CHAPTER VII — The Bible For All Peoples
CHAPTER VII --- The Bible For All Peoples VII. THE BIBLE FOR ALL PEOPLES
By CHARLES H. ROBERSON
More than nineteen centuries ago The Master said: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation.” It is recorded “And they went forth and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by the signs that attended it” (Mark 16:15; Mark 16:20). Also, He said: “And the gospel must first be preached to all nations” (Mark 13:10). (RSV)
RETROSPECTIVE
The Old Covenant was written chiefly in the Hebrew language; the New, in the Greek of the Koine Period. Translation began in the third century before Christ. What is called the Septuagint, the source of so many quotations of the New Covenant in Greek from the Old was the first. In the second century A.D. the Syriac New Covenant was probably the first of the great translations and stands second only to the Latin Vulgate and the English Bible in its far-flung influence. Also in the second century Latin texts were made; and these culminated in Jerome’s great “Vulgate” translation of the fourth and the fifth centuries. In the twelfth century A.D. translations in modern languages or their immediate ancestors began. Yet less than a score are recorded before 1450 A.D. On the eve of the invention of printing, only thirty-three languages have had any part of the Bible translated. However, *It is recognized that the “Targums”—somewhat free translations from the classical Hebrew into Aramaic, may have existed in written form before the first century A.D. (cf. T. Walker in Hastings Die. of Bible, IV, 678). Some scholars maintain that Mt., Mk., Lk., were written in Aramaic and translated therefrom into Greek (C. C. Torrey, Our Translated Gospels). But the evidence is not conclusive. the first hundred years of printing saw great history-making versions of the whole Bible put into print. But. even by 18C0 A.D. only seventy-one languages and dialects had some printed portions of the Bible. The next thirty years saw an amazing expansion—eighty-six languages received some part of the Bible—more than in all the eighteen centuries preceding The British and Foreign Bible Society was founded in 1804, and the American Bible Society in 1816. Through these, translators were aided and the fruits of their labor in printed form sent forth for widespread distribution. These thirty years were no flash in the pan. In the years between them and the end of 1944 there have been added 911 languages. This then gives a resume of an amazing achievement— some substantial part of the Bible translated and published in 1068 languages and dialects. Let no one think that this has been the adventure of putting a few verses of Scripture into as many languages as possible as a tour de force8 (exhibition of skill). On the contrary there are 185 languages with whole Bibles; there are 234 more with whole New Covenant; 560 more with at least one whole book, and 89 more with selections. For those who have minds to discern, this achievement outranks the whole gamut of modern invention, at which we so often marvel! For implicit in it is a hope for the human family which no amount of secular learning or scientific technique can offer. THE ACHIEVERS
Turning from the achievement to the achievers, it is most obvious to al1 that a comparatively small group of people in the church are whole-heartedly evangelistic. Alas, only a minority part! What might have been won if that minority had been a great majority! It is this minority that has held that the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ was not given to assure respectability but to redeem a world from destruction and death. It is this minority who appreciate the priceless value of the redemptive love of God in Christ, and pour out prayers and treasures that the message of the Bible might be given to all peoples.
Tribute must be given to the translators. Down through the centuries they by faith subdued languages and so kingdoms, wrought righteousness, out of weakness became strong, and endured trials of bonds and imprisonment. This is not the time to call the roll of intrepid explorers who were destitute, afflicted and tormented, nor of their wives who did endless copying and proof-reading, yet by their faith put the Bible into a thousand and more languages. It is related that one woman inserted in the manuscript of a translation made by her husband 120,000 commas. Let us trust that their number was matched by the wisdom with which they were placed.
It is imperative that disciples of the Master be impelled by an unwavering purpose that every man wdling to possess the Bible may have it in his own tongue, and at a price within his reach, however much ifl may cost to produce it.
The Bible is God’s Book for the world. The making of it, the translating of it, the distributing of it to all peoples, is a part of His plan, whereby men are being redeemed. The Bible is for man not by the will of man but by the will of God. It is His Providence that raised up the hosts of translators, imbued people with missionary enthusiasm. And it is God who cads us to labor, that they, with us, may be “made perfect.”
PROSPECTIVE
Let no one think that translation of the Bible into nearly eleven hundred tongues that nothing more needs to be done.
