MAORIES AND THE BIBLE.

Auckland Examiner, Volume 1, Issue 12, 5 March 1857, Page 3

MAORIES AND THE BIBLE.

(To the Editor of the Auckland Examiner.)

Sir, —In the review, in the “ Auckland Examiner," February sth, of the lecture on Maori Superstitions, th e following sentiment occurs “\Pakehas -have educated the Maories just up to the point of cunning. We have covered their land with Bibles, without curing themselves of their vices.” It is fifty years ago since missionaries were sent from England to this country to give the Maories the Bible, yet, instead of their land being covered with copies, they have never seen a Bible in their own language. A considerable number of copies of the New Testament, very imperfectly translated, were printed in Maori nearly twenty years since, and about 10,000 six or seven years agobut all, long erenow, must be almost worn but and destroyed. I have seen parts of the New Translation, which missionaries are promising to have ready for printing shortly, —as they have been continually promising for the last thirty years—and in every passage I examined I observed a greater or lesser number of the words of the authorised English version, not translated, but spelt as Maories would pronounce and spell those English words—which is an irreverend and bold tampering with the word of God. There are thousands of Hebrew and Greek words in the English Bible untranslated, because the translators could not find satisfactory' equivalents for them in our language ; but the translators of the Maori Bible, when at a loss for a Maori equivalent, go to our English Bible, take the word out of the passage under consideration, and, whether properly or, as is often the case, improperly translated, array it in a Maori dress, and thus insert it in their-Maori translation. The translators of our authorised version are never guilty of this deceitful and fallacious bungling, nor are the translators of the Septuaginf, nor of the Vulgate, nor of the most popular French version, nor of any other, so far as I know, except the Maori version. Far be it from me to bring a railing accusation against any man, but the truth should be told, let the consequences be what they will. No missionaries that are, or ever were, under the sun, hive been more highly favoured by a government than the New Zesland missionaries, and there are none that have done less than them in giving their adherents the Bible. They came to this country before it was fully translated into any one of the one hundred and fifty languages to which the Governor alluded at the Bible Society meeting, on the 30tb ult.. and to this hour, in consequence of their procrastination, they dare not, without the highest insolence and mockery, say to their adherents, the Maories, “ Search the Scriptures.” And, because there are no Maori Scriptures to search, they have placed the Aborigines in the position of a jury that must come to a decision, on an infinitely important case, without the depositions cf witnesses, and with no other guide but the speeches of prejudiced advocates and of half-educated counsellors.

A faithful translation of the Bible is a more powerful safeguard around a nation than a wall of fire, which Bible missionaries of all nations, except those of New Zealand, have thought it their first duty' to translate : and, had the Missionaries of this country followed their example in producing a Maori Bible, instead of promising, year after year, throughout a whole generation, to have one ready for publication in a few months, most assuredly we would not hear one word of what we are, with alarm, daily hearing, viz., the intense anxiety apparent in our legislative assemblies to raise militia to be drilled in the art of war, in numerous bands throughout the count)y, to defend ns from Moody and unmerciful onsets of the savage aborigines, becoming more and more savage as they are becoming more and more destitute of the Scriptures, which make men wise; for not by spiritual

artillery, or any other means, save through a Maori Bible, will their increasing barbarous ferocity and unmercifulness be displaced by mercy, and by the graces and virtues which enter into the composition of mercy. I am, &c., W. C.