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CHAPTER 5
Translation of Texts
in
JOB, TITUS, ACTS
Includes in order:
Items: 5, 47, 36
Job 21:30
5) NEXT we come to Job 21:30. This is undoubtedly a fascinating
case, but it would show also
that the AV and indeed the NKJV are by no means all comprehensive in their
perfections, excellent as they are in different ways. They do not absolve all
men for all time from the need with chaste care to research and consider the
translations.
In this case, Keil and Delitzsch bring out an
important aspect of a coherent and strong translation which is not disjointed or
lacking in argumentative flow, for the patriarch. It is a matter of the wicked
being "spared
in the day of calamity," as
they render it. This gives something of the sense
of the verb, in the context.
Both the AV
and the NKJV put for verse 30, something similar, each to the other. In the former case:
"That the
wicked is reserved to the day of destruction ?
They shall be brought forth to
the day of wrath."
The latter:
"For the wicked
are reserved for the day of doom;
They shall be
brought out on the day of wrath."
Unlike these, the English Revised Version at least
allows for the sense of it, namely that the simplistic concept of those who
attack Job, in view of his calamities, assuming him wicked, is denied by a
broader knowledge of what happens in the earth. Evil people escape, reserved to
judgment, and are led on the way, none daring to challenge them (Job 21:31). :
"That the wicked man is reserved
to the day of calamity,
That they are led forth to the day of wrath."
While this is not as clear as it might be, in the
RV, it is not alien from the thrust. As to the wicked person, the text proceeds
to illustrate his escapes, saying,
"Who condemns his way to his face ?
And who repays him for what he has done ?"
THEREFORE,
Job indicates, they cannot comfort him with their urbane, superficial words!
Hidden, obscured, the text indicates, the wicked person is kept till calamity
comes (so don't pretend I am wicked, the line is, because I was NOT kept, for
see now innocently vulnerable I am!). Indeed they are led to the brink at the
end, as if on schedule, relatively secure to meet their end, exposed at last. So
don't try that one on me! he snarls.
The thrust is his being kept in obscurity,
darkness, tended, to the time when the day appointed for judgment comes. That is
in the singular, for an envisaged wicked man, looking at a life which seems to
Job not uncommon, as if he were peeping at such a one, to see his stout-looking
performance, deceptive though he deems it, so unlike his own! Indeed, turning to
the plural, he indicates that this type of person is LED to the day of wrath.
The primary meaning is to LEAD, as when God led the children of Israel.
Thus the RV, different in tenor from the AV, and
NKJV renderings, captures better the thought. This one, like the Berkeley
Version, which is stronger yet here, allows for the point at issue, for the
stated argument of Job, which the other translations merely interrupt, tending
to disperse the thrust of thought, rather as if the new data to be gained by
questioning travellers were merely that the wicked get what is coming to them,
How insistently is the irony pursued: from
travellers Job reinforces his view of the deliverance of unjust men, their
escapes from calamities, all solicitous, even the physical grave appealing in
its presentation. It is not a direct and simple matter, in living, of do
this and get that: God is far deeper than this. Often evil men are given
their bait, and allowed for quite a time, the inducements of their folly. They
provide, Job urges, a contrast rather than a confirmation with himself, innocent
as he deems himself to be!
Time may swallow up the realities in superficialities; but in the
end, truth will come out, and justice with it. God will see to that (Job
9:1-13; 28). Superficial condemnation of the just in the meantime, is
contemptible. Brute fish may be allowed quite
Unlike these
the NIV has, in what now needs a fuller context, from 29:
"Have you
never questioned those who travel ?
Have you paid no
regard to their accounts -
that the evil man
is spared from the day of calamity,
that he is
delivered from the day of wrath?"
Lines 2-3,
diverse in the NIV, here parallel the AV, and NKJV renderings. However, they
also bear out the stated argument of Job, which the other translations merely
interrupt, dispersing the thrust of thought, as if the new data to be gained by
questioning travellers were merely that the wicked got what was coming to them,
that those who asked for it would certainly reap, as if to fortify Job’s
opponents, by noting the calamity-wickedness affair the focus, short-circuiting
the entire argument! It is vitally important, not for salvation, but for growth
in the beauties of the truth, feeding on His faithful word, to understand, and
no hero-worshipping of any one translation is the best path to that. Down the
ages, the Lord has indeed done wonders, but his teams are not to be limited to
pet players, however grand their normative performances. Not thus is the kingdom
of heaven. Sportsmen, businessmen and translators all have their place; none is
inordinate!