There is much to be done, and they who by faith have made translations and who have, indeed obtained a glorious report wait for vdiat we, under God, have now to do. Mark 13:10, —“the gospel must first be published among all nations”—is a reminder of what God expects of us, particularly when one discerns that the word nations here, does not signify what we mean by nations today—politically organized national entities —but, in the sense of the Greek £
It was not until 1937 that a Gospel was translated in Kekch' (Guatemala) spoken by some 120,000 people. In Mexico there are over 300,000 people who speak only Mexi- cano, and over 100,000 speaking only Mixteco; perhaps several translations will be required for each of these because of dialect differences. Some of these are already being studied by the Wycliffe Translators and several translations in new languages are on the press or nearly ready for it. It is quite probable that there are now 1,000 more forms of speech in the world in which new translations are needed. When it comes to religion, to the things of the home and the heart, no speech is adequate save the home-speech. This is the deepest reason why the Bible must be in the mother tongue of the people. Oliver .Wendell Holmes in The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table says: “Language is a solemn thing; it grows out of life, out of its agonies and its ecstasies, its wants and its weariness. Every language is a temple in which the soul of those who speak it is enshrined.”
Wyclif wrote, “Crist and His apostlis taughten ye puple in yat tunge yat was moost knowun to ye puple. Why shoulden not men nou do so ?” There are some hundreds of languages in which there is need for at least the New Covenant where only one or two of the Gospels exist. For example, there are 300,000 Sulu Moros in the Philippines who have only one Gospel; likewise 280,000 Quiche Indians in Guatemala; 295,000 Dioula on the Ivory Coast. There are two Gospels only for 1,300,000 Shilluk in the Sudan; for 1,800,000 Balinese in the Dutch East Indies. To carry the Bible to these peoples and to millions of others in similar situations is a challenge to professing Christians that can not be lightly pushed aside. This involves labor, long and expensive, but full of reward in the life of our world neighborhood.
Since languages in use are living, flowing things, there is the constant need for revisions. Rarely does a version remain permanently what the people should have. When native church workers in India began to use the new revised Tamil version, they spoke of feeling as if they had a new sharp plow with which to cultivate their fields. Even with the widespread use of the Authorized and Revised versions in English, and the many translations of individual scholars, three major revisions are available or in the making. The New York Times of date, October 4, 1936, listed, The revision of the American Standard Revised Version (set up by the International Council of Religious Education) ; the British Westminster revision by the Roman Catholic Church; and a “modern” translation projected by a group of American Roman Catholics.
Superb as many of the translations and revisions have been, the time will come when men trained in Greek and Hebrew and masters of their own speech, who with devotion equal to their predecessors will make the Bible even more vivid and powerful in their mother tongue. Then indeed will new light break again out of the Scriptures. THE GREAT URGENCY
Printed translations may exist in some part in the speech of nine-tenths of the world’s population. But it is a disastrous mistake to think that the Bible is in the hands of nine-tenths of the people of the world. On a “calculated guess” considerably less than one-fifth of them actually possess the Bible. The total world population was given by A. M. Carr- Saunders, in World Population, Oxford University Press, 1936, as 2,028,000,000; Hubners Geographish-Statistische Tabe In Aller Lander Brde, 72 Edition, Leipsic, 1936, as 2,092,940,000. It is estimated that the annual increase is 15,000,000.8 Population under ten years of age in the United States as of 1931 was 24,051,999, January 1944 (estimated) 27,473,600,7 that is about twenty per centum. This rate is high for the world as a whole. If one sets aside 20% of the population who are supplied, and another 20% for those under ten years of age, more than 1,200,000,000 are left without the Bible. Not considering replacement copies, a generous estimate is 20,000,000 copies of the Bible or some part of it are distributed annually. Yet, consideration must be taken of 'Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, art. “Population.” On January 1, 1944, the population was estimated by the Bureau of the Census to be 137,368,379. 600,000,000 literate persons without the Bible and as many more not yet literate, though of literate age.8 The Bible Press, 1938) estimates about half of the world to be yet illiterate, either whole or part is in the languages of all perhaps but a tenth of these millions. The task is to see that they have the chance to have it. In the parts of the world where the Bible is best known —United States, Canada, Europe, Australia, New Zealand— population is estimated as 630,000,000 with an estimated yearly increase of 6,000,000.° Even here the distribution of the Bible or parts of it is not keeping pace with the growth of the population.
Turning to other parts of the world, the great populations of Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Islands of the Pacific must be considered. In these areas about 2,000,000 copies of the Bible and some 15,000,000 single gospels and other single parts are distributed annually. And this over against a population of some 1,400,000,000! The distribution is less than one-third the annual increase in population. The circulation of Gospels and other single books might catch up, statistically, with the population in 160 years without considering increase in population.
