The Greatest English Classic: A Study of the King James Version of the Bible and Its Influence on Life and LiteratureMcAfee, Cleland Boyd
Religion
The Greatest English Classic: A Study of the King James Version of the Bible and Its Influence on Life and Literature
McAfee, Cleland Boyd
Bible -- History; Bible -- Influence; Bible and literature; Bible. English -- Versions -- Authorized
The King James translators follow that same practice of transliteration
rather than translation with another word which is full of controversial
possibility. I mean the word "baptism." There was dispute then as now
about the method of that ordinance in early Christian history. There were
many who held that the classical meaning which involved immersion had been
taken over bodily into the Christian faith, and that all baptism was by
immersion. There were others who held that while that might be the
classical meaning of the word, yet in early Christian custom baptism was
not by immersion, but might be by sprinkling or pouring, and who insisted
that no pressure on the mode was wise or necessary. That dispute continues
to this day. Early versions of the Bible already figured in the
discussion, and for a while there was question whether this King James
version should take sides in that controversy, about which men equally
loyal to truth and early Christian history could honestly differ. The
translators avoided taking sides by bringing the Greek word which was
under discussion over into English, letter by letter. Our word "baptism"
is not an English word nor a Saxon word; it is a purely Greek word. The
controversy has been brought over into the English language; but the King
James version avoided becoming a controversial book. A number of years ago
the convictions of some were so strong that another version of the Bible
was made, in which the word baptism was carefully replaced by what was
believed to be the English translation, "immersion," but the version never
had wide influence.
In this connection it is well to notice the effort of the King James
translators at a fair statement of the divine name. It will be remembered
that it appears in the Old Testament ordinarily as "LORD," printed in
small capitals. A very interesting bit of verbal history lies back of that
word. The word which represents the divine name in Hebrew consists of four
consonants, J or Y, H, V, and H. There are no vowels; indeed, there were
no vowels in the early Hebrew at all. Those that we now have were added
not far from the time of Christ. No one knows the original pronunciation
of that sacred name consisting of four letters. At a very early day it had
become too sacred to pronounce, so that when men came to it in reading or
in speech, they simply used another word which is, translated into
English, Lord, a word of high dignity. When the time came that vowels were
to be added to the consonants, the vowels of this other word Lord were
placed under the consonants of the sacred name, so that in the word
Jehovah, where the J H V H occur, there are the consonants of one word
whose vowels are unknown and the vowels of another word whose consonants
are not used.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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