W here W e Got the Bible: Bible: Our Debt t o the Catholic Church by The Right Rev. HENRY G. GRAHAM, Author of "Hindrances to Conversion," etc. Twenty-second Twenty-second Printing Nihil Obstat et I m prim atur JOANNE OANNES S RITCHIE, RITCHIE, Vic. Gen. Glasguae. Originally published by B. Herder Book Co., St. Louis, Missouri. TAN BOOKS AND PUBLI SHERS SHERS,, INC. P.O. Box 424 Rockford, Illinois 61105 Dedicated Dedicated to all lovers of the writt en word. ’In w hich are certain certain t hings hard to be understood, which the unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also also the oth er scriptures, scriptures, t o their own destruction.’ destruction.’ 2 Peter iii. 16 ’I w ould not believe the Gospe Gospell unless moved t hereto by t he authority of the Church.’ - St. Augustine (Contra Epis. Manich., Fund., n. 6.) CONTENTS Preface Introduction Chapter I . Chapter II . Chapter I I I . Chapter IV. Chapter V. Chapter VI. Chapter VII . Chapter VII I. Chapter IX. Chapter X. Chapter XI. Chapter XII . Chapter XII I. Chapter XIV. Chapter XV. Chapter XVI.
Some Error s Re Rem m oved The Ma Making king of the Old Old Te Testament stament The Chur ch Precedes th e New Tes Testam tam ent Cath Ca th olic Church Comp iles th e New Tes Testam tam ent Deficiencies of th e Prot estant Bible The Originals and th eir Disappearance Variations in the text Fatal to the Protestant Protestant Theory Our Debt Debt t o the Monks Monks Bible Reading in th e ’Dark Ages Ages’’ Where th en are all th e Mediae Mediaeval val Bibles? Abundance of Vernacular Scriptur es before Wycliff Why Wycliff was Condemned Tyndale’s Tyndale ’s Condemnation Condemnation Vindicated Vindicated by Posterity Posterity A Deluge of Erron eous Versions The Cathol ic Bible (Douay ) Envoi
PREFAC PREFACE E TO TO THE FI FI RST EDI TI ON This little book about t he Bible grew grew out of lectures lectures which the wri ter delivered on the subject to mix ed audiences. audiences. The lectures lectures were afterwards expanded, and appeared appeared in a series of articles in the Catholic Catholic press press 1908- 9, and are now with slight slight alterations
reprinted. Their origin w ill sufficiently sufficiently account account for t he colloquial colloquial style em ployed throughout. There is, therefore, no pretence either of profound scholarship or of eloquent language; all that is attempt ed is a popular and, as far as possible, possible, accurate accurate exposition exposition along fam iliar lines of the Catholic Catholic claim historically in regard t o the Bible. Bible. It is candidly candidly controversial without , however, let us hope, being uncharitable or unfair. Friends had more than once suggested the reissue of the articles; and it appeared to the writer that at last the proper moment for it had come when the Protestant world is jubilating over the Tercentenary Tercentenary of t he Authorised Version. Version. Amidst th e flood of literature on the subject of the Bible, it seemed seemed but righ t t hat some stat stat ement, however plain and simple, should be set set fort h from the Catholic side, side, with the obj ect of bringing home to the average mind the debt that Britain, in common with the rest of Christendom, Christendom, owes to t he Ca Catholic tholic Church Church in this connection. connection. Probably t he m otive of the pr esent esent publication will be best understood by a perusal of the following lett er from t he writ er which appeared appeared in th e Glasgo Glasgow w Herald, 18th March, 1911: — 1911: — THE BI BLE CE CENTEN NTEN ARY AND TH E CATHOLI C CHURCH. AMID AMID t he general jubilation over the th ree hundredth anniversary of th e appearance appearance of King James's James's version of the Bible, Bible, I think it would be a pity if we did not m ake ment ion of that great Church to which, under God, we owe our posses possession sion of the sacred Scriptures—I mean of course, the Roman Catholic Church. Without striking one single single jarring n ote, I hope, in the univ ersal ersal chorus, chorus, yet I f eel eel it w ould be rather ungenerous, and and indeed historically historically unj ust, did we not t urn our eyes at least in passing passing t o that venerable figure standing standing in the background surveying our celebrations, celebrations, and, and, as it were, saying, 'Rejoice 'Rejoice over it, but remem ber it w as from from me you got it '. As a Scotsman, Scotsman, w ho cannot forget that it is the Bible that has made Scotland Scotland largely what she is today, I yield to no one in veneration of the inspired Scriptur Scriptur es and and in admirat ion of th e incomparably beautiful Authorised Version. Version. Still, honour to w hom h onour. We shall shall only be awarding a ju st meed of praise and gratit ude if we frankly and thank fully recognise recognise that it is t o a council council (or councils) councils) of the R.C. R.C. Church that we owe t he collection collection of th e separate separate books into our present Canon of the New Testament, Testament, and t hat t o the loving care and devoted labour labour of th e monks and scholars of that Church all thr ough th e ages we are indebted, not only for the m ultiplication and distribut distribut ion of the sacre sacred d volum e among the faithful when as yet no prin ting press existed, existed, but even for t he preservation preservation of t he Book Book from corruption and destru destru ction. It is, then, undoubtedly tr ue to say that, in t he present present order of Providence, it is owing to the Roman Catholic Church that we have a Bible at all. And no one will be a bit t he worse Christian Christian and Biblelover Biblelover if he rem embers this notable year that it is to the Mother Church Church of Christendom Christendom he m ust look if he would behold the real preserver, preserver, defender, and transmit ter of th e 'Word that endureth for ever.'— HENRY GREY GRAHAM.
I N T R OD OD U CT CT I O N
IF all were true t hat is alleged alleged against the Catholic Church in her t reatment of Holy Scriptur Scriptur e, then t he proper tit le of these papers papers should b e ‘How ‘How we got', bu t 'How we have not got t he Bible'. Bible'. The comm comm on and received received opinion about the m atter am ong non-Catholics non-Catholics in Britain, for th e most part , has been that Rome hates the Bible-that she has done all she could to destroy it—that in all countries where she has held sway she has kept t he Bible from from the hands of th e people—ha people—has s taken it and burned it whenever she found anyone reading it. Or if she cannot altogether prevent its publication or its perusal, at least she renders it as nearly useless as possible by sealing sealing it up in a dead language which the maj ority of people can can neither r ead nor understand. And all t his she she does, does, ( so we are told) , because because she knows th at her doctrines are absolutely absolutely opposed opposed t o and contradicted by t he letter of God's writt en Word—she holds and propagates dogmas and traditions which could not stand one mom ent's examination if exposed exposed to t he searching searching light of Holy Scripture. As a mat ter of fact, is it not known t o everybody that, w hen the Bible was for the first tim e brought to th e light and printed and put int o the peoples' peoples' hands in the sixteenth centur centur y, suddenly t here was a great r evolt against t he Roman Roman Church—there Church—there w as a glorious Reformation? The people eagerly gazing upon the open Bible, saw they had been befooled befooled and hoodwinked, and been taught to hold 'for doctrines the commandments of men', and forthwith throwing off the fetters, and emancipating them selves selves from the bondage of Romanism, Romanism, t hey embraced the pure trut h of the Word of God as set set fort h in Protestantism and Protestant Bibles. Is not this t he tale that history tells about Rome? Has she not always waged a cruel and relentless war against the Holy Book—issued prohibitions and framed decrees against reading it, or having it in the house—so house—som m etimes even in her deadly hatred going the length of making bonfires of heaps of Old and New Testaments, as Tunstall, Bishop of London, did t o William Tyndale's? Tyndale's? Has Has she not burned at the stake, or at least banished from their home and countr countr y, servants of t he Lord like John John Wycliffe and William William Tyndale for no other crime than that of translating and printing and putting into lay folk's hands the sacred text of the gospel of Jesus Christ? Who does not know instances, even in our own days, of pious old old wom en (especially (especially in I reland) chancing to light upon a Bible (w hich they h ave never seen before) and reading it (especial (especially ly St John's Gospe Gospell iii, 16) , and going to th e priest priest about the new light they had received through the blessed blessed words, and then t he priest priest snatching it out of their hands and throwing it into t he fire? This is not at all un comm comm on (it is said) said) in Catholic lands, lands, where the poor people sometim sometim es chance chance to get a copy of God's Word Word th rough t he devoted labours of Bible-w Bible-w omen and t ract-distribut ors. A Scotc Scotch h lady in Rome, now happily a Catholic Catholic but then a m ember of a Protestant Protestant congregation congregation t here which supports a Bible— Bible— distributor, once informed me of the account account t hat th is gentleman gentleman gravely r elated to a meeting of the congregation, as to how an old woman in a small It alian town, accepting one of his Testaments and being illuminated by the Gospel of St John (w hich she never never saw before, of course, course, though part of it is read read every day at Holy Mass Ma ss), ), straightway went and confuted her priest and silenced silenced him, so that he had no word t o say in reply. This I repeat, is t he comm only accepted accepted idea about about Rome and her att itude t owards Holy Scriptur Scriptur e among t he m asse asses s of non-Catholic people. people. I have said advisedly advisedly 'among t he masses', masses', for happily t here are now a goodly num ber of enlightened and impart ial persons, persons, and of scholars scholars who have studied the mat ter fairly for th emselves, emselves, m en, for example, of the stamp of the late Dr S. R. R. Maitland, Ma itland, among w hom t he idea is quite exploded. And And one may n ot blame t he masses masses too severely severely for entert aining the notion above alluded to: how indeed, we may ask, could they possibly possibly t hink otherw ise in face of the t radition handed down to them from t heir forefathers since since the 'Reformation', 'Reformation', by minister, t eacher, eacher, and parents, thr ough sermon, catechism, catechism, newspaper, newspaper, books of trav el, fiction, and
history? They They have believed the tr adition as naturally as they believed that the sun rose in the east east and set set in th e west; or th at m onasteries onasteries and convents convents were sinks of iniquity and dens of corruption; or th at t here was once a female Pope Pope called called Joan; Joan; or that Catholics pay money to get their sins forgiven. You You cannot blame t hem altogether, for they had, humanly speaking, no opportunity of knowing anything else. The Protestant account of pre-reformation Catholicism has been largely a falsification of history. All the faults and sins that could could possibly possibly be rak ed up or invented against Rome, or against against particular bishops or or priests, were presented to the people of t his unhappy land, and all her best best acts mi sconstrued, sconstrued, misj udged, misrepresented, misrepresented, and nothing of good told in her fav our. She has been painted as all black black and h ideous, ideous, and no beauty could be seen in her. Consequently people came to believe the tradition as a matter of course, course, and accepted accepted it as history, and n o m ore dreamed of enquiring whether it was true or not than t hey dreamed of questioning questioning whet her Mary Mary wrot e the Casket Casket Lett Lett ers or blew up Darnley at Kirk o’ Field. Field. Add to thi s the furth er fact fact t hat, Catholicism Catholicism being almost t otally wiped out in Scotland, Scotland, t he people had no means of makin g them selves selves personally personally acquainted acquainted wit h either it s doctrin doctrin es or or it s practices, practices, and being very im perfectly perfectly educated educated till the beginning of t he nineteenth centur centur y, w ere as incapable incapable of arriving at a t rue knowledge of the interior life of the Catholic Church as of the internal organism of an antediluvian tadpole. Hence one can easily easily understand understand how it came about t hat, am ong the m ass of the people in Bible-loving Scotland, the Pope was recognised as the Anti-Christ foretold by St John, and Rome herself, that sitteth upon t he seven seven hills, identified as ’Babylon, ’Babylon, t he Great, Great, th e mother of harlots, and abominations of the earth’, earth’, and t he ’woman drunken wi th t he blood of the saints’. saints’. The story story goes that one day the Merry Merry Monarch, Charles the Second, propounded to the learned and scientific men about the Court Court the following profound problem: How is it that a dead fish weighs less less than a living one? The learned and scientific men discussed the grave difficulty and wrote elaborate elaborate t reatises reatises on it to please the Royal Royal enquirer, bu t cam cam e to n o satisfactory satisfactory conclusion. conclusion. Finally Finally it occurred to one of them to t est est w hether it really was, as the King had said; said; and of course course he discovere discovered d that the th ing was a joke; the fish weighed exactly exactly the same dead as living, and all the ti me t he Merry Merry Mo Monarch narch had been ’having them on’. People People have been acting acting m uch in t he same same w ay in r egard to the assertion assertion so glibly made t hat Rome hates th e Bible, Bible, and persecutes persecutes it, and tri es to blot it out of existence. existence. But nowadays many are enquiring — enquiring —Is Is it really so? Are we sure of our facts? Are Are we n ot buil ding up m ountains of abuse and calumny calumny on a false suppositon? suppositon? Just Just as all have come come t o know that the sun, as a mat ter of fact, does not rise or set but stands still, that there never was a Pope Joan but his name was John, that monasteries and and convents are homes of learning and sanctit sanctit y and charity, and that no Ca Catholic tholic ever pays or ever could pay a single farthing farthing to get his sins sins remit ted—and ted—and all this t hrough t he spread spread of know ledge and education education and enlightenment and study—so study—so also also I vent ure to thin k that people will now be rightly considered considered ignorant and blameworthy , and at t he least least behind t he tim es, es, if th ey do not learn th at th e notion I h ave alluded to above about about t he Catholic Catholic Church Church and the Bible is false and nonsensical—historically nonsensical—historically false and inh erentl y non sensical. sensical. By a calm consideration consideration of the facts of history and a m ind open to conviction on genuine evidence, evidence, they will be driven by sheer sheer force of honesty honesty to t he conclusion conclusion that t he Catholic Church, Church, so far from being the m onster of iniquity that she is painted, has in very truth been the parent, the author and maker under God, of the Bible; that she has guarded guarded it and defended defended it all t hrough th e ages, ages, and preserved preserved it from error or destru destru ction; that she has has ever held it in highest veneration and esteem, esteem, and has grounded her doctrines doctrines upon it; that she alone has the right to call it her book; that
she alone possesses the true Bible and the whole Bible, and that copies of the Scriptur Scriptur es existing existing out side of of her pale, are part ly incorrect and part ly defective, and that whatever in them is true, is tru e because because derived derived from her who alone possess possesses es the Book in it s fulness fulness and its trut h. I f th ey were Catholics, Catholics, they would love God’s Holy Word more and more; they would understand it better; they would adore the Divine Providence that took such a wise and sure means of preserving and perpetuating it ; and they would profoundly admire th e Catholic Catholic Church Church for her ceaseless vigilance, untiring zeal, and unswerving fidelity to the commission entrusted to her by Almight y God. God.
CHAPTER HAPTER I . Some Errors Rem Rem oved
Now, in order t o understand properly t he work of the Catholic Church Church in creating and defending and perpetuat perpetuat ing the Holy Scriptu Scriptu res, we must say a few preliminary words as to the hu man means used used in t heir production, and as to t he collecting collecting of the Books of the Bible as as we have it at present. present. There There are some common erroneous ideas which we would do well to clear away from our m inds at the very out set. 1. To begin with, t he Bible did not drop down from He Heaven aven ready-m ade, as some some seem seem t o imagine; it did not suddenly suddenly appear upon the earth, carried carried down from Almighty God by the hand of angel or or seraph; but it w as writ ten by m en like ourselves, ourselves, who held in their hand pen ( or reed) and ink and parchm ent, and laboriously laboriously t raced raced every letter in the original languages of the East. East. They They w ere divinely inspired certainly, certainly, as no others ever have been before or since; nevertheless nevertheless they w ere human beings, men chosen chosen by God for the work , mak ing use of the human instruments that lay to t heir hand at at t he time. 2. I n th e seco second nd place we shall shall do well to remem ber that t he Bible was not writ ten all at once, once, or by one man, like m ost ost ot her books with w hich we are acquainted, acquainted, but that 1500 years elapse elapsed d betw een the writ ing of Genesis Genesis (t he first Book of the Old Testament) Testament) and th e Apocalypse Apocalypse or or Revelation Revelation of St John John ( the last Book of t he New). It is made up of a collec collection tion of different books by different authors, form ing, in short, a library instead of a single work, and hence called in Greek, ‘Biblia', or the Books. If you had li ved in t he days imm ediately succe succeeding eding the death of Moses Moses,, all y ou would have had given to you t o represent represent the Bible would have been the first five books of the Old Tes Testam tam ent, wr itt en by that pat riarch himself; t hat was the Bible in embryo, so to speak—the speak—the little seed seed t hat w as to grow subsequently subsequently into a great tree, th e first stone laid on on which was gradually to be erected erected th e beautiful beautiful temple of t he writt en Word throughout the centuries that followed. From From this we can see that the preacher extolling t he Bible as the only comfort and guide of faithful souls souls was slightly slightly out of his reckoning reckoning when he used these these words: 'Ah, m y brethr en! what w as it t hat comforted and strengthened Jose Joseph ph in his dark prison in Egypt? What w as it t hat formed his daily support and meditat ion? What but that blesse blessed d book, t he Bible!' Bible!' As Joseph existed before a line of the Old Testament was penned, and about 1800 years before the first of the New Testament Testament books saw the light, the wort hy evangelist was guilty of what we call a slight slight anachronism.
3. Nor will it be out of place place to remark here that t he Bible was not writ ten originally in English or Gaelic. Some folks speak as if they believed that the Sacred Books were first composed, and the incomparable Psalms of David set forth, in the sweet English tongue, and t hat t hey were afterw ards rendered into barbarous language such such as Latin or Greek or Hebrew, for the sake of inquisitive scholars and critics. This is not correct; correct; the original language, broadly speaking, of t he Old Testament Testament was Hebrew; Hebrew; that of the New Testam Testam ent was Greek. Greek. Thus our Bibles as we have them today for reading are ’translations’ ’translations’ —that —that is, are a rendering or equivalent in English English of t he original Hebrew Hebrew and Greek as it came from the pen of pr ophet and apostle and evangelist. evangelist. We see see this plainly enough in the t itle-page of th e Protestant Protestant Ne New w Testament, —which reads 'New Testament of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, translated out of t he original Greek.' Greek.' 4. A last last point must always be kept clearly in min d, for it concerns concerns one of the greatest greatest delusions delusions entertained by Protestants and m akes their fierce attacks on Rome appear so silly silly and irrat ional—the ional—the point, namely t hat t he Bible, Bible, as we have it now, was not print ed in any language at all till about 1500 years after the birth of Christ, for t he simple reason reason that there was no such such th ing as printing known before that date. We have become become so accustomed accustomed t o the use of the pri nting pr ess ess that w e can scarc scarcely ely conceive conceive of the ages when t he only books know n t o m en were in handwrit ing; but it is the fact fact t hat, had w e lived and flourished flourished before Mr. Mr. John John Goose Goosefles flesh h discovered discovered the art of printin g in t he fifteenth century, we should have had to read our Testam Testam ents and our Gospe Gospels ls from t he manuscript of m onk or friar, from t he pages pages of parchment parchment or v ellum or paper covered covered with t he handwriting, sometim es very beautiful and ornamental, of the scribe that h ad undertaken the slow and laborious task of copying the Sacred Word. Protestants in these days send shiploads of printed Bibles abroad, and scatter thousands of Testaments hither and thit her in every direction for the purpose of evangelising evangelising the heathen and converting converting sinners, and declare that the Bible, and the Bible only, can save men's souls. What, then, came of t hose poor poor souls who lived before the Bible was printed, before it was even writt en in its present present form ? How How were nations made familiar w ith t he Christian Christian religion and converted converted t o Christianity Christianity before the fifteenth century ? Our Our Divine Lord, I suppose, suppose, wished that th e unnum bered millions of human creatures born before before the year 1500 should believe believe what He had t aught and save their souls and go to Heaven, at least least as much as those of of the sixteenth and t wentieth centur centur ies; ies; but how could could they do t his when they had no Bibles, Bibles, or were t oo poor to buy one, or could not read it even though t hey bought it , or could could not understand it even if they could read it? On the Catholic Catholic plan (so to call it) of salvation salvation t hrough t he teaching of the Church, souls may be saved and people become saints, and believe and do all that Jesus Christ m eant th em t o believe and and do,—and, as a matter of fact, this has happened— happened— in all countr countr ies and in all ages wit hout either t he writ ten or th e printed Bible, and both before and after its production. The Protestant Protestant t heory, on the contrary , which stakes a man's salvation on the possession of the Bible, leads to the most flagrant absurdities, absurdities, im putes to Almight y God a total indifference to the salvation of the countless souls that passed hence to eternity for 1500 years, and indeed ends logically in the blasphemous conclusion that our Blessed Lord failed to provide an adequate means of of conveying to m en in every age the knowledge of His trut h. We shall see see,, as we pr oceed, oceed, th e utt er im possibility possibility of t he survival of Christianity, and of its benefits to hum anity, on the prin ciple of 'the Bible and the Bible only'. Meanwhile Meanwhile we can account account for t he fact that intelligent non-Catholics have not awakened t o its hollowness hollowness and absurdity only by supposing that they do not sufficiently sufficiently r ealise, ealise, 'read, m ark, l earn, and inwardly digest' digest' (as the English Prayer-Book Prayer-Book says) thi s single single item of history—the Bible was not prin ted till at least least 1 400 y ears after after Christ.
CHAPTER HAPTER I I . The Making of the Old Testam Testam ent
Now, looking at t he Bible Bible as it stands today, we find it is composed composed of 73 separate separate books —46 —46 in the Old Testament, Testament, and 27 in the New. How has it come t o be composed precisely of these 73 and no others, and no more and no less? Well, taking first t he Old Old Testament, Testament, we know t hat it has always always been been divided into t hree main port ions—the ions—the Law, the Prophets, Prophets, and the Writings. (I ) The Law, Law, as I remarked before, was the nucleus, nucleus, the earliest earliest substantial part, w hich at one tim e formed the sole Book of Scripture that the Jews possessed. Moses wrote it, and placed a copy of it in t he A Ark; rk; that w as about 3300 y ears ago. (2) To this were added, added, long afterwards, the Prophets Prophets and t he Writings, form ing th e complet complet e Old Tes Testam tam ent. At what date precisely precisely th e volum e or 'canon' of t he Old Testament Testament was finally closed closed and recognised as completed for ever is not absolutely certain. When was the Old Testam Testam ent compiled? Some Some w ould decide for about th e year 430 B.C., B.C ., un der Esdras Esdras and Nehemiah, Nehemiah, resting upon t he authorit y of t he famous Jew, Jew, Josephus, osephus, who lived im mediately aft er Our Lord, and wh o declares declares that since since the death of Ataxerxes, B.C. B.C. 424, 'no one had dared to add anyt hing t o the Jewish Jewish Scriptures, to take anything from them, or to make any change in them.' Other authorities, again, contend contend t hat it was not till near 100 B.C. that th e Old Tes Testam tam ent volum e was finally close closed d by t he inclusion inclusion of the 'Writ ings'. But whichever contention is correct, correct, one thin g at least is certain, certain, t hat by this last date—that is, for 100 years before the birth of Our Blessed Lord—the Old Testament existed precisely as we have it now. Of course, I have been speaking so far of the Old Testament, in Hebrew, because it was writ ten by Jewish authorit y in the Jewish Jewish language, namely, He Hebrew, brew, f or Jews, Jews, God's chosen people. But after what is called the 'Dispersion' of the Jews, when that people was scattered abroad and settled in many other lands outside Palestine, and began to lose their Hebrew tongue and gradually became familiar wi th Greek, which was then a univ ersal ersal language, it w as neces necessary sary to furn ish them with a copy copy of t heir Sacred Scriptures in the Greek language. Hence arose that translation of the Hebrew Old Tes Testam tam ent int o Greek Greek kn own as the Septuagint. This word m eans in Latin 70, and is so named named because it is supposed supposed to have been th e work of 70 t ranslators, ranslators, wh o performed t heir task at Alexandria, Alexandria, wh ere there was a large Greek-speaking colony colony of Jews. Jews. Begun Begun about 2 80 or 2 50 years before Christ, Christ, w e may safely safely say that it w as finished in the next centu centu ry; it w as the acknowledged acknowledged Bible of of all th e 'Jews 'Jews of the Dispersion' in Asia, as well as in Egypt, and was the Version used by Our Lord, His Apostles and Evangelists, and by Jews and Gentiles and Christians in the early days of Christianity. Christianity. It is from this Version Version th at Jesus Jesus Christ Christ and t he New Testam Testam ent writ ers and and speakers quote quote wh en referring t o the Old Testament. Testament. But w hat about the Christians in other lands who could not understand Greek? Greek? When When the Gospel Gospel had been spread spread abroad, and m any people embraced Christianity Christianity through the labours of Apostles and missionaries in the first two centuries of our era, naturally they had to be supplied supplied wit h copies of th e Scriptur Scriptur es of the Old Testam Testam ent (w hich was the inspired inspired Word of God) God) in t heir own t ongue; and this gave rise to translations of the Bible into Armenian and Syriac and Coptic and Arabic and Ethiopic
for the benefit of the Christians in these lands. For the Christians in Africa, where Latin Latin was best best un derstood, there was a tr anslation anslation of t he Bible made into Latin about 150 A.D., and, later, another and better for th e Christians Christians in Italy; but all these were finally supersede superseded d by t he grand and m ost import ant version made by St Jerom Jerom e in Latin called the ’Vulgate’ —that —that is, the comm on, or current or accepted accepted Version. Version. This was in the fourth century of our era. By th is time St Jerome Jerome w as born, there was great need of securing securing a correct correct and uniform text in Latin of Holy Scripture, Scripture, f or th ere was danger, through t he variety and corrupt conditions of many t ranslations then existing, lest lest t he pure scripture should be lost. lost. So Jerome, Jerome, w ho was a m onk, and perhaps the m ost ost learned scholar scholar of his day, at the comm and of Pope Pope St Damascus Damascus in 382 A.D., made a fresh Latin Latin Version Version of t he New Testament Testament (w hich was by this tim e practically practically settled) correcting correcting the existing versions by the earliest earliest Greek MSS. MSS. he could find. Then Then in his cell cell at Bethlehem, between ( approximately) the years 392404, he also translated the Old Old Testam Testam ent int o Latin Latin directly from the Hebrew (and not fr om t he Greek Septuagint) Septuagint) —except except the Psalter, Psalter, wh ich he had previously revised from existing Latin Versions. This Bible was the celebrated Vulgate, the official text in the Catholic Church, Church, t he value of wh ich all scholars scholars admit admit to be simpl y inestimable, and which continued t o influence all other versions, versions, and t o hold t he chief place place among Christians down down t o the Reformat Reformat ion. I say the 'official' 'official' t ext, because because the Council of Trent in 1546 issued a decree, stamping it as the only recognised and authorit ative Version Version allowed to Catholics. Catholics. 'I f anyone does not r eceive eceive the entir e books with all their part s as they are accustomed accustomed t o be read in the Catholic Church, Church, and in the old Latin Vulgate Edition, as sacred and canonical ... let him be anathema.' It was revised revised under Pope Sixtus V in 159 0, and again un der Pope Pope Clement VII I in 1593, wh o is responsible responsible for for the present standard text. I t is from t he Vulgate that our English Douai Versio Version n comes; and it is of th is same same Vulgate that the Comm ission ission under Cardinal Gasquet, Gasquet, by comm comm and of t he Pope, Pope, is trying to find or restore the original text as it came from the hands of St Jerome, Jerome, uncorrupt ed by and stripped of subsequent subsequent admixt ures with other Latin copies. copies.
