The first thing that strikes the mind, as undesirable in an accurate version of the Scriptures, is, that words supplied by the translators, which have no counterpart in the original, should not be designated as such by italics as attempted more or less fully in the Authorized Bible. Dr. Scrivener's Cambridge Paragraph Bible sought this more systematically, and therefore is happier in this respect. In the Revised New Testament, on the contrary, the indication of supply is less than ever. It would have been better for the reader had the amount indicated been far greater. Take the instance of “the Lord” so common in the Synoptic Gospels, especially Matthew and Luke, where the Greek word is anarthrous, and means Jehovah. (See Matt. 1:20, 22, 24.) Not so the official title of Christ, unless employed predicatively which would of course deprive it of the article. Again, in 1:20 we have “take unto thee,” and in 24 “took unto him,” without indicating that the pronouns are supplied. So with “our” in 3:9. It seems arbitrary to print “it” in Roman in 2:3, and in Italics in 3:15. Many an unlettered preacher is thus exposed to dwell with emphasis on words merely inserted by the translators as if they were the veritable expressions of the Holy Spirit, from which error they were better guarded by the Authorized Version, and ought to have been yet more now. It is allowable in a version of a Greek or Latin Classic or of any human composition to supply what seems idiomatically requisite in our tongue without distinct notification to the reader. But Scripture stands alone, and deserves the homage of carefully distinguishing what man judges necessary in the language which reflects the original. In some cases it may prove a danger signal; in all it seems due to God and man. As the tendency of the day is to deny the difference between the word of God and any other book, it is the more imperative.
It is singular that the Revisers have left 2:1 as it stands in the Authorized Version, when a slight and lawful change of rendering would guard the reader from a really groundless misapprehension of the history. As it stands one might infer, with superficial poets and painters, according to tradition, that the visit of the magi followed close upon the Messiah's birth. And this error has been greedily misused by skeptics. But a comparison of Luke 2 shows that it was not so; confirmed by the accurate ascertainment of the time by Herod, and his consequent slaughter of the male babes at Bethlehem from two years old and under. Room must be left for several months', if not a year's, interval. As we know, the parents came up to Jerusalem for the passover every year; and is anything more intelligible than the interest which would draw to Bethlehem those who knew that the Child was the promised son and heir of David's throne? Then, on a subsequent occasion, came the magi who had seen the star in the east, and gone to Jerusalem in consequence. They had learned, through Herod, from the scribes that Bethlehem was the predicted spot; and the star, to their joy, re-appears to guide them, till it stood over the place where the Child was. The aorist participle leaves the sense quite open, where “Now when,” &c., limits it in this case unduly. Translate, therefore, “Now Jesus having been born,” or “Now after Jesus was born,” &c.
In 4:18, 20, 21, the difference between a “net” (ἀμφίβληστρον) and the “nets” (δίκτυα) is not marked even in the margin (both distinct from 13:47); whereas they have properly done so as to the “baskets” in 16:9, 10. So there is no attempt even in the margin to distinguish between, άγαθός and καλός, both indiscriminately rendered “good;” though the one means “kind,” “beneficial,” “excellent,” the other “upright” or “honorable.”
In 6:11 (as in Luke 11:3) the rendering is “daily,” which the context seems to refute as tautology. “Needful” or “sufficient” I believe to be the true thought, in contrast with περιούσιος, “abundant,” “superfluous,” “more than enough.” Doubtless the word is unusual, coined (Origen thought) for the purpose. Bishop Lightfoot argues against this source, as if the form in that case should be ἐπούσιος. But ἐπιετής is opposed to this rigidity of derivation, being as far as we know a word of late formation like ἐπιούσιος, without question of the digamma. Hence οὐσία does not require the derivation ἐπούσιος. Still less must we restrict οὐσία to mean “essential being” or “substance” in that sense; for the New Testament itself uses it only in the meaning of “subsistence;” and its application in well-known orators, &c., to “property” real (φανερά) or “personal” (ἀφανής) is certain and common. It is unnecessary therefore to trace the word to ἐπιοῦσα (ἡμέρα) “the morrow,” and if we did, we could not without harshness make it mean “till to-morrow,” that is of to-day, which (as we have seen) does not suit the context. Nor is the mystical sense, founded either on ὁἐπιὼν κ. (the coming world) or on ἐπι-ούσιος (supersubstantial) worthy of serious argument. Nor is it worthy reasoning, finally, to say that, because the disciples were not to be anxious for the morrow, they were not to pray for their bread to-day.
It would have been well, if so small a point as “wine-skins” (9:17) is carefully substituted for “bottles,” that “demons” and “demonizes” (8: 28, 31) had always taken the place of “devils,” So, keeping the word “devil” for the different term which scripture gives to their chief.
A seriously mistaken change of reading is adopted in 11:19, ἔργων,” works,” on the authority of à Bp.m. 124 (a Vienna cursive of cent. xii.) and of some ancient versions, instead of τέκνων, as in all other authorities, not to speak of Luke 7:35. Even Origen lends “works” no support, any more than Chrysostom. It is monstrous to suppose that we are carried back in thought to the moment when Wisdom's works were planned. The contrast is with “this generation;” as the Lord also in the verses following sets forth, the latter as objects of more than outward judgment, whilst the former are objects of the Father's sovereign grace. That the Wisdom of God should be justified of its works seems a truism-of its children is a weighty truth.
Timidity, or want of knowledge, is manifest in perpetuating (13: 39 and elsewhere) “the end of the world,” and relegating to the margin the unquestionably true rendering, “the consummation of the age.”
In 28:1 The old and common error reappears, which has created immense confusion in arranging the order of the facts of the resurrection. The word ἐπιφώσκειν applies equally to the dusk as to the dawn, the context alone deciding. The Jewish day began with the evening. Here it is assuredly the dusk, for the dawn of the first day could not be ὀψὲ σαββάτων. The women came to the tomb on Saturday evening as here, as well as on Sunday morning early to which no doubt the earthquake in verse 2 belongs, when they were there again.
It is a pleasanter task to note some of the improvements of the Revisers, though almost all of moment are familiar to Christians for many years, and may be found in versions of private men. Thus it has long been felt well that Old Testament names, as in chapter 1, should follow the Hebrew rather than the Greek form. Again, the tendency to assimilate the Gospels has been watched against, as in 1:25 (cf. Luke 2:7); 5:44 (cf. Luke 6:27, 28); 9: 13 and Mark 2:17 (cf. Luke 5:32); 17: 21 (cf. Mark 9:29); 18: 11 (cf. Luke 19:10); 19:16, 17 (cf. Mark 10:17, 18, Luke 18:18, 19); 20:16 (cf. 22: 16); 20:22, 23 (cf. Mark 10:38, 39); 23: 14 (cf. Mark 12:40, Luke 20:47); 25:13 (cf. 24:42, 44). The repetition of our Lord's name, Jesus, is corrected as in 4:12, 18, 8:5, 13: 36, 14: 14, 25, 15: 16, 30, 16: 20, 17: 11, 22: 37, 24: 2. This was probably owing to ecclesiastical influence, like the doxology at the end of the prayer for the disciples (6:13), and the “Amen” at the end of the Gospel, and indeed of all the Gospels.