BIBLE TRANSLATIONS.

Dominion, Volume 4, Issue 1126, 13 May 1911, Page 9

BIBLE TRANSLATIONS.

A reviewer not long ago paid a compliment to the "anonymous translator" who, in his rendering of the "Song of Solomon" in the Authorised Version of the Scriptures, had done such superb justice to his original. The truth, however, is that that version is far more a revision than a fresh translation, and the present stato of the "Song of Solomon', is not the felicity of one translator, but the final form into which a series of revisions had at last evolved. It is largo ly a composite work, and contains choice things taken from many versions. It is. interesting to note this in connection with the passage made up of the 6th and 7th verses of the Bth chapter, which so. impeccablo an "indicator" as Mr. Saintsbury declares to bo the best example known to him of "absolutely perfect English prose." Hero it is:—: "Set mo as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thino arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as tho grave; the coals thereof are coals of fire, which hath a most vehement flame. Many waters cannot quench love, neither can tho floods drown: if a man would give all the substance of his house for love, it would utterly be contemned." Neither the Septuagint nor tho Vulgate catch as this rendering does the concise and solemn energy of tho Hebrew. The Vulgate, indeed, in the two occurrences of the word "love" renders "diloctio" and "charitas," neither of which is a full equivalent to tho passionate "alhabah" of the original.! As printed from the Latin in the Douay version of 1609, the passage begins with "Put" instead of "Set" and ends "as nothing he shall despise it" ; it has "overwhelms" instead of "drown," and reads "jealousy is hard as hell, the lamps thereof lamps of firo and flames." Miles Coverdalo came nearer the spirit of the.original when he wrote (1535) :— "O'seti'me'as a seal upon thino heart, and as a seal upon thine arm; for love is mighty as the death, jealousy as tho hell; His coals are of fire, and a very ■flame of; tlio'Lord; so that many waters are not able to quench love, neither may tho streams drown it;_ yea if a man would give all the good of his house for lovo he should count it nothing." Conipared with our version this is inferior, but it was an advance, and Cramner transcribed the passage verbatim into his version of four years later. The Bishops' Bible paid it a like compliment, only altering the difficult "coals of. fire" clause into "her, coals are coals of fire and a very vehement flame (of tho Lord)." Tho Bishops would have done wisoly, however, to have profited moro by tho Genevan Version of 15G0. It run thus:— "Set me as a seal on thine heart, and as a signet upon thino arm, for love is strong as death, jealousy is cruel as tho grave; the coals thereof aro fiery coals and a vehement flame. Much water cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it; if a man should give all tho substance of his house for love they would greatly contemn it."_ Here we are within measurable distance- of the Authorised Version. In tho company of eight who, sitting at Cambridge, translated this portion of the Scriptures there seems to have been no man of surpassing genius, but they made up a composite person of. thorough scholarship and endowed with a fine sense of language. Even the touch of stiffness which, with a knowledge of tho original, one may. detect . in the phrase "which hath a most vehement flamo" is cunningly'disguised for readers of a later day by tho archaic "hath." Their rendering accordingly may be accepted as. final, and most will judge that, if the Kovisers achieve a more complete litoralncss, they go just ono stop beyond perfection in printing "the flashes thereof are flashes of fire, a very flame of tho Lord."—"Manchester' Guardian."