book for which it is, at least immediately, intended,—that is to say, as the deliberate judgment of a considerable number of first-rate scholars, pro- posing, not to supplant, but to supplement and illustrate the words to which we are accustomed.
Professor Newth, therefore, wisely addresses himself to the
* Lecturer on Bale Revision, By Samuel Newth. London : Dodder and Stougliton. 1881.
class which is more especially concerned with this provisional use of the Revised Version. The great mass of Bible-readers are not likely to study the new edition, unless or until they are per. suaded to substitute it for the old. Many of them will buy and look at it, but they will hardly go much further at present Professed students of Biblical literature will, of course, give its their best attention ; but of them we need not now speak. Be- tween these two classes there is a third, those, namely, who without leisure or knowledge for much Biblical learning, under- take to explain and enforce the practical teaching of the Bible. This class includes many clergymen and ministers of religion, to whom it is no reproach that their active lives exclude the leisure and labour required by Biblical students. Besides these, there are the "Sunday-school and Bible-class teachers, and such others as from any cause may be unable to consult many books or to read lengthened treatises," for whom Professor Newth'a work is "especially intended." It is these who will receive most immediate benefit from the Revised Version, and through them wider and juster ideas of the Bible ought to reach the larger class, who can scarcely make much use for themselves of the new edition. They may fairly be expected to take the accustomed volume in the right hand, and the Revised Version in the left. A constant comparison of the two can hardly fail to enlarge their teaching, to give more life and interest to their discourses,. and to keep them from unqualified assertion on some points. where the "vanity of dogmatising " is most evident.
Professor Newth's volume is a handbook, intended to aid in an intelligent use of the Revised Version. Himself one of the Company of Revisers, he does not satisfy mere curiosity about the proceedings in the Jerusalem Chamber. Dr.. Vance Smith has explained, in the current number of the
Nineteenth Century, that any such revelations would be
breach of faith. But our author's object is not to tell us what were the divisions in the Company, and what sides were taken by the different divines, but to show those who need information what was the necessity for revision, and what the history of other Revisions has been. He ex- plains how from very early times it has been found necessary- to remove errors, to revise, and to retranslate. He gives a brief but clear account of the English translations which appeared before 1611. He shows how mistakes must creep in, even into.
printed editions, and how, in fact, there are numerous and un- doubted mistranslations in the Authorised Version. So much as is necessary and possible is then told of the Revision of 1881; and lastly, an appendix contains the prefaces to the different English Bibles, from Wycliffe to the Revisers of King James.
We gladly commend this volume to all who, without leisure for wide reading, intend to make serious use of the Revised Version. One chief benefit resulting from the labours of the Revisers is likely to be that it will help people to. distinguish between the spirit and the letter of the Bible ; and to see how the latter has been altered again and again, and may in places be still uncertain, and yet that the former remains unchanged. The kind of orthodoxy which clings desperately to. the turn of a phrase, and to the absolute certainty of words, hangs by a half-uprooted bush, with a precipice below it. . As the history of the Bible becomes better understood, it will be. seen that this terror is misplaced, and that no changes do or can affect what is really precious. When people learn from the- Revised Version that the wisest and most stable divines are not afraid of alterations, and. from Professor Newth that the immense additions to the critical apparatus of Biblical litera- ture since 1611 leave our Bible in essentials what it was then,. it may be hoped that timidity will be exchanged for a more robust and intelligent faith.
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