Job’s point is
that prolonged patience must work while parodies of justice flourish. While it
is true that unrepentant miscreants await the balances, Job’s concern here is
the interim! It is this after all which is his affair! HE is
caught in it! Accordingly, consultations with travellers are not to do nothing
to detach the prying eyes of his censorious friends from his suffering frame,
but to evoke the data which will confirm Job’s contention that the friends
ignore! This he speedily proceeds to point out, after making his foray
concerning travellers’ reports: the ignorant words of his friends are thus
nonsense, beside the point, a simplistic substitute of carping judgment instead
of facing the issue in point.
To be sure,
the NIV in the book of Job appears a translation almost inspired. It has such
sensitive awareness of aspects and moods, such clear expression of the same, and
achieves such a sense of logical comportment that one feels almost as if present
while the original speakers spoke. That is not a generic commendation of the NIV;
it is merely to note this finding in the case of this particular Old Testament
Book. On the other hand, the negative consideration regarding the New Testament
is similar with it and so many other modern translations, in terms of the Greek
text, as discussed earlier. This feature however stands out here in the Job
translation.
Now Delitzsch
seems to improve even this marvel of translator’s skill still further in one
relatively minor, but still telling point; but that we leave till later.
THE POINT OF THE
ARGUMENT OF JOB HERE
The POINT in
this passage is this: Job is hurt by the endless chastisement of the unruly
tongues of his tormentors - or friends as they are called - who seem all but
inveterate in their insistence that God is punishing Job for his sins. Now of
course it is easy to be confused, and these friends are not lacking in this
facility. Since we are ALL sinners, ALL imperfect, then ALL could well be
chastened for imperfections. In that sense, to question a chastening can be
arrogance and more.
However there is
a further question, always relevant. Is THIS PARTICULAR CASE a chastisement
at all ? Or is it rather a test of endurance ? OR, as is explicit in the case of
the book of Job from the early chapters, is it even PERHAPS a trial to glorify
God, a way of showing the integrity of love FOR HIM on the part of the sinner ?
You remember how the knights of old might seek to show their love to the
beloved. It does matter. The tests may not have been adequate; but the concept
is there. In this case, the devil was wishing to cast aspersion on the reality
of love in the kingdom of God AT ALL (Job 1:9, 2:4-5), and
to advance cynical propositions concerning the motivations of the saints AS
SUCH.
God gave him
liberty to make a test. The result has abundantly glorified God ever since. In
this respect, Job was a type of Christ: he could NOT bear anyone’s sins, and did
NOT come through to perfection, but the integrity of his cause is vindicated,
for it was NOT because of selected sins per se that he was being tested. That
was not the ground at all. It was for a grand and (to him, but not to use who
read the interpretation in the record of this event) inscrutable purpose of the
Almighty, that he was enduring suffering in this case.
In his
endurance and vision (Job 19), he glorified God. Every Christmas countless
thousands if not millions hear the recital:
- "I KNOW THAT MY
REDEEMER LIVES … IN THE LATTER DAY HE WILL STAND UPON THE EARTH …I MYSELF WILL
SEE HIM WITH MY OWN EYES."
At once, and once
and for all, the situation is removed from the superficial snare of considering
pain-pleasure, or vanity-fulfilment or any other natural equation or
desideratum. It is a question of personal reality and love, of God and eternity,
and meaning and roles for God. It is a REDEEMER who is to do the necessary work
to bring one to haven and to heaven itself. It is not performance based as the
ultimate criterion at all!
In their
shallowness, the friends tended to highlight once and for all the worldly minded
simplistic assumptions of personal material prosperity, prestige fulfilment or
the like, as a sign-post or at least signal of divine approval. In fact,
the wicked can for a time thrust around their tongues, indeed these little
members as the Psalmist notes, can stride through the earth while their
deceptive riches and devious ways disadorn the earth.
Now at the
point in the discourse to which in Ch.21 we are directed, Job is removing this
paraphernalia of adverse assumptions about his conduct, as the ground of his
adversity. He is stating that the wicked DO have prosperity (contrary, for
example, to the assertions of his friend in 20:28-29). It is NOT a
simple, be good be rich, proposition, or be good be obviously in a superior
position this world, as far as health and wealth, power or thrust is concerned.
