THOUGHTS on a Revision of the Translation of Various Pas- sages in the Old Testament, by ARCHBISHOP SECKER, in a series of letters addressed to the Rev. Mr. Pilkington, Commentary on the Description of Ardent Fever given by A Letter to the Rev. Mr. Joseph Warton, chiefly relating to the Composition of Greek Indexes, and the advantage to PAGE. On the COINCIDENCE between the Belts of the PLANET JUPITER and the Fabulous Bonds of JUPITER the DE MIURGUS. By TH. TAYLOR. OXFORD PRIZE ESSAY for 1819. CLASSICAL CRITICISM. On a Passage in the First Book of the Georgics. By R. HOBLYN, M.A. MISCELLANEA CLASSICA. NO. VII. Eastern Antiquities. A Letter to the Right Rev. the LORD BISHOP of O1767, on a Character given of Dr. BENTLEY. CAMBRIDGE PRIZE POEM for 1805. 324 327 339 • 344 •• 352 D. ........ 357 ..371 Westminster PROLOGUE and EPILOGUE to the Adelphi of ADVERSARIA LITERARIA. No. xxII.-Remarks on a Pas- Literary Intelligence. 389 394 396 DIRECTIONS TO THE BINDER. Do not bind this XXth Vol. till No. XLI. appears, as the Index to follow this No. will be published with it. THE CLASSICAL JOURNAL. NO. XL. DECEMBER, 1819. Thoughts on a Revision of the Translation of various passages in the Old Testament, by ARCHBISHOP SECKER, in a series of letters addressed to the Rev. Mr. Pilkington, author of Remarks, &c. &c. PART II. [Continued from NO. XXXIX. p. 198.] SIR, Deanery of St. Paul's, Jan. 6, 1757. Your kind manner of receiving my remarks encourages me to say, that I am willing to see the rest of your papers and to give you my general opinion concerning them, though I cannot enter into particulars. Yet I would mention a few concerning those which are now before me.-It doth not seem to me that signifies moreover, Gen. xliv, 32; but expresses a reason either why Jacob will be more grieved at Benjamin's not returning, or why Judah is peculiarly solicitous that he should return, which is that he had engaged and promised it to his father. There may be something of ellipsis in this; but no more than is in our common speech perpetually. And surely if the Bible had been written originally in English, it would not have been thought that for signified moreover in this passage. I do not apprehend Noldius to have mistaken the import of the particles by giving the words of any Latin version, but from want of critical judgment, or desire of multiplying senses. They have undoubtedly some of them many; but fewer and those reducible in a greater degree to one original meaning of each particle than he imagined: as the notes at the bottom VOL. XX. CI. JI. NO. XL. P of the pages of the second edition have shown in the first sheets; but I think have carried the matter too far the other way. On your first section I would observe, that we need not undertake to defend the correctness of scripture as distinct from its consistency. Inspiration doth not imply necessarily any more than such influence of God's spirit as was requisite to attain his purpose. And this might well be attained by a superintendance, which left the writer at liberty to use his own style and manner of expressing many things, though not the most accurate or elegant. There may have been considerable reasons for not extending the divine assistance further. And if we undertake to prove the correctness of scripture language according to critical rules; we should first enter a protest that its authority doth not depend on that point, and we should be very cautious of altering its text in a prosecution of this design. Archbishop Potter in the 3d volume of his works, published three years ago, hath written very well on the subject of Inspiration; and so indeed hath Dr. Doddridge in his Family Expositor. Remarks have been written on Mr. Kennicott's hook, and some of them published, and others privately communicated, which I think have shown that he hath been too bold in a good many of his proposed alterations, though by no means in all. His antagonists in print scarce allow any of them to be right. I do not understand the six last lines of your fourth section. All persons allow that there are various readings in the Hebrew copies. But the defenders of the present text say, that it is not credible that the true reading should have been lost out of them all. How doth any change in the manner of writing Hebrew make variations in the text necessary? You seem to speak of the points as first added to Hebrew by some persons not Masorites, and then confirmed by Masorite authority. It is not safe to be over particular in a matter about which we know so little. You say the transcribers were to write in a more contracted form and the and were frequently to be omitted. There was no need of omitting them for the points. Only transcribers might be tempted to omit them for expedition as they were become less necessary. There are quiescent and defective verbs in Chaldee and Syriac, as well as in Hebrew, and most of them are common to the three languages. Therefore it is evident that they were not contracted by Masoritick rules. And though there had been no proof that they were not thus contracted, it ought not to be supposed or imagined that they were, without proof or probability. If translators can be in no fault when they render the word which they find written, though a wrong one, transcribers are in no fault when they write the word which they find written. Both indeed might do well to correct the mistake where it is extremely plain, only giving notice of it. But the superstition both of transcribing and translating the text as it stands, is much safer than the boldness of altering it rashly. And many wrong alterations have been proposed. In all languages more mistakes are made in transcribing proper names which do not occur frequently, than in transcribing any other words, excepting numbers. Errors in these, therefore, are no proofs that the Jewish transcribers were more careless than others. I believe most of the variations, which you set down here, have been already mentioned by the criticks and commentators. I am with all good wishes, Sir, Your loving Brother and Servant, Remarks forwarded by Archb. Secker, afterwards under date January 13, 1757. Joshua might originally be called, in Deuteronomy xxxii, 44, by his old name. See Numbers xiii, 8, 16. And the versions might choose to call him by his more usual name. Probably 2 Šamuel ii, 8, and elsewhere, is byan I Chron. viii, 35; ix, 39, as hy is na. For by the false deity is nicknamed Jerem. ix, 13; Hosea ix, 10. Le Clerc hath noted .הבכר after יואל the omission of 2 Samuel iii, 3, in the Greek is 4aλouta. And 2, 1 Chron. iii, 2, in the Vatican copy of the Greek is 4auvin, the Alexandrine Aaλouta. And in both places, Syriac and Arabic, have not, as you have by a slip of your pen, written it Chabeb, but 55. This shows that all persons are prone to mistake in uncommon proper names. Some will say that this son of David had two names. -seem only different man יהואש and יואש אבשלום and אבישלום ners of speaking or spelling. In Gen. xx, 6, Samarit. hath NO. The versions might add the pronoun for clearness, without reading it in the Hebrew, as our version hath done often. And may have been the original reading. For that form is frequent in verbs ending with , and there is a great affinity between them and verbs ending with N. Indeed the Chaldee and Syriac confound them entirely one with the other. .א As UN in Chaldee is, and we find in Hebrew and , so possibly may be only a still more contracted spell |