CH A PT PT ER ER I I I . T h e Ch Ch u r ch ch P r e ce ce d e s t h e N e w T e st st a m e n t
So far, we have been dealing with r ather dry m aterial. We have seen seen how the Old Testament Testament books came came t o be collec collected ted int o one volume; now it remains to see how the Catholic Church Church also composed composed and selected selected and form ed int o another v olume t he separate books of the New Testament. 1. Now you will remem ber what I said said before, that the New Testament Testament w as not, any more th an the Old, all all writ ten at one tim e, or all by one one man, but that at least least 40 years passe passed d away betw een een t he writin g of the first and t he writi ng of the last of its books. It is made up of the four Gospels, 14 Epistles of St Paul, 2 of St Peter, I of St James, I of St Jude, 3 of St John, together with the Apocalypse of St John, and the Acts Acts of Apostles Apostles by St Luke, who also wrote t he thi rd Gospel; Gospel; so that w e have in this collection collection works by at least eight different wr iters, and from the year th at th e earliest earliest book was composed composed (pr obably the Gospel Gospel of St Matthew) to t he year th at St John John composed his Gospel about half a century had elapsed. Our Blessed Lord Himself never, so far as we know, wrot e a line of Scripture—c Scripture—certainly ertainly none t hat has been preserved. preserved. He never told His Apostles Apostles to w rite anyt hing. He did not comm and them
to comm it t o writin g what He had delivered delivered to them : but He said, said, ’Go ’Go ye and teach teach all nations’, ’preach ’preach t he Gospel Gospel to every creatur creatur e’ , ’He that heareth you heareth Me’. Me’. What He comm comm anded and meant t hem t o do was precise precisely ly what He had done done Himself, viz. —deliver —deliver the Word of God to the people by the living voice—convince , persuade, persuade, instruct, convert th em by addressing addressing themselves face face to face to living men and women; not int rust their m essage essage to a dead book book which migh t perish and be destroyed, destroyed, and be m isunderstood isunderstood and m isinterpreted and corrupt corrupt ed, but adopt t he more safe and natural way of presenting the truth to them by word of mouth, and of training ot hers to do the same after they t hemselves were gone, and so by a living tradition, preserving preserving and handing down the Word of God as as they had received received it, t o all generations. 2. And t his was, as a mat ter of fact, t he met hod th e Apostles Apostles adopted. Only five out of the twelve wr ote down anythin g at all that has been been preserved preserved to us; and of that , not a line was penned till at least 10 years after the death of Christ, for Jesus Christ was crucified crucified in 33 A.D., and t he first of t he New Testament Testament books was not writ ten till about 45 A.D. You see what follows? The Church and the Faith existed before the Bible; Bible; that seems seems an elementary and simple fact which no one can deny or ever has denied. Thousands of people became Christians through the work of the Apostles and missionaries of Christ in various lands, and believed the whole truth of God as we believe it now, and became saints, before ever they saw or read, or could possibly see or read, a single sentence of inspired Scripture of the New Testament, for the simple reason reason that such such Scriptur Scriptur e did not then exist. How, t hen, did they become Christians? In the same way, of course, that Pagans become Catholics nowadays, by hearing the t ruth of God God from the lips of Christ's Christ's mi ssionaries ssionaries.. When the t welve Apostles Apostles met t ogether in Jerusa Jerusalem, lem, and port ioned out the kn own world among them selves selves for purposes of evangelisation, evangelisation, allott ing one country to one Apostle Apostle ( such such as India to St Thomas), and another t o another, how did t hey propose to evangelise these people? By presenting each one with a New Testament? Such a thing did not exist, and, we m ay safely safely say, was not even thought of. Why did Our Lord Lord prom ise them the gift of the Holy Ghost, Ghost, and command them to be 'wit nesses nesses'' of Him? and why, in fact, did the Holy Ghost Ghost come down upon the Twelve and endow them w ith the power of speaking in various languages languages? ? Why Why but that they m ight be able to 'preach 'preach t he Gospel Gospel to every creature' in t he tongue of every creatur creatur e. 3. I have said said that t he A Apos postles tles at first first never t hought of wri ting t he Ne New w Testam Testam ent; and neither they did. The books books of t he New Testam Testam ent w ere produced and called called forth by specia speciall circumstances circumstances that arose, arose, were writ ten to m eet particular demands and emergencies. emergencies. Nothing w as further from the m inds of the Apostles Apostles and Evangelists than t he idea of composing w orks which should be collected collected and formed into one v olume, and so constitut constitut e the Holy Book of t he Christians. Christians. And we can imagine St Paul staring in amazement if he had been told t hat his Epistles, Epistles, and St Peter's and St. John's, John's, and the ot hers would be tied up together and elevated int o the position of a complete and exhaustive statement of the doctrines of Christianity, Christianity, to be placed in each man's hand as an easy and infallible guide in faith and morals, independent independent of any living and teaching authority t o interpret t hem. No one would have been more shocked at the idea of his letters usurping th e place place of the authorit ative teacher—the teacher—the Church, than the gr eat Apostle Apostle wh o him self self said, 'How shall they hear without a preacher? how shall they preach unless they be sent? Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by t he Word of Christ.' Christ.' The fact is that no r eligion eligion yet known has been been effe effectually ctually propagated among among m en except except by word of m outh, and certainly everything in t he natural and spiritual position of the Apostles on on t he
one hand, and of the Jews Jews on the other, was ut terly unfavour able to the spread of Christianity by means of a writt en record. record. The Jewish Jewish people were not used to i t, and th e Gentiles Gentiles could could not have understood it. Even Protestant Protestant authors of th e highest highest standing are compelled to admit t hat t he living teaching of the Church was necessarily the means chosen by Jesus Christ for the spread of His His Gos Gospel, pel, and that the comm itt ing of it t o writ ing was a later and seconda secondary ry development . Dr. Westcott, Westcott, Bishop Bishop of Durham, t han whom among Anglicans Anglicans there is not a higher authorit y, and w ho is reckoned, reckoned, indeed, by all as a standard scholar on the Canon of Scripture, says ( The Bible in the Church , —pp. —pp. 53 and seqq.): —'In order to appreciate the Apostolic age in its esse essential ntial character, it is necessary to dismiss not only the ideas which are drawn from a collected New Testament, Testament, but those also, also, in a great m easure, easure, w hich sprung from the several groups of writ ings of which it is composed. composed. The first work of the Apostles, Apostles, and t hat out of w hich all their other fu nctions grew, was to deliver in livin g words a personal personal testimony to t he cardinal facts facts of th e Gospe Gospel—the l—the Ministry, Ministry, t he Death and t he Resurrection esurrection of Our Lord. It was only in t he course course of tim e, and under t he influence of external circumstances, that they committed their testimony, or any part of it, to writ ing. Their peculiar peculiar duty was to preach. preach. That they did, in fact, perform a m ission ission for all ages in perpetuating t he tidings which they delivered was due, not to any conscious conscious design design whi ch they form ed, nor t o any definite comm and which th ey received, received, but to t hat m ysterious power', etc. 'The repeated repeated experience of many ages has even even yet hardly sufficed to show that a permanent record record of His words and deeds, deeds, open to all, m ust co-exist with the living body of th e Church, Church, if t hat is to continue in pure and healthy vigour.' And again: 'The Apos Apostles, tles, when t hey speak, claim claim t o speak speak with Divine authority , but t hey nowhere profess profess to give in writing a system of Christian Doctrine. Gospels and Epistles, with the exception, perhaps of the writings of St John, were called out by special circumstances. There is no trace of any designed connection between the separate books, except in the case of the Gospe Gospell of St Luke and the Acts (also by St Luke), still less less of any out ward u nity or completeness completeness in th e entire collection. collection. On the contrary, it is not unlikely th at some Epistles of St Paul have been lost, and though, in point of fact, the books which remain do combine to form a perfect perfect w hole, yet t he completeness completeness is due not to any conscious conscious co-operation of their auth ors, but t o the w ill of Him by whose power they wrot e and wrought.' What a contrast there is, in these clear clear words of the great scholar, scholar, to t he common delusion delusion that seems seems to have seized seized some m inds—that inds—that the Bible, Bible, complete and bound, dr opped down among the Christians Christians from He Heaven aven after the day of Pentecost: entecost: or, at the least, th e Twelve Twelve Apostles Apostles sat sat down together i n an upper room, pens in hand, and wrote off at a sitting all the Books Books of the New Testament! Testament! And allow allow m e to give one more short short quot ation to drive home t he point I am labouring at, that the writ ten New Testament Testament could never have been intended as the only means of preaching preaching Salvation. 'It was some some considerable considerable tim e after Our Lord's Ascension,' (writes the Protestant author of Helps Helps to th e Study of t he Bible , p. 2), 'before any of the books contained contained in the New Testament Testament w ere actually actually w ritt en. The first first and most im portant work of the Apostles was to deliver a personal testimony to t he chief facts facts of th e Gospel Gospel history. history. Their t eaching eaching w as at at first oral, and it w as no part part of their int ention to create a permanent literatu re.' These, These, I consider, are valuable admissions. 4. But now, y ou may say, 'What was the use of writ ing t he Gospe Gospels ls and Epistles Epistles then at all? Did not God God inspire men t o writ e them? Are you not belittling and despising despising God's God's Word?' Word?' No, not at all; we are simply put ting it in its proper place, place, t he place place that God God m eant it t o have; and I would add, the Catholic Church is the only body in
these days which teaches teaches infallibly infallibly t hat t he Bible, Bible, and th e whole of it, is t he Word of God, God, and defends its inspiration, and denounces and excomm excomm unicates anyone who would dare to impugn it s Divine origin and authority. I said said before, and I r epeat, epeat, t hat t he separate separate books of the New New Testam Testam ent came into being to m eet special special demands, in r esponse esponse to particular needs, and were not, nor are they now, absolutely absolutely necessary necessary either to th e preaching preaching or t he perpetuating of th e Gospel Gospel of Christ . It is easy to see how the Gospels arose. So long as the Apostles were still living, the necessity for written records of the words and actions of Our Lord was not so pressing. pressing. But when th e tim e came came for their rem oval from thi s world, it was highly expedient th at some correct, authorit ative, reliable account account be left of Our Lord’s life by t hose who had know n Him personally, or at least least w ere in a position position t o have firsthand, uncorrupted inform ation concerning concerning it. And this was all the m ore necess necessary ary because because there were b eing spread abroad incorrect, incorrect, unfaithful, indeed altogether spurious Gos Gospels pels,, w hich were calculated calculated t o inj ure and ridicule the character and w ork of Our Divine Redeemer. Redeemer. St Luke distinctly declares declares that t his was what cause caused d him to undertake t he writ ing of his Gospel Gospel —'For —'For as much as many have taken in hand to hand to set forth in order a narration of the t hings that h ave been been accomplished accomplished among us' (I ., i.). He goes goes on to say that he has his information from eye-wit nesse nesses, s, and has come come to know all particulars from t he very beginning, and t herefore conside considers rs it right to set set t hem down in writ ing, to secure a correct correct and tru stworthy account account of Christ's life. life. So St Matthew, St Mark, St Luke, and St John, penned their Gospels for the use of the Church, Church, t he one supplying supplying often what anot her omit s, but yet none pretending to give an exhaustive or perfect account of all that Jesus Christ said and did, for if this had been att att empted, St John John t ells us, 'the whole world w ould not have contained the books that w ould be writ ten' about it. The Gospels Gospels,, t hen, are incomplete, and fragmentary, giving us certainly the most important things to know about Our Saviour's earthly life, but still not telling us all we might know, or m uch we do know in fact now and u nderstand better, thr ough th e teaching teaching of t he Catholic Catholic Church, Church, which has preserved preserved tradit ions handed handed down since the tim e of the Apostles, Apostles, from one generation to another. These Gospels were read, as they are now among Catholics, at t he gatherings of th e Christians Christians in th e earliest earliest days on t he Sundays—not Sundays—not t o set forth a scheme scheme of doctrine that t hey knew already, but t o animate their courage, to excite their love and devotion to Jes Jesus us Christ, Christ, and im pel them t o imit ate the example of that Beloved Master, Whose sayings and doings were read aloud in their ears. Well, now, what I said about about the Gospels Gospels is equally true of t he Epistles Epistles,, which m ake up practically the whole of th e rest of the New Testam Testam ent. They were called into existence existence at various t imes to meet pressing pressing needs and circumstances circumstances;; were addresse addressed d t o particular individuals and comm unities in v arious places places,, and not t o the Catholic Church Church at large. The thought furt hest from t he mind of the writ ers was that they should ever be collected collected int o one volume, and m ade to do dut y as a complete and all-sufficient all-sufficient statem ent of Christian faith and m orals. orals. How did t hey arise? arise? In t his natural and simple w ay. St Peter, Peter, St Paul, Paul, and th e rest rest went f orth to various lands, preaching the Gospel, and made thousands of converts, and in each place founded a church, and left priests in charge, charge, and a bishop sometim es (as e.g., e.g., St Timothy in Ephesus). Now these priests and converts had occasion many a time to consult their spiritual father and founder, like St Paul, or St Peter, or St James, James, on m any point s of doctrine or discipline discipline,, or morals; for we must not imagine at th at date, when the Church was in it s infancy, infancy, t hings were so clearly clearly seen or understood or formul ated as
they are now. It was, of course, course, the same same Faith Faith t hen as always; always; but still t here were many points on which t he newly m ade Christians Christians were glad to consult consult the Apostles Apostles who had been sent out with the unction of Jesus Jesus Christ Christ fresh upon t hem hem —points of dogma and rit ual and governm ent and conduct which t hey alone could could settle. And so we find St Paul Paul wri ting to t he Ephesia Ephesians ns (his converts at Ephesus), Ephesus), or to t he Corinthians (his converts at Corinth) , or t o the Philippians (his converts converts at Philippi), and so on to t he rest (1 4 Epistles Epistles in all). all). And for what reason? reason? Either Either in answer to commun ications ications sent sent t o him from t hem, or because because he had heard from other sources sources that there were some t hings that required correction correction in these places places.. All manner of topics are dealt dealt wit h in these lett lett ers, sometim sometim es in the m ost ost hom ely style. style. I t m ight be to advise the converts, or to reprove them ; to encourage them or instruct them ; or to defend him self self from false accus accusations. ations. It might be, like that t o Philemon, Philemon, a letter about a privat e person as Onesimus, Onesimus, the slave. But w hatever t he Epistles Epistles deal deal wit h, it is clear clear as the noonday sun that t hey were writ ten ju st at particular tim es to meet particular cases cases that occurred occurred nat urally in the course of his missionary missionary labours, and that neither St Paul, Paul, nor any of the oth er Apostles, Apostles, intended by t hese lett lett ers to set set fort h t he whole theology or scheme of Christian Christian salvation any more t han Pope Pope Pius the Tenth intended to do so in his Decree against the Modernists, or in his Letter on th e Sanctification Sanctification of t he Clergy. Clergy. The thin g seems seems plain on th e face face of it . Leo XII XII I writ es to the Scotch Bishops Bishops on the Holy Scriptures, for exam ple; or Pius Pius the Tenth to the Eucharistic Congress in London on the Blessed Sacrament, or publishes a Decree Decree on Frequent Frequent Comm union; or, again, one of our Bishops, Bishops, say, sends forth a letter condemning secret societies, or issues a Pastoral dealing with the new Marriage Ma rriage Laws— Laws—are are we t o say that these docum docum ents are intended t o teach the w hole way of salvation to all m en? that t hey profess to state t he whole Catholic creed? creed? The question has only to be asked to expose its absurdity. Yet precisely the same question may be put about the position of St Paul's Epistles. True, he was an Apostle, Apostle, and consequently consequently inspired, and his lett ers are the w ritt en Word of God, and therefore are a final and decisive decisive authority on the v arious points of which they t reat, if properly understood; but that does not alter the fact that they nowhere claim to state the whole of Christian Christian tr uth, or to be a complete guide of salvation salvation to anyone; they already presuppose the knowledge of the Christian Christian faith among t hose to whom they are addresse addressed; d; they are writ ten to believers, believers, not t o unbelievers; unbelievers; i n one word, the Church Church existed and did its work before they w ere writt en, and it w ould still have done so, so, even though t hey had never been writt en at all. St Paul's Paul's letters letters (for we are taking his m erely as a sample sample of all) dat e from t he year 52 A.D. to 68 A.D.; Jesus esus Christ ascended to Heaven leaving His Church to evangelise the world, 33 A.D.; and we may confidently confidently asse assert rt t hat t he very last place we should expect expect t o find a complete summ ary of Christian doctrine is in t he Epistles Epistles of of th e New Testam Testam ent. There There is no need to delay delay furth er on the mat ter. I think I have m ade it clear clear enough how t he various books of the New Testament Testament t ook their origin. And in so explaining the state of the case, case, we are not un dervaluing the writ ten Word of God, God, or placing it on a level inferior to wh at it deserves. deserves. We are are simply showing the position it w as meant t o occupy occupy in the economy economy of t he Christian Christian Church. Church. It was writt en by the Church, by m embers (Apostles and Evangelis Evangelists) ts) of t he Church; Church; it belongs to th e Church, and it is her office, office, therefore, to declare what it means. It is intended for instruction, m editation, spiritual reading, encouragement encouragement , devotion, and also serves as proof proof and testim ony of the Church's doctrines and and Divine authorit y; but as a complete and exclusive exclusive guide to Heaven in the h ands of every every m an— an—this this it never was and never could be. The Bible in the Church; the Church before the Bible—the Bible—the Church the Maker and I nterpreter of the Bible—that Bible—that is right. The Bible above above the Church; the Bible independent independent of t he Church; Church; the Bible, and the Bible only, th e
Religion of Christ ians —that Religion —that is wrong. The one is the Catholic Catholic position; position; the other t he Protestant.
CHAPTER HAPTER I V. Catholic Church Church Compiles Compiles the New Testam ent
Now we know that the Gospels and Epistles of the New Testament were read aloud to t he congregations congregations of Christians Christians that met on the first day of t he week for Holy Mass Mass (j ust as they are still among our selves), selves), one Gospe Gospell here, another t here; one Epistle Epistle of St Paul Paul in one place, place, another in another; all scattered scattered about in various parts of the world w here there were bodies of Christians. Christians. And the next question question t hat nat urally occurs occurs to us is, when w ere these separate separate works gathered together so as to form a volum e, and added added to t he Old Old Testam Testam ent t o make up wh at we now call call the Bible? Well, they were not collected collected for t he best best part of 300 years. So that here again I am afraid is a hard nut for Protestants Protestants to crack, crack, viz.—That viz.—That t hough we adm it t hat t he separate separate works composing the New Testam Testam ent w ere now in existence, yet th ey were for centuries not not t o be found altogether in one volume, were not obtainable by mu ltitu des of Christians, Christians, and even even were altogether unk nown t o many in different parts of the world. How t hen, could they possibly possibly form a gu ide to Heaven Heaven and the chart of salvation for those who had never seen or read or known about t hem? It is a fact fact of h istory t hat t he C Council ouncil of Carthage, Carthage, wh ich was held in 397 A.D., m ainly through the influence of St Augustine, settled the Canon or Collection of New Testament Scriptures as we Catholics have them now, and decreed that its decision should be sent sent on t o Rome Rome for confirm ation. No Council Council (that is, no gathering of t he Bishops Bishops of the Catholic Church Church for t he settlement of some point of doctri doctri ne) w as ever considered considered to be authorit ative or binding unless unless it w as approved approved and confirmed by the Roman Pontiff, whilst the decisions of every General Council that has received th e approval of Rome are bin ding on th e consciences consciences of all Catholi Catholi cs. cs. The Council Council of Carthage, th en, is the first kn own t o us in which we find a clear clear and undisputed catalogue catalogue of all t he New Testament Testament books as we have th em in Bibles Bibles now. It is true that many Fathers and Doctors Doctors and writ ers of of the Church in the first thr ee centur centur ies from t ime to t ime m ention by name m any of the various Gospe Gospels ls and Epistles; and some, as we com com e nearer 397, even r efer to a collection collection already existing in places places.. For example, w e find Constantine, t he first Christian Emperor, after th e Council Council of Nicea, applyin g t o Eusebius, Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea, Caesarea, and a gr eat scholar, scholar, t o provide fifty copies copies of the Christian Christian Scriptures for public use in th e churches of Constantinople, his new capital. This was in 332 A.D. The contents of these copies copies are are known to us, perhaps (according to some, even probably) one of these very copies of Eusebius Eusebius'' handiwork has come come down to us; but t hey are not precisely precisely the same as our New Testament, Testament, though very nearly so. Again, we find lists of the books of the New Testam Testam ent draw n up by St Athanasius, Athanasius, St Jerome, Jerome, St Augustine, and many other gr eat authorit ies, ies, as witnessing witnessing to w hat was generally acknowledged acknowledged as inspired inspired Scriptur Scriptur e in their day and generation and country; but I repeat that none of these corresponds corresponds perfectly perfectly to t he collection collection in t he Bible that we posses possess s now; we m ust wait till 397 for the Council Council of Carthage, Carthage, before we find t he complete collection of New Testament books settled as we have it today, and as all Christendom had it till the sixteenth century , when t he Reformers Reformers changed changed it.
You m ay ask me, h owever, what was the difference betw betw een the lists of New New Testament Testament books found in various countr countr ies and and different aut hors before 397, and the catalogue drawn up at the Council Council of that date? Well, Well, that introduces us to a very import ant point which tells us eloquently eloquently of t he office office that the Catholic Church Church performed, un der God God t he Holy Ghost, Ghost, in selecting selecting and sifting and stamping with her Divine authority , the Scriptures of the New New Law; and I m ake bold to say that a calm consideration consideration of the part th at Rome Rome took in t he making and drawing up and preserving preserving of th e Christian Christian Scriptur Scriptur es will convince convince any any im partial min d that to th e Catholic Church Church alone, so much maligned, we ow e it t hat w e know w hat t he New Testament should consist of, and why precisely it consists of these books and of no others; and t hat wit hout her we should, hum anly speaking, speaking, have had no New New Testament Testament at all, or, if a New New Testam Testam ent, t hen one in whi ch works spurious and and works genuine would h ave been been m ixed up in r uinous and inextricable confusio confusion. n. I have used the words ’spurious’ and ’genuine’ in regard to the Gospels and Epistles in t he Christian Christian Church. You You are horrified, and hold up y our hands and exclaim: ’Lord, save us! here we have a Higher Critic and a Modernist.’ Not at all, dear reader; quite t he reverse, I assure assure you. Observe, Observe, I have said in ’the Christian Church’ Church’ — —II did not say 'in the Bible' for there is nothing spurious in t he Bible. Bible. But w hy? Simply Simply because because the Roman Roman See in th e fourth century of our era prevented anyt hing spurious being admit ted into it . There were spurious spurious books floating floating about 'in t he Christian Christian Church', wit hout a doubt in t he early centur centur ies; ies; this is certain, certain, because we know their very names; and it is precisely precisely in her rej ection ection of th ese, ese, and in her guarding t he collection collection of inspired inspired writ ings from being mi xed up wit h them , that we shall now see see the great work that the Catholic Church Church did, under God's Holy Holy Spirit, for all succee succeeding ding generations of Christians, Christians, whether w ithin t he fold or outside of it. I t is through the Roman Catholic Catholic Church Church that Protestants have got t heir Bible; t here is not ( to paraphrase some some w ords of Newm Newm an) a Protestant t hat vilifies and condemns condemns the Catholic Catholic Church Church for her tr eatment of Holy Scriptur Scriptur e, but owes it t o that Church that he has the Scripture Scripture at all. What Almight y God God m ight have done if Rome Rome had not handed down th e Bible to us is a fruitless specula speculation tion wi th w hich we have nothing whatever t o do. It is a contingent contingent possibility possibility belonging to an order of t hings which has never existed, existed, except in im agination. What we are concerned concerned wit h is the order of things and the sequence sequence of history in which we are now living, and which we know, and which consequently consequently God God has divinely disposed; disposed; and in this providential arrangement of history it is a fact, fact, as clear as any other historical historical fact, th at Almight y God chose the Catholic Church, and her only, to give us His Holy Scriptures, and to give us them as we have them now, neither gr eater nor less. less. This I shall now proceed proceed t o prove. (i) Before Before the collection collection of New Testament Testament books was finally sett sett led at t he Council Council of Carthage, 397, we find t hat t here were thr ee distinct distinct classes classes into which the Christian writ ings were divided. divided. This we know ( and every scholar scholar admits it) from t he works of early Christian writers like Eusebius, Jerome, Epiphanius, and a whole host of others that we could name. These classes were (I) the books 'acknowledged' as Canonical, (2) books 'disputed' 'disputed' or 'controverted', ( 3) books declare declared d 'spurious' or false. false. Now in class (I) i.e., those acknowledged acknowledged by Christians everywhere t o be genuine and authentic, and t o have been writ ten by Apostolic Apostolic men, w e find such such books as the Four Gospels, 13 Epistles of St Paul, Acts of t he Apostles. These were recognised east and west as 'Canonical', genuinely the works of the Apostles and Evangelists whose names they bor e, wort hy of being in t he 'Canon' 'Canon' or sacred sacred collection collection of inspired writings of the Church, and read aloud at Holy Mass. Mass. But there w as (2) a class—and Protestants should particularly take notice of the fact, as it utterly
undermin es their Rule of Faith Faith ‘t he Bible and the Bible only'—of only'—of books th at w ere disputed, contr contr overted, in some some places acknowledged, acknowledged, in others rejected; and among th ese we actually find t he Epistle Epistle of St James, Epistle of St Jude, 2nd Epistle of St Peter; 2nd and 3 rd of St John, John, Epistle to th e Hebrews, and th e Apocalypse Apocalypse of St St John. There were doubts about these works; perhaps, it was said, they were not really writ ten by Apostles, Apostles, or Apostolic Apostolic men, or by the m en whose names they carried; in some parts of th e Christian Christian world t hey were suspec suspected, ted, t hough in others unhesitatingly received received as genuine. There There is no getting out of t his fact, fact, then: som som e of the books of our Bible which we, Catholic and Protestant alike, now recognise as inspired and as the w ritt en Word of God, God, were at one tim e, and indeed for long, viewed wit h suspicion, suspicion, doubted, disputed, as not posses possessing sing the same aut hority as the others. ( I am speaking speaking only of the New Testam Testam ent books; the same could could be proved, if t here were space, space, of the Old Testam Testam ent; but the New Testam Testam ent suffices suffices abundantly for the argument.) But further still—what is even more striking, and is equally fatal to t he Protestant Protestant t heory—in this (2) class class of 'controverted' and doubtful books some some were t o be found which are not now in our New Testam Testam ent at all, but which were by many then considered considered to be inspired and Apostolic, Apostolic, or w ere actually read at t he public worship of the Christians, Christians, or w ere used used for instru ctions to the newly- converted; converted; in short, ranked in some places as equal equal to t he works of St James James or St Peter Peter or St Jude. Among th ese ese we m ay m ention specially specially t he 'Shepherd' 'Shepherd' of Hermas, Epistle of Barnabas, the Doctrine of the Twelve Apostles, Apostolic Constit Co nstit ut ions, Gospel Gospel according t o th e Hebrews, St Paul's Epistle Epistle t o th e Laodiceans, Laodiceans, Epistle of St Clement, and others. Why are these not in our Bible today? We shall see in a m inute. Lastly Lastly (3) there was a class class of books floating floating about before 397 A.D., which were never acknowledged as of of any value in the Church, nor tr eated as having having Apostolic Apostolic authorit y, seeing that they were obviously spurious and false, false, full of absurd fables, superstitions, puerilities, and stories and miracles of Our Lord and His Apostles Apostles which made th em a laughing- stock stock t o th e world. Of these som som e have survived, and we have them today, t o let us see see what stamp of writ ing they were; most have perished. But we k now t he names of about 50 Gospe Gospels ls (such (such as the Gospel of James, the Gospel of Thomas, and the like), about 22 Acts (like the Acts of Pilate, Acts of Paul and Thecla, and others), and a smaller number of Epistles and Apocalypses. These were condemned and rejected wholesale as 'Apocrypha'—that is, false, spurious, uncanonical. (ii) This then being th e state state of m att ers, you can can see at once what perplexity arose arose for th e poor Christians Christians in days of persec persecution, ution, w hen they were required t o surrender their sacred sacred books. books. The Emperor Emperor Diocletian, Diocletian, for example, wh o inaugurated a t errible war against the Christians, issued an edict in 303 A.D. that all the churches should be razed razed to t he ground and t he Sacred Sacred Scriptur Scriptur es should should be delivered up to t he Pagan authorities to be burned. Well, t he question was what was Sacred Sacred Scriptur Scriptur e? If a Christian Christian gave up an inspired writin g to the Pagans Pagans to save his life, he thereby became became an apostate: he denied his faith, faith, he betrayed his Lord Lord and God; he saved saved his life, indeed, but he lost his soul. Some Some did t his and were called called 'tradit ores', ores', t raitors, betrayers, 'deliverers up' (of t he Scriptu Scriptu res). res). Most, however, preferred marty rdom, and refusing to surrender the inspired writings, suffered suffered the death. But it w as a most perplexing and harrowing question question t hey had t o decide—what decide—what really w as Sac Sacred red Scriptur Scriptur e? I am not bound t o go to the stake for refusing to give up some 'spurious' Gospe Gospell or Epistle. Could Could I , t hen, safely give up some of t he 'controvert ed' or disputed books, like the Epistle of St James, or the Hebrews, or the Shepherd of Hermas, or the Epistle of St Barnabas, or of St Clement? There is no need to be a martyr by mistake. And so the stress of persecution persecution had the effect of mak ing still m ore urgent the necessity necessity of deciding once once and for all what was to form the New Testam Testam ent.