GOD, he says, is deep: "Can anyone teach knowledge to God, since He judges even the
highest ?" . This he declares with perspicuous justice, since at that very
time he was in the midst of such pangs and troubles as were an utter vexation
and trial to his spirit.
Very well: Job
is arguing that despite this fact of God’s wholly divine competence and final
determination, it is NEVERTHELESS true that the wicked can flourish for a time,
and (by implication) the righteous may not match their worldly show!
He proceeds in
vv.22-33, to give his case to the effect that this concept of prosperity and
sanctity, as a sort of indissoluble duet, is nonsense! In fact in v. 34 he
expressly confronts them with his summary:
- "so how can you
console me with your nonsense ?
Nothing is
left of your answers but falsehood ?"
IN MAKING THIS
ARGUMENT, and in process of reaching this rebuttal by way of conclusion, Job is
making several points. Amongst them are these. In 21:7ff., the position
put is this: The wicked live on with abundance of zest, with flowing
children flourishing, homes safe, cattle unblighted, dancing and prosperity,
even when, in amazing effrontery, they tell their Maker: "Leave us alone!"
(21:7-14). We don’t want You, they declaim!
"Who is the
Almighty, that we should serve Him!" they mockingly spout, to the airs.
Pray to You !
Why? We have enough! For them, it is as if this world were their beginning and
end, and God was lost in forgetfulness for their express benefit. This of course
God hates (Malachi 2:17, Psalm 50) and will
judge in His own patient depth and eloquence.
Thus in Isaiah
37:21ff., we find the case where the ruthless oppressor, Sennacherib, having
served his evil purpose (Isaiah 37:26-28), and taken his place in the tartan of
history, and then having expressly challenged God, meets a turn of the wheel of
no uncertain vigour!. THAT timing, however, is for God, and many-faceted are His
plans and purposes, as the book of history declaims the folly of pride and the
arrogance of pretension with God. Meanwhile there is much to be found in the
realm of evil prosperity.
This life is
not a test for the advancement of simpletons; nor is it a pleasure-pain job that
makes history what it is! In the midst, then, of his own personal affliction,
Job is rebutting the adversaries in their unqualified attentions to his
discouragement in handing out interim judgments on his assumed evil deeds.
How often, Job
pursues the point (21:17) is the lamp of the
wicked snuffed out ? That is in the whole line of rebuttal, summarised as we
noted in v.34. Have you never questioned travellers, he continues (v. 29), for
they will tell you! The evil man may indeed be found, contrary to your
imputations, he tells his friends, spared in the day of calamity (Delitzsch does
a marvellous piece of research here, to show such usages of the verb here, from
other Biblical instances) . Yes he may be found delivered in the day of wrath!
Who, Job demands, tells the man of prospering power, his sin to his
face! (many fear to do so for the sake of penalty at the hand of evil injustice,
or intrigue). How often he is carried to his grave, and even there, "the clods of the
valley shall be sweet to him" (AV).
It is here that Delitzsch
makes an improvement even on the NIV - in this case - excellent rendering here.
After all, if the valley is sweet to the DEAD, there is clearly some sort of
imagery. He quite grammatically, translates vv. 32:
§"And he is
brought to the grave,
And over the tomb
he still keepeth watch.
The clods of the
valley are sweet to him …"
The concept is that it is as
if, well placed in perhaps some eminent part (as one sees so often in
cemeteries), he is envisaged as looking (in terms of the worldly image, of
course, that he held before his death, and many still hold) with pleasure over
the well-tended area of interment, with a good view to the listless eye, were it
to open. Thus is he thought of, as contentedly maintaining his eminence to the
(worldly) end!
In the AV and the NKJV, the
entire force of the thrust of Job’s answer is muddied here, for some of the
renderings interrupt or even arrest the flow of his argument, as indicated in
kind, in his summary of it in verse 34. Such an instance was the verse rendering
which they gave, as cited as the outset of this section, and allied to this,
verse 30, is verse 32.
Titus 2:13
47) Titus 2:13 is a further case of interest in
this translation area.
Titus
2:13ff. has already been a focus for some little attention in Stepping Out for Christ
10. Let us use and extend this for our present purpose.
So great is the infinite affinity of God the Father and His word, that we even
read in Titus 2:13-14 of this great expression: We are, says Paul and oh so
rightly!
