the Hebrew tradition - knowledge of David Kimchi, Rashi, Mik'raot Gedelot, Targumim and more - David Daiches

Steven Avery

Administrator
WIP

This is a topic that I have covered on many individual verses over the years.
Psalm 12:6-7 is an example that is definitely online.

There is a need for a book that shows the superiority of the AV in utilizing these resources, instead of the deficient modern Hebrew attempts since the 1800s.

This first book I have to check as to whether it is still in my library (some books I let go to a Singapore pastor friend! :) )

The King James version of the English Bible: an account of the development and sources of the English Bible of 1611 with special reference to the Hebrew tradition (1941)
David Daiches
http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/355561/editions?editionsView=true&referer=br
http://www.amazon.com/King-James-Version-English-Bible/dp/0208004939
 
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Steven Avery

Administrator
Facebook - Pure Bible - April 2015
https://www.facebook.com/groups/purebible/permalink/783430685082156/

The King James Version of the English Bible - An Account of the Development and Sources of the English Bible of 1611 with Special Reference to the Hebrew Tradition (1941, 1968 edition)
David Daiches (1912-2005)

"... Jerome, learning Jewish traditional renderings from Jewish teachers, must have incorporated these in the Vulgate. And so it comes about that the Vulgate Old Testament differs much less from the traditional Jewish interpretation than might be expected. When sixteenth-century translators made use of Jewish commentators, such as David Kimchi, in order to clear up doubtful points in the Hebrew text, they did not realize that some of he traditional renderings which Kimchi records were already embodied in the Vulgate, owing to the Jewish sources of Jerome's Hebrew education. And when we realize that the translators of the Authorized Version of the Old Testament made great use of Kimchi's commentary and based their translation on versions which derived from the Vulgate as well as renderings from the Hebrew based on the Hebrew knowledge made available by the scholarship of the school of Reuchlin, who himself had Jewish teachers -- when we see how at every stage English Old Testament Bible translation is reinforced by works embodying traditional Jewish interpretations, we begin to realize how dependent on Jewish sources Christian interpretation of the text of the Old Testament has been. It was not until a long time after the Authorized Version was completed that Christian Hebrew scholarship began to make itself independent of Jewish influence, so far as such independence was desirable or possible." (p. 91-92)

Steven Avery

As far as we can tell, there was no real justification for the phrase "appointed to be read in churches" ... whatever theoretical authorization the 1611 version may have lacked, it was the first English Bible translation to have been initiated at a conference summoned by the king and to have awakened the king's active interest to the extent that it did. ... apart from all this, the super merits of the 1611 Bible soon won for it a position in the country which was as high as any authorization could have effected. p. 70-72

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Steven Avery
Admin
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The blunders and totally false analysis of James Price (separate thread planned, this is sitting on another forum from a couple of years back) in his NKJV agitprop book, accusing the AV of various emendations based on his private, false definition of convenience (anything that is not directly Ben Hayim as he understands the Hebrew through modern scholarship dim eyes and a weak Scrivener filter), might have been avoided by Price if he had read Daiches and had any ethical sense.
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This next section is auxiliary to explaining that there were very solid and in depth Hebraic library Bible edition and commentary and grammar sources available directly to the learned men. Along with their superb skills and the sufficient time that was given to the labours and the cross-checking committee system. One irony is that James Price was in fact aware that they had many Hebrew Bible editions and strong resources, yet he still strained to falsely accuse.
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Daiches