What, definitely and precisely, precisely, w ere to be th e books for which a Christian Christian would be bound t o lay down his life on pain of losing his soul? (iii) He Here, re, as I said said before, comes in t he Council Council of Carthage, Carthage, 397 A.D., confirming and approving the decrees of a previous Council (Hippo, 393 A.D.) declaring, for all tim e to come, what w as the exact exact collection collection of sacred sacred writ ings thenceforth thenceforth to be reckoned, reckoned, t o the exclusion exclusion of all oth ers, ers, as the inspired Scripture Scripture of t he New Testament. That collection is precisely that which Catholics possess at this day in their Douai Bible. That decree of Carthage was never changed. It was sent to Rome for confirmation. As I have already remark ed, a Council, Council, even though not a general Council of the wh ole Catholic Catholic Church, Church, m ay yet have its decrees decrees made binding on th e whole Church by the approval and will of the Pope. A second Council of Carthage over which St Augustine presided, presided, in 4 19 A.D., renewed th e decrees decrees of of th e former one, and declared declared th at it s act act w as to be noti fied to Boniface, Boniface, Bishop Bishop of Rome, for t he purpose of confirming confirming it. From t hat date all doubt cease ceased d as to what was, and what was not ’spurious’, ’spurious’, or ’genuine’, or ’doubt ful’ among t he Christian Christian wr itings then known. Rome had spoken. A Council of the Roman Catholic Church had settled it. You m ight hear a voice here here or t here, in East East or West, in subsequent subsequent tim es, es, rakin g up some old doubt, or r aising aising a question as to wh ether this or th at book of the New Testament Testament is really really w hat it claims claims t o be, or should be where it is. But it is a voice in the wilderness. wilderness. Rome had fix ed the ’Canon’ of the New Testam Testam ent. There are henceforward henceforward but tw o classes of books —inspired and not inspired. Within the covers of the New Testament all is inspired; inspired; all wit hout, know n or unk nown, is uninspired. Under Under the guidance of the Holy Ghost the Council declared 'This is genuine, that is false'; 'this is Apostolic, that is not Apostolic'. She sifted, weighed, discussed, selected, rejected, and finally decided decided what w as what. Here she rejected a writing that was once once very popular and reckoned by many as inspired, and was actually read as Scripture at public service; there, again, she acce accepted pted another t hat was very m uch disputed and viewed with suspicion, and said: said: 'This is to go into th e New New Testam Testam ent. ' She had the evidence before her; she had tradition t o help her; and above all she had had the assistance assistance of the Holy Spirit, Spirit, to enable her to come to a right conclusion conclusion on so so mom entous a matt er. And in fact, her conclus conclusion ion was received received by all Christendom Christendom un til the sixteenth century, when as we shall see, men arose rebelling against her decision and altering the Sacred Sacred Volume. But, at all events in regard t o the New Testam Testam ent, t he Reformers Reformers left the books as they found them , and today t heir Testament Testament contains exactly exactly t he same books books as ours; and w hat I wish to drive home, is that t hey got these books books from Rome, that w ithout t he Roman Roman Catholic Catholic Church Church they would not have got them , and that the decrees of Carthage, Carthage, 397 and 419 A.D., when all Christianity Christianity w as Roman Catholic—reaffirmed by the Council of Florence, 1442, under Pope Eugenius IV, and the Council of Trent, 1546—these decrees of the Roman Church, and these only are th e means and the channel and the aut hority which Almight y God has used to hand down to us His writt en Word. Who can can deny it ? The The Church Church existed before the Bible; she made the Bible; she selec selected ted it s books, books, and she preserved preserved it. She handed it down; through her w e know what is the Word of God, God, and what th e word of man; and hence to t ry at t his time of day, as many do, t o overthrow t he Church Church by m eans of this very Bible, and to put it above the Church, Church, and to revile her for destroying destroying it and corrupt corrupt ing it—what is this but to strike the m other that reared them; to curse the hand that fed them; to turn against their best friend and benefactor; benefactor; and to repay wit h ingratitu de and slander slander the very guide and protector protector who has led led them to drink of t he water out of t he S Saviour's aviour's fountains?
CHAPTER V. Def iciencies iciencies of the Prote stant Bible
(I ) THE point t hat we have arrived at now, if you rem ember, is this —The this —The Catholic Church, through her Popes and Councils, gathered together the separate books that Christians venerated venerated wh ich existed existed in different part s of the world; sifted the chaff from t he wheat, the false from t he genuine; decisively decisively and finally formed a collection—i. collection—i. e ., . , drew up a list or catalogue of inspired inspired and apostolic writings into which no other book should ever be admitt ed, and declared declared that these and these only, were t he Sacred Sacred Scriptur Scriptur es of of th e New New Testam Testam ent. The authorities that were mainly responsible responsible for for t hus sett sett ling and closing the 'Canon' 'Canon' of Holy Scriptur Scriptur e were the Councils Councils of Hippo and of Carthage Carthage in the fourt h century, under t he influence of St. Augustine (at the latt er of which t wo Legatees Legatees were present present from the P Pope), ope), and the Popes Innocent I in 405, and Gelasius, 494, both of whom issued lists of Sacred Scriptur Scriptur e identical identical wit h that fixed by th e Councils Councils.. From From t hat dat e all through th e centur centur ies this was the Christian's Bible. Bible. The Church Church never admit ted any other; and at the Council Council of Florence Florence in the fift eenth eenth centur centur y, and th e Council Council of Trent Trent in t he sixteenth, and t he Council Council of the Vatican Vatican in t he nineteenth, she renewed her anathemas against against all who should deny or dispute this collection collection of books as the inspired word of God. (2) What follows from th is is self-evident. self-evident. The same authority which made and collected collected and preserved these books books alone has the right to claim them as her own, and to say what the m eaning of them is. The Church Church of St. Paul Paul and St. Peter Peter and St. James in the first century was the same Church as that of the Council of Carthage and of St. Augustine in t he fourth, and of the Council of Florenc Florence e in th e fifteenth, and the Vatican in t he nineteenth—one and the same body—growing and developing, certainly, as every living thing m ust do, but still preserving preserving its identity and rem aining esse essentially ntially t he same same body, as a man of 80 is the same person as he was at 40, and the same person at 40 as he was at at 2. The Catholic Catholic Church Church of today, t hen, m ay be compared to a man who has grown from infancy to youth, and from youth to middleage. Suppose Suppose a man wr ote a letter sett sett ing forth certain statements, wh om w ould you naturally ask to t ell what th e meaning of these statem statem ents was? Surely the man t hat wrot e it. The Church Church wr ote the New Testam Testam ent; she, and she she alone, can can t ell us what the m eaning of it is. is. Again, the Catholic Church is like a person who was present at the side of Our Blessed Blessed Lord Lord w hen He walk ed and t alked in Galilee and Judea. Suppose, for a moment, that t hat man w as gifted gifted with perpetual perpetual youth ( this by the way is an illustration of W. H. Ma Malloc llock's, k's, 'Doctrine and Doctrinal Disruption', chap. xi.,) and also wit h perfect perfect m emory, and heard all the t eaching eaching and explanations of Our Redee Redeem m er and of His Apos Apostles, tles, and retained them ; he would be an invaluable wit ness ness and authorit y t o consult, consult, surely, so as to discover discover exactly w hat w as the doctrine of Jesus Jesus Christ and of the Twelve. But such such undoubt edly is the Catholic Church: Church: not an individual person, person, but a corporate personality personality wh o lived with , indeed was called called into being by, Our Divine Saviour; Saviour; in whose hearing hearing He uttered all His teaching; teaching; who listened to the Apostles Apostles in their day and generation, repeating and expounding t he Saviour's doctrine; doctrine; who, ever y oung and ever strong, h as persisted persisted and lived all through the centuries, and continues continues even till our own day fr esh esh and keen in m emory
as ever, ever, and able to assure assure us, without fear of forgetting, or m ixing t hings up, or adding things out of his own head, what exactly exactly Our Bless Blessed ed L Lord ord said, and taught , and meant, and did. Suppose, Suppose, again, the man we are imagining had writ ten down mu ch of what h e heard Christ Christ and t he Apostles Apostles say, say, but had not fu lly reported all, and was able to supplement wh at was lacking by personal explanations explanations which he gave from his perfect mem ory: that , again, is a figure of of the Catholic Church. She wrot e down mu ch, indeed, and and m ost ost im portant parts of Our Lord’s Lord’s teaching, teaching, and of the Apostolic Apostolic explanation of it in Scripture; Scripture; but n evertheless evertheless she she did not int end it to be a complete complete and exhaustive account, account, apart from h er own explanation of it; and, as a matt er of fact, fact, she is able able from her own perpetual m emory t o give fuller and clearer clearer accounts, accounts, and to add some some thin gs that are either either om itt ed from th e writt en report, or are only h inted at, or part ially recorded, recorded, or ment ioned merely in passing. passing. Such Such is the Catholic Church in relation t o her own book, the New Testam Testam ent. I t is hers because because she she wr ote it by her first Apostles, Apostles, and preserved it and guarded it all down t he ages by her Popes Popes and and Bishops; n obody else has any ri ght to it whatsoever, any m ore than a stranger has the right to come into y our house and and break open your desk, and pilfer your private documents. Therefore, Therefore, I say that for people to step in 1500 years after the Catholic Church had had possession of the Bible, Bible, and to pretend that it is theirs, and that they alone know what t he meaning of it is, and t hat t he Scriptur Scriptur es alone, alone, wit hout t he voice of of th e Catholic Catholic Church Church explaining them, are intended by God God to be th e guide and rule of faith faith —this —this is an absurd and groundless groundless claim. claim. Only th ose ose who are ignorant of th e true history of t he Sacred Sacred Scriptures—their Scriptures—their origin and authorship and preservation—c preservation—could ould pret end t hat there is any logic or commonsense in such such a mode of acting. And t he absurdity is magnified when it is remembered th at the Protestants Protestants did not appropriate the whole of the Catholic books, books, but actually cast cast out some from the collection, collection, and t ook what remained, and elevated elevated t hese into a new ' Canon', or volum e of Sacred Sacred Scripture, such such as had never been seen seen or h eard of before, from t he first t o the sixteenth centur centur y, in any Church, either in Heaven above or or on earth beneath, or in the wat ers under the earth! Let Let u s make good this charge. charge. (3) Open Open a Protestant Protestant Bible, Bible, and y ou will find there are seven complete Books awanting—that is, seven books fewer th an there are i n t he Catholic Catholic Bible, Bible, and seven fewer than there were in every collection collection and catalogue of Holy Holy Scripture from the fourth to t he sixteenth century . Their names are Tobias, Tobias, Baruch, Baruch, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, I Machabees, II Machabees, together with seven chapters of the Book of Esther Esther and 66 verses of of t he 3rd chapter of Daniel, commonly called called 't he Song of the Three Children', Children', ( Daniel iii., 24-9 0, Douai version). These were deliberately deliberately cut out, and t he Bible bound up wit hout t hem. The criticisms criticisms and remark s of Luther, Luther, Calvin, and the Swiss and German Reformers about these seven books of the Old Testament Testament show t o what depth s of impiety t hose unhappy m en had allowed them selves selves to fall when they broke away fr om t he true Church. Even Even in regard to t he New Testament Testament it required all the powers of resistance resistance on the part of the m ore conconservative Reformers Reformers to prevent Luther from flinging out the Epistle Epistle of St. James as unwort hy t o remain wit hin th e volume of Holy Scriptur Scriptur e— e—'an 'an Epistle Epistle of straw' straw' he called called it, 'wi th no character of the Gospe Gospell in it '. I n th e same same way, and alm ost ost t o the same degree, he dishonoured the Epistle of St. Jude and the Epistle to the Hebrews, and th e beautiful Apocalypse Apocalypse of of St. John, declaring they w ere not on the same footing as the rest of t he books, and did not contain t he same same am ount of Gospe Gospell (i.e., h is Gospel). ospel). The presumpt presumpt uous way, indeed, in wh ich Luther, Luther, am ong others, poured contem contem pt, and doubt upon some of the inspired writings which had been acknowledged acknowledged and cherished cherished and venerated for 1 000 or 1000 y ears would be scarcely scarcely credible credible were it not that we have his very w ords in cold print, w hich cannot cannot
lie, and may be read in his Biography, or be seen quoted in such books as Dr. Westcott’s The Bible in The Church. And why did he impugn such books as we have mentioned? Because they did not suit his new doctrines and opinions. He had arrived at the principle of private judgment — judgment —of of picking and choosing religiou s doctr doctr ines; and whenever any book, such as the Book of Machabees Machabees,, t aught a doctrine th at w as repugnant t o his individual taste—as taste—as,, for exam ple, that 'it is a holy and wholesome wholesome thought to pray for th e dead dead that t hey may be loosed loosed from sins', sins', 2 Mach. Mach. xii., 46— well, so much the worse for the book; 'thr ow it overboard', was his sentence sentence,, and overboard it w ent. And it was the same wit h passages passages and text s in those books which Luther allowed to remain, and pronounced to be worth y t o find a place place within the boards of the new Re Reformed formed Bible. In short, he not only cast cast out certain books, but h e mut ilated some some t hat were left. For example, not pleased pleased wit h St Paul's Paul's doctrine, ‘we are justified by faith', and fearing lest lest g ood works (a Popish Popish superstit superstit ion) m ight creep in, he added the word 'only' aft er St Paul's Paul's words, words, m aking the sentence run: 'We are justified by Faith only', and so it reads in Lutheran Lutheran Bibles to t his day. An action such as that m ust surely be r eprobated by all Bible Christians. Christians. What surprises us is the audacity audacity of the m an that could could coolly change change by a stroke of the pen a fundam ental doctrine of the Apostle of God, God, St. Paul, Paul, who w rote, as all admit ted, under th e inspiration inspiration of the Holy Ghost. Ghost. But t his was the outcome of the Protestant standpoint, individual j udgm ent: no authorit y outside of oneself. oneself. However However ignorant, however stupid, however unl ettered, you may , indeed you are bound to cut and carve out a Bible and a Religion for y ourself. No Pope, Pope, no Council, no Chur ch shall enlighten enlighten you or dictate or hand dow n th e doctrines of of Christ. Christ. And t he result we have seen in the corruption of God's Holy Word. (4) Yet, in spite of all reviling of the Roman Roman Church, th e Reformers Reformers were forced to accept accept from her t hose Sac Sacred red Scriptures which they retained in t heir collection. collection. Whatever Bible they have today, disfigured as it is, was taken from us. Blind indeed indeed must be the evangelical Christian who cannot recognise in the old Catholic Bible the quarry from which he has hewn th e Tes Testam tam ent he loves and studies; studies; but w ith w hat loss! loss! at what a sacrifice! sacrifice! in what a mut ilated and disfigured disfigured condition! That the Reformers should appropriate unabridged the unabridged the Bible of the Catholic Church (which was the only volum e of God's God's Scripture Scripture ever known on earth), even for the purp ose of elevating it int o a false false position—this position—this we could could have understood; what staggers us, is their deliberate excision excision from that Sacred Sacred Volume of some of t he inspired Books Books which had God for t heir Author, and th eir no less deliberate deliberate alteration of some of the text s of those books that were suffered to remain. I t is on consideration consideration of such points as these that pious persons outside the Catholic fold would do well to ask themselves the question—Which Christian body really loves and reveres the Scriptures most? Which has proved, by its actions, its love and veneration? and which seems seems m ost likely to incur t he anathema, r ecorded ecorded by St John, that God God will send upon those who shall take away from the words of the Book of Life? (Apoc. xxii., 19.)
CHAPTER HAPTER VI . The Originals, and t heir Disappearance I. Now, you may nat urally enough ask ask m e: 'But how do you know all this? Where has the Bible come come from ? Have Have you got t he original writings that came came from the hand of Moses, or Paul, or John?' No, none of it, not a scrap or a letter, but we know from history and traditi on that t hese hese were the books they wrote, and they have been
handed down to us in a m ost ost w onderful way. What w e have now is the printed Bible; but before the invention of printi ng in 1450, t he B Bible ible existed existed only in handwriting — handwriting — what we call manuscript—and we have in our possession now copies of the Bible in manuscript ( MS.), MS.), which were m ade as early early as the 4t h century, and th ese ese copies, copies, which you can see see with your own eyes at th is day, contain contain t he books which th e Catholic Bible Bible contains contains today, and t hat is how w e know w e are right in receiving these books as Scripture, as genuinely the work of the Apostles and Evangelists. Why is it th at we have not t he originals written by St. John and St. St. Paul and the rest? Well, there are several reasons to account for the disappearance of the originals. (I ) The persecutors persecutors of t he Church Church for t he first 300 years of Christianity Christianity destroyed everything Christian that t hey could lay their hands on. Over Over and over again, barbarous pagans burst in upon Christian cities, and villages and churches, and burned all t he sacred sacred things they could find. And not only so, but t hey especial especially ly compelled compelled Christians Christians (as we saw before) to deliver u p t heir sacred sacred books, under pain of death, and t hen consigned consigned them to t he flames. Among th ese, ese, doubtless, doubtless, some of the w ritings t hat came from the hand of t he Apostle Apostle and Evangelist Evangelist perished. perished. (2) Again, we must remem ber, the m aterial which the inspired inspired authors used used for writing their Gospels and Epistles was very easily destroyed; it was perishable to a degree. It was called called papyrus, (I shall explain what it was made of in a moment) , very frail and britt le, and not made to last to any great age; and its delicate delicate quality, no doubt, accounts for the loss of some of the choicest treasures of ancient literature, as well as of of th e original handwriting of the New Testam Testam ent wri ters. We know of no MS of the New New Testam Testam ent existing now, w hich is written on papyrus. (3) Furtherm ore, when in various churches churches throughout the first centuries copies copies were made of the inspired writ ings, there was not the same necess necessity ity for p reserving reserving t he originals. originals. The first Christians had no superstitious or idolatrous veneration for the Sacred Sacred Scriptures, such such as seems seems t o prevail among some people today; they did not consider consider it n eces ecessa sary ry f or salvation that the very handwrit ing of St. Paul Paul or St. Matt Ma tt hew should be preserved, preserved, inspired by God God though t hese hese men were; they had t he living, infallible Church Church to t each each and guide t hem by the m outh of h er Popes Popes and and Bishops; Bishops; and t o teach them not only all that could be found found in the Sacred Sacred Scriptur Scriptur es, es, but t he true m eaning of it as well; so that w e need need not be surprised surprised that they were content content with mere copies of copies of the original works of t he inspired writ ers. So soon soon as a more beautiful or correct correct copy was m ade, an earlier earlier and rougher one was simply simply allowed to perish. perish. There is nothing strange or unusual in all this; it is just w hat holds good in the secular secular world. We do not doubt the t erms or provisions of the Magna Charta because because we have not seen seen the original; a copy, if w e are sure it is correct, correct, is good enough for us. II . Well, th en, the originals, as they came from the hand of Apostle and Evangelis Evangelist, t, have totally disappeared. disappeared. This This is what infidels and and sceptics sceptics taunt us with and cast cast in our teeth: 'You 'You cannot cannot produce,' they say, 'the handwr iting of those from whom you derive your religion , neith er the Founder Founder nor His Apostl Apostl es; you r Gospels Gospels and and Epistles Epistles are a fraud; t hey were not wri tt en by these men at all, but are the invention of a later age; and consequently consequently w e cannot cannot depend upon t he contents contents of th em or believe what they tell us about Jesus Christ.' Now, of course, these attacks fall harmlessly upon us Catholics, because we do not profess to rest our religion upon the Bible alone, and are are independent independent of it , and would be ju st as we are and and what we are
though t here were no Bible at all. It is those who have staked their very existence existence upon that Book, Book, and m ust stand or fall with it , that are called called upon to defend them selves selves against against the critics. But But I shall shall only rem ark here that the argum ent of infidel and sceptic sceptic would, if logically logically applied, discredit discredit not only t he Bible, Bible, but many other books which t hey th emselves accept accept and believe without hesitation. hesitation. There There is far m ore evidence for for t he Bible than t here is for certain books of classic classical al antiquity which no one dreams of disputing. There are, for example, only 15 m anuscripts anuscripts of the work s of Herodotus, Herodotus, and none earlier earlier than t he 10th century A.D.; yet he lived 400 years before Christ. Christ. The oldest oldest manuscript of t he work s of Thucydides Thucydides is of the 11th centur centur y A.D.; yet he flourished and wrote m ore than 400 years before before Christ. Christ. Shall we say, say, th en, ’I want to see the handwrit ing of Thucydides Thucydides and Herodotus, Herodotus, else I shall shall not believe believe th ese ese are their genuine work s. You You have no copy of th eir writi ngs nearr the t ime they lived; none, nea none, indeed, indeed, till 1400 years after after them; they m ust be a fraud and a forgery’? Scholars Scholars with no r eligion at all would say we were fit for an asylum if we took up th at position; y et it w ould be a far more reasonable reasonable attitude than t hat whi ch they take up t owards the Bible. Bible. Why? Bec Because ause there are known t o have been many t housand copies copies of of th e Testament Testament in existence by t he 3rd century — century — i. e ., . , only a century or tw o after St. John— John—and and we know for certain there are 3000 existing at th e present present day, r anging from t he fourth century downwards. The fact fact is, the w ealth of evidence for the genuin eness eness of the New Testament Testament is simply stupendous, stupendous, and in comparison wit h m any ancient histories which are received received wit hout qu estion estion on t he authorit y of late and few and bad copies, copies, the Sacred Sacred Volume is founded on a rock. But let us pass on; on; enough for us to k now t hat God has willed that the handiwork of every inspired writer, from Mo Mose ses s down to St. John, John, should have perished perished from am ongst men, and that h e has entrusted our salvation to something m ore stable and and enduring t han a dead book or an undecipherable manuscript—that is, t he living and infallible Church Church of Christ: ubi Ecclesia, ibi Christus. Now I wish to devote wh at remains of this chapter chapter to say somet somet hing about the mat erial instrum instrum ents that were used for the writing and tr ansmission ansmission of Holy Holy Scriptur Scriptur es in th e earliest earliest days; days; and a brief review of the m aterials employed, employed, and t he dangers of loss and of corruption which necessarily accompanied the work, will convince convince us more t han ever of t he absolute absolute need of some divinely prot ected ected authorit y like t he Catholic Catholic Church Church to guard the Gospel Gospel from error and destruction, and preserve 'the Apostolic deposit' deposit' ( as it is called) called) from sharing the fat e which is liable to overtake all things that are, as says St Paul, contained in 'earthen vessels'. II I. Various materials were used in ancient ancient tim es for writ ing, as, e.g., e.g., stone, pottery , bark of t rees, rees, leather, and clay t ablets among the Babylonians and and Egypti Egypti ans. ans. ( I) But before Christianity, and for the first few ages of our era, Papyrus was used, which has given given its name to our 'paper'. I t w as formed formed of the bark of th e reed or or bulrush, which once grew plentifully on t he Nile banks. banks. First First split int o layers, layers, it was then glued by overlapping the edges, and and another layer glued to t his at right angles to prevent splitting, and, aft er sizing sizing and dryin g, it formed a suitable writ ing surface. surface. Thousands Thousands of rolls of papyrus have been found in Egyptian and Babylonian Babylonian tom bs and beneath the buried city of Herculaneum, Herculaneum, owing t heir preservation preservation probably t o the very fact of being buried, because, because, as I said, said, t he substance substance was very br itt le, frail, and perishable, and unsuited for rough u sage. sage. Though probably m any copies of of t he Bible were originally writt en on this papyrus (and most likely t he inspired inspired writ ers used used it them selves), selves), none have survived th e wreck of ages. ages. I t is t his material St. John John is referring to wh en he says to his correspondent correspondent in I I Epistle, verse 10; 'Having more things to write to you, I would not by paper and ink'. (2) When in the course of time,
papyrus fell into comparat comparat ive disuse from from its unsuitableness unsuitableness and fragility, t he skins of animals came came t o be used. used. This mat erial had two nam es; es; if it w as made out of the skin of sheep sheep or goats, it w as called called Parchment; Parchment; if m ade of the skin of delicate delicate young calves, it was called Vellum. Vellum was used in earlier days, but being very dear and hard t o obtain, gave place to a large extent t o the coarser coarser parchment . St. Paul Paul speaks speaks about about t his stuff stuff w hen he tells St Timot Timot hy, ( II . Tim. iv. 13) to ’bring t he books, books, but especia especially lly t he parchments’. Most Most of the New Testament Testament manuscripts which we possess today are written on this material. A curious consequence of the costliness of this substance substance was this, that t he same same sheet of vellum w as made to do duty t wice over, and became what is termed a palim psest, psest, whi ch means ’rubbed again’. again’. A scribe, scribe, say, of the tenth centur centur y, unable to purchase a new new supply of vellum , would take a sheet containing, perhaps, perhaps, a wr iting of the second second century, w hich had becom becom e worn out thr ough age and difficult difficult t o decipher; decipher; he would wash or scrape scrape out th e old ink, and use the surface surface over again for copying copying out some other w ork in w hich the living generation felt more interest. It goes with out saying that in m any case cases s the writ ing thu s blotted blotted out w as of of far greater value than that w hich replaced replaced it; indeed, some of th e most precious monum ents of sacred sacred learning are of t his description, description, and they were discovered in this way. The process of erasing or sponging out the ancient ink w as seldom seldom so perfectly perfectly done as to pr event all tr aces aces of it still rem aining, and some strok strok es of of the older hand m ight oft en be seen seen peeping peeping out beneath t he more modern w riting. In 1 834 some chemical mixt ure was discovere discovered d which was applied wit h m uch succe success ss,, and h ad the effect of r estoring estoring the faded lines and letters of those venerable records. Cardinal Mai, a man of colossal scholarship and untiring industry, and a member of the Sacred College in Rome under Pope Gregory XVI, was a perfect expert in this branch of research, and by his ceaseless labours and ferretlike hunts in the Vatican Vatican library, brought t o light some remarkable old manuscripts manuscripts and some priceless priceless works of antiqui ty. Among th ese, ese, all students have to t hank him for restoring a long lost work of Cice Cicero ro ( De Republica Republica)) t hat was known to have existed previously, previously, and which the Cardinal unearthed unearthed fr om beneath St Augustine’s Comm entary on t he P Psalms! salms! The most im portant MS. of the New Testament Testament of th is description is called the Codex of Ephraem. About 200 years ago it was noticed that this curious looking looking vellum , all soiled soiled and stained, and hith erto though t t o contain only the theological discourses of St. Ephraem, an old Syrian Father, was showing dim traces and faint lines of some older writ ing beneath. The chemical chemical mix ture w as applied, and lo! what should appear appear but a m ost ost ancient ancient and valuable copy copy of Holy Scriptur Scriptur es of of handwrit ing not later t han the fift h centur centur y! This had been been coolly scrubbed scrubbed out by some impecunious scribe scribe of the tw elfth century t o make room for his favourite work, the discourses discourses of St St Ephraem! Let us charitably hope that the good monk ( as he probably probably was) did not know w hat he was scrubbing scrubbing out. At all events, it was brought into France by Queen Catherine de Medici, and is now safely preserved preserved in the Royal Library Library at Paris, containing containing on the same page two w orks, one writ ten on top of the other wit h a period of of 700 years between them. I h ave told you about t he sheets sheets used by the earliest earliest w riters of the New Testament: Testament: what k ind of pen and and ink had they? (I ) Well, for the brit tle papyrus, a reed was used, used, much th e same same as that still in use in the East; East; but of course for writ ing on hard tough parchment or vellum a met al pen, or stylus, was required. I t is t o this St. John John refers in his thir d Epistle Epistle (verse 13) when he says, ’I had many things to write unto thee, but I would not by ink and pen write to thee’. The strokes of these pens may still be seen quite clearly impressed on the parchment , even t hough all tr ace ace of the ink has utterly v anished. anished. Besides Besides this, a bodkin or needle was employed, by m eans of which, along wit h a ruler, a blank leaf
or sheet was carefully carefully divided into column s and lines; lines; and on nearly all the manuscripts these lines lines and marks m ay still be seen, seen, sometim es so so firm ly and deeply drawn t hat t hose on on one side of the leaf have penetrat penetrat ed through t o the other side, without, however, cutting the vellum. (2) The ink used used was a composition of soot soot or lampblack or burnt shavings of of ivory, mix ed with gum or winelees winelees or alum alum ( for all these these element element s entered entered into it ). I n m ost ost ancient ancient m anuscripts, anuscripts, unfortu nately, the ink h as for the most part t urned red or brown, or become very pale, or peeled peeled off or or eaten through t he vellum, and in m any cases cases later later h ands have ruth lessly lessly retraced the ancient lett ers, making the original writ ing look much coarser. coarser. But w e know th at m any coloured coloured inks were used, such such as red, green, blue, or purple, and th ey are often quite brilliant t o this day. (3) As to t he shape of the MSS., MSS., the oldest form was that of a roll. They were generally fixed on two rollers, so so that t he part read (for example in public worship) could be wound out of sight and a new portion brought to view. This was the kind of thing t hat w as handed to Our Lord Lord when He went into th e synagogue synagogue at Nazareth Nazareth on the Sabbath. ’He unfolded unfolded the book’, and read: and then ’when He had folded the book, he restored restored it t o the minister’ (St Luke iv., 17- 20.) When not in u se these rolls were kept in round boxes or cylinders, and sometimes in cases of silver or cloth of great value. The leaves of parchment were sometimes of considerable size, such as folio; bu t generally the shape was what w e know as quarto or small folio, and som som e were octavo. The skin of one anim al, especial especially ly if an antelope, could could fur nish m any sheets sheets of parchment; but if t he animal was a small small calf, then its skin could could only furnish very few sheets; sheets; and an instance of of t his is the manuscript called called th e Sinaitic Sinaitic (now in St Petersburg) whose sheets are so large that the skin of a single animal (believed to have been th e youngest youngest and finest finest antelope) could could only pr ovide two sheets (8 pages). (4) The page was divided into two or t hree or four colum colum ns (though t he latter is very rare). The writ ing was of two distinct kinds, one called called uncial uncial (m eaning an inch), inch), consisting consisting entirely of capital letters, wit h no connection connection betw een the lett ers, and no space space between words at all; the other style, wh ich is later, later, was cursive (that is, a running hand) like our ordinary handwriti ng, with capitals only only at t he beginning of sentences sentences;; and in this case case the let ters are j oined together and there is a space between words. The uncial style (consisting (consisting of capitals only) was prevalent for t he first thr ee centuries centuries of our era; in the fourt h century t he cursive cursive began and continued till the invention of printing. (5) Originally, I need hardly say, say, t here was no such such t hing in t he M MSS SS.. as divisions into chapters and verses, verses, and no point s or full stops or comm comm as, as, t o let you k now where one sentence sentence began and the next finished: finished: hence the reading of one of these ancient ancient records records is a matt er of some difficulty t o the unscholarly. unscholarly. The division into chapters so so familiar t o us in our modern Bibles Bibles was the invent ion either of Cardinal Hugo, a Dominican, in 1048, or m ore probably of Stephen Langton, Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury, (d. 1027); and it is no calumny upon the reputation of either of these great m en to say that t he division is not very satisfactory. satisfactory. He is not happy in his met hod of splitting up t he page of of Scripture; the chapters are of very unequal length, and frequently int errupt a narrativ e or argument or an incident in an inconvenient way, as any one may see for himself by looking up such passages as Acts Acts xxi. 40 ; or Acts Acts iv. and v.; or I Corinthians xii. and xiii. The division division again into verses was the work of one Robert Stephens, and the first English version in which it
appeared appeared was th e Geneva Geneva Bible, Bible, 156 0. This gentleman seems to h ave completed his performance on a journey between Paris and Lyons ( inter equitandum , as the Latin biographer phrases it) , probably w hile stopping overnights in inns and hostels. hostels. ’I think ,’ an old comm comm entator quaintly remarks, ’it had been better done on his knees in the closet’. closet’. To this I would v enture t o add that his achievement achievement mu st share the same criticism criticism of inappropriateness as as the arrangement into chapters. chapters. (6) The manuscripts of the Bible, Bible, as I before remark ed, now known to be in existence, existence, number about 300 0, of which the vast maj ority are in running hand, and hence are are subsequent subsequent to t he fourth century. There are none of course course later than t he sixteenth centur centur y, for th en the Book Book began to be printed; and none have yet been been found earlier than the fourt h. Their age, age, th at is, the precise precise centur centur y in wh ich they were writ ten, it is not always easy easy to determine. About th e tenth century t he scribes scribes who copied copied them b egan to notify the date in a comer comer of th e page; page; but before that tim e we can only j udge by v arious characteris characteristics tics that appear in the MSS. MSS. For example, the m ore simple and upright and regular t he letters are, the less less flourish flourish and ornamentat ion they have about them, the nearer equality there is between between the height and br eadth of th e characters characters —the more ancient we may be sure is the MS. Then, Then, of course, we can can oft en tell th e age of a MS. MS. approximately at least least by the ki nd of pictures the scribe scribe had painted painted in it ; the illustrations he had introduced, introduced, and the ornament ing of the first letter of a sentence sentence or on the top of a page; for w e know in what century that part icular style style of illumination prevailed. It would be impossible impossible to give anyone who had never seen any specimens specimens of t hese wonderful old manuscripts a proper idea of their appearance or m ake him realise realise their uniqu e beauty. beauty. There There they are today, perfect marvels of human skill and workmanship; manuscripts of of every kind; old parchment parchment s all all stained and worn; books of of faded purple lettered with silver, and their pages beautifully beautifully designed designed and ornam ented; bundles of finest finest vellum, y ellow with age, and bright even yet wit h the gold and vermilion laid on by pious hands 1000 years ago—in ago—in m any shapes, shapes, in many colours, colours, in m any languages. There There th ey are, scatt scatt ered throughout the libraries and m useums of Europe, Europe, challenging challenging th e admiration of everyone that beholds them for the astonishing beauty, beauty, clearnes clearness, s, and regularity of t heir lettering, and the incomparable illuminati on of their capitals and headings; still at t his day, after so m any centuries of change and chance, chance, charming t he eye of all with their soft yet brilliant colours, colours, and defying our modern scribes scribes to produce anything the least approaching approaching t hem i n loveliness. loveliness. There There lie the sacred sacred records, records, hoary w ith age, fragile, slender, slender, tim e-worn, bearing upon their front clear proofs of their ancient ancient birt h; yet wit h the bloom of youth still clinging about t hem. We simply simply stand and wonder; and we also despair. despair. We speak speak glibly of the 'Dark Ages' and despise despise their m onks and friars (and I shall, with y our leave, speak speak a little more about t hem im mediately) , but one thing at least is certain, certain, and that is, that not in the wide world t oday could could any of th eir critics find a craftsman craftsman t o make a copy of Holy Scripture wort hy t o be com com pared for beauty, clearness, clearness, and finish with any one of th e hundreds of copies copies produced produced in th e convents convents and monasteries of mediaeval Europe.
