VITAL TEAM-WORK

Te Ao Hou, Spring 1952, Page 14

VITAL TEAM-WORK The committee was a representative one, and much is owed to all its members. Sir Apirana himself was the first to admit that team-work and the pooling of experiences were of vital importance in such an undertaking. Subsequently, Mr Pei Te Hurinui Jones was co-opted as a member of the committee. A Maori linguist, and an authority on Maori lore and history, he represented the Tainui dialect, in which the Old Testament of the Maori Bible was written by men like Dr Maunsell. Arising out of the same conference, two further resolutions should be noted here and quoted in full. These should dispel all the criticism and misunderstanding which arose from different quarters during the course of our work. The first resolution was moved by the Right Rev. the Bishop of Aotearoa, seconded by the Rev. Eru Te Tuhi, and agreed to: ‘That this committee is of the opinion that the Very Rev. J. G. Laughton, Superintendent of the Maori Missions of the Presbyterian Church, should be sent to London to see the revision of the Maori Bible through the press, and further, that, if the British and Foreign Bible Society approve of this proposal, the authorities of the Presbyterian Church be asked to release him from his present duties for the necessary time.’ In the second resolution it was laid down that: ‘This committee, convened in the Frederic Wallis House, Lower Hutt, in connection with the revision and re-publication of the Maori Bible, puts on record its conception of the task to which the committee, as being the production of the most perfect edition of the Maori Bible within the capacity of its members, by the removal of all typographical errors, by the clearing up of obscure passages in the text, and by casting the same in characteristic Maori idiom where desirable, the English Authorised Version of the Bible and the Maori translation thereof, being the basis from which the committee works. For clearing up difficulties in the text, the committee recommends to its members the use of the English Revised Version, and also to have recourse to the original Hebrew and Greek, Dr Moffatt's translation being used as a guide if thought desirable.’ Thus authorised and armed for its great assignment, the committee settled down at once to its own methods of procedure in carrying out this great work. From the outset three great principles were laid down for the general guidance of the committee: 1. Every decision made to amend, alter, or add to the text in the process of improving or clearing up, as laid down in our charter, must be the decision of the whole committee. 2. The original dialect or dialects in which the Maori Bible was first written must not be tampered with, but remain paramount. 3. The actual sittings of the committee in its revision work to be of one week's duration, and to be held in open forum, in all important Maori centres, in rotation. There was quite a flutter in Northland and other sections of the Maori community about the new revision. Some made the rather worn objection that what was good enough for our fathers was good enough for us. However, there was a real concern that the original dialect would be changed, and the literary merits of the old Bible would be replaced by a conglomeration of all the dialects represented by the members on the committee. Canon Wiremu Keretene wrote a touching letter from the Bay of Islands to a member of the committee, saying: ‘I have just concluded my lament over the passing of the dialect of our fathers: so let it be, you and I can at least give it a decent burial.’ The decision not to tamper with the original dialect or dialects, however, was very satisfying to our people in the north.