Other faults Judaical, profane, mere vanities, follies & novelties

1 NOW leaving matters of controversy, let us talk a little with you familiarly, and learn of you the reason of other points in your translation, which to us seem faults, and savour not of that spirit which should be in Christian Catholic translators.

2 First, you are so profane, that you say, The ballad of ballads of Solomon, so terming that divine book Canticum Canticorum, [the Canticle of Canticles] containing the high mystery of Christ & his Church, as if it were a ballad of love between Solomon and his concubine, as Castaleo wantonly translates it. But you say more profanely thus, we have conceived, we have borne in pain, as though we should have brought forth wind. I am ashamed to tell the literal commentary of this your translation.¹ Why might you not have said, We have conceived and as it were travailed to bring forth, and have brought forth the spirit? is there anything in the Hebrew to hinder you thus far? Why would you say, wind, rather than, spirit: knowing that the Septuaginta in Greek, & the ancient fathers, and S. Jerome himself who translates according to the Hebrew,² yet for sense of the place, all expound it both according to Hebrew & Greek, of the spirit of God, which is first conceived in us & begins by fear, which the Scripture calls the beginning of wisdom, in so much that in the Greek there are these goodly words, famous in all antiquity: Through the fear of the Lord we conceived and have travailed with pain, and have brought forth the spirit of thy salvation, which thou hast made upon the earth. Which does excellently set before our eyes the degrees of a faithful man’s increase and proceeding in the spirit of God, which begins by the fear of his judgements, & is a good fear, though servile, and not sufficient. & it may be that you condemning with Luther this servile fear as evil and hurtful, mean also some such thing by your translation. But indeed the place may be understood of the other fear also, which has his degrees more or less.

3 But to say, we have brought forth wind, can admit no such interpretation. But even as if a mere Jew should translate or understand it, who has no sense of God’s spirit, so have you excluded the true sense which concerns the Holy Ghost, & not the cold term of wind, and whatsoever naked interpretation thereof. And it is your fashion in all such cases, where the richer sense is of God’s holy spirit, there to translate wind, as Ps. 147. v. 18. as you number the psalms.

4 And it is not unlike to this, that you will not translate for the Angels honour that carried Habakkuk, He set him into Babylon, over the lake by the force of his spirit: ³ but thus, through a mighty wind: so attributing it to the wind, not to the Angels power, and omitting clean the Greek pronoun αὐτοῦ, his, which shows evidently that it was the Angels spirit, force, and power.

5 Again, where the Prophets speak most manifestly of Christ, there you translate clean another thing: as Esa. 30. v. 20. When S. Jerome translates thus,⁴ and the Church has always read accordingly, Non faciet auolare a te ultra Doctorem tuum: & erunt oculi tui videntes praeceptorem tuum. that is,⁵ And (our Lord) shall not cause thy Doctor to fly from thee any more: and thine eyes shall see thy Master. Which is all one in effect with that which Christ says, I will be with you unto the end of the world: there you translate thus, Thy rain shall be no more kept back: but thine eyes shall see thy rain. So likewise Joel 2. v. 23. where the holy Church reads, Rejoice ye children of Zion in the Lord your God: because he has given you the Doctor of justice: there you translate, the rain of righteousness. ⁶ Does the Hebrew word force you to this? You know that it signifies a teacher or Master. And therefore the Jews themselves,⁷ partly understand it of Esdras, partly of Christ’s Divinity. Why are you more profane (I will not say more Judaical) than the Jews themselves? Why might not S. Jerome a Christian Doctor and lacking no skill in the Hebrew (as you well know) satisfy you, who makes no doubt but the Hebrew in these places is, Doctor, Master, teacher? Who also (in Psal. 84, 7:) translates thus, With blessings shall the Doctor be arrayed: meaning Christ. Where you with the later Rabbines the enemies of Christ translate, The rain covers the pools. What cold stuff is this in respect of that other translation so clearly pointing to Christ our Master and Doctor?

6 And again, where S. Jerome translates, and the Church reads, and all the fathers interpret and expound accordingly,⁸ There shall be faith in thy times: to express the marvelous faith that shall be then, in the first Christians specially, even unto death, and in all the rest concerning the hidden mysteries of the New Testament: there you translate, There shall be stability of thy times. The Prophet joins together there, judgement, justice, faith, wisdom, knowledge, the fear of our Lord: you for a little ambiguity of the Hebrew word, turn faith into stability.