§"looking for the blessed hope and glorious appearing of our great God and
Saviour Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from
every lawless deed and purify for Himself His own special people, zealous of
good works."
The Greek
has: the great God and Saviour of us. It is not the great God and the
Saviour: it is one identity, with only one introductory 'the'.
This is obvious enough when
you realise that in Titus 2:10 we find written, "God our Saviour", which in turn is not surprising,
since Isaiah 43:10 tells us that besides GOD there IS NO SAVIOUR. Whatever is
the saviour in this highest, most eminent, final way is God; and of course this
is precisely what Jesus Christ was called from the first (Luke 2:11, 2:30,38).
Redeemer, Saviour from sin, the Christ is of necessity God, who acknowledges no
other Saviour. Hence that it is God, even the great God and our Saviour who is
to appear, is merely a reflection of all these things. It is HIS WORD which
acts, and delivers the salvation in His own name, which naturally is above every
name (Philippians 2:9-11), AND does so, with the result that all whether
in heaven or on earth should bow to Him, the Christ, confessing Him as Lord to
the glory of God the Father.
This is the specific data on
His return, result, reality.
Now that is
as it must be. What is true is real, and reality will show what it is. Lies, and
liars are but the ephemeral production of that glorious invention, freedom, when
it is abused. The former perish and the latter have their own more instructive
mode of divorce from the platform of the present! Thus, when Peter admonishes
the rulers, priests and elders, inflamed in their infamy, he spoke what is, and
what is to be shown with more than logic, as it now is: with Lordship. For as he
declaimed it, so it will be:
- "This is 'the
stone which was rejected by you builders, which has become the chief
cornerstone.' Nor is there salvation in any other name; for there is no
other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved"
- Acts 4:11-12.
There is no
more important fact in the universe to which ANY ONE in our race may apply the
mind, address the heart, than this!
Look at again in Titus
2:13ff., therefore. For what are we waiting, among all this political flotsam
and jetsam, this abominable and appalling generation of death, and degeneration
of the race in war of mind and soul and spirit and flesh, notion and nation ! It
is the due end. And that: "the glorious appearing of the great God, even our Saviour,
Jesus Christ who gave Himself for us, that He might redeem us from all
lawlessness". And as to
this LOOKING, ANTICIPATING, EXPECTATION of which Paul here speaks ? It is one
which results from one fact, this - "the grace of God which brings salvation has
appeared to all men" (2:11). So much has it appeared that the dating system of the
world has been altered to acknowledge it. It is not a private party. Millions of
books have doubtless been written on it, of broadcast made about it, and some of
the most inventive of scientists have been entirely assured of it.
Here the NKJV is most clear.
The AV is ambiguous, where this is not needed: "Looking for that blessed hope
and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ".
Acts 13:19-20
36)
Acts 13:19-20
Our
21st case
if
one of wide interest, because of its implications. In this
illustration, both the AV and the NKJV rather astonishingly, and rarely indeed
as a combination, fail to provide a satisfactory translation. It is found in
Acts
13:19-20.
"And when He had destroyed seven nations in the land of Canaan, He distributed
their land to them by allotment. After that He gave them judges for about four
hundred and fifty years, until Samuel the prophet."
The
NASV, duly covering Egypt, 400 years, and the Exodus (13:17-18), proceeds:
§"And when He had destroyed seven nations
in the land of Canaan,
He distributed their land as an inheritance -
all of which took about four hundred and fifty years.
And after these things He gave them judges
until Samuel the prophet."
The
Berkeley version translates similarly.
The
time noted for Israel’s period in Egypt was 400 years (Genesis 15:13), the
wilderness 40, and a little time was needed from Egypt to the failure to enter
the land, as in Numbers 14, while Joshua, who began his military entry at a late
age, proceeded for a small number of years to the allocation of the tribal
lands, as seen late in the book of Joshua, and anticipated in Numbers 33:54. This fits both grammatically, as we shall see,
covering all the data both aptly and well, and historically as an approximation,
which it statedly is.
The Majority Greek text has,
literally: "And having destroyed seven nations in the land of Canaan, He distributed their
land to them as inheritance. And after these things, in about four hundred
and fifty years, He gave them judges until Samuel the prophet."
Two major points at once
obtrude. FIRST, the phrase "after these things" is FOLLOWED AT ONCE by the
dative case reference to time, which would be construed as TIME WITHIN WHICH.