CHAPTER HAPTER VI I . Variations in in Text Fatal to Protestant Theory.
I HA HAVE VE m entioned monasteries, monasteries, and j ustly so, for th ere is no doubt th at t he vast maj ority, indeed practically practically all, of these venerable pages pages,, were t raced raced by t he hand of some ecclesiastic. The clergy were the only persons who had learning enough for it. What care, care, what zeal, zeal, what loving labour was spent spent by t hese holy m en in their w ork of transcribing the word of Scripture we can judge by viewing t heir handiwork. Yet Yet the w ork w as necess necessarily arily very slow slow and liable to err or; and that errors did creep creep in we know from the simple fact that there are about 200,000 variations in the text of the Bible as writ ten in t hese hese MSS. MSS. that we have today. This is not to be w ondered at, if you rem ember t hat t here are 35,000 verses in the Bible. Bible. Conside Considerr th e various ways in w hich corrupt corrupt ions and variations could could be int roduced. roduced. The variations m ight have been been (a) intent ionally introduced or or (b) unint entionally. (a) Unde Underr th is clas class s we mu st unfortunat ely reckon those changes changes which which were m ade by heretics to suit t heir particular doctrin doctrin e or practice, practice, j ust as, for example, t he Lutherans added added the w ord ’only’ to St. Paul’s Paul’s words to fit in wit h their new fangled notion about ’justification by faith only’. Or again, a scribe scribe might really think t hat he was improvin g the old copy from w hich he was transcribing by putting in a word here or leaving out a word there, or pu tt ing in a different w ord, so as to make t he sentence sentence clearer clearer or th e sense sense better. But ( b) it is satisfac satisfactory tory t o be ass assured ured (as we are) that t he vast vast m ajority of changes and varieties of readings in these old MSS. is entirely due to some unint entional cause cause.. (i) The scribe scribe might be tired or sleepy sleepy or exhausted wit h m uch writ ing, and m ight easily easily skip over a word, or indeed a whole sentence; sentence; or miss a line or repeat repeat a line; or make a m istake when he came came t o the end of a line or a sentence; sentence; he m ight be interrupt ed in his work and begin at th e wrong word when he recomm recomm enced. enced. Or he might ( ii) have bad eyesight eyesight ( some some lost it altogether th rough copying so so much); or not know r eally what was the proper division division to m ake of the words he was copying, especially especially if t he copy he was busy wit h w as one of the old Uncials, Uncials, wit h no stops and no pauses and no div ision between w ords or sentences; or he might , if he were writing at t he dictation dictation of another, not h ear very well, or pick pick up a word or phrase wrongly, as, for example, t he woman did w hen she wrote ’Satan ’Satan died here’ for a milliner’s shop, shop, instead of ’Satin ’Satin dyed here’. Or (iii) he might actually embody and copy into t he sacred sacred text of the Gospels Gospels words or not es or phrases phrases which did not really belong to the Gospel Gospel at all, but had been writ ten on t he margin of th e parchment by some previous scribe merely t o explain t hings. These These ’glosse ’glosses’ s’,, as they are called, undoubtedly h ave crept in t o some copies and th e Protestants Protestants are guilty of repeating one every tim e they say say th eir form of th e Lord’s Lord’s Prayer, Prayer, wit h its ending ’For ’For thin e is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.’ Such an addition was not u tt ered by Our Lord; Catholics conse consequently quently do n ot u se it. These These are some some ( and not all) of t he ways in which you could could easily see see th at differences could arise in the various copies made by old scribes. Put six men today to report a speech speech by any orat or; there will be considerable considerable variety variety in their report s, as one can prove by comparing different newspaper accounts of the same speech any m orning. I do not say that the differences differences will always signify signify m uch or substant substant ially alter the speaker’s speaker’s meaning; yet th ere they are, and sometim es they may be serious enough; enough; and if these things happen happen daily, even now wi th all our advanced advanced and highly developed developed meth ods of of printing, h ow much m ore would they happen in th e old days before before printing, when hand and br ain and eyesight eyesight and hearing could make so many blunders? One single letter changed would conceivably reverse the meaning of the whole sentence. sentence. I shall not alarm you by flaunt ing specimens specimens from the Greek or Hebrew, but shall make plain enough what I mean by recording an instance occurring occurring in our own days in our own t ongue. An old Provost Provost of a certain Eas Eastt Lothian Lothian town had died and been duly buried, and a headstone had been erected erected bearing t he fitt ing inscription from St. Paul’s Paul’s 1st 1st Epistle to t he
Corinthians (xv. 52). ’And we shall shall be changed.’ changed.’ It was finished finished on the Saturday; but a deed of darkness was done before the ’Sabbath’ morning. The minister had a son who loved a practical practical j oke. He got accomplices accomplices for for his shameful deed; they hoisted him up, and in cold blood blood he took put ty and oblit erated the letter ’c’ in ’changed’. ’changed’. On the ’Sabbath’ the godly, passing passing around, with long faces, faces, Bibles, Bibles, and whit e handkerchiefs, handkerchiefs, to view t he old Provost’s Provost’s tombstone, learned for the first t ime t hat t he Apostle taught ’And we shall be hanged’. You see what I mean? Well, the Bibles, before printing, are full of varieties and differences and blunders. Which of them all is correct? Pious Protestants may hold up their hands in horror and cry out , ’there are no m istakes in th e Bible! Bible! it is all inspired! it is God’s God’s own Book!’ Quite true, if you get God’s own book, t he originals as they came from the hand of Apostle, Prophet, and Evangelist. These, and these men only, w ere inspired inspired and protected protected from maki ng mistakes: but God God never promised that every individual scribe (perhaps sleepy-headed, sleepy-headed, or stupid, or heretical) who took in hand the copying out of t he Ne New w Testam Testam ent would be infallibly secure secure from comm itti ng errors in his work. The original Scripture Scripture is free from error, because because it has God God for it s author; so teaches teaches the Catholic Catholic Church; Church; and the Catholic Bible, Bible, t oo, the Vulgate, is a correct correct version of the Scriptur Scriptur e; but t hat does not alter the fact that there are scores, nay thousands, of differences in the old manuscripts and copies of the Bible that w ere writt en before the days of printing; and I should like any any enquiring Protestants Protestants to ponder over thi s fact fact and see how th ey can possibly possibly reconcile reconcile it wit h t heir principle that t he Bible alone is the all-sufficient all-sufficient guide to salvation. Which Bible? Are you sure you have got the right Bible? Are you certain that your Bible contains contains exactly exactly the words, and all the words and only t he words, that came from t he hands of Apostle Apostle and Evangelist? Evangelist? Are you sure that n o other words have crept in or t hat none have been dropped out? Can Can you study the Hebrew and Greek Greek and Latin m anuscripts anuscripts and v ersions, ersions, page by page, and com pare them , and compile compile for your self self a copy of Holy Holy Scripture identical identical with that writ ten by t he inspired authors from Moses to St. John? If you cannot —and cannot —and you see at once that it is impossible— impossible—then then do n ot t alk about 't he Bible and the Bible only'. You You kn ow perfectly perfectly w ell that you m ust trust t o some some auth ority outside of yourself yourself to give you the Bible. The The Bible you are using today was handed down to y ou: you have, in fact, fact, allowed some some third part y to come between you and God, God, a thing quit e repugnant to the Protestant Protestant t heory. We Catholics Catholics,, on th e other hand, glory in having some third party to come bet ween us and God, because because God God Himself has given it to us, nam ely, the Catholic Church, to teach us and lead us to Him. We believe in the Bible Int erpreted for us by t hat Church, because because God God entrusted to her th e Bible as as part of His word, and gave her a prom ise that she would never err in telling us what it means and explaining to us the 'm any t hings hard to be understood', w hich St Peter Peter tells us are are to be found wit hin it. Though there were as many m illion variations as as there are t housands in t he different copies of of t he Bible, we should be still unm oved, for w e have a 'Teacher 'Teacher sent from God', God', above and independent independent of all Scriptu Scriptu re, who, assisted assisted by t he Holy Ghost, Ghost, speaks speaks wit h Divine auth ority, and whose voice to us is the Voice Voice of God. God. It mat ters not t o us when a Christian Christian may h ave lived on earth; earth; whether before any of t he Ne New w Testam Testam ent was writ ten at all, or before it w as collected, collected, into one volume, or before it w as printed, or after it has been been printed; no mat ter t o us whether there are 1,000 or 1,000, 000 variations in texts and passage passages s and chapters of ancient ancient copies copies of which our m odern Bibles are compiled; we do n ot hazard our salvation on such a precarious precarious and unreliable support. We rather take that Guide who is 'yesterday and today and the same for ever', and w ho speaks speaks to us with a living v oice, oice, and who can never make a m istake; w ho is never uncertain uncertain or doubtful or wavering in her ut terances, terances, never denying today what she affirmed affirmed
yesterday, but ever clear, clear, definite, dogmatic; enlightening what is dark and making plain what is obscure to the minds of men. This is the Catholic Church, established by Almight y God as His organ organ and m outhpiece and interpreter, unaffected by th e changes changes and unshaken unshaken by the discoveries discoveries of ages. ages. To her her we listen; her we obey; to her we submit our j udgment and our intellect, intellect, kn owing she will never never lead us wrong. In her w e find peace and comfort comfort , satisfaction satisfaction and solution solution of all our difficulties, for she is the one in fallible Teacher Teacher an d Guide appoint ed by God. This is a logical, consistent, consistent, clear, clear, and int elligible meth od of attaining and preserving the tr uth, a perfect perfect plan and schem schem e of Christianity. Christianity. It is the Catholic Catholic plan; it is Christ’s Christ’s plan. What plan have any others to substitut e for it th at can stand stand a m oment’s analysis at the bar of reason, reason, history , comm onsense, onsense, or even of Holy Scripture it self? self?
CH A PT PT ER ER V I I I . O u r D e bt bt t o t h e M o n k s
THUS far we have been speaking of the Bible as found written in the old manuscripts, mostly in t he very early centuries of Christianity. Christianity. Now t he next question after settling how t he Bible was made and collected collected and comm itt ed to writ ing, is, how was it preserved preserved and multiplied and diffused diffused throughout the centur centur ies previous to the invent ion of printing? For For you will bear in m ind that we are as yet a long way off the day w hen the first print ing press was invented or set up. Did the people at large know anyt hing at all about the Sacred Scriptures Scriptures before it was printed and put into t heir hands? Here we are suddenly suddenly plunged into t he Middle Ages; Ages; w hat was the history of the Holy Book Book during that tim e which people in th ese ese countries generally generally call call ’Dark’? If you hav e patience with me for a littl e I shall prove to y ou that , j ust as the Catholic Catholic Church Church at t he very beginning wrote and collected collected together t he sacred sacred books of the New Testam Testam ent, so by h er m onks and friars and clergy clergy g enerally she preserved preserved them from destr destr uction during the Middle Ages Ages and made the people familiar familiar wit h them ; and, in short, that it is to the Roman Roman Church again under God God th at w e owe the possess possession ion of th e Bible in it s integrity at the present present day. Now of course, course, this will sound strange and startling in th e ears of of th ose who have imbibed t he comm comm on notions about t he Middle Ages. Ages. As I said said th ere was a traditional Protestant delusion about the Catholic Church and the Bible in general, so there is a traditional opinion which every good Protestant Protestant mu st adopt about t hose Ages Ages of Faith, as we Catholics prefer to call call t hem. The general general idea is that they were centuries (from the eighth century to the end of the fourteenth) of profound ignorance, ignorance, oppression, oppression, superstit superstit ion and of univ ersal ersal m isery isery — —that that the m onks were debauched, greedy and lazy—that the people in consequence were illiterate and imm oral, only half civilised, civilised, and always fighting—that t he whole of Europe Europe was sunk in barbarism and darkness, darkness, m en's intellects intellects enslaved enslaved and t heir wills enervated, and all their natu ral energies paralysed paralysed and benum bed by th e blighting y oke of Rome— Rome— that (in the comprehensive language of of th e Church Church of England England Homilies) 'laity and clergy, learned and unlearned, all ages, sects and degrees of men, women and children, of whole Christendom, Christendom, had been altogether drowned in damnable idolatry, and that by t he space space of 800 y ears and and m ore'. That is fairly sweeping. sweeping. How t hey can reconcile that alleged state of things with the unconditioned promises of Our Blessed Lord Lord t hat 't he gates of hell should should never prevail against th e Church' Church' and t hat He
would ’be with her always to the end of the w orld’, and that the ’Holy Ghost Ghost would lead lead them into all the truth’ — truth’ —is is to m e a my stery. But let that pass. pass. We are asked asked then t o believe that durin g the Middle Ages Ages true Christianity Christianity w as overlaid overlaid and buried beneath a mass of Popish fables and traditions, and that of course the Bible in consequenc consequence e was unknown except t o a very f ew; was neglected neglected and ignored and kept out of sight, because because it would h ave destroyed destroyed Popery Popery if it had been known. Only when th e light of the Reform Reform ation shone out out did t he Holy Book Book appear openly openly in t he world, and become familiar to t he faithful of Christ Christ as that w hich was to 'make th em wise unto salvation'. Now, I am not going t o enter into a general defence defence of the condition condition of things in t he Catholic world during these Ages Ages of of Faith, Faith, t hough, if t ime perm itt ed, nothing w ould be more congenial congenial to me. I would m erely remark in passing, passing, however, t hat perhaps men of the twenty-first or twenty-second century will take the very same view of this age of ours as some people do now of the Middle Ages, and will look back with horror upon it as a time wh en the w orld was desolated desolated by fam ine, pestilence, pestilence, and war— when nat ions of the earth am asse assed d huge arm ies and and built imm ense ense navies to slaughter each each oth er and plunder each other's territ ories— ories—when t he condition of the poor was harsher and crueller crueller t han ever before in t he history of t he world since Christ w as born—when born—when there w ere on th e one side some some hu ndreds or th ousands ousands of capitalists, capitalists, with some m illionaires illionaires amongst amongst t hem; and on the other, m any millions of the labouring classe classes s in deepes deepestt w ant and m isery; isery; mul titudes on the very v erge of starvation, wondering how they w ere to keep a roof over their heads or or get a bit of food for t hemselves and and for their children. People People in ages to come will, mayhap, regard this century w ith it s boasted boasted progress progress and civilisation, civilisation, and t his land with 350 years of Protestantism Protestantism behind it as an age and a countr countr y w here drunk enness enness and dishonesty dishonesty and im morality and mat rim onial unfaithfulness unfaithfulness and extr extr avagance avagance and unbelief and youthful excess excesses es and and insubordination and barbarity of mann ers were so universally universally and so deeply rooted that t he authorities of the kingdom were simply helpless helpless to cope wit h them . I am one of th ose who hold that the 'Dark Ages' Ages' were ages full of light in comparison comparison to these in which w e are now livi ng. The ages which which built the gorgeous Cathedrals and Abbeys whose ruins still stand as silent but eloquent eloquent wit nesse nesses s of their past glory and beauty, and still delight th e eye and captivate the adm iration of even t he most u nsympath etic beholder—those beholder—those ages could could not at least least have been sunk in ignorance of of architecture, or been insensible insensible to the beautiful and the artistic, or been niggardly or ungenerous in their estimate of what was a worthy t emple for th e majesty of the God of of heaven and earth and a dwellingplace fitting for the Lord of Hosts. Again, the ages which covered the face of Europe with universities and schools of learning, which produced philosophers and theologians like St. Thomas Aquinas and St. Bonaventure, and Albertus Magnus and Scotus Scotus and Bacon, Bacon, and w hich built up t he scholastic system—a system which, for logical acuteness and metaphysical accuracy, for subtilt y and u nity and complete consistenc consistency, y, has never been equalled, equalled, and w hich still stands unshaken by all attacks and and tr ium phing over all its rivals that 'have their day and cease cease to be'—that age, I say, say, could hardly have been intellectually intellectually dark or barren. Once more: an age which produced saints like Dominick and Francis and Bernard, Bernard, and w as fruitful in bringing fort h Orders of of m en and women for assisting assisting our poor hum anity in every form and stage of its existence existence— —teaching the ignorant, caring for the sick and the afflicted, and even redeemin redeemin g captives from t he yoke of slavery—the age, besides, which witnessed the Crusades, those magnificent outbursts of Christian chivalry and of loyalty to Jesus Christ Our Lord—when men, kings, and princes, and subjects, seizing the Crusader's cross, went cheerfully to lay
down th eir lives in m yriads on the burning plains of Syria Syria in t heir glorious attem pts to rescue the Holy Sepulchre Sepulchre from t he hand of Turk and infidel —that infidel —that age, I say, cannot have been altogether devoid of t he love of Him who Him self self gave His life for m en, and Wh ose feet had t rod t hose sacred sacred places in t he days of His Flesh. Flesh. People People speak speak glibly nowadays of the ignorance of of these far-back times; but it seems seems to m e that no man w ho is really really grounded in t he trut h of Christianity, Christianity, who know s his Pater Noster, Noster, Ave, Creed, Creed, the Ten Ten Commandm ents, and t he Seven Seven Sacram Sacram ents, and put s them into practice, can can ever be said said to be tr uly ignorant . He might not have been able to build a motor car or even to dr ive one—to one—to tu rn out a steam ship or a flying machine or speak the weird language of Esperanto. Neither could St. Peter or St. Joseph, oseph, for the m att er of t hat. Nevertheless Nevertheless the practical practical t eaching eaching t he people of those ages received received from priest and m onk in church and school school was, I submit, of far more r eal moral and intellectual value than t he hash of scraps scraps of of hygiene and science science,, French French and cookery, cookery, civics civics and art w hich is crammed in to t he unwilling brain of our t wentieth centur centur y public school school children. Generally Generally speaking, speaking, the mediaevalists, mediaevalists, so despise despised, d, had t he knowledge of God and of the world to come; and that was really the best knowledge they could have. (See preface preface to Dr. Maitland's Dark Ages .) .) But I am afraid I have been guilty of a serious serious digression; digression; what w e must do now is to confine ourselves ourselves to the single point as to how the Scriptures were preserved and mu ltiplied and made known t o the people in the Middle Middle Ages. Ages. (I ) I shall first first pr ove that the Bible was mu ltiplied and preserved preserved by t he monks and priests. All All mu st now admit that i t w as really really in m onasteries onasteries that m ultit udes of copies copies of the Holy Holy Scriptures were made. Monasteries were centres of learning in those times even more t han t hey are t oday, because because education education w as not so widely spread. An indispensab indispensable le part of th e outfit of every m onastery onastery w as a library. library. 'A m onastery onastery without a library,' writes a monk of the twelfth century to another monk, 'is like a castle castle wit hout an arm oury.' And he goes on on to d eclare eclare that t he great defence defence in the monastic armoury should be the Bible. Bible. Sometim es the libraries were very large, and we read of Emperors Emperors and other great people borrowing from them . The monks were the m ost learned men of t hose days, days, and were by profession profession schola scholars, rs, men w ho had renounced renounced worl dly pursuits and pl easures, easures, and dedicated dedicated t hemselves to a retired life of prayer and study; and one of the principal parts of their scholas scholastic tic activity w as the copying and t ranscribing ranscribing of t he Sacred Sacred Scriptures. For For t his purpose there w as a large room called called the Scriptorium in which a dozen dozen or m ore monks could be engaged engaged at one time but there were also many m onks employed, each each in his own cell, which contained all the necessary apparatus for literary work. These cells were so arranged around the centr centr al heating chamber chamber t hat in wint er their hands would not get benumbed with so much writing. Day by day, year after year, the monks would persevere persevere in t heir holy labours, copying copying w ith l oving care every every let ter of t he sacred sacred text from some old manuscript manuscript of t he Bible, Bible, adorning and illuminating the pages of of vellum with pictures and and illustrations in purple and gold and silver colouring, and so producing real real works of art that excite the envy and admiration of modern generations. generations. Some Bishops Bishops and Abbots Abbots wrot e out w ith their own hands the whole of both t he Old and th e New Testaments Testaments for the use of t heir churches and and m onasteries. onasteries. Even nun s—and s—and th is point I would br ing under special special notice—nuns notice—nuns took their share in thi s pious and highly skilled labour. We read of one who copied copied wit h her own hands two whole Bibles, and besides made six copies of several large portions of the Gospels and Epistles. Every monastery and church possessed at least one, and some possessed many copies of the Bible and the Gospels. In those ages it was a common thing t o copy copy out part icular parts of the Bible Bible (as well as the whole Bible); for example, the Gospels, or the Psalms, or Epistles, so that many who could not afford
to purchase a complete Bible, were able to possess themselves of at least some part which was specially interesting or popular. This custom is truly Catholic, as it flourishes amongst us t oday. At th e end of our prayer books, for i nstance, nstance, we have Gospels and Epistles for the Sundays, and various publishers, too, have issued the four Gospels separately, each by itself, and the practice seems to me to harmonise entirely w ith t he very idea and structure of t he Bible, which was originally originally composed composed of separate separate and in dependent dependent portions, in u se in different Churches Churches throughout Christendom. And so we find that the m onks and clergy clergy often confined their work t o copying out certain special portions of Sacred Scripture, and naturally the Gospels were the favourite part. The work, we mu st remem ber, was very slow, and expensive expensive as well. Dr. Maitland Maitland reckons that it w ould require ten m onths for a scribe scribe of those days to copy out a Bible; Bible; and that 60 or 70 [ pounds] w ould have been been required if he had been been paid at the rate th at lawstationers pay pay th eir writers. Of course, course, with the m onks it was a labour of love, and not for m oney; but t his calcula calculation tion of Dr Maitland only refers to the work of copying; it leaves leaves out of account account t he mat erials that had to be used, used, pen and ink and parchment. Another authorit y (Buckingham) has made a more detailed calculation, calculation, and assum assum ing th at 427 skins of of parchment would have been needed for the 35,0 00 verses, verses, runnin g into 107,0 00 folios, he reckons reckons that a complete copy of Old and New New Testam Testam ents could not have been purchased purchased for less than 2 18 [ pounds]. Yet Protestants Protestants stare in astonishment astonishment when you t ell them t hat not everybody could sit by his fireside fireside in t hose days days wit h a Bible on his knees! Some princes (among them, I think, Charlemagne) gave the monks permission to hunt for deer in the Royal forests, forests, so as to get skins to m ake into parchment for copying w ork. I have no space space to give elaborate proof of m y assertion assertion t hat, as a m atter of course, course, all monasteries and churches possessed copies of the Scriptures in the Middle Ages. It stands to reason reason th at t hose who made the copies would keep at least least one for their own use in t he monastery, and another for t he public service services s in the church. We read of one convent convent in I taly w hich had not m oney enough for th e bare neces necessa saries ries of life, yet m anaged to scrape scrape up 50 [ pounds]t o purchase purchase a Bible. Bible. Dr Maitland, in his most valuable book The Dark Ages —he was a Protestant, librarian to the Archbishop of Canterbury, a great stu dent, and a m ost ost impart ial scholar— scholar—gives gives page after page of instances, that came under his own notice in his researches, of religious houses that had Bibles and Testaments in their possession. Of course these are but casual specimens; specimens; t he thin g was so comm comm on that there was no need to chronicle the fact any m ore than y ou would chronicle the fact that A or B had a clock clock in his parlour in the nineteenth century. Kings and Princes and Popes often presented beautiful copies of the Bible to Abbots and Priors Priors for use in t heir m onastery, onastery, sometim es gloriously gloriously embellished embellished within w ith painting and illuminati ons, writt en in letters of of gold and silver, and bound in golden casing casing set set wit h gems. We frequently read of such gifts. And not only t he Bible, Bible, but other books used used in t he service service of the Church, such such as copies of the Missal Missal or Psalter Psalter or Gospels, Gospels, all cont aining great p orti ons of Holy Scriptur Scriptur e, were often presented presented as gifts by great personages in Church or State, bound in gold or ivory or silver of the ut most purit y, and marv ellously ellously adorned and studded with pearls and precious stones. Nothing was considered too costly or too magnificent t o lavish on the sacred sacred volum e. But I suppose suppose that when w e find Popes Popes like Leo Leo I II , and Leo IV, and Emp Emp erors like Henry Henry I I, and Lewis the Debonnaire, Debonnaire, and Bishops like Hincmar of Rheims, and Dukes like Hugh of Burgundy, and Bishops like Ralph of Rochester, and numberless Abbots and Priors in the eighth and ninth centuries causing copies of the Sacred Scriptures to be made and gifted to monasteries and churches churches throughout Europe, t his must be taken as evidence of of Rome's hatred of t he Word of God, and her fear of its becomin becomin g known or read or
studied! Yet Yet th at t his was the common custom custom for hundreds of years is a fact fact of history t hat is quite beyond t he region of doubt. Moreover, the Sacred Sacred Scriptures were a favourite subject of study am ong the clergy; and a popular occupation occupation was the wr iting of comm entaries upon them , as all priests priests at at least are aware, from having t o recite recite portions of them every day, ranging fr om t he age of St St Leo the Great Great and St Gregory, Gregory, down to St Bernard and St Anslem. Anslem. (2) Now one could could go on at any length accumu accumu lating evidence as as to the fact of monks and priests reproducing and transmittin g copies copies of of th e Bible Bible from century to centur centur y, before th e days of Wycliff Wycliff and Luther; but there is no need, because because I am not wri ting a treatise on the subj subj ect, ect, but merely adducing a few few proofs of my assertions, assertions, and trying t o show how utt erly absurd is the contention contention t hat Rome Rome hat es the Bible, and did her best to k eep it a locked and sealed sealed book and even to destroy it throughout the Middle Ages Ages.. Surely noth ing but the crasses crassestt ignorance or or t he blindest blindest pr ejudice could could support a t heory so flatly contradicted by th e simplest simplest facts of history. The real real tru th of t he mat ter is that it is the Middle Ages Ages which have been been a closed closed and sealed sealed book to Protestants, Protestants, and th at only now, owing to t he honest honest and patient researche researches s of im partial scholars scholars amongst t hem, are the t reasures reasures of those grand centuries being being unlocked and brought to t heir view. I t is this ignorance or or prejudice which explains to me a feature t hat w ould be otherwise unaccountable unaccountable in the histories of the Bible Bible writt en by non-Catholics. non-Catholics. I have consulted many of th em, and they all, with hardly an exception, either skip over t his period of the Bible’s Bible’s existence existence altogether or dismiss it wit h a few off- hand references. references. They They j ump right over from t he inspired inspired writ ers them selves, selves, or perhaps perhaps from th e fourth century, w hen the Canon was fixed, to John Wycliff, ’The Morning Star of the Reformation’, leaving blank th e intermediate centuries, plunged, as as they im agine, in worse than Egyptian Egyptian darkness. darkness. But I ask — —Is Is this fair or honest? Is it consistent consistent wit h a love of trut h thu s to suppress suppress the fact, which is now h appily beginning to dawn on the m ore enlightened min ds, that it was the monks and clergy of the Catholic Catholic Church Church who, dur ing all these ages, preserved, multiplied, and perpetuated the Sacred Scriptures? The Bible on its hum an side is a perishable perishable article. Inspired by God God th ough it be, it was yet, by t he Providence of of God, writt en on perishable parchment w ith pen and ink; liable to be lost or destroyed destroyed by fire, by natu ral decay decay and corruption, or by t he enemies, whether civilised civilised or pagan, that wasted and ravaged Christendom Christendom by the sword, and gave its churches churches and monasteries and and libraries to th e flames. Who, I ask, ask, but the men and women, consec consecrated rated to God God by t heir vows and devoted t o a life of prayer and study in m onasteries onasteries and and convents, remote from w orldly strife and ambit ambit ion— who but they saved the written Word of God from total extinction, and with loving and reverent care reproduced its sacred pages, to be known and read of all, and to be handed down to our own generation, which grudges to acknowledge acknowledge the debt it owes to their pious and unremit ting labours?