7 If I should burden you with translating thus also concerning Christ,⁹ Cease from the man whose breath in his nostrils: for wherein is he to be esteemed? You would say I did you wrong, because it is so pointed now in the Hebrew. Whereas you know very well by S. Jerome’s commentary upon that place,¹⁰ that this is the Jews pointing or reading of the word, against the honour of Christ: the true reading and translation being as he interprets it, for he is reputed high: and therefore beware of him. Otherwise (as S. Jerome says) what a consequence were this, or who would commend any man thus, Take heed ye offend not him, who is nothing esteemed? yet that is your translation. Neither does the Greek help you which (if the accent be truly put) is thus,¹¹ because he is reputed for somebody or something: as S. Paul speaks of the chief Apostles, and it is our phrase in the commendation of a man.

8 The like excuse you would have by alleging the Hebrew vowels, if you were told that you much obscure a notable saying of the prophet concerning Christ, or rather the speech of Christ himself by his prophet, saying: I have spoken by the Prophets, ¹² and I have multiplied vision, & in the hand of the Prophets (that is, by the Prophets) have I been resembled. Which later words do exceedingly express, that all the Prophets spake of Christ: as our Saviour himself declares,¹³ beginning from Moses and all the Prophets to interpret unto the two disciples, the things that concerned him. and as S. Peter says in these words, All the Prophets from Samuel and that spake after him, did tell of these days. This prophecy then being so consonant to these speeches of the New Testament, the Greek also being word for word so,¹⁴ the Hebrew by changing one little prick [diacritical mark] (which the later Jews have added at their own pleasure) being fully so as we read with the Catholic Church: why pretend you the Jews authority to maintain another less Christian translation, which is thus: I use similitudes by the ministry of the Prophets. as though there were nothing there concerning Christ or the second person peculiarly?

9 You will also perhaps allege not only the later Jews, but also some later Catholic men that so translate the Hebrew.¹⁵ But the difference between them and you, is, that they, with reverence and preferment always of S. Jerome’s and the Churches ancient translation, tell us how it is now in the Hebrew: you, with derogation and disannulling the same altogether, set down your own as the only true interpretation according to the Hebrew: avouching the Hebrew that now is, and as now it is printed, to be the only authentical truth of the Old Testament. Where you can never answer us, how that in the Psalm 22, As a lion my hand and my feet (as now it is in the Hebrew) can be the true and old authentical Hebrew,¹⁶ which none of the fathers knew, the ancient Rabbines condemn as a corruption, yourselves translate it not, but after the old accustomed reading, They have pierced my hands and my feet Which is a notable prophecy of our Saviour’s kind and manner of Passion, being crucified on the Cross. Only the later Jews, and such Heretics as think he died upon a gallows or gibbet [gallows], and not upon the Cross, they like this Hebrew text well, and stand upon it, as you do upon all without exception, & yet when it comes to certain particulars, you are compelled to forsake it. As in certain other places, for example.

¹⁷10 Where the Hebrew says, Achaz king of Israel, 2 Paralip. 28. v. 19. which is not true, you are compelled to translate, Achaz king of Judah, as the truth is, and as it is in the Greek and the vulgar Latin. Yet ¹⁸ some of your Bibles follow the falsehood of the Hebrew.

11 Likewise, where the Hebrew says, Zedecias his brother, meaning the brother of Joachin, you translate, Zedecias his fathers brother, ¹⁹ as indeed the truth is, according to the Greek, and to the Scripture 4 Reg. 24. v. 19. and therefore your Bible which follows the Hebrew here also, translating, his brother, yet in the margin puts down as more true, uncle.

12 Likewise in another place, the Hebrew is so out of frame, that some of your Bibles say, he begat Azuba of his wife Azuba. and others translate, he begat Jerioth of his wife Azuba: the Hebrew being thus, he begat Azuba his wife and Jerioth, which neither you nor any man else can easily tell what to make of. Thus you see how easy it were (if a man would multiply such examples) to show by your own testimonies the corruption of the Hebrew,²⁰ and that yourselves do not, nor dare not exactly follow it, as of the Greek text of the New Testament also is declared elsewhere.

13 But it is greater marvel, why you follow not the Hebrew in other places also, where is no corruption. You protest to translate it according to the points or vowels that now it has, and that you call the Hebrew verity. Tell me then I beseech you, why do you in all your Bibles translate thus, O Virgin daughter of Zion, he has despised thee, and laughed thee to scorn: ²¹ O daughter of Jerusalem he has shaken his head at thee. In the Hebrew, Greek,²² S. Jerome’s translation and commentary, it is clean contrary, The Virgin daughter of Zion has despised thee (O Assur:) the daughter of Jerusalem has shaken her head at thee. All are the feminine gender, and spoken of Zion literally, and of the Church spiritually triumphing over Assur and all her enemies:²³ you translate all as of the masculine gender, & apply it to Assur insulting against Jerusalem. &c. I can not conceive what this translation means, & I would gladly know the reason, & I would have thought it some gross oversight, but that I find it so in all your English Bibles, & not only in this place of Isaiah, but also in the books of the kings, 4 Reg. 19. where the same words are repeated. And it is no less marvel unto us that know not the reason of your doings, why you have²⁴ left out Alleluia nine times in the six last Psalms,²⁵ being in the Hebrew nine times more than in your translation: specially when you know that it is the ancient and joyful song of the primitive Church. See the new English Testament, Annot. Apoc. 19.

