A Translation into Modern PREFACE. ENGLISH-SPEAKING people of to-day have not, until quite recently, had the opportunity of reading the Bible in the English of their own time. Though in the course English. of the last hundred years the Bible has been translated into the vernacular of most countries, the language of our Bible remains the English of three hundred years ago. This translation of the New Testament is an endeavour to do for the English nation what has been done already for the people of almost all other countries to enable Englishmen to read the most important part of their Bible in that form of their own language which they themselves use. It had its origin in the recognition of the fact that the English of the Authorized Version (closely followed in that of the Revised Version), though widely valued for its antique charm, is in many passages difficult, or even quite unintelligible to the modern reader. The retention, too, of a form of English no longer in common use is liable to give the impression that the contents of the Bible have little to do with the life of today. The Greek used by the New Testament writers was not the Classical Greek of some centuries earlier, but the form of the language spoken in their own day. Moreover the writers represent those whose utterances they record as using the words and phrases of every-day life. We believe that the New Testament will be better understood by modern readers if presented in a modern form; and that a translation of it, which presents the original in an exalted literary and antiquated dress, cannot, despite its aroma' and the tender memories that have gathered around it, really make the New Testament for the reader of to-day the living reality that it was to its first readers. In this respect the present translation differs altogether in its aim from that of the Revised Version of 1881. No attempt is made in that Version to translate the original into the language of our own time. Its authors state in their preface: "We have faithfully adhered to the rule that the alterations to be introduced should be expressed, as far as possible, in the language of the Authorized Version, or of the Versions that preceded it." Our constant effort, on the contrary, has been to exclude all words and phrases not used in current English. We have, however, followed the modern practice of using an older phraseology in the rendering of poetical passages, and of quotations from the Old Testament, and in the language of prayer. Neither a The translation of 1611, known as the "Authorized Revision nor Version," was the outcome of many successive revisions a Paraphrase. of the translation completed by Tyndale in 1534, which was, at least to some extent, founded on that completed by Wycliffe about 1380. Further, the last named translation was not made from the original Greek, but from the Latin Version, known as the Vulgate. The present translation is not a revision of any previous one, but is made directly from the Greek. Nor is it a paraphrase. A paraphrase might be useful as a help to the interpretation of the New Testament, but it would not be the New Testament itself. Yet, on the other hand, our work is more than a verbal translation. No purely verbal rendering can ever adequately represent the thoughts conveyed in the idioms of another language. In this translation, not only has every word been carefully weighed, but also the emphasis placed upon every word, and the effort has been made to give the exact force and meaning in idiomatic modern English. The Greek Since the publication of the Authorized Version of Text. 1611, more than 1,500 manuscripts of the whole or of parts of the New Testament have been discovered or have become accessible, and among them are the three oldest and most important. The Greek text here translated, that of Westcott and Hort, is mainly founded on the oldest manuscripts, and may be said to represent that form of the text of the New Testament which was generally in use in the Church at the end of the Third Century. Parallel A large amount of time and care has been expended Passages. upon those passages of the gospels which record the same, or similar, events or discourses, in order to show the remarkable similarities, and the no less remarkable divergences, which abound in them. Such passages are common in the first three gospels, while in the fourth they are more numerous than is generally supposed. Dr. Westcott writes: "The English reader has a right to expect that he will find in the Revision which is placed in his hands a faithful indication of the verbal agreement or difference between the several narratives." In addition to such help as that referred to by Dr. Westcott, the English reader should now be able, to some extent, to study the origins of the gospels, and to discern their relation to a common source. Great advances have been made in the study of this subject since the issue of the Authorized and even of the Revised Version. There are still, however, minute points where such an indication as that required by Dr. Westcott seems impossible. Quotations and The numerous and important quotations from the Old Testament are in this translation set out in modern "Borrowed form; but minor quotations (i.e., those not specially Phrases," introduced as quotations) from the Old Testament, the Apocrypha, the Book of Enoch, and other sources, are placed between single inverted commas; while, at the foot of the pages, references are given to some of the vast number of places, in which the writers consciously or unconsciously borrow the phraseology of the Old Testament. This will enable the reader to see how familiar the writers were with the very words and phrases of the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament, and how insensibly it influenced them in describing the events of their own day. Proper The names of persons and places we have, as a rule, Names. left in the forms with which English readers have been made familiar by the Authorized and Revised Versions, except where a change in the spelling seemed likely to show the correct pronunciation. Measures, and Titles. Bracketed We have attempted to give measures of space and time, the values of coins, and also official titles in their nearest English equivalents. These are A few passages, numbering fourteen in all, will be Passages. found placed between square brackets. judged by Westcott and Hort "not to have originally formed part of the work in which they occur," but to be " stray relics from the Apostolic or sub-Apostolic age.' The three most important of these will be found at pages 39 and 210. Order of the The order, in which the Books and Letters of the Books. New Testament appear in this translation, is due to the desire not to inconvenience a reader, familiar with the old order, more than is necessary, but, at the same time, to make an advance in the direction of such a chronological arrangement, as modern research has rendered possible. Three main divisions have been adopted suggested by the character of the books-Historical Books, Letters, and an Apocalypse; and, in the sub-divisions, the Letters have been grouped under the names of those writers to whom they have been traditionally attributed. Within these sub-divisions the Books and Letters stand in a probable chronological arrangement. It is certain that our translation will not be acceptable to those who regard any attempt to re-translate the New Testament as undesirable, if not dangerous. It is, nevertheless, hoped that, by this modern translation, the New Testament may become a living reality to many by whom the Authorized Version, with all its acknowledged beauties, is but imperfectly understood or never read. In this hope, we now commend this translation, which has been undertaken as a labour of love, to the good-will of all Englishspeaking people, and to the blessing of Almighty God. September, 1904. THE TRANSLATORS, |