No literary sensation since opened. Copies went to every letters were invented has equal-considerable city and' town by led that caused by the issue of lightning express. Some of the the Revised Version of the New great daily papers reprinted the Testament on the twentieth whole of the revised New Tesday of May, 1881. Public ex- tament in a single issue, and pectation had been excited to disposed, of immense editions. the utmost by newspaper com- The news-stands displayed the ments, ministerial discussions, new book side by side with and conversations in every in- the daily and weekly papers. telligent home. Although the Newsboys, with arms full of most liberal preparations had Testaments, shouted it about been made to supply the the post-offices, exchanges, and popular demand for the new leading resorts, and found eager book, they proved entirely in- customers. Readers who study adequate. It was cabled from this new version of the Word England that two millions of of God will wish to know how copies were sold in London it was secured, and we purpose within the first two days. The to tell for them briefly the story four hundred thousand copies of the Revised New Testament. imported into America were To understand this fully, we not adequate to supply the must go back to the original first day's orders. The leading tongues of Scripture.

31

use

The conquests of Alexander the Great extended the use of the Greek tongue, which gradually became the medium of communication throughout the civilized world. It supplanted the Hebrew in common among the Jews, and the Old Testament was translated into Greek by a company of learned Jews at Alexandria, B. c. 285. This translation was called the Septuaginti. e. seventy,, a round number for the seventytwo scholars who are said to have been engaged upon it. The Septuagint, commonly designated by the Roman numerals LXX., was in general use in the time of Christ. It was quoted from by the New Testament writers and the Greek Fathers, was made the basis of early

THE OLD TESTAMENT IN HEBREW. | Bibles printed since that time The Bible contains a revela- have been substantially reprotion from God concerning truth, ductions of those two editions. luty, and destiny. Holy men of old wrote as they were inspired by the Holy Ghost. They must use language which men could understand. In Old Testament times Hebrew was the language of God's people, and so that portion of the divine Word was written in the Hebrew tongue. The Jews preserved their sacred writings with the utmost care. Each word and letter was counted. The Hebrew Bible of to-day is printed from the so-called Masoretic text, which was punctuated and vocalized by a body of Jewish scholars who lived at Tiberias on the Sea of Galilee, and at Sora in the Euphrates Valley, from the sixth to the twelfth centuries. They affixed the vowel points, which were not in the original text. The translations into Latin, and is oldest existing Hebrew manu- the authority in the Greek scripts date from the tenth Church to this day. century. The whole Hebrew Bible was first printed in 1488, before Columbus discovered America. A second edition appeared in 1494, and all Hebrew

THE NEW TESTAMENT IN GREEK.

As Greek was the language both of scholarship and common life at the beginning of

In the case of the New Testament the number of manuscripts is very large, considering the labor and expense of transcribing. They are divided into

the Christian era, the books of the New Testament were written in Greek, between the years 39 and 98 A. D. It was a literary age, and copies of the sacred text multiplied rapidly. The two classes: The uncials, which manuscripts were all written are written throughout in capiout by hand, and of course were liable to many errors. They were also written upon perishable materials, and would naturally be destroyed in the lapse of time. But, more than this, a determined attempt was made to destroy the sacred writings. The emperor Diocletian issued an edict in 303 A. D. that all copies of the Scriptures should be burned. No manuscripts of the Scriptures of an earlier date than the fourth century are now known to be in existence.

WORDWASG

tals, and with no division of words or of sentences, and with very few and simple marks of punctuation. The writing is in columns of uniform width, from one to four on a page, the letters filling out the page irrespective of the completion of a word. The pages resembled the following in their general appearance, though they were of course wider and longer; and from these specimens some idea may be formed of the difficulty of reading uncial manuscripts:

INTHEBEGI
NNINGWAST

FEANDTHELI

FEWASTHELI

GHTOFMENA

NDTHELIGHT

SHINETHIND

JOHN i. 1-5.

The material was parchment in | St. Catherine, on Mount Sinai, book-form. The uncials go down 1859, and published in fac

simile 1862), the Vatican of the same age (in the Vatican Library at Rome), and the somewhat later Alexandrian (in

to the tenth century. The most important uncial manuscripts are the Sinaitic of the fourth century (discovered by Prof. Tischendorf in the convent of the British Museum, London).

3

Specimens of existing MSS. of the Scriptures.

TOTHCEYCEBELAC
MYCTHPIONOCE

4th Cent. Codex Sinaiticus.-1 Tim iii. 16.
το της ευσέβειας | μυστηριον [θe late corr.] os ε,

NOгENHCOCET

4th Cent. Codex Sinaiticus.-John i. 18.
νογενης θεο]ς [ο ων corr.] εις τον.

& CTACICKAIOYAENJOY.
AENEIMONE DOBOYN
Toгáp:

KATE

επάρκου

4th Cent. Codex Vaticanus.-Mark xvi. 8. στασις και ουδενι ου | δεν ειπον εφοβουν | το γαρί

ENAPXHHNOAOTOCIAIOAÃO CH

FOCH

PоCTONANKAIOCHNOXoгoc.

5th Cent. Codex Alexandrinus.-John i. 1.

Εν αρχή ην ο λογος και ο λογος ην | προς τον θεο]ν' και θ' εο] ς ην ο λογος

The second kind of manu-made- from the Septuagint, and scripts, the cursives, are so call- the Latin Vulgate of Jerome ed because written in running-was made A. d. 385–405. This hand. The uncial form was, version was declared by the however, retained for some time Council of Trent in 1536 to be after this in church copies. of equal authority with the original Scriptures. The German Bible now in use, the translation of Martin Luther, was first published in 1522, but before his time fourteen editions of the entire Bible had been printed and circulated in Germany. A French version

CHAPTER II.

TRANSLATIONS OF THE BIBLE.

lished at Antwerp in 1530. Other French versions have been made by Olivetan (a cousin of Calvin, who improved

ALTHOUGH the revelation of God's truth was first given to the race in Hebrew and Greek, it was designed to be extended to people of every tongue and made by Le Fèvre was pubnation. This truth was very early felt and acted upon by devout men. Even in the Old Testament times, as appears from Nehemiah viii. 8, the sa- the translation), by Martin Oscred Hebrew books were ex-tervald, and by De Sacy. A plained in Chaldee for the benefit of the Jews, who had lost the knowledge of their native tongue during their captivity in Babylon. The Greek version, called the Septuagint, was made before the Christian era. A translation was made directly from the Hebrew into the Syriac. This version, called the Peshitc, probably dates from the second century. At a very early period a Latin version was

Dutch version was ordered by the Synod of Dort, in 1619, which has been regarded as "the most accurate of all present modern versions."

EARLY ENGLISH TRANSLATIONS.

The story of the English Bi ble is one of the most remark able in all the history of the Book of books since the manuscripts left the hands of the inspired writers.