14 Again, you translate thus: Many which had seen the first house, when the foundation of this house was laid before their eyes, wept &c. Look well to your Hebrew, and you shall find it according both to the Greek & the Latin, thus: Many which had seen the first house in the foundation thereof (that is, yet standing upon the foundation, not destroyed) and this temple before their eyes, wept. You imagined that it should be meant, they saw Solomon’s temple, when it was first founded, which because it was unpossible [impossible], therefore you translated otherwise than is in the Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. But yet in some of your Bibles you should have considered the matter better,²⁶ and translated accordingly.

15 And surely why you should translate (4 Reg. 23. v. 13.) On the right hand of mount Olivet, rather than as it is in the vulgar Latin: and why, Ye abject of the Gentiles, Esa. 45. v. 20. rather than, ye that are saved of the Gentiles: you belike know some reason, we do not, neither by the Hebrew nor the Greek.

16 Howbeit in these lesser things (though nothing in the Scripture is to be counted little) you might perhaps more freely have taken your pleasure, in following neither Hebrew nor Greek: but when it concerns a matter no less than usury, thereby your false translation to give occasion unto the reader, to be an usurer, is no small fault either against true religion or against good manners.²⁷ This you do most evidently in your most authentical translations, saying thus: Thou shalt not hurt thy brother by usury of money, nor by usury of corn, nor by usury of anything that he may be hurt withal. What is this to say, but that usury is not here forbidden, unless it hurt the party that borrows, which is so rooted in most men’s hearts,²⁸ that they think such usury very lawful, and daily offend mortally that way. Where almighty God in this place of holy Scripture has not a word of hurting or not hurting (as may be seen by the Geneva bibles) but says simply thus: Thou shalt not lend to thy brother to usury, usury of money, usury of meat, usury of anything that is put to usury.

17 Mark the Hebrew and the Greek, and see, and be ashamed, that you strain and pervert it, to say for, Non foenerabis fratri tuo, which is word for word in the Greek and Hebrew, Thou shalt not hurt thy brother by usury. If the Hebrew word in the use of holy Scripture do signify, to hurt by usury, why do you in the very next words following, in the self same Bibles translate it thus,²⁹ unto a stranger thou mayst lend upon usury, but not unto thy brother? Why said you not, A stranger thou mayst hurt with usury, but not thy brother? Is it not all one word and phrase here and before? And if you had so translated it here also, the Jews would have thanked you, who by forcing the Hebrew word as you do, think it very good to hurt any stranger, that is, any Christian by any usury be it never so great.

18 What shall I tell you of other faults, which I would gladly account oversights or ignorances, such as we also desire pardon of, but all are not such, though some be. As, Two thousand, ³⁰ (written at length) to them that keep the fruit thereof. In the Hebrew & Greek, two hundred. Again in the same book c. 1. v. 4. As the fruits of Cedar. in the Hebr. and Greek. Tabernacles. And,³¹ Ask a sign either in the depth or in the height above, for, in the depth of Hell. And, Great works are wrought by him. ³² for, do work in him, as S. Paul uses the same word 2 Cor. 4. v. 12. And,³³ To make ready an horse. Act. 23. v. 24. in the Greek, beasts, And,³⁴ If a man on the Sabbath day receive circumcision without breaking of the law of Moses. Io. 7. v. 23. For,³⁵ to the end that the law of Moses be not broken. And, The son of man must suffer many things, ³⁶ and be reproved of the elders. Mar. 8. v. 31. For, be rejected, as in the psalm, The stone which the builders rejected, we say not, reproving of the said stone, which is Christ.³⁷ And, νεόφυτος a young scholar, in all your translations, falsely. And, Simon of Chanaan or Simon the Cananite, ³⁸ who is called otherwise, Zelótes, that is Zelous, as an interpretation of the Hebrew word, Cananaeus: which I marvel you considered not, specially considering that the Hebrew word for Zelous,³⁹ & the other for a Cananite, begin with divers letters. And,⁴⁰ lest at any time we should let them slip. for, lest we slip or run by, and so be lost.

19 And as for the first bible,⁴¹ which was done in haste, and not yet corrected, but is printed still afresh:⁴² that says, With Herods servants, as though that were the only sense: that calls idiotas lay men:⁴³ κιβωτόν, a ship:⁴⁴ θόρυβον, wondering:⁴⁵ σβέννυται, are gone out:⁴⁶ ἐξουσίαν, his substance: and, To know the excellent love of the knowledge of Christ. For, the love of Christ that excels knowledge. And, of men that turn away the truth. ⁴⁷ For, that shun the truth and turn away from it. And, Mount Sinai is Hagar in Arabia. For, Hagar is Mount Sinai. &c.

