The Life of William Carey, Shoemaker & MissionarySmith, George
Religion
The Life of William Carey, Shoemaker & Missionary
Smith, George
Carey, William, 1761-1834; Missions -- India
The third edition of the Bengali Testament was published in 1811 in
folio for the use of the native congregations by that time formed. The
fourth, consisting of 5000 copies, appeared in 1816, and the eighth in
1832. The venerable scholar, like Columba at Iona over the
thirty-fourth psalm, and Baeda at Jarrow over the sixth chapter of
John's Gospel, said as he corrected the last sheet--the last after
forty years' faithful and delighted toil: "My work is done; I have
nothing more to do but to wait the will of the Lord." The Old Testament
from the Hebrew appeared in portions from 1802 to 1809. Such was the
ardour of the translator, that he had finished the correction of his
version of the first chapter of Genesis in January 1794. When he read
it to two pundits from Nuddea, he told Fuller in his journal of that
month they seemed much pleased with the account of the creation, but
they objected to the omission of patala, their imaginary place beneath
the earth, which they thought should have been mentioned. At this
early period Carey saw the weakness of Hindooism as a pretended
revelation, from its identification with false physics, just as Duff
was to see and use it afterwards with tremendous effect, and
wrote:--"There is a necessity of explaining to them several
circumstances relative to geography and chronology, as they have many
superstitious opinions on those subjects which are closely connected
with their systems of idolatry." The Bengali Bible was the result of
fifteen years' sweet toil, in which Marshman read the Greek and Carey
the Bengali; every one of their colleagues examined the proof sheets,
and Carey finally wrote with his own pen the whole of the five octavo
volumes. In the forty years of his missionary career Carey prepared
and saw through the press five editions of the Old Testament and eight
editions of the New in Bengali.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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