Unlike this, the time
references in vv. 18,21 are in the accusative case, and would indicate duration
of time. In those cases, one sees the time of action stretching out as it is
lived; in the dative example, however, it is posing the time within which the
action in view had happened. That is the difference.
That time within which the
action described in some detail, occurred: 450 years. The
action ? what preceded, here summarised. The sense: after these things,
themselves occupying a period of around 450 years.
The reason for not putting
it with what FOLLOWS is simply the change of case. It is not wise to ignore
grammatical change of case in a varied series of references to time. It is as if
for a doctor there were a change in inflammation, and one simply ignored it, or
for a mechanic, a change in engine noise, and one was listless about it.
What then do we find here ?
The judges would
be conceived as living it, as stretching forth like the case of the wilderness
40 years, and Saul, bearing rule over the same period of time! As to the 400,
there is certainly, in simple grammatical terms, an option, to take it as
summarising what had been said or anticipating what was about to be said.
However this would be to miss the significant and indeed conspicuous case change
for time reference.
We are rather having a
change of speech to cover a change in aspect. Otherwise why write at all, if
data are ignored! No more is it as in v.18 a duration happening as it were
before our eyes, 40 years; for now a time slot is carved out in review, a survey
note on time elapsed, before the action proceeds to more things graphically
before the eyes, another 40 years coming in v. 21, exactly as in the wilderness
case in v. 18: both duration of time.
As to the grammatical
evidence, in terms of case change, then, in v. 19 on the one hand and 18,11 on
the other: this is survey; that is living.
The former has it
transpiring, the latter sees it elapsed. The NASV gives attention more aptly to
ALL the evidence and thus is here preferable.
The other reason is this: it
was NOT about 450 years from the distribution of land by allotment for
inheritance purposes, to Samuel. If he were born about 1050 B.C., having
been young as a prophet, and we allow the normal 30 years before maturity for
spiritual service, then we have about 1020 B.C. If the Exodus was at 1445
( Archer op.cit.), then the date in view would be a little after 1400, say 1380.
But from 1380 to 1020 is not about 450 years.
Further, if
it took Joshua more than 20 years to the distribution, then the disparity would
be greater. It is much less near if the Exodus were, contrary to detailed
evidence, at some imaginary later time! In this, the early date of the Exodus*1
is
confirmed; one underscored in Archer "Bible Difficulties" in such
decisive manner (pp. 191ff.). That in turn is indicated clearly in I Kings 6:1,
as in Judges 11:26, this making a third affirmation. In biblical terms, it is
one more harmony, from different quarters in it. It is of course confirmed here
in Acts 13.
What is the length of time,
then, from the exaltation in Egypt through the 400 or so years there, and the 40
in the wilderness to Joshua's distribution ? It would be 440 plus perhaps 20, or
about 450.
Even if we leave the field of
approximation in which the text is in fact moving in Acts 13, then the figure
still relates. Then,
from the day of the exaltation of the Israelites in Egypt, till the end of their
residence there would be 430 years, less such time as it took them to reach that
exalted state, which might have come no later than the days of Jacob, as we read
of the flourishing situation in Genesis 47:27-31 some 17 years).
Whether the round figure of 400 years, therefore as in Genesis 15:13, be used,
with 40 years for the wandering in the desert, and a relatively short additive
for Joshua to reach the point of land distribution, so making about 450;
or instead, it be taken as 430 plus 40 or 470 with some extra for Joshua
to reach the events of Joshua , with something omitted from the 430 for the
exaltation of Israel, to be reached a the starting point: both come to much the
same.
It is in round terms to be
considered as about 450 years. The use of the 400 as in Genesis 15, plus
the 40 in the wilderness, in terms of KNOWN approximation, in a field statedly
one of approximation, however, would seem the most likely meaning. Stephen
appears to use precisely the same approximation in Acts 7:6, in confirmation,
just as Genesis 15 is in anticipation.
450 is just what one would
expect on such a basis.
A further detail of interest
is Joshua's
precise invasion time for reaching the distribution of lands as in Joshua 13ff..
Thus, if he were 40 when
made Commander in the assault on Ai, and made a close to Moses as
suggested in Exodus 32:17 at the time of the golden calf episode, then it
follows he would be 80 at the time for the entry into the Promised Land, so that
if the main distribution took till he was 100 before death at 110, we would have
430 plus 40 plus perhaps 20 making 490, minus time for flourishing and
exaltation in Egypt as the point of departure.
