2d. This is a quotation hy the Apostle from Deuteronomy xxi. 23 ; -which, in king James’s
-version stands — “ (for he that is hanged is accursed of God;)” [The French of
Cahen reads — “ car un pendu est une malédiction de Dieu” '(y. pp. 98, 94); -which
oonforms better to the context, and resembles current superstitious aversion to gibbets.]
Apart from illiteral citation, the New Testament, in this passage, leaves out the word
ELoHIM, I God.’ Tbeologists who combat for “ plenary inspiration” can doubtless answer
the following interrogatories. If those words be Paul’s (always provided for), did he quote
from memory ? then his recollection was faulty. If he copied the LXX, then, in his day,
the Greek already differed from the Hebrew ; and who can tell which of the two transcripts
preserved the original reading ?
The catalogue continues with—“ Epiphanius, 403 — Augustine; 430”— but we abridge
twenty-two folio pages of extracts from later Christian writers, who protest to the same
effect, into aline; epitomizing the series by one name — Ludovicus Capellus, foundertf
sacred criticism in 1660.
All the subjoined commentators vouch for inaccuracies in the Text: viz.— “ Raymondde
Pennaforti, 1250—Nic. Lyranns, 1320—Rudolphus Armachanus, 1359—Tostatus, 145(K-
Jacob Perez deYalentia, 1450 — Marsilius Ficinus, 1450 — Baptista Mantuanus, 1516—
Zuinglius, 1528—Martin Luther, 1546—Bibliander, 1564,” &e. The same corruptions ate
certified through the decrees of the Council of Trent, 1546 ; through the Vulgate of Siztut
V., 1590 ; and through king James’s version, 1604-1611 : on which t ie Oxonian, critic
remarks (p. 5Q| ? 108): — “ To the Authobs of the English version that which is due:
many examples prove that they did not always mind what they found in the Hebrew, but
what they thought ought to be read therein : tantamount to that, in their opinion, the Hebrew
Text was corrupt. This the reader evolves from twenty .places :—Gm. xxv. 8 : n n
29: Ex. xx. 10: Deut. v. 14; xxvii. 26; xxxii. 43: Jos. xxii. 34: Jud. vii. 18—vid. com.]
20—1 Sam. ii. 23: 2 Sam. iii. 7 ; v. 8 ; xxi. 19 ; xxiii. 8: 2 Kings xxv. 3: 1 Chron. vii. 6;
ix. 41 ; xxiv. 23 : Ps. xxxiv. 17 ; lxx. 1 : Isa. xxviii. 12 : Ezecfy. xxvi. 23.”
After citing “ Jos. Scaliger ; the Buxtorfs, father and son, defenders of the purity of til
text; Capellus; Glassius; Joseph Mede; Usher, Morinus, Beveridge, Walton, Hammond,
Bochart, Hottinger, Huet, Pococke, Jablonski, Clericus, Opitius, Vetringa, Mickaelis,
Wolfius, Carpzovius, Joseph Hallet, Francis Hare” — Kennicott concludes (§ 132): —
“ Id autem a me maximè propositum fuit, ut ostenderem — produci posse testimonii
multa et insignia, per intervallum fere 2000 annorum, ad probandas mutationes in Hebni;
cum Textum invectas : quanquam in contrariam sententiam, annis abhinc triginta, docti
fere omnes abierint.” (189)
One would have thought (to return to Prof. Stuart’s metaphor), that this “ immense
desert” contained “ game enough,” in all conscience ! but, in some men, the lové of chase
is insatiable. “ Defence,” as he justly observes', “ would Beem to be needed. The contest
has become one pro aris et foots" — “ truly become one, as I have said, pro aril ft
focis£ (190)
“ It has become plain,” frankly declares this lamented Hebraist, “ that the battle whiil
has been going on over most European ground these forty or fifty years past, has at Ins
come even to us [alluding to the exegetical works of his learned and reverend New EnglaK
colleagues, Noyes, Palfrey; Norton, Parker, Ac.], and we can no longer decline the contest
Unbelief in the Voltaire and the Thomas Paine style we have coped with, and in a measurs
gained the victory. But now it comes in the shape of philosophy, literature, criticism, philology,
knowledge of antiquity, and the like.[!] Hume’s arguments against miracles have beij
exhumed, clothed with a new and splendid costume, and commended to the world by maoj
among the most learned men in Europe. Before them, all revelation falls alike, both 01
Testament and New.” (191)
And, considering who these “ most learned men ” veritably are, it is not for us to question
the uprightness of his outspoken recognition, that—
(189) Dissertabio Generedits; 1780; pp. 7, 8, 33-43, 55, seq.
(190) Op. cit. ; pp. 3, 422.
