I

BIBLICAL CRITICISM.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE CLASSICAL JOURNAL.

take the liberty of troubling you with a few remarks on Mr. Hails's letter on Biblical Criticism, published in No. XIII. of your Journal. I am much surprized at his assertion, p. 68.; that if "all the various lections in the Old Test. collected by Kennicott, De Rossi, &c. and those in the New Test. collected by Mill, Wetstein, Griesbach, &c. remained scattered in the various Codices whence they gathered them, nothing which materially affects either our Faith or our Practice, would have remained in the textus receptus, which ought to be expunged, or have been wanting which ought to be supplied." He surely cannot be ignorant of the importance of the passage, Psalm xvi. 10. Thou shalt not leave my soul in hell (or Hades) neither shalt thou suffer thy holy One to see corruption: he surely cannot be uninformed that in the printed Heb. Bibles, that is to say the "textus receptus," the word, which we render holy One, is TTD: literally, sancti tui. I cannot better state the case, than by transcribing Dr. Kennicott's note on the passage which, I do not doubt, will, to a man of Mr. H's candor and learning, be convincing: as to Mr. Bellamy, I am well persuaded that he would be convinced with more difficulty. Dr. K's note may be found at page 496. of his first dissertation on the state of the printed Text, Oxon. 1753: it is as follows. "These words, the Apostles observe to the Jews, are a Prophecy of the wonderful Resurrection of some particular Person, whose soul was not long to continue in the place of departed spirits, and whose body was not long to be corrupted, both being soon to be re-united. Now David, say they, did not speak this of himself; his body hath seen Corruption but, being a Prophet, he spake of the Resurrection of CHRIST. We see that the whole force of this appeal to the Jews depends upon this :-that the passage referred to as predictive of the Resurrection of Christ, is predictive of the Resurrection of some one particular Person. But, is this the case in the printed Heb. Bibles? Is not the leading word, almost universally TTON? And do we not find this word every where else rendered Sancti tui? and is it not certain that the Hebrew language will not admit a singular rendering? But, if this word be necessarily plural, it must be observed, first-that the words God will not suffer his Saints to see corruption, are not true: and if they were, they would not predict the resurrection of any particular

:

Person, and consequently not that of Jesus Christ. What shall we say then? Have the apostles imposed a prophecy upon the Jewish people and upon the world? Certainly they who insist upon the reading TTON do in effect accuse the apostles, that they are found faise witnesses in the cause of God; because they have testified of David that he prophecied of the resurrection of Christ, in particular; which however he prophecied not of, if so be that he spoke of saints in general. But, who shall lay any such thing to their charge? Let the apostles be true and other men liars, other n may be deficient in their knowledge and in their honesty; but inspired apostles could neither be deceived nor deceive.—Let us now see what further reasons there are for supposing this word TTD corrupted from Ton. To apostolical authority may be added the authority of all the ancient versions; secondly the authority of the Masoretes themselves, who, (though they have ordered the word to be printed plural in the text) have ordered it to be read singular; and thirdly, the conclusive authority of Heb. MSS. Of these I have examined twenty-four, which contain this Psalm; and of these twenty-four, SIXTEEN have now the true reading TTDп sanctum tuum written regularly in the text: and one more had this word also TTON at first, but part of the horizontal stroke of the has been erased, and a inserted by some late corrector. The MSS. which happily discover this important reading are No. 2, 3, 4, 5. 13. 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37. 60. and Camb. MSS. 1, 2, 3, 4. In R. Stephens's Bible it is

"חסידך properly

From Dr. Kennicott's second dissertation, p. 108. I learn, that he had examined thirty-one MSS. which contained the Psalm, and in twenty-seven, (of which number fifteen were at Oxford, five at Cambridge, six in the British Museum, and one in the possession of S. Da Costa, Esq.) he read 770, sanctum tuum.

After the perusal of this able note written by Dr. K. I am inclined to think that Mr. Hails will abandon his opinion respecting the importance of various readings in the Old Testament: it now remains for me to adduce similar instances in the New Testament. Mr. H. must indisputably be acquainted with the instances of the rule respecting the Greek article, produced by Mr. Granville Sharp as proving the Divinity of Christ. I shall produce a variation respecting a passage adduced by him as an instance of the rule, which will prove that the various readings to be collected from MSS. are not altogether unimportant: the pas sage to which I allude is Jude 4. where the received text exhibits the following words. Τον μόνον δεσπότην θεὸν καὶ Κύριον ἡμῶν 'INσour XQiOTÓV. I shall here transcribe a note on the passage, written by the very learned Dr. Middleton, now Archdeacon of Huntingdon: it may be found at page 658. of "The Doctrine

of the Greek Article, applied to the Criticism and Illustration of the New Testament," 8vo. Lond. 1808. and is as follows. "This is the last of the passages adduced by Mr. Granville Sharp, to show that Christ is called God. There is, however, some difficulty in ascertaining the true reading, since very many authorities omit ov, and Griesbach has rejected it from his Text. Yet of Matthäis' MSS. all, except one, have sov: so also the Syriac, Arabic, and Æthiopic. Farther, Mr. Wordsworth has remarked against Wetstein and Griesbach, that Ecumenius, of whose works Mr. W. examined four editions, has the word cóv.”

