OF THE BIBLE INFERRED FROM ITS VERSIONS. 



07 



" Tliou gavest me no kiss " had to be translated " Thou didst not 

 smell my nose." No word could be found meaning " forgive," 

 which had to be translated by " forget " or " do not punish." 

 Well, only a dozen years ago, the readers of this Gospel were 

 using stone weapons and practising cannibalism. But last 

 Christmas twelvemonth the Holy Communion was celebrated in 

 the Binandere language for the first time. 



Surely the spiritual potency of its versions in all languages 

 and among all races, sets the New Testament immeasurably 

 above every other book in the world. What is there to substitute 

 for it ? A dramatic preacher once pictured a missionary landing 

 on some savage island in the Pacific, and addressing the cannibals 

 who gathered round him in words like these : " Wipe your 

 blood-stained lips, and listen while I read you this passage, 

 which I have translated into your own tongue, from The Light 

 of Asia." 



The final evidence for the supernatural quality of the Bible 

 lies in the moral and spiritual power with which it is speaking 

 to-day in all the tongues of the world. God's living voice 

 uttered in the Scriptures still comes home to men's consciences, 

 and authenticates itself in their deepest experiences. On the 

 title-page of an Italian pocket Testament printed at Lyons in 

 1551 we read : // Nuovo cd Etcrno Testarnento cli Giesic Chrido — 

 The Xew and Eternal Testament of Jesus Christ. This J)Ook 

 can never be called old, except in the sense in which time is 

 old, while morning is always new. Its message is as mighty as 

 ever to quicken human hearts and regenerate human characters ; 

 it moves among the nations with the power of an endless Life. 



Discussion. 



The CHAiFtMAN said there were two great mysteries — Babel and 

 Bible. What was the nature of the confusion ^vhich took place at 

 Babel ? Was it that men lost their memories, or was there a 

 disturbance of their tongues or of their thinking powers 1 There 

 were about 2,000 languages now current in the world; how did they 

 come into existence In the New He])rides, a dozen difterent 

 languages sometimes existed in the same island. Probably the 

 transliteration of the Bible began before any translation ; a change 

 of character probably took place in the time of Moses. In the 

 Ijook of Genesis, we found two ways of expressing the same thing ; 

 thus Laban and Jacob gave different things to their stone of 



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