Notwithstanding the more limited and the less reliable sources of
literature (including the Bible) there was, nevertheless, substantial
and even abundant material of a historical character from which to
construct a bridge of the-continuous-history-of-literature over and
beyond the gulf of the Dark Ages. The preservation and circulation of
literature, not only sacred but profane as well, by means of written
symbols, is not limited to one language, nor to mediæval times,--nor to
the Christian Era--but reaches back into a remote age. Considering the
slow and laborious process of book-making and the generally low stage
of interest in literature throughout wide areas of the earth and for
lengthy periods of time, the amplitude of the manuscript productions of
the world, as evidenced in the ancient libraries and religious "houses"
with their various utilities, is one of the marvels of history--a
veritable wonder of the world.
Note an incident of the New Testament record which, within the realm
of sacred literature, illustrates the process by which literature in
general has been disseminated: We are informed in one of the books
of the New Testament that, early in the fourth decade of the first
century (on the first Pentecost after the crucifixion of Jesus), "there
were dwelling at Jerusalem, Jews, devout men out of every nation under
heaven." And in the effusion of the Holy Spirit which came upon them
then and there, they exclaimed--amazed and bewildered--"How hear we
every man, in our own tongue, wherein we were born? Parthians, and
Medes, and Elamites, and the dwellers in Mesopotamia, and in Judea, and
Cappadocia, in Pontus, and Asia, Phrygia, and Pamphylia, in Egypt, and
in the parts of Libya about Cyrene, and strangers of Rome, Jews and
proselytes, Cretes and Arabians, we do hear them speak in our tongues
the wonderful works of God." (The Acts 2:8-11.) As many as fifteen
distinct nationalities and races were represented in this assemblage.
It was, indeed, a cosmopolitan congregation and was composed of
inhabitants from the then known world; and nothing is more probable
than that representatives of those gathered at Jerusalem were among the
"three thousand" added to that primitive company of believers on that
occasion and that, when many of them went back to their native lands,
they returned instinct with devotion to their new-found Master, and
that, in their own respective and widely separated countries--under
the impact of this new and inspiring hope which had been begotten
within them at Jerusalem--they sowed the seed which bore the precious
fruitage of evangelism in many lands throughout the early centuries
of our Era. Indeed, the wide dispersion of the first Apostles and
disciples of Jesus to the East, to the West, and to the South--into
eastern Asia, into Europe, and into northern Africa--in the face of
efforts to repress, and over obstacles and against contending forces
everywhere, can best or only be accounted for on some such historical
presupposition as is brought to our notice in the book of The Acts.
The first Apostles, in accordance with the terms of the Great
Commission, were supernaturally endowed with "the gift of tongues" in
order to be the message-bearers of the truth unto the nations. But
this special endowment of Apostles did not extend to the peoples unto
whom the revealed truth was sent nor, indeed, to their successors in
commission. The recipients of the gospel message wrote and spoke in
many languages and dialects, and thus there was created a need and
demand for the word of God in the vernacular of many peoples. The
many versions made, soon afterwards, into the different languages and
dialects were the evidences of this demand and of its urgency and
pertinency when the Apostles with their supernatural endowments were no
longer accessible or available. In evidence of this fact we cite the
career of the Apostle Paul. It is an established fact of history that
the propagandist labors of Paul, within a little more than a quarter of
a century, extended from Jerusalem, the capital of the religious world,
to Rome, the seat of world-empire. This fact witnessed, indubitably,
to the westward growth of the Christian Church. And we have traditions,
literary, historical, and archæological evidences which indicate,
conclusively, that others of the Apostles and early Christian teachers
went eastward and southward from that common center at Jerusalem to
Egypt and the shores of the Mediterranean and the Euxine; toward, if
not unto, Babylon, Armenia, Hindustan, and the coasts of Ceylon. And
in all these sections, over what may be called "the known world" of
the time, these Christian propagandists--Apostles and disciples of
Jesus--planted churches which, many of them for long after, became
centers of evangelizing power.
The Apostles spoke and wrote in Greek, save as they were moved by the
Holy Spirit and prompted by the needs of the people at Pentecost. But
in every place whither the Apostles were sent and where converts to the
Christian faith were gathered through their preaching, there remained
the opportunity for and the need of the scriptures which had been the
burden of the apostolic message, when these first propagandists of
Christianity had passed on to other needy places. The after decline of
the Greek language as the spoken tongue and the development or adoption
of other tongues facilitated in consequence the multiplication of
the scriptures or parts thereof, or communications from leaders and
teachers, in the vernacular of different races or families of mankind.
It is an interesting fact that, during the first three centuries of
the Christian Era, and even when the Bible was interdicted, every
Christian who could possess it tried to own at least some one book of
the New Testament.
Furthermore, it is the fact sustained by scholarship and history that
numerous versions of the scriptures were made, in the early Christian
centuries, into other languages and dialects;--the Slavonic, Arabic,
Persic, and Armenian tongues; earlier still into the Gothic tongue
and the Ethiopic dialects of Abyssinia; and still earlier into the
Coptic, Latin, and Syriac dialects. [It was the estimate of Gibbon, the
historian of the _Roman Empire_, that there were probably six millions
of avowed Christians when Constantine began to patronize Christianity
in 313 A. D. And, allowing that there was one copy of the scriptures
(of the New Testament or one of its books) to each three hundred
Christians--not an extravagant supposition, considering what the
sacred writings were to the early believers--there were probably not
fewer than twenty thousand copies of the New Testament or individual
books or their parts scattered throughout the world when Christianity
came into royal favor in the Roman Empire.] These unnumbered copies
in Greek--which long continued to be the spoken language for a large
part of the world's population--together with the vast number of
versions made from the original Greek into the languages and dialects
of adjacent and contemporaneous peoples in order to meet the need of
the first Christian Churches in wide areas of the Roman Empire, down to
and after its fall, suggests the amplitude of the sacred writings _in
manuscript_ during the early centuries of our Era. This is proclaimed
as from the house-top in the large and constantly increasing number of
manuscripts, in different languages, which have been rescued as relics
from an otherwise chaotic era. It is the estimate of Dr. Marvin R.
Vincent that no fewer than 3,829 manuscripts have been discovered and
catalogued. These have been gathered from many lands--Turkey, Egypt,
the Ægean region, Cyprus, Greece, Italy, ancient Macedonia, Palestine,
Africa, Spain, the Sinaitic Peninsula, Asia Minor, and in fact, from
all Bible lands, and are preserved in the world's greatest libraries.
Professor Dobschütz summarizes the history of the versions and
translations of the Bible, throughout the centuries to the invention
of printing, as follows: "In the first period we found the Bible
translated from the Greek into Latin, Syriac, Coptic; in the next
period Gothic, Armenian, Georgian, Libyan, and Ethiopic were added, not
to mention several revisions of former translations. About 600 A. D.
the Bible was known in eight languages; in each of these there had been
several attempts at translating. There were different dialects, too;
in Coptic no less than five. The spread of Christianity in the next
period is shown by the fact that the Bible is translated--and this
again several times--into Arabic and Slavonic from the Greek, and into
the German, Anglo-Saxon, Celtic, and French from the Latin--rather
should I say, parts of the Bible, for it was only parts which people at
this period tried to translate."[15] And he shows us how this movement
to give the Bible to the people in their own vernacular spread--from
the thirteenth century on until the invention of printing--into
south-eastern France, over Italy and Germany, into England and Bohemia,
and, possibly, into Scandinavia; and declares, truly, "it is like a net
thrown all over Europe."
V