It is all approximate;
but it seems for that very reason to take the 400 year base as in Genesis 15,
because of its fame in terms of approximation for that period, with the 40 and
the 20 or so for Joshua to reach the point described in the text. At 460 this
gives a relevant approximation of 450.
That would appear an almost
elementary fact, for one versed at all in what would be for Paul, national
history, religiously significant. In lecturer style, he is expanding and
compressing, giving action and then time slotting it. Again, there would not
seem any ready way of explaining away the case change, unless there is precisely
that difference.
Now let us reflect. The majority text, of which the
textus receptus made use in important selections of this family in the AV,
is beautifully conveying to us the fact. It is showing itself reliable.
Certainly, one could as in the NASV expand with italicised words; but that is
only to bring out the sense of what is in the Greek data.
God has not left Himself without a most clear witness; BUT that
is not at all the same thing as saying this: that the AV is THE standard, the
ONLY translation to be used, that it is so honoured of God that it must be the
criterion.
Great as that translation is, and normatively reliable, it does
not reach to that grand height all by itself! Here once more it slips. Alas, it
even - with the NKJV, puts the time of '450 years' after the words "He gave
them judges" ,so displacing the word order in the Greek text. This makes the
ordinary reader STILL MORE confused, for it then appears that that is a closed
case. In fact, the time reference comes before that topic is mentioned, and the
rest of the point is as above.
Now this sort of thing in
the AV is a rarity, for it has a care and alertness hard to match, despite
its imperfections, elsewhere: the main problem being clarity; but that is something
which does occur in the AV, at times, partly because of the passage of time and
change of language. .
Similarly, as with all
translations, there are books or areas where the special expertise of someone is
most helpful and a feeling for, a flair comes to light as in the NIV in Job. It
is unwise to ignore this. It is unwise also to idolatrise anyone or any thing;
to make a monument and authority, a PILLAR as Paul put it, of anyone, or any
creation. ONLY GOD, ONLY THE LORD, ONLY HIS WORD is that. It is simply a
failure, if one should do otherwise; be it to honour someone or something, most
cordially, it is still an error, and how well I John 2:27 guards against it. Indeed, let us
remember that the AV is the PRODUCT of people, and you must look NOT to them but
to the Lord.
Now someone may say, It
is not idolatry to prefer a version; and of course, this is so. What is
idolatry is to have such reverential feelings toward anyone or anything not the
Lord, with whatever good intention or even in one sense, admirable loyalty, that
one dispenses with the full breadth of what the Lord is doing. That is why it is
quite unscriptural as noted in Repent or Perish 1,
End-note 1, to have this ism-itis, the inflammation of the 'ism', this
tendency to set some one theologian as one's real parent, the name by which we
are called. Paul condemns it explicitly, expressly in I Cor. 3.
It is FORBIDDEN. How long
does it take for people to realise that just as the RC horror of cordially
disobeying Christ (Matthew 23:8-10) in calling people 'father' is not the ONLY
way to fall. In that sense, of spiritual supervisor and master or authority, it
is for CHRIST ONLY. It is not only by EVERY word which proceeds out of the mouth
of God which one is to live (Matthew 4:4), but by no other AT THAT LEVEL!
NOTHING may add even a jot! Suggestions may abound, authority however is vested
not elsewhere, and its administration is not another name for its supervision
with complexes and cords, chains and additives, stringencies and requirements,
provided courtesy of some kind party - again, however well-intentioned such may
be!
What then ? The AV is fine,
but not final in all things. Its eminent and justly famed serviceability is
indeed a useful barrier to some of the subtle intrigues in the area of the Greek
text, which so many for so long have seemingly so supinely accepted. That
however is no excuse for idolatrising it, or treating it in such a way as to
contravene Biblical restrictions for our liberty and our walk in love in the
Lord; for the simple fact is this, that as soon as you set up these human
instruments (i.e. work of a particular set of translators to the exclusion of
all others, or the same in a particular theologian) , you are limiting the
liberty of the word of God, and that inhibits the love which abides in His word:
it is polluting your inheritance, in the very desire to preserve it pure.
How one praises the Lord to
have put the things before us in this external evidential way, letting the
testimony of His due care and wonderful control of things appear in this also,
the preservation of the thrust and meaning of His text to achieve the fulfilment
of His promises.