CHAPTER I X. Bible- re a ding in the ‘Da rk Age s ’
BUT perhaps some BUT some obj ector ector may say: say: ’Yes ’Yes,, t hey copied the Scripture, t hese monks and priests, but that was all; they did not know anything really about it, did not understand it; their work w as merely mechanical.’ mechanical.’ Now, Now, I shall show show that the very contrary was the fact; fact; they had a profound knowledge and understanding understanding of the
Bible, Bible, and it w as their constant constant companion. (I ) I n th e first place, place, the Bishops Bishops and and Abbots required required all th eir priests priests to k now t he Scriptur Scriptur es. es. We find constant constant ly in t he old Constitutions and Canons of of different diocese dioceses s that the clergy were boun d t o know th e Psalms, Psalms, t he Epistles, Epistles, and Gospels, Gospels, besides, of course, th e Missal Missal and oth er Church service books, (take for example, the Constitutions of Belfric or of Soissons). And these rules were effective; effective; they had to be observed, for we find Councils like like that of Toledo, Toledo, for instance (in 835) , issuing decrees decrees that Bishops were bound to enquire throughout their dioceses dioceses whether th e clergy clergy w ere sufficiently sufficiently instructed in the Scripture. In some case cases s they were obliged to know by heart not only th e whole Psalter, salter, bu t ( as under the r ule of St. Pachomius) achomius) the New Testam Testam ent as well. I suppose suppose most m inisters of the Kirk could stand this test quit e easily. easily. Then Then th e clergy clergy w ere continually meditat ing on various portions of the Scriptures, and writin g about them in homilies and and comment aries, aries, and ever reciting reciting t hem in their services, services, so they could not help but know t hem well. Some of th e saints saints of those days, days, like St. Anslem Anslem and St. Hubert, actually k new them off by heart, and could answer answer every question, however difficult, about t he meaning of them . And not only saints, but m ultit udes of of ordinary pr iests iests and Bishops Bishops constantly constantly had t he Scriptur Scriptur es on their lips. Wulstan, Bishop of Worces Worcester, ter, for example, had a custom, which would be decidedly decidedly tr ying t o most clergy in our days, of repeating the whole Psalter salter along with his attendant pr iests iests when j ourneying; and we are told that ’lying, standing, walking, sitting, he h ad always a Psal Psalm m on his lips, always Christ Christ in his heart.’ Again, we know of Abbots (like him of Cologne) Cologne) who ’caused ’caused the wh ole of the Old and the New Testam Testam ents to be r ead through every year.’ Besides, Besides, the Scriptures were read daily during m eals in m onasteries. onasteries. And And if furt her proof were required that the clergy clergy were intim ately ately familiar, not only wit h the w ords, ords, but with the m eaning eaning and teaching of Holy Scripture, Scripture, w e have only t o dip into t he sermons, sermons, happily preserved, preserved, whi ch these men preached preached to t heir flocks, flocks, and w e shall find them simply full to overflowing w ith quot ations from every part of the Bible, far fuller, indeed, indeed, than t he serm serm ons of Protestant Protestant clergy in t he twent ieth century. I shall give only only one example, and we have no reason reason to t hink t hat it is at all exceptional. exceptional. It is the serm serm on of a monk called Bardo Bardo in Germ Germ any, who w as about about t o be appointed Archbishop Archbishop of Mentz. Mentz. He preached, preached, how ever, first before a gr eat m ultit ude at Christm as about about t he year 1000, the Emperor being present. His text w as Psalm Psalm xvii, 1 3 . —I —I h ave not seen the whole of his sermon, bu t only about eight pr inted pages of it. I have counted the references references and quotations from the Old and New Testaments, Testaments, and I find there are exactly 73. The audience audience enjoyed enjoyed t he serm serm on, understood the references, references, and and th e monk w as made Archbis Archbishop. hop. I hope I have shown now how really preposterous preposterous is the idea that the m onks did not know t he Bible. Bible. What m an in his senses can have patience to listen to the silly legend that Martin Luther first discovered by accident the Scriptures—a book which, as a friar, he was bound to have known and studied and learned and recited for years? The simple fact, as is now prov ed by irrefut able evidence evidence,, is that the clergy of th ose 'dark ages' ages' had a knowledge of and and familiarity w ith t he writt en Word of of God God which modern m inisters cannot equal; equal; and what is no less less important, together wit h their knowledge they had a deep veneration veneration and love for it, guarding it j ealously ealously from corrupti on and error, believing what they t aught, hum bly accepting accepting its Divine Divine authorship and authority—an attit ude in striking contrast to present day critics, who treat t he Bible like a comm comm on book, and pick holes in it and im pugn it s genuineness genuineness and and it s accurac accuracy, y, and in general attempt to eliminate the supernatural element from it altogether.
(2) But, again, I th ink I hear the voice of the objector, who will not believe all this if he can possibly help it — it —'Y 'Yes; es; w ell, perhaps th e clergy clergy di d know t he Bible, but nobody else did ; it w as a closed closed and sealed volum e to th e poor lay people, because, because, of course, course, it was all in Latin.' Latin.' Now, leaving aside the question of Latin Latin for a m oment (for I shall come come back to that im mediately), it is utterly false to say or suppose suppose that t he lay folks were ignorant of the Scriptures. Scriptures. They were thoroughly well-acquainted well-acquainted wit h them so far as they r equired to be in their state of life. It is true, of course—a course—and nd how could it be ot herwise?—that herwise?—that eccles ecclesias iastics tics being the reading m en and wr iting m en, in short, t he only well- educated educated persons persons of those days, naturally have left behind t hem more evidence than most lay people could could do of their familiarit y wit h the Sacred Sacred Word; but it is yet the fact that the literatur e of those ages ages,, outside clerical clerical documents altogether, w hich has come come down to us, is steeped steeped and perm eated through and th rough wi th Scriptur Scriptur e. Conversations Conversations,, for example, correspondence correspondence,, law deeds, household books, legal documents, historical narratives—all are full of it; full not only of t he ideas, ideas, but oft en of the very words of Scriptur Scriptur e. How many law yers and doctors and professors professors and ordinary lay folks nowadays, nowadays, I wonder, w ould be found quoting from t he Bible in their wr itings? The The reason, reason, of course, course, w as that books were scarce scarce in those days, and expensive, and th e Bible was the most common and popular and acces accessible sible;; it was the m ost familiar to kin gs and princes, princes, t o soldiers soldiers and lawyers, to bu siness siness men and t radesmen, radesmen, labourers and artisans. artisans. They all knew it and understood it, and enjoyed t he num berless berless quotations and references references to it in sermons and addresse addresses, s, and could could often r epeat epeat portions of it from mem ory. 'The writ ings of the dark ages'—s ages'—says ays Dr. Maitland in chapter 27 of his m ost ost valuable and entertaining book, The Dark Ages—'the Ages—'the writi ngs of the dark ages are, if I may use the expression, expression, made of the Scriptur Scriptur es. es. I do not m erely mean that t he writers constantly constantly quoted the Scriptures, and appealed appealed t o them as authorities on all occasio occasions ns as other wr iters have done since since their day; but I m ean that t hey thought and spoke spoke and wrot e the thought s and and words and phrases of the Bible, and and th at th ey did thi s constantly constantly and habitu ally as the natural m ode of expressing expressing themselves. themselves. They They did it, too, not exclusively exclusively in theological theological or eccles ecclesiastic iastical al mat ters, but in histories, histories, biographies, familiar lett ers, ers, legal instrum ents, and document s of every description. description. I do not k now th at I can fully express express my meaning, but perhaps I m ay render it m ore clear clear if I repeat that I do not so much refer to direct direct quot ations of of Scriptur Scriptur e as to th e fact fact t hat t heir ideas seem seem t o have fallen fallen so naturally into t he words of Scriptur Scriptur e that t hey were constantly constantly referring to t hem in a w ay of passing passing allusion allusion which is now very puzzling puzzling t o those who are unacquainted with the phraseology phraseology of th e Vulgate.' Vulgate.' We can thus see from th e testimony of such such a student of that period as Rev. Dr. Maitland how the language and ideas of the Bible had passed into the current language of the people. Sometimes persons carried copies of the Gospels Gospels about about wit h t hem, just as Catholics Catholics today carry carry about t hem a Gospe Gospell of St John, out of veneration. (3) But how, it m ay be asked, asked, could the people people who were unable to read (and th ey were admit tedly a large num ber) become acquainted with the Bible? The answer answer is simple. They They were taught by m onk and priest, both in church and and school, school, through sermon and instruction. They were t aught by sacred sacred plays or dramas, wh ich represented visibly to them the principal facts of sacred history, like the Passion Play of today at Oberamm Oberamm ergau. They They were taught through paint ings and statu statu ary and frescoes in the churches, which portrayed before their eyes the doctrines of the Faith and the t ruth s of Scriptur Scriptur e: and hence it is that in Catholic Catholic countr countr ies the walls of churches and monasteries and convents, and even cemeteries, are covered with pictures representing Scriptural scenes.
’Painting ’Painting is the book of t he ignorant’. Stained glass windows m ay be m entioned in the same category; category; and so may popular hym ns, and poetry poetry , and simple devotional devotional books for the poor, all of wh ich, along with the ceremonies and and functions of the Church, served to im print on people’s people’s mem ories and and understandings the great events in God’s dealings with His creatures since the beginning of the world. We mu st remem ber, too, t hat, for t hose who could could not afford t o purchase purchase a B Bible ible or a copy of the Gospels, the Sacred Volume was often chained to a stone in some public place about the church for everyone to study; and wealthy persons in their wills were known t o leave m oney enough to provide for such a thing. The simple simple tr uth is that the Catholic Church Church adopted every m eans at her disposal disposal in t hese hese old days to brin g a knowledge of God’s Word to those who could not read, as well as to those who could. Bibles Bibles were not print ed because because there was no printing pr ess; ess; bu t w hose fault fault w as that ? Is th e Church Church to blam e for not inventin g printing sooner? sooner? But why did God God not invent printing Himself if he wished wished th e Bible to be in everybody’s hand? Nero had no mot or car, nor had Julius Julius Caes Caesar ar a m axim gun, n or William Wallace Wallace a flying machine —were —were these men consequently consequently ignorant and behind the t imes and worth y of contempt? There There were no railw ay trains in Luther's day; nor did John Knox Knox inv ent chloroform chloroform , or Oliver Oliver Cromwell electricity—a electricity—are re t hese hese m en in conseque consequence nce to be considered as illiterate, stupid, barbarous, sunk in mental degradation? The Catholic Church, then, h ad to do the best she could could in the circumstances; circumstances; and I submit she did all t hat any organisation organisation on earth could could possibly possibly have done for the spread of Scriptur Scriptur e knowledge am am ong her children. children. Vast Vast nu mbers could could not read; I adm it it ; the Church Church was not t o blame for that . Latin Latin w as the universal universal tongue, and you had t o be rather scholarly scholarly to r ead it. But I protest against the outrageous notion that a m an cannot know the Bible unless he can read it. Can he not see it r epresented epresented before his eyes? Can he not hear it read? Do you not know and un derstand one of Shakespeare's Shakespeare's plays much bett er by seeing it acted on th e stage than by r eading it out of a book? Do the visitors to Oberammergau, witnessing the 'Passion Play', not come to understand and realise the story of the Passion and Death of Our Lord more vividly by seeing it enacted before their eyes than if t hey read the cold print of a New Testament? You hear a Board School child rattling off the ten plagues of Egypt and the nam es of all the Kings of Israel and Judah, and divers chapters chapters of t he Bible: Bible: but does that child necessarily necessarily know what it is reciting? reciting? Does Does it understand and appreciate appreciate and realise? realise? It may or it may not; there is no necessary necessary connection connection between the two things. There There is such such a thin g as literal idolatry idolatry , worshipping t he letter and n eglecting eglecting t he spirit; a superstitious, superstitious, grovelling subserviency subserviency to t he mere t ext of t he Bible. Bible. A boy or girl mi ght k now whole passages passages of the Bible by heart, and only use them for t heir own m oral ruin. I am contending for the genuine, real, practica practicall working know ledge of the Bible among t he generality of Catholics Catholics in the Middle Ages Ages:: and, whet her they could read read or not, I do not hesitate to assert assert t hat, wi th few exceptions, they had a personal personal and int elligent elligent knowledge and a viv id realisation realisation of t he m ost ost necess necessary ary facts in th e Sacred Sacred Scripture Scripture and in the life of Our Divine Lord Lord t o an extent which is simply not t o be found among the m illions of of our nom inal Christians Christians in these islands islands today. Whatever ignorance there was—this at least all impartial scholars must concede—the Church was in no way t o blame for it. Where, I ask, ask, is the proof of the Church's hatred of the Bible, of of any attem pt t o hide it, to destroy it, t o dishonour dishonour and belittle it? I cannot do better than give you here tw o or three sentences sentences from t he work of the learned and honest honest Protestant student , some of whose words I have quoted before: 'I must add that I have not found anything about the arts and engines of hostility, the blind hat red of half-barbarian kings, the fanatical fanatical fury of t heir subjects, or the reckless reckless antipat antipat hy of t he Popes Popes (in regard to t he Bible). Bible). I d o not r ecollec ecollectt any
instance in which it is recorded recorded that the Scriptures, or any part of t hem, were treated wit h indignity, or with less less than profound respect. respect. I k now of no case case in which they were intenti onally deface defaced d or destroyed (except as I have j ust stated for their rich covers), covers), t hough I have met with , and hope to produce several several instances instances,, in some of which they w ere the only, and in others almost t he only, books which were preserved preserved thr ough the revoluti ons of of the m onasteries onasteries to which they belonged, and all the ravage of fire, pillage, carelessness, or whatever else had swept away all the others. I kn ow of nothing wh ich should should lead lead me t o suppose suppose that any h um an craft craft or power was exercise exercised d to prevent the reading, the m ultiplication, the diffusion of the Word of God.’ God.’ We may fitt ingly conclude conclude this part of our papers with t he words of the Quarterly Review , October, 1879: ’The ’The notion t hat people in th e Middle Middle Ages Ages did not read their Bibles is probably exploded except except am ong the m ore ignorant of controversialists controversialists.. The notion is not simply a mistake; it is one of th e most ludicrous and grot esque esque blunders.’
CHAPTER HAPTER X. W here t hen ar e all t he Me dieval Bibles? Bibles?
BUT let us return for a m oment t o the popular objection BUT objection (h inted at above); ’Still ’Still t he Bible was in Latin; you cannot deny t hat. The Church Church kept it in Latin so as the people should not read it. She was afraid afraid of putt ing it int o the comm on language of of the people.’ people.’ There There is some some tr uth in t hese hese statem statem ents; bu t t here is mor e untrut h. That the Scriptur Scriptur es were for th e most part in Latin Latin is tru e; that it w as beca because use of the Church’s Church’s dread of her people gett gett ing t o know t he Bible and and so abandoning abandoning t heir Catholic Catholic faith is, of course, fal se. (I) Bible in Latin. Admitting for the moment that the Bible was in Latin during the Middle Ages, what follows? That nobody but priests could read it? Nonsense. There were ju st tw o classes classes of people then: those who could read, and those who could not read. Now, those who did r ead could could read Latin, Latin, and, therefore, w ere perfectly perfectly content wit h t he Scriptures Scriptures in Latin. Those Those who could not r ead Latin Latin could not read at all. I ask, th erefore, what earthly n eed was there of a translation of the Bible from Latin Latin i nto t he language of of the comm on m ultit ude? What good would it have done? At this point w e may expect to hear our friend indignant ly giving vent to some such such objection as this: ’The ’The people, people, th en, were horribly illiterate; t hey could not not wr ite their own names; they could not read; they were half barbarian and savage; they were really fearfully ignorant, you know , and degraded. Just Just compare them for one mom ent wit h our present-day School School Board Board children in the matt er of reading reading and writ ing and general int elligence elligence.’ .’ Softly now, I answer; one thi ng at a tim e. We are not discuss discussing ing that at present, present, and do not mean to discuss it, because it is beside the question. The Church was not to blame for th e people’s people’s ignorance of of letters; but l et that pass, pass, or even grant, if you like for the sake of argument, that the Church was blameworthy; the point I am insisting insisting on is only t his —granted —granted a m an cannot read, what on earth is th e use of putt ing a Bible in his hand in any language under Heaven, Heaven, wh ether Greek Greek or Hebrew, Hebrew, or Latin, or English, English, or Arabic? That man, i f he is taught the Bible at all, must be taught it in ot her ways and by other m eans, eans, as we have seen seen he was in the 'Dark Ages'. Ages'. So that w e arrive at t his point, t hat either t he Latin Latin Bible was read, or no Bible
at all. The learned Protestant Protestant author, Dr. Cutts, in his book, Turning Point s of English Church History , refers to this fact fact wh en he says: says: ’Another comm on error is that the clergy clergy w ere unwilling t hat t he laity should read the Bible for them selves, selves, and carefully carefully kept it i n an unknown t ongue that th e people people might not be able to read read it. The truth is that m ost ost people who could could read at all could read Latin, Latin, and w ould certainly prefer to read t he authorised Vulgate Vulgate to any vernacular version’ version’ — —i.e. i.e. preferred the Latin Bible to an English one. Dr Peter Bayne also deals with this point when he remarked in the Literary Literary World (189 World (189 4, Oct.), quot ed by 'M.C.L.' 'M.C.L.' in her booklet, 'Latin 'Latin w as then the language of all all m en of cultur cultur e, and to an extent probably far beyond what w e at present present r ealise, ealise, the comm on language of Europe; Europe; in those days tens of thousands of lads, many of t hem poor, studied at th e Universities, Universities, and learned learned to talk Latin.' I may add th at I came across across the statem ent lately in th e life of St St Peter Peter Martyr, who flourished in the 13t h centur centur y, t hat he gave some retreat or addresses addresses to nuns in t hat age in Latin, and was understood by t hem. The whole mistake in peoples' peoples' minds arises, arises, of course, from t he supposition supposition t hey m ake that Latin was then a dead language, whereas it was really a living one in every sense of the t erm, being read and spoken spoken and w ritt en universally in Europe, Europe, and consequently consequently being understood by everyone who could read read at all. What m otive or purpose, then, could the Church Church have had in translating it in to another t ongue? In any case, case, th is mu ch none can can help admitt ing—that ing—that at least least t he Church Church tu rned the Scriptures from Hebrew and Greek Greek (w hich were the original languages) languages) in to Latin, which w as the living language of the world, for th e benefit benefit of her children. She might still have kept the Bible a dark, dark, u nknown, my sterious document by leaving it in Hebrew and Greek. Greek. She did the very opposite. Does this seem as if she was anxious to keep her people in ignorance? (2) However, we are not done with objections yet. 'How is it,' ask our Protestant Protestant friends, 'that if, as you say, say, t he Sacred Sacred Scriptures were mu ltiplied and reproduced and copied copied over and over again hundr eds and and t housands housands of tim es, es, even in Latin, h ow is it that we have so few of these copies now? Where have they gone? Surely we should expect expect to have m any of them preserved.' preserved.' The question, question, I am afraid, betrays an ignorance (not altogether inexcusable) inexcusable) of t he condition of society society and civilisation civilisation and of in ternational r elations in these distant centuries. There were m any causes causes at work which perfectly perfectly account account for the disappearance disappearance of the maj ority of the old copies of the Bible. (a) To begin with, t here was frequent, frequent, if not continual, war going on, during which books and manuscripts were rut hlessly hlessly destroyed. We need only mention such instances as the invasions of the Danes and Normans, and of the Sarace Saracens ns and Northern Barbarians Barbarians into It aly, bur ning monasteries and and churches, churches, sacking and laying waste ecclesiastical buildings. During these oft-repeated incursions incursions and the h orrible pillage that generally generally accompanied accompanied w arfare, m any m ost valuable libraries and thousands of MSS. and copies of the Scriptures of rare, indeed of priceless priceless wort h, m ust have perished. (b) Then Then t here is the common occurrence occurrence of of fire which accounts for the loss of much valuable literature—by which copies of Scriptur Scriptur e were burned, eith er by accident accident or by design, design, either singly or in th e general general conflagration conflagration th at consum consum ed the whole monastery or library as well. (c) Another very common cause of loss was negligence, through which, both in the Middle Ages and since, since, many invaluable books and and papers have gone t o destruction. Sometim es a book was borrowed from the conventual library and never retur ned. This beca became me so great an evil t hat proprietors of books adopted th e plan of inscribing inscribing an excomm excomm unication or a curse against against t hose who should keep or steal what had been merely lent —much in the style of t he anathemas pronounced in the Decrees Decrees of the Church's Co Councils. uncils.
For exam ple, we fin d one case case like thi s: ’This book belongs to St Mary of Robert Robert ’s Bridge; w hosoever hosoever shall steal steal it or sell it, or alienate it from t his house, house, or mu tilate it, let h im be anathema maranatha, Am en.’ The The librarian was not often as careful careful as he should have been over hi s treasures; so his books and MSS. MSS. were somet im es allowed to go amissing, amissing, or t o be taken away, or t o perish through damp, or corruption, or rat s or mice, or water, or by being stolen, stolen, or even by being sold by those who had no right to sell, and to those who had no right t o buy. Lastly, Lastly, we know that great quantities of most important parchments and manuscripts have been used by bookbinders for such ignoble purposes as to form backs and bands and fly-leaves and covers covers of other books. (d) But over and above t hese simple simple and natural causes, causes, there was another whi ch we m ust not f orget, and wh ich was perhaps more far- reaching and powerful powerful t han the rest — rest —II mean t he deliberate destruction destruction of the books and manuscripts so as to get the gold and silver and precious stones in which t hey were set and bound. I have spoken before of the costliness costliness of the cases cases and ornaments th at surrounded the copies of the Scriptu Scriptu res. res. Sometim es tw enty pounds of pure gold were used used in their binding, not to speak of the jewels that adorned their covers. Now, t hat r apacious apacious and unscrupulous unscrupulous m en, whet her Catholic Catholic or Protestant, Protestant, should in th eir lust for money seize seize upon t hese treasures, treasures, which w ere in the keeping of harmless and defenceless monks and priests, we can well understand; and that they did so is unfortunately only t oo true. Thousands Thousands of monasteries and libraries were rifled, an incalcula incalculable ble amount of ancient ancient and precious books and parchm parchm ents burned or oth erwise destroyed, destroyed, and their gold and silver sett sett ings turned int o hard cash. cash. For For the Word of God they cared cared nothing; what t hey wanted was money. And if this were true, as it is to a limit ed extent, of Catholic days, what shall we say of th e robberies and plunders comm comm itt ed by sectaries sectaries in England, in their first fury, at the Reformation? We can scarcely conceive the extent to which the Reformers Reformers went in their rage and hatred against against everything t hat had the least least semblance semblance of Rom Rom e about it , especially especially if it seemed seemed likely t o afford th em some 'filthy lu cre'. The The P Protestant rotestant historian, Collier, Collier, tells how Henry Henry VI II , determi ned to 'purge his library' of all Popish and superstitious books, and consequently gave orders for th e destru destru ction of such things as 'missals, 'missals, legends, and suchlike'; suchlike'; but notice the next point of comm comm and—'to deliver deliver th e garniture of the books, being either silver or gold, t o his officers'. officers'. That That w as the real mot ive; avarice, avarice, cupidity, greed of gold. The books thus plundered and stripped of their precious precious stones were largely Bibles and copies of t he Gospels. Gospels. Fuller says: says: 'The Holy Scriptu res them selves, selves, much as the Gospe Gospellers llers pretended to regard them, underwent t he fate of the r est. est. If a book had a cross on it, it w as condemned condemned for Popery, Popery, and t hose wit h lines and and figures were int erpreted the black art, and destroyed for conjuring.' 'Whole libraries,' libraries,' exclaims another, 'w ere destroy destroy ed or m ade waste paper of, or consumed for the vilest uses ... brok en windows were patched with rem nants of the m ost valuable MSS MSS.. on vellum , and t he bakers consumed consumed vast quant ities in heating th eir ovens.' Collier, who is quoted above (he w as an an Anglican Anglican Bishop), Bishop), writ es: es: 'One among the misfortunes consequent consequent upon t he suppression suppression of m onasteries onasteries was an ignorant destru destru ction of a great m any books. The books, books, instead of being removed to r oyal libraries, libraries, to t hose of Cathedrals, Cathedrals, or the univ ersities, ersities, were frequently t hrown in to grantees as things of small consideration. consideration. Now, t hese men oftentim es proved a very ill protection for learning and for antiquity; their avarice was oftentim es so so mean and their ignorance so undistinguishing undistinguishing th at, wh en the covers were somewh somewh at rich and would yield a little, they pulled them off, and t hrew away t he books or tur ned them to waste-paper; and thus m any noble libraries were destroyed, destroyed, t o a great public scandal scandal and an irr eparable loss loss to learning.' That Henry VII I caused caused the m onasteries onasteries
and convents to be dissolved, dissolved, and t heir books and t reasures reasures plundered and pillaged pillaged wholesale, wholesale, in order to r eplenish eplenish his coffers coffers that were sorely depleted, is matt er of history, t hough t he ostensible reaso reason n w as, of course, course, zeal for th e true religion and the purify ing of t he morals of people and priests. priests. How far a sixteenth centur centur y Nero like Henry Henry VI II was fitted to undertake such a work is a mat ter of opinion. But certain it is that, in the diabolical diabolical fury which th e authorities of that day w aged against all Catholic institutions and monuments, loads of priceless copies of the Sacred Sacred Scriptur Scriptur es perished perished as utt erly as though t hey had been destroyed destroyed by the Pagan persecutors of the first four centuries after Christ. Listen (if you are not tired of hearing of such atrocities) to t he account account gi ven by Dom Bede Camm Camm , O.S.B., O.S.B., in his charming Life of Cardinal Allen, of the outrageous vandalism and hideous barbarities perpetrated at Oxford in t hose fearful fearful days. After t elling how t he Chapel Chapel of All Souls was wrecked, its images and altars defaced and desecrated, the organs burnt in th e quadrangle, quadrangle, and even the sacred sacred pyx in w hich the body of the Lord had lain so long cut cut dow n and broken int o pieces pieces,, he goes on, (page 11) : —'Terrible, —'Terrible, too, to all who loved learning w as the want on destruction of pri celes celess s manuscripts. Cartloads of books books were carried off to th e fire or sold to m erchants erchants to wrap t heir wares in. Anything which these miserable m en did not understand was condemned condemned as savouring savouring of superstit superstit ion. All MSS. MSS. that were guilty of the superstition of displaying displaying red lett ers on their front s or tiles were doomed. Ribald Ribald young m en carried great spoils of of books on biers up and down t he city, singing as at a m ock funeral, and their pr iceles iceless s burdens were finally burned in t he comm comm on mark et-place. The The story of it all as told by contem contem poraries, poraries, is all but incredible. incredible. The University University libr ary was stri stri pped so bare bare that even the very shelves shelves were sold sold for firewood, and t he quadrangles of of New College College were for days littered wit h t orn m anuscripts.' anuscripts.' I do not think I need say more on the point. I t m ust be tolerably clear clear now where we should should look for an answer to t he question, 'Where are all the old copies copies of the Bible that Catholics say the monks so lovingly and laboriously made in the Middle Ages?' The answer must be plainly found in the insensate insensate greed and fanatical destructiveness destructiveness on the part of the sixteenth centur centur y Revolutionaries. Revolutionaries. Which Which side showed showed th e more veneration and regard for God's God's written Word may be safely safely left to t he judgm ent of all reflecting reflecting minds.
