Unitarianism Defended: A Series of Lectures by Three Protestant Dissenting Ministers of LiverpoolMartineau, James
Religion
Unitarianism Defended: A Series of Lectures by Three Protestant Dissenting Ministers of Liverpool
Martineau, James
Unitarianism
could take holy orders in the Episcopal church, without pledging his
assent to the Thirty-nine Articles; and should he cease to approve of
them, his ordination vow would require him to resign his preferment. But
in that country are hundreds of Unitarian ministers, who know nothing of
the Improved Version; and would be as much astonished to be told that
they were bound by it, as would Dr. Tattershall to hear that he must
answer for the Oxford Tracts.
But the mere fact, that within a year after the publication of this
work, a Unitarian divine, a subscriber to the Unitarian society, in a
Unitarian periodical, submitted it to a criticism far more searching and
elaborate than that which an acumen sharpened by theological hostility
is now able to produce, is sufficient to set in its true light the
statement which I have quoted. I beg to call the attention of our
Reverend opponents to the following enumeration of the points, to which
the censures of the Reviewer (Dr. Carpenter) are directed.
(1.) The selection of Newcome’s Revision, instead of the authorized
version, as the basis.
(2.) The departure, and without any intelligible rule, from Griesbach’s
text, which, in the introduction, had been mentioned in a way to excite
the expectation of its invariable adoption. Of these departures, a
complete table is given.
(3.) The neglect of proper acknowledgment and defence of these
departures.
(4.) The professed employment of brackets for one purpose, (to indicate
words which, according to Griesbach, were probably, though not
certainly, to be expunged,) and the actual use of them for another; as,
for example, in the introduction of St. Matthew’s Gospel, which is thus
enclosed.
(5.) The use of italics (intended to indicate doubtful authority)
without adequate evidence of doubtful authority, and in violation of the
apparent intention to repudiate critical conjecture. And in particular,
the use of this type in the introduction to St. Luke’s gospel; which
“the evidence is far too little to justify;” and in the introduction to
St. Matthew’s gospel. Both these examples are considered by the reviewer
as instances of _conjectural criticism_.
(6.) The unwarrantable license allowed in general to conjectural
emendation of the text; of which particular cases are adduced; as the
transposition of verses, John i. 15, 18; and, in a lower sense of the
word _conjecture_, the omission of διὰ τῆς πίστεως, Rom. iii. 25; and
the καὶ in 2 Tim. iii. 16.
(7.) The departures from the received text without notice. Of these
departures, a complete table is given.
(8.) The departures from Newcome’s Revision, without sufficient notice;
of these, a list was given, and a synoptical table has since been
published in the appendix to Dr. Carpenter’s reply to the “unanswered”
Archbishop Magee.
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