Addresses on the Revised Version of Holy Scripture

by C. J. Ellicott

ADDRESS V.
Public use of the Version.

We have now traced the external, and to some extent the internal history of Revision from the time, some fifty years ago, when it began to occupy the thoughts of scholars and divines, down to the present day.

We have seen the steady advance in Church opinion as to its necessity; its earliest manifestations, and the silent progress from what was tentative and provisional to authoritative recognition, and to carefully formulated procedures under the high and venerable sanction of the two Houses of the Convocation of Canterbury. We have further seen how the movement extended to America, and how some of the best scholars and divines of that Christian country co-operated with those of our own country in the arduous and responsible work of revising their common heritage, the Version of God’s most Holy Word, as set forth by authority 290 years ago. We have noted

too, that in this work not less than one hundred scholars and divines were engaged—for fourteen years in the case of the Old Testament, and for ten years in the case of the New Testament—and that this long period of labour and study was marked by regularly appointed and faithfully kept times of meeting, and by the interchange with the Revisers on the other side of the Atlantic of successive portions of the work, until the whole was completed.

And this Revision, as we have seen, has included a full consideration of the text of the original languages as well as of the renderings. In the Old Testament, adherence to the Massorite Text has left only a very limited number of passages in which consideration of the ancient Version was deemed to be necessary; but, in the New Testament, as we well know, questions of textual criticism occupied a large portion of the time and attention of the Revisers, both here and in America. In regard of the renderings, we have seen the care and thoroughness with which the Revision was carried out, the marginal notes in both Testaments showing convincingly, especially on the more difficult passages, how every rendering that could be regarded as in any degree probable received its full share of

consideration. Finally, it must not be forgotten that, in the case of the New Testament, the serious question whether the research in New Testament Greek since the Revision was completed has, to any appreciable extent, affected the suggestive light and truth of really innumerable corrections and changes—this too has been faced, and the charge fairly met, that just conclusions drawn from the true nature of the Greek, gravely affecting interpretation, have been ignored by the Revisers.

So much of the latter part of the last Address has been taken up with this necessary duty of showing that the changes in renderings cannot be invalidated by a priori considerations founded on the alleged insufficient knowledge, on the part of the Revisers, of the nature of the Greek they were translating, that I have not cited examples of the light-giving and often serious nature of the changes made in the Authorised Version. This I regretted at the time; but a little consideration showed me that it was much better for the cause in which I am engaged that I should refer you for illustrations of the nature and value of the renderings in the Revised Version of the New Testament to

a singularly fruitful and helpful volume, published only four years ago, and so subsequently to the researches in New Testament Greek of which I have spoken. This volume was written by a member of our Company—now, alas, no longer with us—whose knowledge of the Greek language, whether of earlier or of later date, no one could possibly doubt. I allude to the “Lessons of the Revised Version of the New Testament,” by Dr. Westcott, a volume that has not yet received the full attention which its remarkable merits abundantly claim, for it.

Of this volume I shall speak more fully later on in this Address, my object now being to set forth the desirableness, I might even say the duty, of using the Revised Version in the Public Services of the Church.

After the summary I have just given of the external history of this great movement, does not the question come home to us, Why has all this been done? For what have the hundred labourers in the great work freely given their time and their energies during the four and twenty years (speaking collectively) that were spent on the work? For what did the venerable Convocation of our Province give the weight of its sanction and authority