CHAPTER HAPTER XI . Abundance of Vernacular Scriptures Scriptures before W ycl ycliff iff
I HAVE said that people who could read at all in the Middle Ages could read Latin: hence there was littl e need need for the Church to i ssue ssue the Scriptures in any other language. But But as a matt er of fact fact she did in m any countries put the Scriptures in the hands of her children in their own tongue. (I) We know from history that there were popular translations of the Bible and Gospels in Spanish, Italian, Danish, French, Norwegian, Polish, Bohemian and Hungarian for the Catholics of those lands before the days of pr inting, but we shall confine ourselves ourselves to England, England, so as to refut e once more the common fallacy that John Wycliff was the first to place an English translation of t he Scriptures in the h ands of the English English people in 138 2. To anyone that has investigated investigated the r eal facts facts of the case, case, this fondly- cherished cherished notion m ust seem seem t ruly r idiculous; idiculous; it is not only absolutely absolutely false, but stupidly so, inasmuch as it admit s of such such easy easy disproof; one wonders that n owadays any
lecturer lecturer or w riter should have the temerit y to advance it. Now, observe I am speaking speaking of the days before the printingpress was invented; I am speaking speaking of England; and concerning concerning a Church which did not , and does not, admit the necessity necessity of Bible-reading Bible-reading for salvation; and concerning concerning an age when t he production of the Scriptur Scriptur es was a most costly costly business, business, and far beyond t he m eans of of nearly everybody. Yet Yet w e may safely safely assert, assert, and we can prove, th at t here were actually in existence among the people many copies of the Scriptures in the English tongue of that day. To begin begin far back, we have a copy copy of t he work of Caedmon, Caedmon, a m onk of Whitby, in th e end of the seventh century, consisting consisting of great portions of the Bible in the common tongue. In the next century we have the well-known translations of Venerable Venerable Bede, Bede, a m onk of Jarrow, wh o died whilst busy with the Gospel Gospel of St. John. In the same ( eighth) centur centur y we h ave the copies of Eadhelm, Eadhelm, Bishop of Sherborne; Sherborne; of Guthlac, a hermit near Peterborough; Peterborough; and of Egbert, Egbert, Bishop of Holy Island; these were all in Saxon, Saxon, t he language understood and spoken by t he Christians Christians of that tim e. Coming Coming down a little later, we have th e free translations translations of King Alfred Alfred the Great who was working at the Psalms when he died, and of Aelfric, Archbishop of Canterbury; as well as popular renderings of Holy Holy Scripture like th e Book Book of Durham , and the Rushwort Rushwort h Gloss Gloss and others that h ave survived the w reck of ages. ages. After t he Norman conquest conquest in 106 6, Anglo-Norman or Middle-English Middle-English became became t he language of England, and consequently consequently th e next t ranslations ranslations of the Bible we meet wit h are in that tongue. There are several specimens still known, such as the paraphrase of Orm (about 1 150) and the Salus Animae Animae (1 050) , the t ranslations of William William Shoreham and Richard Richard Rolle, Rolle, hermit of Hampole (died 1349 ). I say advisedly advisedly ’specimens’ ’specimens’ for those that have come down t o us are merely indications of a much greater num ber that once existed, existed, but afterwards perished. perished. We have proof of th is in the wor ds of Blessed Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England under Henry VIII who says: ’The whole Bible long before Wycliff’s Wycliff’s day was by v irtuous and w ell-learned men translated into t he English English tongue, and by good and godly people with devotion and soberness soberness well and reverently r ead’ (Dialogues II I) . Again, ’The clergy clergy k eep eep no Bibles Bibles from t he laity but such such translations as be either not y et approved for good, or such such as be already already reproved for naught ( i. e ., . , bad, naughty) as Wycliff’s was. For, as for old ones that were before Wycliff’s days, they r emain lawful and be in some folks’ hand. I my self self have seen, and can show you, Bibles, Bibles, fair and old w hich have been known and seen by th e Bishop Bishop of t he Diocese Diocese,, and left in laymen’s hands and women’s too, such as he knew for good and Catholic folk, that used used them wit h soberness soberness and devotion.’ ( 2) But you w ill say, that is the wit ness ness of a Roman Roman Catholic. Well, I shall advance Protestant testimony also. The translators of the Authorised Version, Version, in their ’Prefac ’Preface’, e’, referring to pr evious translations of the Scriptur Scriptur es into the language of the people, make t he following import ant statem ents. After speaking of th e Greek Greek and Latin Latin Versions Versions,, t hey proceed: ’The ’The godly-learned were not content to have the Scriptures in the language which them selves selves understood, understood, Greek and Latin Latin ... but also also for th e behoof and edifying of the unlearned which hungered and t hirsted after right eousness eousness,, and had souls to be saved saved as well as they, t hey provided tr anslations anslations into t he Vulgar for their countrym en, insomu insomu ch that m ost ost nations under Heaven Heaven did shortly after th eir conversion conversion hear Christ Christ speaking speaking unt o them in their Mother tongue, not by th e voice of their minister only but also by the written word translated.’ Now, as all these nations were certainly converted by the Roman Catholic Church, for there was th en no other t o send send m issionaries issionaries to convert anybody, t his is really really a
valuable admission. admission. The Translators Translators of 1611, t hen, after enum erating m any converted nations that had th e Vernacular Vernacular Scriptures, come come t o the case of England, England, and include it among t he others. ’Much ’Much about that t ime,’ they say (136 0), even in our King Richard the Second’s days, John Trevisa translated them into English, and many English Bibles Bibles in writ ten hand are yet to be seen that divers translated, as it is very probable, in that age . ... So that, t o have the Scriptures Scriptures in the moth er tongue is not a quaint conceit conceit lately taken up, either by t he L Lord ord Crom Crom well in England England [ or others] . .. but hat h been thought upon, and put in practice of old, even even from t he first tim es of the conversion conversion of any nation.’ This testimony, from t he P Prefac reface, e, (t oo little known) of their own Auth orised orised Bible, Bible, ought surely t o carry some weight with well disposed disposed Protestants. Protestants. Moreover, the ’Reformed’ Archbishop of Canterbury, Cranmer, says, in his preface to the Bible of 1540: ’The ’The Holy Bible was translated and read in t he Saxon Saxon t ongue, which at that time was our mother tongue, whereof there remaineth yet divers copies copies found in old Abbeys, Abbeys, of such antique m anner of writ ing and speaking speaking t hat few men now be able to read and understand them . And when th is language language waxed old and out of comm on use, because because folks folks should should not lack lack t he fruit of reading, it was again translated into t he newer language, whereof yet also many copies copies remain and be daily found.’ Again, Foxe, Foxe, a man that Protestants tru st, says: ’I f histories be well examined, w e shall find, both before t he Co Conquest nquest and after, as well before John John Wycliff was born born as since, since, the w hole body of Scripture by sundry m en translated into our country tongue.’ ’But as of the earlier period, so of this, there are none but fragment ary remains, the "m any copies" copies" which remained when Cranmer Cranmer w rote in 1540 having doubtless disappea disappeared red in t he vast and ruth less less destruction destruction of libraries which took place within a few years after that date.’ These These last words are from th e pen of Re Rev. v. J. H. Blunt, a Protestant Protestant author, in his History of the English Bible ; and another Anglican Anglican dignitary, Dea Dean n Hook, t ells us that ’long before Wycliff’s Wycliff’s tim e there had been translators of Holy Holy Writ .’ One more authorit y on t he Protestant Protestant side, and I have done: it i s Mr. Mr. Karl Pearson Pearson ( Academy , August, 1885) , who says: ’The Catholic Catholic Church has quite enough enough t o answer answer for, but in the 15t h century it certainly did not hold back back the Bible from the folk: and it gave them in t he vernacular vernacular ( i.e. their own tongue) a long series of of devotional w orks which for language and r eligious eligious sentim sentim ent have never been surpasse surpassed. d. I ndeed, we are inclined to think it m ade a mistake in allowing the masses such ready access to the Bible. It ought to have recognised the Bible once for all as a work absolutely unintelligible without a long course of historical historical study, and, so far as it was supposed supposed to be inspired, inspired, v ery dangerous in t he hands of the ignorant.’ We do not know what Mr. Pears Pearson’s on’s religious religious standpoint standpoint may have been, been, but he goes too far in blaming the Church Church for th rowing t he Bible open to the people in the 15t h century, or in dee deed d in any previous age. No evil evil results whatsoever followed the reading of that precious precious volume in any century pr eceding eceding the 16t h, because because the people had the Catholic Catholic Church Church to lead th em and guide them and teach teach them the m eaning of it. It was only when the principle of ’Private ’Private judgm ent’ was proclaimed that the Book became ’dangerous’ ’dangerous’ and ’unint elligible’, elligible’, as it is still still to t he mult itudes who will not receive receive the tru e interpretation of it at t he hands of the Catholic Church, Church, and wh o are about as compet compet ent t o understand and explain it by t hemselves as they are to explain or prophesy the movem ents of the heavenly bodies. (3) There There is no need, need, it seems seems to m e, to waste furt her tim e and space space in accumu accumu lating proofs that the Bible was known, read and distribut ed by th e Catholic Catholic
Church in th e comm comm on language of of th e people people in all countries countries from t he 7th down to the 14t h century. I have paid more att ention to t he case case of of England England because because of the popularity of the m yth about Wycliff having having been the first to translate it, and to enable the poor blinded Papists Papists,, for t he first ti me in their experience, to behold the Figure of the Christ of the Gospels in 1382. Such a grotesque notion can only be due either to ign orance or or concealment concealment of the now well-known facts facts of history. One would fain hope that, in this age of enlightenm enlightenm ent and study, no one valuing his scholarship scholarship will so far far im peril it as to att empt to r evive the silly fable. But supposing supposing it w ere as true as it is false, false, that John Wycliff was the first to pu blish the Bible in English, how in t he name of reason reason can it be true at t he sam sam e tim e that Luther, m ore than 100 years afterwards, discovered discovered it ? Really, Really, people must decide decide which story they are going t o tell, for the one is the direct contradictory contradictory of t he other. Wycliff or Luther, let it be; but Wycliff and Luther Luther t ogether —that ogether —that is impossible. (4) Now, it m ay seem seem somewhat irr elevant to our present present subject, wh ich is simply 'where we got t he Bible', Bible', to w ander off to foreign lands and and see how m atters stood there at th e date at at w hich we have now now arrived; but I should not like to pass pass from this part of t he enquiry wit hout setting down a few facts facts which are generally generally unknown to our separated separated brethr en, as to the existence of plenty of Bibles in those very countries which they th ink were, and of course still still are, plunged in the depths of superstit superstit ion, illiteracy and degradation. degradation. They flatt er them selves selves with the idea that it was the kn owledge of the Scriptures which produced the blessed blessed Reformati Reformati on the world over; and will t ell you that it w as all all because because the Holy Book Book was scaled scaled and locked locked and hidden away fr om t he benighted Papis Papists ts in Contin Contin ental countri countri es that th e glorious light light of t he Reformation Reformation never broke, and h as not not y et broken, upon t hem. There There are, however, unfort unately for t hem, facts at hand, facts unquestioned, which explode this pious notion. The facts facts are t hese: hese: —(i) As was shown long ago in the Dublin Review (October, Review (October, 1837) , 'it was almost almost solely in those countries countries which have remained constant t o th e Catholic Catholic Faith Faith t hat popular versions versions of th e Bible had been been published; published; while it was precisely precisely in those kingdoms, England, Scotland, Scotland, Sweden, Denmark and Norway, wh ere Protestantism Protestantism acquired an early and has maint ained a permanent ascendanc ascendancy, y, t hat no pr inted Bible existed existed when t hey embr aced aced Protestantism. Holland alone and a few cities in Germany were in possession of the Bible when they adopted t he Reformed Reformed Creed.' Creed.' I s it really t he case case then, you ask wit h open eyes, eyes, t hat t hese Latin countries allowed the Bible to be read and translated and print ed before Luther? Luther? Listen Listen and j udge for yourself what rubbish is cramm ed into people's heads. heads. (ii) Luther's first Bible (or what p retended to be the Bible, Bible, for he had amputated some of its members) came out in 152 0. Now, will you believe it, there w ere exactly exactly 104 editions of the Bible in Latin before that dat e; there were 9 before the birt h of Luther in the German language, and there were 27 in German before ever his own saw the light of day. Many of these were to be seen seen at t he Caxton Caxton Exhibition in London, London, 1877: and seeing seeing is believing. believing. In It aly there were more t han 40 editions of the Bible before the first Protestant v ersion ersion appeared, beginning at Venice Venice in 1471; and 25 of th ese ese were in the I talian language before before 1500, wit h th e express express permission permission of Rome. Rome. I n France France there were 18 editions before before 1547, the first appearing in 1478. Spain began to publish editions in the same year, and issued issued Bibles Bibles with the full approval of the Spanish In quisition (of course one can can hardly expect Protestants Protestants to believe this). I n Hungary by t he year 1456, in Bohemia Bohemia by t he year 1478, in Flanders Flanders before 1500, and in other lands groaning under the yoke of Rome, Rome, w e know t hat editions of the Sacred Sacred Scriptures had been been given t o the people. people. 'I n all (t o quote from " M.C M.C.L's .L's"" useful pamphlet on t he subject) subject) 626 editions of the Bible, in which 198 were in t he language of of the laity, had issued issued from t he press, press, wit h t he sanction sanction and at t he instance of of t he Church, Church, in t he countr countr ies where
she reigned supreme, before the first Protestant version of the Scriptures was sent forth int o the world.’ England was perhaps perhaps worse off off than any countr y at t he tim e of the Reformat Reformat ion in the m atter of vernacular versions of the Bible: m any Catholic Catholic kingdom s abroad abroad had far surpassed surpassed her in m aking known the Sacred Sacred Word. Yet t hese lands remained Catholic; Catholic; England turned Protestant; Protestant; what, then, becomes of the pathetic delusion of ’Evangelical’ Christians that an acquaintance with the open Bible in our own tongue m ust necessa necessarily rily pr ove fatal to Catholicism? Catholicism? The The simple tru th of course course is just t his, that if knowledge of the Scriptures should should of itself make people Protestants, then the Italian and French and Spanish and Hungarian and Belgian and Portuguese nations should all have embraced embraced Protestantism, Protestantism, which up to t he mom ent of writ ing they have declined declined to do. I am afraid there is something wrong wit h th e theory, for it is in woeful contradiction contradiction to plain facts, which may be learned by all who care to take th e trouble to read and study for t hemselves. hemselves. (5) Now, before pass passing ing on to anoth er part of t he subject, I should like you to pause pause for a moment with the brief historical review fresh in your memory; and I would simply ask this: How can can anyone living in t he light of modern education and history cling any longer to t he fantastic idea that Rome Rome hat es the Bible — Bible —th th at she has done her worst t o destroy destroy it—that she conce conceals als it from her people lest lest it should enlighten their blindness, blindness, and that the Holy Book, Book, after ly ing for m any long dark ages in the dungeons and and lum ber rooms of Popery, Popery, was at last exhum ed and dragged into t he light of day by the gr eat and glorious discoverer, discoverer, Martin Luther? O foolish foolish Scotchmen, Scotchmen, w ho hath bewitched you? Do you not see see that Rome could have easily destroyed it if she had been so disposed during all those centuries that elapsed between its formation int o one volume in 397 A.D., and the sixteenth sixteenth century ? It was absolutely, absolutely, exclusively exclusively in her power t o do wi th it as she she pleased, pleased, for Rome reigned supreme. supreme. What more simple th an to order her priests and monks and Inquisitors to search out every copy and reduce it to ashes? But did she do this? We have seen seen that she preserved preserved it and m ultiplied it. She saved saved it from utt er destruction destruction at t he hands of infidels and barbarians and and pagan tr ibes that burned everyt hing Christian they could come across; across; she saved saved it and gu arded it from tot al extinction by her care and loving watchfulness; she, and she alone. There was no one else to do it; she only only w as sent sent by God God to d efend His His Bless Blessed ed Word. It might have perished, perished, and would have perished, perished, were it not t hat she employed her clergy clergy t o reproduce it and adorn it and mu ltiply it , and t o furnish churches and m onasteries onasteries with copies copies of of it, which all might read and learn and commit to memory, and meditate upon. Nay, she not not only mu ltiplied it in it s original original languages (Greek and Hebrew), Hebrew), which would have been been int elligible and useful useful only t o the learned few, but she put it into th e hands of all her people who could could read, by t ranslating it int o Latin, Latin, t he universal tongue; and even for t hose less less schola scholarly rly she rendered it int o the comm on languages spoken spoken in di fferent countries. Truly Truly she took a curious way of showing her hatred of God's Holy Word and of destroying it. Many senseless charges are laid at the door of the Catholic Church; Church; but surely the accusation accusation that, during t he centur centur ies preceding preceding the sixteenth, she was the enemy of t he Bible and of Bible Bible reading must, t o any one who does not wilfully shut his eyes to facts, appear of all accusations the most ludicrous; ludicrous; and to tell t he trut h, it is ridiculed ridiculed and laughed out of court court by all serious serious and imparti al students students of the question. With far more ju stice, stice, it hum bly seems seems to me, m ay th e charge of degrading degrading and profaning t he Sacred Sacred Scriptu Scriptu res be brought against those highly-financed Bible Societies which, with a recklessness that passes comprehension, comprehension, scatt scatt er am ong savages savages and pagans utterly uninstructed, t ons of Testaments, Testaments, only t o be used used for m aking ball cartridges cartridges or wadding, for w rapping up snuff, bacon, bacon, t obacco, obacco, fruit and other goods; f or papering the w alls of houses houses;; for converting into tapestry or prett y kit es for children; children; and for other and fouler uses uses
which it makes one ashamed ashamed t o thin k of. True, th e versions versions thus degraded are false false and heretical, which may m itigate th e horror in th e eyes of Catholics Catholics;; but t hose who thus expose them t o dishonour believe believe them to be t he real Words of of Life Life.. On their heads, heads, th en, falls the guilt of ’giving that w hich is holy to t he dogs’. dogs’.