20 Let these and the like be small negligences or ignorances, such as you will pardon us also, if you find the like. Neither do we greatly mislike, that you leave these words,⁴⁸ Urim and Thummim and⁴⁹ Chemarim and c Ziims, & Iims, untranslated,⁵⁰ because it is not easy to express them in English: and we would have liked it as well in certain other words, which you have translated, images, images, and still, images, ⁵¹ being as hard to express the true signification of them, as the former. And we hope you will the rather bear with the late Catholic translation of the English Testament, that leaves also certain words untranslated, not only because they can not be expressed, but also for reverence and religion (as S. Augustine says) and greater majesty of the same.

21 Of one thing we can by no means excuse you, but it must savour vanity, or novelty, or both. As when you affectate new strange words which the people are not acquainted withal, but it is rather Hebrew to them than English:⁵² μάλα σεμνῶς ὀνομάζοντες, as Demosthenes speaks,⁵³ uttering with great countenance and majesty, Against him came up Nabucadnezzar king of Babel, ⁵⁴ 2 Par. 36. v. 6. for, Nabuchodonosor king of Babylon: Saneherib, ⁵⁵ for Sennacherib: Michaiah’s prophecy, for Michaeas: Ichoshaphats prayer, for Iosaphats: Vzza slain, for Oza. When Zerubbabel went about to build the Temple, for Zorobabel: Remember what the Lord did to Miriam, for Mary, Deut. 34.⁵⁶ And in your first translation, Elisa for Elisaeus, Pekahia & Pekah for Phaceia & Phacee, Vziahu for Ozias, ⁵⁷ Thiglath-peleser for Teglath phalasar, Ahaziahu for Ochozias: Peka the son of Remaliabu, for, Phacee the son of Romelia. And why say you not as well Shelomoh for Salomon, and Coresh for Cyrus, and so alter every word from the known sound and pronunciation thereof? Is this to teach the people, when you speak Hebrew rather than English? Were it a goodly hearing (think you) to say for JESUS, Ieshuah, and for MARY his mother, Miriam: and for Messias Meshiach, and for John, Iachannan, and such like monstrous novelties? Which you might as well do, and the people would understand you as well, as when your preachers say,⁵⁸ Nabucadnezer king of Bábel.

22 When Zuinglius your great Patriarke did read in Munsters translation of the Old Testament,⁵⁹ Iehizkiahu, Iehezchel, Choresh, Darianesch, Beltzezzer, and the like. For, Ezechias, Ezechiel, Cyrus, Darius, Baltasar: he called them barbarous voices, & uncivil speeches, & said the word of God was soiled and depraved by them. Know you not that proper names alter & change, and are written and sounded in every language diversely? Might not all antiquity & the general custom both of reading and hearing the known names of Nabuchodonosor, and Michaeas, and Ozias, suffice you, but you must needs invent other which the people never heard, rather for vain ostentation to amaze and astonish them, than to edification and instruction. Which is an old Heretical fashion, noted by Eusebius lib. 4. c. 10: and by the author of the unperfect [imperfect] commentaries upon S. Matthew, ho. 44: and by S. Augustine lib. 3. c. 26. contra Cresconium.

23 What shall I speak of your affectation of the word Jehova (for so it pleases you to accent it) instead of Dominus, ⁶⁰ The Lord: whereas the ancient fathers in the very Hebrew text did read and sound it rather, Adonai, as appears both by S. Jerome’s translation and also his commentaries, and I would know of them the reason, why in the Hebrew Bible, when so ever this word is joined with Adonai, it is to be read Elohim, but only for avoiding Adonai, twice together. This I say we might justly demand of these that take a pride in using this word Jehova so oft both in English & Latin: though otherwise we are not superstitious, but as occasion serves, only in the Hebrew text we pronounce it and read it. Again we might ask them, why they use not as well Elohim instead of Deus, God: and so of the rest, changing all into Hebrew, that they may seem gay fellows, and the people may wonder at their wonderful and mystical divinity.

24 To conclude, are not your scholars (think you) much bound unto you, for giving them instead of God’s blessed word and his holy Scriptures, such translations, heretical, Judaical, profane, false, negligent, fantastical, new, naught, monstrous? God open their eyes to see, and mollify your hearts to repent of all your falsehood & treachery, both that which is manifestly convinced against you and can not be denied, as also that which may by some show of answer be shifted off in the sight of the ignorant, but in your consciences is as manifest as the other.