Translations into nigh 1100 languages are a priceless resource, indispensable to the world’s advance. But they are powerless until distributed. They are seed in the granary; not until the seed is sown can there be any hope of harvest. The major advance in giving the Bible to all peoples lies in distribution. For here depends the hope of countless millions of humble despairing folk and the possibility of saving the world from bitterness and destruction. In 1883 Dr. G. F. Verbeck, a veteran missionary in Japan, quoted with approval the verdict that if the choice were ever *F. C. Laubach (in Toward a Literate World, Columbia University ’Summary of figures drawn from Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, to be between the Bible without the teacher or the teacher without the Bible he would unhesitatingly choose the former. The Bible itself is the most powerful of all vernacular preachers. It goes where the human preacher cannot go. It stays when the human preacher must leave. It hides in the memory and soul and cannot be expelled. Its message reaches men of every people and condition.
SELECTIVE
Now shall consideration turn to the imperative responsibility of the church. Not the place to account for lack of conviction, or why those loyal to conviction hesitate to express it. It may be that multitudes, hearing the storm of controversy and criticism about the Bible a generation and more ago, took refuge in an indifference to which the present generation is heir. Or over-enthusiasm about the scope of science and the possible achievements of man “on his own” may be suggestive. There were many misconceived “defenses” of the Bible; when such crumbled, many who could not see beyond them thought the Bible had crumbled also. A deluge of new knowledge, surprisingly intricate relationships of industry and commerce in an emergence of “one world,” omnipresent new amusements—all have swiftly overwhelmed men and so displaced the center of their thought. Religion is for many pushed to the margin or beyond it. Whatever may be the cause, far too many regard the Bible with respect and a vague loyalty, but without conviction and fervor. The many conflicting religions could not have come into being had the imperative declarations of the Bible laid hold upon the multitudes. It is those who grasp most firmly the primary meaning of the Bible who resist most faithfully the falsehood on which so many of the “isms” of the world rest. In the hesitation and perplexity of the church and the overwhelming confusion of the world, the hope and the remedy lie in the Bible itself. Out of the years of criticism, the Bible and the Christian faith have emerged stronger than ever before—not stronger because anything has been added, but because of having been freed from a vast weight of misconception, freed from methods of interpretation false to their spirit, freed from confusion as to historical basis, freed trom entanglement with philosophies never a part of their genius. With all assurance men may be directed to the Bible as the primary and unique witness to Almighty God. This assurance does not come upon men as a reality because someone says so, no matter how authoritative. It comes from knowing the Bible. If men are to find in the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ the one Being worthy of unreserved loyalty, if they are to lean their whole weight on Him for the salvation so urgently needed, the one place they can find Him is in the Bible, and the one thing needed to do with the Bible is to read it—and read it and read it. Courage to stand off other preoccupations, faith that here is the supreme hope for man, patience with what one may not understand, and willingness to do God’s will—this and reading God’s Word constitute the imperative need. This is God’s way to bring men into His Presence. If humankind, the world around, multitudes harassed by poverty, ignorance, and war and the few who build in their vanity proud houses on wealth and force and the sowing of hate—shall come to know that the God and Father of Our Lord Jesus Christ is Sovereign of all—they must have the Bible.
CONCLUSION
No one can deny that the Bible should be given to all peoples. More than nineteen centuries have passed since the Master gave the command to take the “Good News” “to every creature.” John wrote, “Thou didst purchase unto God with thy blood men of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation” (Revelation 5:9). On the birthday of the church men heard in the languages in which they were horn the wonderful works of God (Acts 2:6; Acts 2:8; Acts 2:11). How thankful we are that we have the Bible in English, and we express tribute to those earnest men who through trials and tribulations gave to us in our own language the Book that has meant more to England and the United States of America and Canada than all the other books of the world combined.
What can you do of lasting value apart from the Bible? It is through the Word of God that men are born again (1 Peter 1:23). We are nourished by the Word (1 Peter 2:2). It is through that precious Book that we are equipped for service (2 Timothy 3:16). THE BIBLE IS THE DOOR OF HOPE THAT MUST BE OPENED TO ALL PEOPLE. The United States of America rests upon four cornerstones: the English Bible, the English language, the common law, and the traditions of liberty. THE BIBLE HAS MADE ALL THAT IS GREAT WHICH AMERICA POSSESSES.
Without the Bible, America could not have become what it has. Let us then be up and doing so that all peoples of the earth may have the Bible. The Bible is a teacher of our best men, a rebuke to our worst, and a noble companion to all.
“I am not an optimist; there is too much evil in the world and in me.
“Nor am I a pessimist; there is too much good in the world, and God.
“I am rather, I suppose, a meliorist, believing God wills to make the world
better, trying to do my bit to help, and wishing it were more.”—Henry Dyke. The BIBLE IS “THE LIVING AND ABIDING WORD OF GOD.”