CH A PT PT ER ER X I I . W h y W y cl cl if if f w a s Co Co n d e m n e d
BUT here we are likely to be met wit h an objection by t hose who have not a very BUT profound or accurate accurate knowledge of the history of t his question. question. ’Why, t hen,’ they will say, ’why, if the Catholic Church approved of th e Bible being read in the t ongue of the people, why did she condemn condemn Wycliff, one of her own priests, for translating it into English, and forbid her people to read his version of the sacred Scriptures?’ I answer, because John Wycliff ’s version of the Bible was not a correct version, and because he was using it as a means of corrupting the people’s faith and of teaching them false false doctrin doctrin e; and it seems seems t o me at least th at th at was a perfectly perfectly good reason reason for condemning it. For, please observe, observe, t hat w hilst t he Church Church approves of the people reading the Scriptures in their own language, she she also claims claims the righ t t o see that they r eally have a tru e version version of the Scriptures to read, and not a mu tilated or false false or im perfect perfect or heretical version. She claims claims th at she alone has the right to m ake translations from t he original languages languages (Hebrew (Hebrew or Greek) in w hich the Bible was writt en; t he right to superintend and supervise supervise the work of translating; the right of appointing appointing certain priests or or scholars scholars to undertake the work; the right of approving or condemning versions and translations which are subm subm itt ed to her for her j udgment . She declares declares she she will not tolerate that her children should be exposed exposed to the danger of reading copies of Scripture which have changed or falsified something of th e original Apos Apostolic tolic writing; which have added added something or left out something; which have notes and explanations and prefaces prefaces and prologues that convey false doctrine or false morals. Her people must have the correct Bible, or no Bible at all. Rome claims that the Bible is her book; book; that she has preserved preserved it and perpetuated it, and that she alone knows what it means; t hat nobody else has any any right to it whatsoever, or any authority to declare declare what t he true meaning of it is. She therefore has declare declared d that the work of translating it fr om t he original languages, languages, and of explaining it, and of printin g it and publishing it, belongs strictly strictly to her alone; and that , if she cannot nowadays prevent th ose outside her fold fold from t ampering wit h it and m isusing isusing it, at least she will take care that none of her own children abuse it or take liberties with it; and hence hence she she forbids any private person to attem pt t o translate it int o the comm on language without authority from eccle ecclesia siastica sticall superiors, superiors, and also forbids forbids the faithful to read any editions but such such as are approved by t he Bishops. All this the Catholic Church does out of reverence for God’s Holy Word. She desires that the pure, uncorrupted Gospel should be put in her people’s hands as it came from the pen of the Apostles and Evangelists. She dreads lest the faithful should draw down upon t hemselves a curse by believing for Gospel Gospel the addit ions and changes changes introduced by foolish and sinful sinful m en to support some pet th eories of their own; just as a mother w ould fear lest lest her children children should, along along with water or m ilk, drink down some poison poison that was mixed up wit h it. There There are then, let it be clearly clearly understood, versions and versions versions of Holy Scriptu Scriptu res: res: som som e that are correct correct and
guaranteed by the Church; others that sim ply bristle with mistakes and falsities. falsities. The The former are permit ted to Catholics Catholics to read and study study ; the latt er, it need hardly be said, are utterly forbidden. Now, t o th e latter class class belonged belonged the v ersion ersion of John Wycliff, first first put into people’s people’s hands in 1382 . A very slight knowledge of the m an himself and of his opinions and of his career might persuade any reasonable person that a version version m ade by him was the very last that would be allowed to Catholics Catholics.. (2) What are the simpl e facts facts about t he man? He was born in 1320, became became a priest and theologian and lecturer lecturer at Oxford; and at first caused caused notoriety by t aking part wit h th e State State against the claims of the Pope Pope in regard to tribut e money and benefices benefices.. But in course course of a few years he went further and began to oppose the Church not only in mat ters of policy policy or governm ent (a course which might conconceivably ceivably at tim es be pardonable), but in th e things of faith. Being Being accused accused of preaching novel and uncommon doctrines, he was, at the instance of Pope Gregory XI, summ oned before before his Archbisho Archbishop p in 1378 , and inhibited from teaching any furth er on the m atters in dispute. No more proceedings proceedings were taken against against him (t hough he did not desist desist from his anti-Papal anti-Papal teaching) teaching) till 1381 when again he was makin g him self self notorious. He att acked acked t he friars and Religious Religious Orders Orders wit h great bitt erness; erness; im pugned transubstantiation, and seemed seemed to advocate the theory that was afterwards peculiarly Luther’s, ridiculed Indulgences and flooded flooded t he country wit h pamphlets and tr acts reeking wit h heresy. heresy. He was, in short, a kind of Lollard. Lollard. ’The Lollards’ (says the National Cyclopedia) ’were a religious sect which rose in Germ Germ any at th e beginning of of the fourteenth century , and differed in many points of doctrine from the Church of Rome, more especially as regards the Mass, Extreme Unction, Unction, and atonem ent for sin.’ That, of course, course, is a very bald and crude statement of their t enets. The The extent of their ’differences ’differences from the Church of Rome’ Rome’ w ill appear in a clearer clearer light if we consider consider th e ’Lollards ’Lollards Petition Petition to Parliament’, Parliament’, 1 395. It contained among ot her novelties the famous ’twelve conclusions’ against the temporal possessions of the Church, t he celibacy celibacy of t he clergy, clergy, and all vows of chastity; against against exorcisms exorcisms and blessings blessings of of inanimat e objects; objects; transubstantiation and pray ers for the dead; pilgrimages; compulsory auricular confess confession; ion; veneration of images; and t he holding of secular secular offices by pri ests. ests. Many also objected objected t o the t aking of oaths, denied the necess necessity ity of Baptism for salvation, salvation, held m arriage to be a m ere civil contract, contract, and spoke of sacramentals as ’jugglery’. (See Cham bers Cyclopedia an Cyclopedia an d The Cath Cath olic Cyclopedia , under ’Lollards ’Lollards’.) ’.) Now, you m ay sympat hise with t hese hese amiable persons persons if you like, but you would hardly expect expect t he Catholic Catholic Church Church of that centu centu ry ( or of any century) to sympat hise with th em, and still less to suffer them to issue issue her Scriptures expurgated according to their ideas. But thus did John Wycliff. ’He held views,’ (says the devout Anglican, Dore, Dore, in h is most interesting work Old Bibles ), ) , ’he held views which, if carried carried int o practice, practice, w ould have been tot ally subversive of moralit y and good order, but h e never separated separated him self self from t he [ Catholic] Church of England’. England’. Another Anglican Anglican says the Lollards were political political m artyrs r ather t han religious; religious; that their actions tended to a Revolution Revolution in the state as well as in the Church; and that both civili ans and eccle ecclesiastics siastics regarded t heir prin ciples as subversive subversive of all order in t hings temporal as well as things spiritual. (Dr. Hook; Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury .) . ) Can we be surprised, surprised, then, at reading that in 1382, in consequence of the monstrous heresies that he was now spreading, John Wycliff was again put on tr ial by t he Ecc Eccles lesias iastical tical Courts, Courts, and t hat 22 propositions propositions taken f rom his works were condemned? Thereupon Thereupon he retired t o Lutterwort h, of w hich he had been R Rec ector tor for m any years. He was gently gently dealt wit h, and his declining declining years were not h arasse arassed d by any of the persecution persecution and tort ure which it pleases pleases some some t o depict
him as suffering; suffering; and he died, after a stroke of paralysis whilst hearing Mass, Mass, on 31st December, December, 13 84. I n later y ears, two separate Councils Councils,, one at London, the ot her at Constance, selected 45 propositions from the teaching of Wycliff, and condemned them ) declaring some some to be notoriously heretical; heretical; others erroneous; erroneous; ot hers scandalous scandalous and and blasphemous; others seditious seditious and rash; and the rest offensive to pious ears. (3) Now, I ask any unprej udiced udiced person, person, was this the kind of man t o undertake the translation of the Bible into t he common language of the people? Was he likely t o be trusted by t he Church Church at t hat t ime t o produce a version thoroughly Catholic Catholic and free from all error or corruption — corruption —a a m an, not oriously ecce eccentr ntr ic, guilty of heretical and suspicious suspicious teaching, teaching, attacking t he Church Church in its authorit ies from t he Pope Pope down t o the friars, and associated with sectaries abroad who were at once revolutionaries and heretics? The question answers itself. You may cry out that Wycliff was right and Rome was wrong in doctrine; that he was a glorious glorious Reformer Reformer and ‘m orning star of the Reformat Reformat ion', and that he taught the pure word of th e Lord Lord as against against the abominable traditions of the Scarle Scarlett Woman of Babylon. But But I hum bly submit t hat that is not the point. The point is this: you ask why did t he Catholic Catholic Church Church condemn condemn Wycliff's version, and at the same t ime allow other v ersions ersions of th e Bible in English? English? and I am showing you why. I am t elling you that Wycliff was heretical in the eyes eyes of Rome; that he produced a heretical heretical version for the pur pose of of att acking the Catholic Catholic Church of that day, and of spreading his heresies heresies;; and that to blam e the Church Church for forbidding him to do so, and for condemn condemn ing his version, is about as sensible sensible as to blame an auth or for int erdicting erdicting someone someone else from publishing a copy of his work that was full of errors and absurdities, absurdities, and contained opinions and sentim sentim ents which he detested. The Catholic Church certainly could never allow a version of Holy Scriptur Scriptur e, (wh ich is her own book) li ke that of Wycliff to go forth unchallenged, unchallenged, as if it w ere correct correct and authorit ative, and bore her sanction and approval. As well might we expect th e British Sovereign Sovereign t o sanction sanction som e hideous carica caricature ture from a comic paper as a true and faithful picture of his coronation. coronation. (4) We do not shrink from giving John John Wycliff and Nicholas Nicholas of Hereford Hereford an equal share of praise praise for th eir laborious work of tr anslating anslating t he whole of the Bible into t he English tongue, if the w ork w as really theirs, (w hich some scholars scholars like Gas Gasquet, quet, however, have doubted) . What we assert assert is that it w as a bad translation, and hence useless, and worse than useless, for Catholics. It was condemned and forbidden to be used by a Decree of Archbishop Arundel at Oxford in 1408, which also prohibited the t ranslation ranslation of any part of t he Bible into English English by any un authorised person, person, and the reading of any v ersion ersion before it w as formally approved. This was a natural and wise and neces necessa sary ry d ecree. ecree. It did not forbid th e reading of any of the old approved versions of versions of Scripture in English English w hich existed existed in great num bers before Wycliff, Wycliff, as we have seen seen already. Nor did it forbid new versions to be made or read, if under proper supervision and approval by ecclesiastical superiors. It only banned false and unauthorised translations like Wycliff's Wycliff's;; and Protestant Protestant w riters, like Dr. Hook, have often declared declared their belief that it w as not from hostility t o a translated Bible as as such such that the Church condemned condemned Wycliff; and that she never would have issued issued her decree, if his sole purpose had been the edification and sanctification of the readers. It was only w hen th e design of the Lollards was disco discovered, vered, and Wycliff's subtle subtle plot unm asked asked of disseminating disseminating t heir pestilential pestilential errors through h is translation, translation, th at th e Church's condemnation condemnation fell upon him . A greater authority even than Dr. Hook, I mean the veteran historian, Dr. James Gairdner—an English Churchman who spent more t han 60 of his four score years in research research among t he State papers of England England dealing with t he period about th e Reformation, Reformation, and who was recognised recognised as eas easily ily t he
most profound and compr ehensive ehensive student of th ose ose tim es —Dr. es —Dr. Gairdner, I say, expressed some very strong conclusions to which his historical enquiries had driven him in regard to the Wycliffite revolt and it s results, results, and about Rome and t he Bible. Bible. (See his book Lollardy and t he Reformat Reformat ion , reviewed in December December Month , 1908.) 'The truth is,' he says, says, 'th e Church Church of Rom Rom e was not at all opposed opposed to t he m aking of translations of Scripture Scripture or to placing them in the hands of the laity un der what w ere deemed proper precautions. precautions. I t was only j udged necess necessary ary t o see that no unauthorised or corrupt corrupt t ranslations got abroad; and even in this mat ter it w ould seem seem t he authorit ies were not roused to special special vigilance vigilance till they t ook alarm at t he diffusion diffusion of Wycliffite translations in the generation after his death.' ( Vol. I, p. 105 .) Again, 'To the possession by worthy lay men of licensed translations the Church was never opposed; but to pl ace such a weapon as an English English Bible in th e hands of men who had no regard for authority , and who would use it w ithout being instructed instructed how to use it properly, was dangerous not only to t he souls of those who read, but t o the peace peace and order of th e Church,' Church,' ( p. 117) . From a deep, calm calm scholar scholar like Dr. Gairdner Gairdner words like t hese are more v aluable than whole volum es of of parti san san and unenlightened assertions assertions from anti- Catholic controv controv ersialists; ersialists; and ( as Father Father Thurston Thurston suggests) we cannot but feel grateful to th is honoured old scholar scholar in the evening of his days for thus vigorously and boldly identifying himself with an unpopular cause. cause. Simply honesty of pu rpose and and love of t ruth comp comp elled elled him , out of his vast and prolonged studies, studies, t o expose the r evolutionary character character of the Wycliffite Wycliffite and Lollard Lollard rebellions against against Rome, as well as to sympathise wit h t he glorious marty rs like More and Fisher, Fisher, and to defend the Catholic authorities like Archbishop Warham and Bishops Bonner and Tunstall, and to vindicate the good reputation and piety of the m onasteries onasteries so so cruelly suppress suppressed ed by Henry VII I. But we are anticipating. I was speaking speaking of th e Church's Church's condemnation of Wycliff's undesired undesired and undesirable version. (5) This was the first t ime in England th at t he Church Church ever felt herself obliged to lay some restriction on Bible reading reading in t he vulgar t ongue; and that fact fact in itself is surely surely sufficient sufficient t o prove that there m ust have been some very specia speciall reason reason for h er acting so differently differently from what she had been been accustomed accustomed t o do before. Her action action at this tim e was precisely precisely similar t o th e action of the Church in France nearly nearly 2 00 y ears previously. Then Then (t hat is in t he 10th and 13th centur centur ies) ies) some heretics called called Waldense Waldenses s and Albigenses Albigenses revolted against all authorit y, and overran t he country, spreading spreading t heir wild and blasphemous doctrines. doctrines. They taught, among ot her enormit ies, ies, th at th ere were two Gods (creator of the good and creator of the evil), that there was no Real Presence of Our Lord in the Blessed Eucharist, that there was no forgiveness for sins after baptism, and t hat t here was no resurrection resurrection of t he body. They They declared oaths unlawful, condemned m arriage, and called called th e begetting of children a crime. All these impieties they professed to base on Holy Scripture. Consequently, onsequently, to save her people from being ensnared ensnared and l ed away, t he Church Church in council council assembled assembled at Toulouse Toulouse,, 1029 , passed passed an enactment forbidding to laymen t he possession of the sacred books, especially in the vernacular, though anyone might possess possess a Breviary Breviary or a Psalter Psalter or Office of our Blessed Blessed Lady Lady for devot ion. Will an y one blame the Church for taking these measures to suppress the poisonous heresy and prevent it s spreading, spreading, and to save the Sacred Scriptures Scriptures from b eing made the mere tool and war-cry of a certain sect? sect? In like manner we m ay not blame th e Church at Oxford under Archbishop Archbishop Arundel for her famous constit constit ution against Wycliffite Wycliffite and ot her false versions versions of the Bible, but rather adm ire and applaud her wisdom and vigilance and zeal for the purity of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. And in the same way we m ay examine and investigate the action of the Church Church in various countries and in various centuries as to her legislation in regard to Bible reading
among t he people; people; and wherever we find some apparently severe or unaccountable unaccountable prohibition of it , we shall on enquiry fin d th at it was necess necessitated itated by the foolish or sinful conduct conduct on the part eit her of some of her own people, or of bitter and aggressive aggressive enemies enemies who l iterally forced her to forbid wh at in ordinary circumstances circumstances she would not only have allowed but have approved and encouraged. encouraged. It is true that the approving or condemning of Bible reading in part icular centuries centuries or countries is a mat ter of policy and of discipline discipline on the part of t he local local Catholic authorit authorit ies, ies, and depends largely upon the prudence and wisdom and zeal of the Bishops set over them , and does not necess necessarily arily inv olve any action on t he part of th e Pope Pope as Supreme Head of the Church; and hence one cannot cannot declare declare infallibly off-hand t hat there has never been a case of unwise or indiscreet legislation in regard to the mat ter at t he hands of individual Bishops Bishops.. I do not know of any case case myself; and never read of any instance where Bishops Bishops have been proved in t he course of of ti me t o have made m istakes in issuing issuing decrees decrees about about t he mat ter. But supposing supposing some mistake had been made, that would not affect th e general general principle on on which th e ecclesiastical authorities always are supposed to act; and in the light of Rome’s principle, principle, and her clear and definite att itude t owards the Bible as her own Book, Book, w e may safely safely challenge anyone to convict her either of inconsistency inconsistency or h atred t owards God’s God’s writt en Word. Once Once grasp her doctrinal position position in regard to t he Bible and and th e Rule of Faith, Faith, and y ou will h ave no difficulty in accounting accounting for her uncomprom ising hostility t o versions like Wycliff’s Wycliff’s,, and f or her action in condemning condemning the Bible Societies Societies which spread spread abroad a m utilated, corrupt, and incomplete copy of the Holy Scriptur Scriptur es, es, ( generally accompanied accompanied by tracts) wit h th e design design of underm ining th e faith of Catholics.
CHAPTER HAPTER XI I I . Tyndale’s Tyndale’s Condemna Condemna tion Vindicated Vindicated by Posterity. Posterity.
So much then for John Wycliff and his unhappy version. The The next man of any consequenc consequence e we are confronted w ith is another favourit e of the Reformers, another ’mart yr’ for t he Bible, Bible, and t hat is William Tyndale. His His treatm ent is also flung in our teeth by critics, as fresh evidence of Rome’s implacable hatred of the open Bible. Did she not persecute and burn poor Tyndale, and consign his copy of the Scriptures in English to the flames? So here again, we must show how wise and consistent was the action of t he Ca Catholic tholic Church Church in England in regard t o Tyndale and his translations, and clear clear h er absolutely from the slightest slightest shadow shadow or suspicion suspicion of hostility t o God’s God’s writ ten Word. (i) What we are about to speak of now, be it rem embered, is the Printed Printed Bible, for in 1450 t he art of print ing was discovere discovered d by a m an rejoicing in the m elodious elodious name of John Goosefles Gooseflesh, h, ( a Germ Germ an), and in 14 56 t he first book ever print ed issued issued from the pr ess ess at Mayence, Mayence, and it was — was —what? what? It was the Bible, and it is known as the Mazarin Bible, after Cardinal Mazarin. This again, demonstrates anew what hatred Catholics had in those days to th e Bible, Bible, and t heir fear and dr ead lest lest it should be known even t o exist! The best best w ay to k eep eep it secret, secret, of course, course, was to print it . Beside Besides, s, how could t he Bible be printed in 1456? Did not Martin Luther discover discover it for the first tim e in 1507? However, However, jokin g apart, the fact remains that w e have now in our historical review arrived at t he point w here we bid farewell to copies of the Bible writ ten by th e hand, and have to consider consider only those that were turn ed out by the
printing press from 1456 onw ards. On On Protestant Protestant principles it m ust seem seem a pit y t hat the Lord waited so many centur centur ies before before He invented printin g m achines achines to spread spread Bibles Bibles about among the people; and it seems seems also very hard on all preceding generations that slipped away without this lamp to th eir feet feet and light unt o their path.
(ii) Well, William William Tyndale (and for th at m atter Martin Luther too), w as born born almost a 100 y ears after after John John Wycliff died, that is, 1484. He studied at Oxford and became a priest, and was seized seized with t he ambition of getting the Bible printed in England. Now, Now, there were thr ee great great objections to this step step being approved. (I) In t he first place, place, Tyndale was not the man t o do it; he was utt erly unfitt ed for such such a great work. He says himself himself he was ’evil favoured in this world, and wit hout grace in the sight of men, speechless and rude, dull and slow witted.’ He had no special qualifications for the t ask ask of translation. He was but a mediocre scholar, scholar, and could not boast boast of anything above the average intellect. Indeed, non- Catholic authors have admit admit ted that the cause of of Scriptur Scriptur e reading in th e vernacular vernacular was distinctly prej udiced udiced by having been taken in hand by in capable capable men like Tyndale. Then Then (2) in t he second second place, place, he was acting entirely on his own account, account, and with out aut horisation from ecclesias ecclesiastical tical superiors, eith er in England England or in Rome; he was simply a priv ate obscure obscure priest, and was acting acting w ithout comm comm ission ission and without sanction sanction from h igher quarters. In deed, I go furt her and say that he w as acting acting in disobedience disobedience to t he decisio decision n of higher authorit ies. ies. At the very beginning of the sixteenth century (I am now quot ing th e Anglican Anglican Dore) ’the aut horities of the English English Church took into consideration consideration t he desirability desirability of int roducing a vernacular Bible [ i.e. Bible in English] English] into England, and the great m ajorit y of th e Council Council were of opinion that, considering the religious troubles on on th e Continent Continent and the unsettled state of things at hom e, at this ju ncture the t ranslation ranslation of th e Bible into th e vulgar tongue, and its circulation among t he people, people, would rat her tend t o confusion confusion and distraction distraction th an to edification.’ edification.’ Now, you m ay lament if you lik e (as Dore does) does) th is decisio decision n as an error of judgm ent, and affirm that the postponement of an English English version in print aut horised horised by t he Bishops Bishops was a most unfort unate event, as leading leading to false and corrupt corrupt versions being being issued issued by irresponsible irresponsible individuals. individuals. But right or wrong in t heir judgment, this was the conscientious conclusion at which the Council under Archbishop Archbishop Wareham Wareham arrived: no print ed English English Bible Bible meanwhile w as to be allowed; and after all is said said and done, they were probably bett er judges than w e are as to what was best best for the Church of that tim e in England. England. The Lutheran Lutheran Revolution was in full swing abroad (1520) , and the Lutheran heresy was spreading spreading everywhere, carrying with it rebellion and imm orality, and t he E English nglish Bishops Bishops might w ell have cause cause to fear lest the infection should poison poison t he faithful un der their own jur isdiction. isdiction. (3) In the t hird place, place, there was no demand for a prin ted English English Bible Bible to any great extent — extent —ce certainly rtainly n ot to t he extent of m aking it at all an urgent or pressing duty on the part of the aut horities to issue issue one. Dore, (so often quoted already) ridicules ridicules the idea that at t hat ti me England England was a 'Bible-t 'Bible-t hirsty land'. He declares declares that 'there was no anxiety wh atever for an English English version version excepting excepting am ong a small minority of the people', and 'the universal desire for a Bible in England we read so much of in most works on the subject existed only only in th e imagination of the writers'. Dr. Brewer, another Protestant, Protestant, also also scoffs scoffs at t he idea. 'To imagine,' he says, 'that ploughmen and shepherds shepherds in th e country read t he New Testament Testament in English English by stealth, or t hat smiths and carpenters in towns pored over it s pages pages in the corner of t heir m aster's aster's workshops, is to m istake the character and acquirements of th e age.' There has, has, in short, been a great deal of wild and groundless groundless talk about t he intense desire desire of th e people of that centur centur y t o devour the Scriptures. And And we can prove it by t hese simple
facts, facts, th at (I ) t he people had to be compelled by law to buy Bibles, for Acts Acts were passed again and again threatening the King’s displeasure and a fine of 40s. per mont h if the Book was not purchased; purchased; (2) we have docum docum entary evidence that inhabitants of certain part s of the countr y, such such as Cornwall Cornwall and Devonshire, Devonshire, unanimously objected too the new translation, and that even among t he clergy clergy Reformers like Bishop Hugh Latimer alm ost ost entirely i gnored the English copy and always took their text s from the Latin Latin Vulgate; (3) print ers had large stocks stocks of print ed Bibles Bibles left left un sold sold on th eir hands, and could not get rid of them at any pr ice, ice, except except u nder legal coercio coercion; n; (4) the same edition of t he Bible was often often re-issued wit h fresh fresh tit les and preliminary m atter, and new t itle-pages were composed composed for old unsold Bibles Bibles,, with out any regard to tr uth, simply to get t hem sold. I do not see how we can resist resist t he conviction that there was really no extensive demand for English Bibles Bibles among the m ass of Christians Christians at that tim e in England, England, whet her clergy clergy or laity, and that the design of spreading spreading t hem w holesale holesale among th e masses masses was borrowed from t he Continent w hich was then in a perfect perfect ferm ent of Religious Religious and Civil Civil Revolution. Hence you can understand at once how Tyndale’s proposal was viewed with suspicion and disfavour by the Bishops, and himself refused any assistance or encouragement encouragement from Tunstall, Tunstall, Bishop Bishop of London, and other prelates. And when w e further bear in mind (as the Athenaeum pertinently remarked, 24th August, 1889) that this irresponsible irresponsible private chaplain had become become already k nown as a m an of dangerous views, views, w ho was exceedingly exceedingly insulting in his m anner, unscrupulous, unscrupulous, and of a most v iolent tem per; that in postprandial discuss discussions ions he repeatedly repeatedly abused and insulted Church Church dignitaries who were pr esent; esent; that wit h him the P Pope ope was anti-Christ anti-Christ and the w hore of Babylon, whilst t he monks and friars were ’caterpillars, ’caterpillars, horseleeches, drone-bees, and draff,’ we shall not be vastly astonished that these dignitaries did not evince much enthu siasm siasm in pushing on Mr. Tyndale’s Tyndale’s scheme. scheme. (iii) Unab Unable le therefore to proceed with the work in his own land because because of ecclesiastical prohibition, Tyndale goes abroad, and after much wandering about sett sett les at at Worm s, where in 15 25 t he Bible was printed and t hence smu smu ggled in considerable quantities into England. At once, as was to be expected, it was denounced denounced by t he Bishop Bishop of London, London, and I do not deny (n or can I see see any reason to deplore) the fact that copies of it were burned ceremonially at St Paul’s Cross. But why? Because it was a false and erroneous and anti-Catholic version of the Holy Scriptur Scriptur es. es. I t was full of Lutheran h eresies. eresies. Tyndale Tyndale had fallen under t he influence of the German Reformer, Reformer, who by t his tim e had revolted from Rome. About 1522 he had been suspec suspected ted and t ried for heresy; he had declared: declared: ’I d efy the Pope Pope and all his laws’; and now h e actually embodied in his English English version version Luther’s notes and explanations of texts, w hich were as full of venom and hatr ed against against Rome as an egg is full of meat. ’I t h as long long been a notorious fact,’ fact,’ says Mr. Allnatt Allnatt (in his Bible and the Reform Reform ation ), ) , ’that all the early Protestant Protestant v ersions ersions of the Bible literally swarmed wit h gross and flagrant corruptions —corruptions corruptions —corruptions consisting in the wilful and deliberate mistranslation of various passages of the sacred text, and all directly aimed against those doctrines and practices of the Catholic Church which the "Reformers" "Re formers" w ere most anxious to u proot. They did give t he people an an " open Bible", Bible", but what a Bible!' Bible!' And Canon Canon Dixon, the cultu red Anglican Anglican historian, referring to t he fact fact t hat copies of Tyndale's Tyndale's Bible Bible were burnt, makes these strik strik ing remarks: 'I f the clergy clergy had acted th us simply because because they w ould have the people kept ignorant of the word of God, God, they w ould have been been wit hout excuse. excuse. But it was not so. Every Every one of the lit tle volum es, es, containing portions of the sacred sacred text t hat w as issued issued by Tyndale, Tyndale, contained also a prologue and notes writ ten wit h such hot fury of vitu peration against against t he prelates and clergy, clergy, t he monks and friars, the rit es and ceremonies ceremonies of the Church, as was hardly likely to comm end it t o the favour of those
who w ere attacked.’ Tunstall, Tunstall, Bishop of London, London, declared he could could count more t han 2,000 errors in Tyndale’s Tyndale’s Bible Bible ’made in Germany’; whilst t he learned Sir Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England, found it necessary to write a treatise against it, and asserted asserted th at t o ’find errors in Tyndale’s Tyndale’s book were like studying t o find water in the sea’. sea’. In short t here is not an unprej udiced udiced enquirer now but adm its that t he Church could not possibly tolerate Tyndale’s Bible as though it were a true or correct version of the Holy Scriptur Scriptur es; es; she had no alternative but to prescribe and and forbid it ; otherwise she would have been sinfully neglectful neglectful of her guardianship over t he word of God, God, and idly standing by whilst h er children were being poisoned. poisoned. But who w ill be so obtuse or or so malicious as as to tw ist thi s action action of hers int o a determined hat red of the Scriptures as Scriptures and to represent her as hostile and opposed to all reading of the Bible whatsoever, whatsoever, even of a tr ue and correct version? Surely Surely t o hate the Bible is one one thing, and to prohibit a false false version version of t he Bible is quite another. Has the Catholic Church not as a matter of fact put a correct copy of the Bible into the bands of her children in t heir own language in t he Douai version? version? As As for the burning of Tyndale’s version, there is nothing to be wondered at in it; it was probably the only, or at least least t he most strik ing and effective effective w ay of stemm ing its sale and instilling a horror of it int o the hearts of the people. It was the custom custom of the age (as Dore remarks) t o burn t he works of opponents, as Luther a few years before before burnt the books of Canon Law, and the Bull of Pope Leo, and in 1522 John Calvin burnt all th e copies he could could collect of Serv etus’ Bible at Geneva, b ecause th ese contai contai ned some notes he did not think were orthodox. I ndeed Calvin Calvin went a step further th an that — that —he he burned Servetus himself. And surely it m ust be plain enough to everyone that , in the case case before us, what the ecclesia ecclesiastica sticall auth orities meant t o destroy was, not t he Word of God, God, but t he errors of Luther Luther and Tyndale which were corrupt corrupt ing it. (iv ) But t he most interesting point about th e whole affair affair is that tim e has abundantly justified the action of the Catholic Church Church and proved t hat she did th e proper thin g in attem pting t o stamp out Tyndale's Bible. Bible. For For (I ) t he reading of this pernicious pernicious book book produced most disastrous disastrous effects upon the m orals of the people, who became rebellious, rebellious, profane, and ir religious, religious, and disaffected disaffected t o th e civil as well as to the spiritual authorit ies. ies. Hence we find th at for t en years, Tyndale's Tyndale's version was denounced denounced and opposed even m ore by t he Co Court urt and secular secular officials officials than by the Bishops; Bishops; and that at least tw o royal proclamations were issued for every one clerical, clerical, against against all wh o read or conceale concealed d th e obnoxious volume. I n fact in t he year 1531 King Henry Henry VI II , wit h t he advice of of his Council Council and prelates published an edict edict t hat 'the t ranslation of the Scripture corrupted by William Tyndale Tyndale should should be ut terly expelled, expelled, rej ected, ected, and put aw ay out of the hands of the people, and not be suffered suffered to go abroad among his subjects'. What a comm comm entary upon t he good and godly doctrines inculcated inculcated by Mr. William Tyndale! And furt her still—some still—some years later ( the King's veto not having secured secured t he desired desired effect), aft er several other editions of th e English Bible had been issued and the condition of the Scripture-reading masses was becoming worse and worse in consequence, the same Royal Defender of the Faith caused caused another Act Act t o be passe passed d (1 543) entitled 'for t he advancement advancement of true religion and for the abolishment of the contrary' . By force of this it w as decreed decreed that, seeing what abuses had followed the indiscriminate reading of certain versions of Holy Scripture, Scripture, and what 'tum ults and schisms' schisms' had sprung up, and 'divers naughty and erroneous opinions', and 'pestiferous and noisome t eachings eachings and instructions', including ‘writings against against t he holy and blessed blessed Sacrament Sacrament of t he Altar, and for t he maint enance enance of the dam nable opinions of of th e sect sect of Anabaptists'—all Anabaptists'—all to t he 'great unquietness of the realm and great displeasure of his Majesty’ as a result of all this, it w as enacted enacted that 'all m anner of books of the Old and New New Testam Testam ent in English, being of the crafty, false, and untr ue translation of Tyndale ', along with any writings
containing Doctrine Doctrine contrary to t hat of t he King, ’shall be clearly clearly and utt erly abolished, abolished, extinguished, and forbidden to be k ept or used in t his realm’. realm’. The Act Act then goes on to explain wh at versions of the Bible might be used, and by wh om, and forbids the general reading reading of it by w omen, art ificers, ificers, journeym en and certain certain oth er classe classes; s; and lays down sundry ot her restrictions in regard to it , which are t o be observed, observed, un der pains and penalties, penalties, ranging from fines of 40s and 5 pounds 40 pounds up to impr isonment for life. I shall not dwell on the reflections reflections that arise in one’s mind on r eading such such legal enactm enactm ents coming from such such a m an as Henry Henry VII I; but, t o complet complet e our remarks about Tyndale’s Tyndale’s version and to pursue to th e end the King’s dealing dealing with it , I may add that t he very year before he went t o his account account (15 46) h e struck struck one m ore blow, which no doubt he intended to be and and hoped would be fatal, at t his hated volum e. He de1iberately de1iberately comm anded all copies copies of of it (along wit h Coverdale’s Coverdale’s)) t o be delivered delivered up and burned. Verily the ’whirligig of t ime brings in his revenges’. revenges’. After this, one finds it somewhat amu sing to be told that only priests and Popes Popes burn and hat e the Word of God. Henceforth Henceforth Prot Prot estant readers of these lines lines would do well to remem ber that the great Reform Reform er and Founder Founder of the Church of England, England, Henry VII I, set set a high example in the m atter. However, t hat is by the way. I was saying saying that t he tim e justified the action action of the Church which first first proscribed proscribed and did its utm ost ost to r epress epress Tyndale’s Tyndale’s version, version, and I have shown how the secular secular power felt itself driven in selfprotection selfprotection to do t he same. same. ( 2) But another, and perhaps to Protestants Protestants a m ore telling proof of th e statement is found in t he fact fact that their subsequent subsequent versions of Scriptur Scriptur e deliberately deliberately om itt ed Tyndale’s Tyndale’s most characteristic features, such as his notes, prefaces and prologues. They appeared and then t hey disappeared. disappeared. They had their day, and they ceased ceased t o be. They They w ere considered considered unfit to find a place place in what pu rported to be a pure copy of the wor k of the Apostle and Evangelist. Posterity, then, has justified Sir Thomas More, and has condemn condemn ed Tyndale. Tyndale. What is t his but t o vindicate the Church Church in h er action towards the corrupt volume? Wisdom Wisdom is indeed ’j ustified of her children’.