I need scarcely observe on this passage the great importance of the V. R. I need scarcely remark that it is chiefly by such things as these, that the most important points both of faith and practice must be proved: that they depend frequently on a single reading and it surely will not be thought unimportant to ascertain the authority of the passages on which these matters rest. For my own part, I sincerely believe that in the present instance, the reading sov is derived a manu apostoli; and I think that there can be no doubt, that CHRIST is called by the Apostles GOD. The case is, however, by no means altered, should the reading be proved spurious: it will then be proper that we should abandon it in our disputations: that we should seek to defend our creed with other less questionable texts: and that we should no longer use a weak argument in behalf of a good cause. cannot but regret that I am confined to a short space: were I at liberty to extend this article, I should produce many instances which are parallel in circumstances; but not inferior in import

ance.

The last passage I shall adduce is the celebrated verse I. John v. 7. relating to the heavenly witnesses. I think that it will be conceded that the verse is spurious: that it was interpolated by some injudicious friend to the Trinitarian cause: and that it consequently should be expunged from all future editions both of the Greek Text, and of our version: indeed, I have no doubt that whenever our version shall be revised by authority, it will be done. If this be allowed, it must be manifest that the collation of MSS. and versions is by no means useless: it has at length decided a long controverted point: it has secured the acquiescence of some of the greatest luminaries' of our church: and has benefited the cause of truth. Let then all scholars assist the collation of MSS. both of the Old and New Testament, wheresoever they may be found. By so doing, they will serve the

Among these I may rank the BISHOP OF LINCOLN, to whom the Church is so much indebted: bis name alone will carry conviction, and assist in no small degree the cause I have here espoused.

cause of our holy religion may the Almighty bless their endeavours for the public good; and for Jesus Christ's sake, shed abundantly upon them the influence of his holy spirit.

In conclusion I may now be permitted to assure Mr. Hails, that I entered into this controversy with him, not for victory, but for truth. I do not make any apology for having so done : I conceive it unnecessary, when I take into consideration the candid and liberal spirit which pervades his letter.

I remain, Sir,

Your most obedient servant,
M.

P. S. Since I wrote the above notes, a fact has come to my knowledge, which, as it somewhat militates against the explanation of the passage adopted by Dr. Kennicott and myself, it would be disingenuous to suppress. It is that the author of the Commentary printed with St. Jerome's Version of the Psalms, (vid. Sti. Hieronymi Op. Tom. 8. fol. par. 1533. does not explain the passage as referring to Christ: the Commentary, however, is not the work of Jerome. His version, indeed, is conformable to the reading proposed by Dr. K.: it is as follows: "non enim derelinques animam meam in inferno: nec dabis sanctum tuum videre corruptionem." To the eighth vol. of this edition of Jerome's works, there is an APPENDIX: it contains, in parallel columns, the Heb. Text of the Psalms; the literal version of it made by Jerome; the lxx vers. of the Psalter; and his literal rendering from it. Although neither the Heb. Text, nor lxx. was added by St. Jerome, they are yet valuable, as giving the reading found in both at the time the edit. was printed. I therefore transcribe them. The Heb. Text is as follows:

כי לא תעוב נפשי לשאול לא תתן חסידך לראות שחת ;

The Gr. Vers. has, Οτι οὐκ ἐγκαταλείψεις τὴν ψυχήν μου εἰς ᾅδου, οὐδὲ δώσεις τὸν ὅσιον σοῦ ἴδειν διαφθοράν. The passage, however is not quoted by Cyprian or Tertullian, by Hilary or Ambrose: I find it cited, however, by Augustine, Tom. 2. p. 679 Tom. 8. p. 6 1. edit. Benedictin. who reads sanctum tuum and applies it to Christ. I do not find it in the works of Basil: but Origen cites it in his exegetical works, Tom. I. p. 32. edit. 1668. He has given it verbatim from the lxx. as I have quoted it above. He explains it of Christ: but his commentary is too long to be transcribed.