“ The unbelief that consistently sets aside the whole, shows a more,manly and energetic
attitude of mind; and, in my opinion, it is much more likely to be convinced at last of error,
than he is who thinks ,that he is already,a believer and is safe, while he virtually rejects
from the Gospel all which makes a Gospël, in distinction from the teachings of Socrates,
of Plato, of Plutarch, of Cicero, and of Seneca.” (192)
We have quoted the highest contemporary authority of the Calvinist school ; and impartiality
requires that a member of the “ Chiesa Cattolica^ Apostolica Romana” should make
up for the mild notice taken of Kennicott’s and De Rossi’s researches by His Eminence the
Cardinal.
If the man of science mourns, with as much fervor as the most devout, over the irrecoverable
loss of Hebrew manuscripts of the Bible—of those precious documents that would
have linked the Bodleian codex (about 800 years old, said to be the most ancient) (193) with
the transcripts of Ezra’s copy ; and filled up the frightful chasm that now divides, in Hebrew
palæography, the tenth century after Christ*from the fifth century before his advent — to
whose acts is he indebted, and by whom are his sorrows caused ? Lacour shall answer | | | |
“ At the commencement of the thirteenth century, it was expressly forbidden to the
laity to possess the books of the Old and New Testament. The Church permitted only the
Psalter, the Breviary, or the Hours of the Sainted Mary ; and these books were required
not to be translated ifito the vulgar tongue. Decrees of Bishops interdicted the use of
grammar.” (194) Other sources'bonfirm this assertion.
Gregory the Great, a . d. 590, censured Didier, Archbishop of Vienna, for suffering
grammar to be taught in his diocese ; “ boasting that he (himself ) scorned to conform his
latinity to grammatical rules, lest thereby he should resemble the heathen.” (195) In the
ninth century, Alfred the Great laments that there was not a priest in England who really
understood Latin, and, for ages after, English Bishops were termed “ marksmen,” because
they could not sign their names otherwise than by a cross !
“ In 1490, the Inquisition caused the Hebrew Bibles to be burned, that is to say, the
work in default of the author ; in the absence of Moses, his Pentateuch.” At Salamanca,
the fiendish Dominican, Torquemada, reduced some 6000 Hebrew volumes to ashes ; and
besides such as were ravished from libraries in Spain and Italy, about 12,000 Talmudic
rolls perished, circa a . d . 1559, in Inquisitorial flames at Cremona. (196) These un-
nameable deeds were induced by orthodox doubts that, the Hebrew Text, as represented
in the square-letter copies, was ever quoted by the Apostles ; (196) but, in those ages of
darkness, little respect could have been paid to MSS. even of the New Testament ; for such
ancient copies as had been preserved, down to a . d . 1749, at Alcala in Spain, were sold to
one Toryo, a pyrotechnist, as materials for sky-rockets. (197) Quintillian [Inst. Orat. i. I),
in the first century after Christ, complains that writing was neglected ; but it was not until
after the barbarian irruptions of the eighth century that “ la crasse ignorance ” prevailed
in Western Europe. It is uncertain if even Charlemagne could write. The tenth to twelfth
centuries exhibit Bishops, Abbots, Clerks, &c., incredibly ignorant : as even in earlier times,
before the seventh century, at the Episcopal Conference of Carthage, the “ brigandage”
of Ephesus, and the Council of Chalcedon—at which last there were forty most incapable
Bishops (Labbe, Concil, iv). Few Romish monks could read, in the eleventh; the laity
began about the end of the thirteenth; but in the fourteenth, the number was small.(198)
From these fearful destructions (the Inquisitorial agents having acted in obedience to
orders sent from Rome), Lacour draws a singular argument in behalf of his own free restorations
of the Hebrew Text, maintaining:—
(192) Op. cit.; p.' 320.
(193) K ennicott: 2 d Dissert.; p . 317 — “ Laud, A, No. 162,” in c a ta lo g u e B o d le ia n L ib r a r y .
(194) Æ loîm: B o r d e a u x , 1 828 ; i . p . 28.
(195) Mandeville, apud T aylor; p. 3 4 ; — also, Big h e l l in i: Examen; iii. p . 5 3 7 ; — and V ic o : Scienza Nuova,
trad. Michelet ; ii. p. 67 ; for other examples.
(196) L aootjr: p . 2 9 ; — a n d K ennicott: Dissert. Gen. ; p. 16
(197) M a r sh ’s Michaelis ; i i . p . 44.
(198) Condensed from an excellent article on Alphabets, in vol. ix. pp. 72 7 -7 3 9 . of the great “ Encyclopédie
Catholique”; Paris, 1 846 : conducted b ÿ the Abbé Glaire and M. W a lsh .