CHAPTER XI V. A Deluge of Erroneous Versions
FOLLOWING Tyndale’s example, others continued the work of issuing English-printed Bibles, Bibles, and so in the reign of Henry VII I we have t o face quite a deluge of them . One by one they came fort h, authorised and unauthorised, printed and published by irresponsible irresponsible individuals, individuals, full of errors, wit h no pr oper supervision, supervision, and having no other effect effect ( as we shall shall presently presently see) see) than t hat of drawin g down contempt and disgrace upon the Sacred Scriptures. (I) The English Church was now separated from Rome, and the English Bishops were mere puppets and slaves at the beck and call of the Royal Tyrant, Henry. They exercised exercised no real independent independent jur isdiction isdiction over eith er clergy clergy or people; people; the governor and rul er in Church and State was th e King; and consequent consequent ly no ecclesiastic ecclesiastic could could undertake r esponsibili esponsibility ty in regard t o the pu blication blication or suppressio suppression n of Bibles without the w ill of his Im perial Master. Master. So long as Henry made no obj ection, ection, any printer or publisher publisher or lit erary hack, who th ought he saw a chance chance of making a litt le money out of the ventu re, would t ake in hand the publishing of a new new v ersion ersion of the Bible. George Joye, for example, took this course in regard to Tyndale’s Bible, and in consequenc consequence e (1535) brought down upon him self self a volley of bitter and un- Christian
reproaches reproaches from th at wort hy w ho (as I hav e said said before) was a man of uncontrollable temper and scurrilous scurrilous language when thwart ed or resisted. resisted. In reply to this t irade, George George Joye Joye published an ’Apology’, ’Apology’, in which he showed that the prin ter had paid him only 4 ½ d. for the correction of every 16 leaves, leaves, while Tyndale had netted 10 pounds for his work; and besides besides,, he exposed in fine style the departure from t he trut h of which Tyndale had been been guilty in boasting boasting of his tr anslation anslation and exposition as if it were his own, whereas Joye shows it was really Luther's all the tim e; t hat Tyndale did did not know enough Greek to do it, and had only added added 'fantasies' 'fantasies' and glosses glosses and notes of his own i magination t o the w ork of others. However, we have no t ime t o dwell on t he quarrels of these amiable amiable Bible translators, else we should never reach the end of our historical review. Let us enumerate bri efly the versions that saw t he light in rapid succe success ssion ion during t he reign of Henry Henry VII VII I. (2) There was Myles Coverdale's in 1535. Coverdale was a priest, who married abroad, and kept a school. In aft er years King Edward Edward VI granted him and his wife (sic) Eliza Elizabeth beth a dispensation dispensation (! ) t o eat flesh flesh and w hite m eats in Lent Lent and ot her fasting fasting days. I t is wonderful wh at power t he Kings of England England had in those days! days! In 1537 appeared appeared Matthew's or Rogers' ogers' Bible (w hich was a mixt ure of Tyndale's and Coverdale's), overdale's), and t his has the distinction of being the first t hat Henry aut horised horised to be used used by t he people at large. Matth Matth ew or Rogers Rogers (for h e assumed assumed different nam es for Bible-selling purposes) was, like Coverdale, a renegade priest, and had married, and we are not surprised surprised to fin d that some of his notes on the Gospel Gospel were indecent, indecent, and others consisted of abuse of the Church, her clergy, and her doctrines. Two years later (1539 ) a man, Taverner, Taverner, pr oduced oduced another v ersion ersion of t he Bible. He He was a layman, bu t a preacher preacher not with standing, who had saved saved his skin by recanting recanting his opinions. opinions. And the same year appeared a version that w as to hold the field for popularity for t he next t wenty years viz., the Great Great bible, sometimes called called Cranmer's, from the Prefac Preface e writt en by that accomm accomm odating prelate. It was Cromw Cromw ell (Thomas, not Oliver, Oliver, of course) course) wh o engineered it, and Coverdale who supervised supervised it s progress. progress. The printing of it w as begun begun in France, rance, but when t he work was half finished, the I nquisitor-General nquisitor-General very properly stepped in and confisca confiscated ted the pr esse esses s and ty pes. pes. I f England England w as going to t he dogs through anti- Papal Bibles Bibles,, he saw n o reason reason why France should should do t he same. However, it was completed and published in London London in 1539 , and, like previous versions, versions, contained contained fulsome fulsome flatt ery of Henry VII I, concerning concerning whom Our Lord Lord is represented represented as saying, 'I have found a m an after My Own heart, who shall fulfil all My will!' This volume was by Royal Proclamation ordered to be put up in every church in England; England; and Bonner, Bishop Bishop of London ('Bloody Bonner',) Bonner',) who is held up as the most determ ined enem enem y of Bible reading, reading, set up at his own expense six beautiful copies of this Book at various convenient places in St Paul's Cathedral. Unfortunately, so much ill-feeling, disturbance, contention, and irreverence was the result of this unrestrained Scripture reading that he was compelled compelled to t hreaten their removal. The license license to read and ju dge, each each one for himself, of the sense and meaning of the Word of God produced, as we said before, most lament able effects, effects, and led to th e utt er degradation of the Sacred Sacred Volume. Not Not t hat t here was any any eager desire or thi rst for it, or any great or general use made of it: for the print ers often often complained of the large stock stock left, unbought , on their h ands, and begged that persons should should be compelled to purchase purchase them , and besought besought that no fresh editions might be published; published; and we have seen seen t hat Acts had to be made to force people people to buy them, under thr eat of fine and and impr isonment. But yet t hose who did read the Bible Bible made it only a m atter of alt ercation ercation and contention and argument, and br ought it down to th e depths of of disrepute disrepute and contempt. The extent t o which this evil had had spread spread may best be judged from the pathetic lament of
Henry VIII him self self in his last speec speech h to Parliament: Parliament: ’I am extrem ely sorry to find how mu ch the Word of God God is abused: abused: w ith h ow litt le reverence reverence it is mentioned; how people squabble about t he sense; sense; how it is turn ed into wretched rhym es, es, sung and jangled in every alehouse and and t avern; and all t his in a false construction construction and counter-m eaning to the inspired writ ers. I am sorry t o perceive perceive the readers readers of the Bible discover discover so little of it in th eir practice; practice; for I am sure charity was never in a more languishing condition, virt ue never at a lower ebb, nor God Himself Himself less honoured or w orse served served in Christendom.’ There is no ambiguit y about these words, and when we rem ember th at t he same same sentiment s are express expressed ed in the wr itings and speeches of many of the Reformers themselves, who complain of the licentiousness of the m asses asses since since the abolition Popery, Popery, and remem ber too, how Henry VII I was constrained to seize and burn Tyndale’s and Coverdale’s and other versions of the Bible, and to forbid the reading of any version at all to large classes of his subjects — subjects — in t he face of all this, who w ill fail to see see the sinful folly of the p olicy olicy of the English English schismatics schismatics of that day? And And w ho will deny t hat t he Catholic Catholic Church Church showed consumm consumm ate wisdom, h oly prudence, and the t ruest reverence for God's God's Word in wit hholding her version till a m ore convenient convenient season? season? (3) But are we finished with th e erroneous erroneous versions versions yet? Far Far from it. Henry VI II certainly authorised authorised no more, for th e simple simple reason reason that h e went to j udgment in 1547. No new edition came out in Edward the Sixth's reign (1547-1553) but in 1557 one was published published that owed it s origin to William William Whit tingham , a layman, w ho had married a sister sister of John Calvin's wife, and who was made Dean of Durham . Whittingh am's Bible, issue issued d at Geneva, Geneva, perpetuated t he corruptions of Tyndale's with an Epistle of Calvin added to the Epistles of St Paul and the other Apostles. During the reign of 'Bloody' 'Bloody' Mary (1553- 1558) , who, of course, course, ought t o have hated the Scriptur Scriptur es like poison poison ( being a bigoted Papist Papist and the w ife of a Spaniard), t here were, strange to say, no pr oclamations oclamations against Scriptur Scriptur e reading, nor is there t o be found any t race of opposition opposition on the part either of t he Queen Queen or of h er Bishops Bishops to the Bible being being read or print ed in th e vulgar t ongue; so says says Mr. Mr. Blunt, the Anglican historian. With the accession of the 'Virgin Queen Bess', however, a new Bible saw the light in 1560 at Geneva, Geneva, which was the work of t he No Nonconformists nconformists resident resident there, and is known as the Genevan Genevan Bible, though Bible collec collectors tors know it m ore familiarly by the t itle 'Breeches 'Breeches Bible', Bible', from its rendering of Genesis Genesis iii, 7: 'They sewed sewed fig leaves together and made t hemselves breeches breeches'. '. It was certainly the m ost ost popular th at had y et appeared among t he sectaries, sectaries, partly because because of its undeniable scholarship scholarship and accuracy, accuracy, and part ly because because of it s notes on the m argin, w hich were fiercely fiercely Calvinistic. Calvinistic. Take an example: Rev. ix., 3. Here th e note ru ns: 'Locus 'Locusts ts are false teachers, teachers, heretics and wordly subtil prelates, wit h m onks, friars, cardinals, cardinals, patriarchs, archbishops, bishops, doctors, bachelors, masters, which forsake Christ to m aintain false doctrine.' doctrine.' Nobody worth speaking speaking about is m issed issed out here. The Purit Purit an soldiers soldiers used used to carry about with them a littl e book made up of quotations from the not es of of t his Calvinistic Calvinistic version. version. It seems seems also to have suited the Scottish Scottish t aste of the period, for it was the first edition pri nted in Scotland. So little, however, did t he great m ass ass of the people in this country care care for any Bible in in English at all that the Privy Council passed a law compelling every householder possessed of a certain sum to purchase a copy under a penalty of 10 pounds. The Magistrates and Town Council of Edinburgh also did their best to force the sale of the volum e; and searchers searchers went from house to house throughout t his unhappy land to see if it had been bought. But, in spite of all the pressure, pressure, w e find from the P Privy rivy Council Records that many householders preferred to incur the pains and penalties to purchasing purchasing t he Bible. Bible. The old dodge was then adopted in regard to t he Genevan Genevan
version that had done service with previous copies —the dodge, namely, of issuing the very same book, wit h the same errors and and identical notes, notes, but under a new tit le page, so as as to deceive deceive the un wary i nto believing it was a fresh fresh edition. This trick had to be played, of course, by the un fortunat e and impecunious printers and booksellers, who had large stocks of Bibles Bibles unsold on their shelves; and t he perpetration of this fraud h elped the Genevan Genevan editions considerably. considerably. But t he Elizabethan Bishops soon found that this Bible, with its violent Calvinistic notes and teaching, was undermining the popularity of the Church of England; England; so Matthew Matthew Parker, Archbishop Archbishop of Canterbury, set set him self self t he task of pr oviding another v ersion ersion that would be less offensive offensive to t he High Church Church party and m ore favourable to Anglicanism. The result was the Bishops' Bible, which appeared in 1568, and took the chief place in the public services services of the Church, though it never displaced displaced the Genevan Genevan in the favour of the p eople. eople. We are close close now t o the m oment at which t he first Catholic Catholic version version (and up t ill today the only one ever sanctioned sanctioned in English) English) appeared. appeared. But t here was still one m ore Protestant version which, as it is yet the principal recognised Bible of the Protestants of the British Empire, m ust not be omit ted. I m ean, of course, course, King James's James's version version of 1611. I t is the 300 th anniv ersary ersary of t his, comm comm only called called the Authorised Versio Version, n, that English-speaking nglish-speaking Protestants Protestants are everywh ere celebrating celebrating t his year (1 911) . (4) Neither the Royal Pedant himself, nor anybody else, seems to have been satisfied wit h any of t he Bibles Bibles then floating about. Dr. Reynolds, Reynolds, the Puritan Puritan leader, leader, 'm oved his Majesty Majesty t here might be a new t ranslation ranslation of t he Bible, Bible, because because those which were allowed in the reign of Henry Henry VI II and Edward Edward VI were corrupt, and not answerable to t he trut hs of the original'. James, James, great scholar scholar as he thought him self self to be professed professed 'that he could never yet see see a Bible well translated into English, but the worst of all his Majesty Majesty thought , t he Geneva'— Geneva'—a a ju dgment we cannot be surprised at, considering considering th at t hat v ersion ersion openly allowed disobedience disobedience to a kin g, and blam ed Asa Asa for only deposing deposing his mother and not killing her. ( 2 Chron. Chron. xv . 16) . Moreover, Moreover, he declared declared that ' some of its notes were very part ial, untr ue, seditious, seditious, and savoured too m uch of dangerous and t raitorous conceits'. conceits'. Hence Hence a large band of tr anslators anslators was appointed and in 1611 there was finished and published published what has proved to be the best Protestant version that ever appeared—one which has exercised an enormous influence not only on th e min ds of its readers, readers, but also on English English literature th roughout t he world. In 1 881- 1885 t his version version of King James James was revised, revised, but whilst acceptable acceptable to students, the Revision evision has gained no hold upon the people at large. (5) How long it will be before another Protestant Protestant v ersion ersion appears he would be a bold man who would venture to prophecy; but that others will spring up and add to the num ber of the wrecks that already strew th e path we may confidently predict. I have given a goodly list of corrupt and erroneous versions; versions; but please please do not im agine for a moment that my catalogue is anything like complete. I have merely mentioned those that were more comm only used and secured secured a certain certain amount of popularity and authorisation from Protestant headquarters. But t here are, I am safe safe in saying, hundreds of other editions that flooded this unhappy realm from the tim e of Tyndale, Tyndale, some from foreign countries, countries, like Holland, and Germany, Germany, and Switzerland, and som som e produced at at h ome, but all of them swarm ing wit h blunders and perversions. perversions. On On glancing over over a bookseller's bookseller's catalogue catalogue the ot her day m y eye happened to light on some of those that have attained notoriety for th eir absurd mistakes. There There is, for example, t he 'He' Bible and the 'She' Bible, so called called from t he hopeless hopeless mi xing up of
these pronouns in th e Book Book of Ruth; the ' He' Bible Bible has one set set of errors and the ‘She' ‘She' Bible another. There is the 'Wicked' Bible Bible from t he word 'not' being omitt ed from t he 7th Comm andment. There There is the 'Vinegar' 'Vinegar' Bible, Bible, from printin g 'vinegar' instead of 'vineyard', and so producing ‘The Parable of the Vinegar'. This Bible was printed by a man called called Baskett, Baskett, and is now vainly sought for by collectors collectors on account account of its num berless berless errors; in dee deed, d, it was witt ily called called the 'Basket-ful of Errors'. There There is the 'Murderer's Bible', Bible', from the w ords of Our Lord being th us printed: 'But Jesus Jesus said said unto her, l et the children first be killed' (instead of 'fed'). Then we have the 'Whig' Bible and the 'Unrighteous' Bible and the 'Bug' Bible, and the 'Treacle’ Bible, and no end of other kinds of Bibles, all crammed full of mistakes and corruptions. The Pearl Bible, Bible, for in stance, stance, published by Field, Field, t he Parliamentary Parliamentary printer, has 6,000 errors in it. A famous book was writ ten by a man nam ed Ward Ward in the seventeenth century, Protestant Bible , containing a formidable list of, I should not entitled Errat a of t he Protestant like to say how m any th ousand ousand errors in t he various versions. versions. No one has yet succeeded in refuting Ward's Errata . It stands as a gruesome comm comm entary on th e history of heretical treatment of the inspired text. I cam cam e across across a curious and and rare book one day in Glasgow Glasgow University Library, writ ten in 1 659, by a Protestant, Protestant, one William William Kilburn, entitled Dangerous Errors in Several Late Printed Bibles to the Great Scandal and Corruption of Sound and True Religion . He enumerates the errors, omissions, and specimens of nonsense that he discovered in these editions, many of them imported from Holland, and mentions that a gentleman had unearthed 6,000 mistakes in one copy alone. (6) But tim e would fail to tell of all the corruptions and perversions perversions of the original texts w hich are to be found in practically practically all the Protestant Protestant Bibles, Bibles, down to t he present present t ime, and wh ose existence existence is proved proved by t he fact fact t hat one after th e other has been withdrawn, and its place taken by a fresh version, which in its turn was found to be no bett er than t he rest. I s this reverence for for t he Word of God? Which of all these corrupt partisan versions was 'the Rule of Faith?' The Bible, and the Bible only, we are t old; but which Bible? I ask. ask. Or had Protestants Protestants a different Rule of Faith Faith according according t o the century in whi ch they lived? according according to th e copy copy of t he Bible they chanced to possess? What a mockery of Religion! What a degradation of God's Holy Word, that it should have been knocked about like a shutt lecock, lecock, and made t o serve the int erests erests now of t his sec sect, t, n ow of that, and loaded loaded wit h notes that shrieked aloud party war-cries and bitter accus accusations ations and filthy insinuations! I s this zeal zeal for t he pure and incorrupt Gospel? Is this the grand and unspeakable blessing of the 'open Bible'? It only remains now to show by contrast the calm, dignified, and reverent reverent action taken by the Catholic Church, Church, t owards her own Book. Book.
CHAPTER XV. Th e Cat holic’s Bible Bible
WHAT was the Catholic Church doing all this time? Well, she was in a state of persecution persecution in England, and could not do v ery m uch except except suffer. (I ) Many of her b est est sons sons went abroad to m ore favourable lands. lands. The circumstances circumstances had assuredly assuredly been m ost unsuitable for brin ging out a Catholic Catholic version of the Scriptur Scriptur es. es. She was rather content, indeed compelled, compelled, to sit still and from h er maj estic estic height look down and w atch the rise and fall, fall, th e publication publication and
withdrawal, the appearance and disappearance of dozens of different versions, heretical and corrupt, corrupt, grotesque in their blu nders and bitter in their sectarianism, sectarianism, that had been issued issued by t he various bodies. bodies. By the end of t he sixteenth century no less less than 270 new sects sects had been enumerated, and some that had been extinct for centur centur ies, ies, like Arianism, r evived under t he genial influence of of Luther. Dr. Walton, Bishop Bishop of Chester, Chester, and auth or of t he famous Polyglott Polyglott Bible that bears his name, laments t his fact fact in his Prefac Preface e about t he end of t he seventeenth century. ’There ’There is no fanatic or clown’ ’ says he, ’from the lowest dregs of th e people who does not giv e you his own dreams as the Word of God. God. For the bott omless pit seems seems t o have been set set open from whence a smoke has risen which has obscured obscured t he heavens and the stars, and locusts locusts are come come out wit h wings — wings —a a num erous race of sectaries and heretics, heretics, w ho have renewed all t he old heresies, heresies, and invent ed monstrous opinions of their own. These have filled our cities, villages, camps, houses—nay, our churches and pulpits, too, and lead the poor deluded people people with t hem t o the pit of perdit ion.' Doubtless the poor Bishop, being a self-complacent Anglican, failed to perceive that he him self self was as much of a deluded sectary sectary and heretic as any of th em. It was not till 15 82 t hat a Catholic Ne New w Testam Testam ent appeared, and that was not in England, but in France, at Rheims, whence a colony of persecuted Catholics had fled, including Cardinal Allen, Gregory Martin, and Robert Bristow, who were mainly responsible for this new t ranslation. William William Allen, Allen, form erly Canon Canon of York, later Archbishop Archbishop of Mechlin, and lastly Cardinal, had founded a college at Douai for the training of priests for th e English English mission mission in 15 68. He was compelled to remove it to Rheims in 1578 owing t o Huguenot Huguenot riot s, and there, as I said, in 1582 th ey issued issued the New Testament Testament in English English for Catholics. atholics. I t was a tr anslation, anslation, of course, course, from the Latin Vulgate, which had been declared declared by th e Council Council of Trent Trent t o be the aut horised horised t ext of Scriptur Scriptur e for the Church. Martin Martin was the principal translator, whilst Bristow m ainly contributed t he notes, which are powerful and illum inative. The whole was intended to be of service both to pr iests iests and people, to give th em a t rue and sound rendering of the original w ritings, t o save them from the nu mberless false false and and incorrect versions in circulation, circulation, and to provide them w ith something w herewith t o refute the heretics who then, as ever, approached approached with a t ext in th eir mouth . (2) Nee Needles dless s to say, t he appearance appearance of th is New New Testament, Testament, with its annotations, at once aroused the fiercest opposition. Queen Elizabeth ordered the searchers to seek out and confiscate every copy they could find. If a priest was found in possession of it, h e was forthw forthw ith im prisoned. prisoned. Torture by rack was applied to those who circulated circulated it, and a scholar, scholar, Dr. Fulke, w as appointed appointed t o refute i t. All these measures, measures, be it noted, kind reader, were taken by parties who advocated advocated loudly the unlim ited right of private judgment. In 1593 the College returned to Douai, and there in 1609 the Old Testament was added, and the Catholic Bible in English was complete, and is called called the Douai Bible. Bible. Complete Complete w e may well call it; it is th e only really complete Bible in English, for it contains those seven books of the Old Testament which I pointed out before were, and are, omit ted by t he P Protestants rotestants in their editions. So that w e can can claim claim t o have not only the pure, unadulterated Bible but the whole of it, wit hout addition or subtraction: a translation of the Vulgate, which is itself itself the work of S St. t. Jerome Jerome in t he fourth century, w hich, again, again, is the most authorit ative and correct of all the early copies of Holy Scripture. At a single leap we thus arrive at that great work , completed by the greatest scholar scholar of his day, w ho had acces access s to manuscripts and authorities that have now perished, and who, living so near the days of the Apostles, Apostles, and, as it were, close to t he very fount ainhead, was able able to produce a copy copy of the i nspired nspired wr itings which, for correctness correctness,, can never be equalled.
We may feel j ustly proud of our Douai Bible. Bible. We need need not declare declare it t o be perfect perfect in all respec respects, ts, either in regard to it s English English style or its employm ent of w ords from foreign languages; languages; w e need not feel the less less affection affection or admiration for it t hough we should sugges suggestt t he possibility possibility of revision and im provement in some particulars —it particulars —it has, indeed, been re-edited and revised ere now especially by Bishop Challoner. But when all is said and done, done, it is a noble version version wit h a noble history; tru e, honest, honest, scholarly, scholarly, faith ful to the original. The Catholic Catholic Church Church has nothing to r egret in her policy or her action towards English versions of the Scriptures. She has not issued one version one year and cancelled it the next because of its corruptions and errors, its partisan notes, or political doctrines. Nobly she has stood for reverence and caution in respect respect of tr anslating God's God's Holy Holy Word int o the vulgar tongue. She was slow in acting, I admit , if by slowness slowness we mean deliberation and prudence, prudence, for she saw with un erring vision the evils that were certain to result from a hasty hasty casting casting of pearls before swine. But when she did act, she acted decisively and once for all. Who is there that has followed followed th e sad sad story of the non- Catholic treatm ent of t he Sacred Sacred Scriptur Scriptur es but w ill be forced forced by contr contr ast ast t o admire the wisdom, t he calm calm dignit y, th e consistent and deliberate policy of the Ecclesiastical authorities of the Catholic Church in England, which stands as a reproof to the vi olent, blundering, malicious met hods of the sectaries and which, if it h ad been acquies acquiesced ced in by ot hers, would have saved saved th e Word of God God from infinite degradation and contempt ? (3) Hatred against against her version of the Bible when it first appeared appeared was so deep that an oath sworn on it was not deemed to be valid. I t w as on on th is sacre sacred d volum e that Mary, Queen of Scots, laid her hand and swore her innocence the night before her execution. execution. The Earl Earl of Kent at once interposed with the rem ark t hat t he Book Book w as a Popish and false translation, and in consequence the oath was of no value. 'Does your Lordship suppose suppose,' ,' w as the quiet answer of th e noble Queen, Queen, 'that my oath would be the better if I swore on on your translation, which I do n ot believe?' Thanks be to God, the Douai version has now so established established its position, position, and hatred to it and t o its auth ors has so so dim inished, inished, t hat a Catholic may, even in t hese hese lands, swear swear up on it in conscience, and his word is believed as any other man's in a Court of Law. Found in thousands of pious Catholic Catholic homes at t he present present hour, w e may comfort ourselves ourselves with t he reflection reflection t hat, in t his kingdom, t here has now for long existed existed th e true version of the Gospel of our Blessed Lord and the inspired words of His holy Apostles and Evangelists, as they have been handed down and preserved by the Catholic Church Church from the b eginning, unchangeable and and unchanged; and we m ay feel the m ost absolute absolute certainty t hat, as it is the tru e version, version, so, at a date not incalculably incalculably distant, it w ill prove to be the only one, for t he others will have gone to join their predecessors, and been consigned to a happy oblivion, and only survive in the m emory of him w ho glances glances at their m usty covers and and faded pages beneath beneath t he glass cases of library or museum.
CHAPTER XVI . Envoi
AND AN D now m y task is finished, finished, and you, dear reader, if you have followed it up, w ill utter, I am sure, a hearty hearty Deo gratias ! As sincerely and as clearly as possible, I have tried t o show that it is to the Catholic Catholic Church Church under God God th at we owe t he preservation preservation and integrity of th e Sacred Sacred Scriptures. The The Old Testament Testament she took over
from t he Jewish Jewish Church; Church; to it she added added the New Testament, Testament, the work of her own Apostles Apostles and Bishops, Bishops, and comprising them in one great whole, declared that t hey had the Holy Ghost Ghost for their aut hor, and w ere neither to b e increase increased d nor diminished. Throughout t he ages when there w as no other Church she has preserved preserved them from error, saved them from destruction, multiplied them in every language under Heaven, and put t hem w ith the necessary necessary prudence in her people’s people’s hands. Again and again again heretics and apostates apostates have tried to m utilate and corrupt them — them — indeed, have actually done so; but the Roman Church has ever preserved a version pure and entire. She claims that she alone alone knows the m eaning of their t eaching, eaching, and alone poss posses esses ses the right to int erpret th em t o men. She will t olerate olerate no tam pering wit h t he sacred sacred text , and in t hese hese days espec especially, ially, when scientists scientists and critics who have lost lost belief in the supernatural supernatural att ack ack them and labour to overthrow t heir Divine authorit y and authorship, Rom Rom e alone alone stands as as their protector; to her alone pious lovers of the Sacred Sacred Volume, be t hey Catholic Catholic or Protestant, Protestant, must look to save it and defend it. The Pope has appointed a standing Biblical Commission to guard the integrity and authenticity of Holy Scriptu Scriptu re. This is but natur al; for h e stands stands as it were in loco parentis ; the Bible is the Church's offspring. offspring. But it is surely t he keenest keenest irony of history that , whilst Protestants Protestants themselves are striv striv ing with might and main to pull to pieces the ancient obj ect ect of th eir veneration, t he Catholic Catholic Church, Church, ever reputed its deadliest enemy, alone is left of all Christian bodies to save it from destru destru ction. And this she will do, as she she has ever done in the past; it is part of her office office in this world; there is no other other t hat has either either t he right or th e power to do it. If the Bible loses its sovereign place in the heart and mind of non-Catholics, as it is rapidly doing, it is the work of those who, whether in Germany, or Britain or America, have loudly professed themselves its greatest champions. The Catholic Catholic Church Church on t he other hand, in her long history has nothin g to be ashamed ashamed of in her t reatment of it, but deserves deserves the praise praise and thanks of all Christians for so zealous zealously ly and fearless fearlessly ly prot ecting ecting it fr om corruption and contem contem pt. Indeed, I will say that a simple study of her at tit ude towards the inspired Scriptures, Scriptures, in comparison with that of all heretical heretical bodies, bodies, will fur nish one of the strongest argument s that she is the True Church Church of Christ. Venerable and inspired as Catholics regard the Bible, great as is their devotion to it for spiritual reading and support support of doctrine, w e yet do not pr etend to lean upon it alone, as the Rule of of faith and m orals. orals. Along with it we take that great Word that was never writt en, Tradition, Tradition, and hold by both th e one and the other int erpreted by the livin g voice of the Catholic Church Church speaking speaking t hrough her Supreme Head, the infallible Vicar of Christ. Here we have a Guide that has never failed, and never can, in teaching us our our dut y both to God and man. Not on th e quicksands quicksands of human and varying j udgment , but on t he Rock Rock of Divine Divine Authority, w e place place our feet; feet; and, amidst t he warring of opinions and the conflict of num berless berless editions and versions of Sacred Sacred Scripture, and th e confused confused and contr contr adictory adictory interpretat ions of texts, we find an unassailable unassailable refuge refuge in t he decisio decision n of Rome, and in submit ting t o the judgm ent of that Church to w hich Christ Christ gave Divine authority to teach when He said, 'Go ye and teach all nations', we find a sure consolation and an abiding peace. Indi vidual interpretation of th e Bible—the Bible—the most sublime but also the most difficult Book ever penned—can never bring satisfaction, can never give infallible certainty, can never place place a man in posse possess ssion ion of th at great obj ective ective body of trut h wh ich Our Our Blessed Lord taught, and which it is necessary to salvation that all should believe. The experience of many centuries proves it. It can not do so because it was never
meant t o do so. so. It produces not unit y, but div ision; ision; not peace, peace, but strife. Only listening to t hose to whom Jesus Christ Christ said, ’He that heareth you heareth Me,’ only sinking his own fads and fancies and and submit ting w ith childlike childlike confidence confidence to th ose whom the Redeemer Redeemer sent out t o teach in His Name and with His authority —only authority —only this, I say, say, w ill satisfy satisfy a m an, and give t o his intellect intellect r epose, epose, and to his soul a 'peace 'peace that surpasse surpasseth th all understanding'. Then Then no longer w ill he be torm ented wit h contentious disputings about about this passage passage of the Bible and that, no longer racked and rent and 'tossed 'tossed to and fro w ith every wind of doctrine', changing with the changing years. years. He will, on the contrary, experience a joy and comfort and certainty t hat nothin g can can shake in being able to say, 'O my God, I believe whatever Thy Holy Catholic Church believes and teaches, because Thou hast revealed it Who canst neither deceive nor be deceived.' deceived.' God God grant that many Bible-readers Bible-readers and Bible-lovers Bible-lovers may obtain t he grace to m ake this act of fait h, and pass pass from an unreasoning subservienc subservience e to a Book to reasonable obedience and submission to its maker and defender—the Cath Ca th olic and Roman Church.
BI OGRAPHI OGRAPHI CAL NOTE CATHOLI ATHOLI C The Bible and the Rule of Faith . Abbe Begin. The Bible: Bible: I ts Use and Abuse . Paul McLachlan. Concerning the Holy Bible . J. S. Vaughan Vaughan . Text-Books of Catholic Theology. — Tanquerey, Hunter, etc. Catholic Dictionary, Catholic Cyclopedia . C.T.S. C.T.S. Publicati Publicati ons.—Clarke, ons.—Clarke, Ander son, Donnelly , M. C. L., Allnatt , etc. The Question Box, Faith of our Fathers , etc. Introduction to Old Testament and New Testament . Cornely. The Old English Bible . Gasquet. Catholic Student Student s "Aids" "Aids" t o the Study of the Bible . H. Pope, O. P. PROTESTANT English Church Histories.—Dixon, Hook, Blunt. The Bible and the Church .. . . Westcott Westcott . The Dark Ages . Maitland. History of the English Bible . Burnett Thompson. The English Bible . Milligan. How the Bible came came t o us . Herne. English Bibles . Dore'. Our Bible . Talbot. How we got our Bible . Smyth. Introduction to New Testament Criticism . Scrivener. Helps Helps to Study of th e Bible . (Oxford.) The Bibles of England . Edgar. Our English Bible . Hoare.
[transcribed and uploaded to www.endofman.com on Sept. 14, 2001.]
