THE BIBLE. 



395 



corruptions in the text of both. At length 

 the complete supremacy of Jerome's Latin was 

 marked by the transference to it of the name of 

 the Vulgate Version, which in older times was 

 given to the LXX. 



The Egyptian versions (Memphitic in the dia- 

 lect of Lower Egypt, Thebaic or Sahidic for Up- 

 per Egypt) supplied the needs of the only great 

 Christian population of the early Church which 

 was not able to use the Greek, the Latin, or the 

 Syriae. The most recent inquirers are disposed 

 to believe that Egypt received the Bible in the 

 vernacular almost as soon as Syria. The version 

 was taken from the Greek, which was also the 

 source of various later translations — the Ethiopic, 

 the Armenian (fifth century), the Georgian (sixth 

 century), the Slavonic (ninth century) — fruits of 

 the gradual diffusion of Christianity in the re- 

 motest regions of the ancient world. The Gothic 

 version of Ulfilas — the earliest written monument 

 of the Teutonic languages — is of the fourth cen- 

 tury, and was also from the Greek. Only frag- 

 ments of this translation remain to us, mainly in 

 the famous silver-lettered MS. of the fifth or sixth 

 century [Codex Argenteus) in the library of Up- 

 sal. 



Thus far the history of the versions records 

 the triumphs of Christianity. The Arabic ver- 

 sions, on the contrary, owe their origin to the 

 spread of Islam, when the language of the con- 

 quering Saracens displaced the ancient dialects 

 of Syria and Egypt. This change did not di- 

 minish the authority of the old ecclesiastical ver- 

 sions, or displace them from their position in the 

 services of the Church. The edification of the 

 unlearned was secured by reading the lessons in 

 the vulgar tongue, as well as in Syriae or Coptic; 

 and, accordingly, the numerous Christian Arabic 

 versions are mainly taken not from the original 

 tongues, but from the versions whose use they 

 were designed to supplement. In like manner 

 the rise of the New-Persian language and litera- 

 ture produced a Persian version of the Syriae 

 New Testament. Of parts of the Old Testament 

 there are Arabic and Persian translations directly 

 from the Hebrew, but these are the work of Jew- 

 ish scholars. The Arabic versions of the Penta- 

 teuch and Isaiah, by R. Saadias Gaon, in the tenth 

 century, are among the most important monu- 

 ments of ancient Jewish learning. 



In the West, as in the East, the disintegration 

 of the Roman Empire was associated with the 

 rise of new national dialects, and Latin ceased to 

 be understood by the laity. But the Roman 

 Church was too intent on the preservation of her 



homogeneous organization, her visible unity of 

 worship, to allow the vulgar tongues to supplant 

 the old liturgical language, or even to introduce 

 a bilingual service. The use of the Bible in a 

 form intelligible to the illiterate was shifted from 

 the sphere of public worship to that of private 

 edification and instruction ; and for the latter 

 purpose the necessities of a barbarous age seemed 

 to demand explanatory paraphrases, Bible narra- 

 tives in metre, and the like, rather than literal 

 renderings of the whole Scriptures. Thus, in the 

 Anglo-Saxon Church, CaBdmon's poetical version 

 of the Bible history dates from 604 a. d., while 

 the earliest prose translations of parts of the 

 Latin Bible (gospels, Psalms, etc.) do not seem to 

 be older than the eighth century. In Germany, 

 in like manner, metrical versions of the gospel 

 are among the earliest attempts to convey the 

 Bible to the people. Outrid's harmony of the 

 gospels in High German, and the poem called 

 Heliand (Saviour), in Old Saxon, date from the 

 ninth century ; and the prose translation of the 

 so-called " Gospel Harmony of Tatian " — from the 

 Latin of Victor of Capua — belongs to the same 

 age. A complete and literal translation of the 

 Vulgate existed in Germany perhaps as early as 

 the beginning of the fourteenth century. Among 

 nations whose speech was descended from the 

 vulgar Latin, the work of translation naturally 

 began later. The earliest remains of Romance 

 versions are thought to be as old as the eleventh 

 century; but the work of translation assumed 

 important dimensions mainly in connection with 

 the spirit of revolt against the Church of Rome, 

 which rose in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. 

 The study of the Bible in the vulgar tongue was 

 a characteristic of the Cathari and Waldenses, 

 and the whole weight of the Church's authority 

 was turned against the use of the Scriptures by 

 the laity. The prohibition of the Bible in the 

 vulgar tongue, put forth at the Council of Tou- 

 louse in 1229, was repeated by other councils in 

 various parts of the Church, but failed to quell 

 the rising interest in the Scriptures. In England 

 and in Bohemia the Bible was translated by the 

 reforming parties of Wyclif and Huss ; and the 

 early presses of the fifteenth century sent forth 

 Bibles, not only in Latin, but in French, Spanish, 

 Italian, German, and Dutch. 



The Printed Text.— Though the Latin Bible 

 was the first book printed, the original text was 

 for some time neglected. The Jews of Italy led 

 the way with several editions of parts of the Old 

 Testament, commencing with the Psalter of 1475. 

 The beautiful edition of Soncino (1488) was the 