To determine exactly and in detail the sources of A.V would be an impossible task, as the combinaions of possible sources which would have yielded the same results are almost infinite in number .. the problem is impossibly complex. ... Of English versions .. Tyndale, Coverdale's Bible, "Matthew's" Bible, the Great Bible, Taverner's Bible the Geneva Bible and the Bishops' Bible... different editions. Of translations of languages other than English .. Complutensian Polyglot, Luther's Bible, the Zurich Bible, the Latin Bible of Paginus, the Latin Old Testament of Münster (lists 10 more).... it is impossible to give definitely the source of an A.V. rendering which differs from most or all of the declared principle sources but yet agrees with, say, Tremellius and the commentary of David Kimchi; or with Pagninus and the Targum; or with Leo Juda and one of the French versions. ... any given renderings might have come from one of many available sources. Was it Kimchi or Tremellius that suggested the rendering in the first of the cases just cited? Was it Paginus or the Targum in he second? ... One might prove that Kimchi has influenced the rendering of all the principal cruxes in a certain book, yet because Kimchi's influence runs through most of the European versions of the sixteenth century, this would be no conclusive evidence of the use of that commentary by the A.V. .. Of course, the A. V. translators did not choose a rendering blindly; if they did accept an interpretation from a given source, it was because they convinced that it was right, so ultimately the version does reflect their own scholarship in the original tongues. In no case did they accept an interpretation from a given source solely on account of the prestige of that sources. (explains the special strength of Kimchi) (p. 172-173)
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In reading Daiches (the overall analysis and one direct reference to non-emendation) it is clear that the learned men give no evidence of ever emending the Hebrew text.
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What the NKJV charlatan James Price did was combine huge holes and deficiencies in the Scrivener source analysis, with peddling his own totally bogus definitions and his own lack of knowledge and familiarity with the Hebraic sources. He put that all together and thus accused the AV of OT emendations.
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It was quite tawdry. And in the modern pablum scholarship milieu, he gets away with that nonsense. (Donald Waite, to his credit, made some attempts to counter the James Price agitprop, however Waite often missed the real issues and the big issues.)
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Steven Avery
Admin
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The first Bodleian (Oxford) Librarian was Thomas James (1573-1629) and there was a catalogue of books published in 1605. This would be one of the sources available to the learned men.
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"The Hebrew items in James's catalogue should therefore be fairly representative of the material available for English translators at this time. .. a cross-section ... surprisingly varied. There are several Hebrew texts of the Old Testament, of which the two most used by Bodleian readers were almost certainly those in the Complutensian and Antwerp poylglots. ... .all the available Hebrew grammars, including those of David Kimchi, Moses Kimchi, Reuchlin, Münster, Bertram and Martinius.. the Aramaic grammar and dictionary of Münster and the Aramaic and Syriac grammar of Tremellius .. copies of Targum Onkelos and Targum Jonathan, both in the original and in the Latin translation (apart from the texts in the polyglots)... fair number of rabbinical works, including some complete Talmud sets ... biblical commentaries of Lyra, Arias Montanus, Conrad Pellican and John Drusius ... Jewish commentaries, those of David Kimchi (several editions), Rashi, Levi ben Gershom, Abarbanel, and a few minor commentators ... Hebrew dictionaries, in addition to those included in the grammars already mentioned and David Kimchi's Liber radicum, there are those of Avernarius, Celepinus, and Pagninus, and the Hebrew-Latin-Italian dictionary of David de Pomis .. minor cabalistic works. ... ample scope for those translating from the original Hebrew. For a complete study of the material available for the A.V. translators, it would be necessary to examine the contents of all contemporary libraries, both public and private. (p. 165-166).
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Steven Avery
 
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Steven Avery

Administrator
Steven Avery
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The next quote is not from Daiches, it is from the 1800s, and shows that at least some savvy scholars had a sense of the depth of the study, knowledge, dedication and diverse sources available to the learned men. . As such, it goes well with Daiches.
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Southern Presbyterian review, Volume 10 (1858)
Revision Movement (p. 493-519)
Richard Strong Gladney (1806-1869)
http://books.google.com/books?id=vfsQAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA510

1. The character of the age in which they lived.—"
The age in which our translation was made was pre-eminently a learned age. In science and the arts, that in which we live is, we admit, greatly beyond its predecessors. But so far as learning and scholarship is concerned, we do affirm there never has been an age equal to it. There never was an age so distinguished by so many illustrious scholars in every department of classical and biblical learning. Where do we go for profound original information on Latin, Greek or Oriental Literature? Where are the great storehouses from which our bookmakers draw their Lexicons, their Grammars, their Commentaries? Was Melancthon a mere Latin scholar? Did Roger Ascham know nothing of Greek ? Were Erpenius, and Golius, and Pococke, unacquainted with Arabic? Was Hebrew a dead letter to such men as Buxtorf, Morinus, Pagninus, Arias Montanus, Tremellius, Junius, Beza, Castell, Walton and Pool ? Where is the Public Library, three-fourths of whose volumes on sacred philology are not dated in the 16th and 17th centuries? We find in this period among the magnates of Oriental and Classical learning besides those already mentioned, such names as Budaeus, Erasmus, Turnebus, the Scaligers, P. Manutius, Aldus Manutius the younger, Casaubon, Fagius, the Morels, Gesner, Fabricus, Morus, Glass, Capellus, Grotius, Usher, Lightfoot, Montfaucon, Vossius, Heinsius, (father and son), Bochart, Meursius, Robert and Henry Stephens, all of them scholars of the very highest order; to say nothing of the incomparable divines, and illustrious authors of every sort and in every nation, who flourished during the same period. Now, though all these were not living at the time our translation was made, yet a majority of them were cotemporary with the translators; and they show the general character of the age, that it was the age of great men, especially of great scholars. The eighteenth century excelled it in science and works of taste. But for men of profound erudition, beyond all contradiction there never was such a period since the foundation of the world. The turn which the Reformation took, and the great controversies, between the Papacy and its opposers, appealing at every step to the original languages of the Scriptures, made Greek and Hebrew what politics is now, the great absorbing topic of the world. Critical editions of the Bible and of Classical authors were published on a scale and in a style utterly unparalleled. The immense Thesaurus of the Greek language, by Henry Stephens; the Rabbinical Lexicon, of Buxtorf; the Arabic Lexicon, of Golius ; the Hierozoicon, of Bochart, the twelve folio volumes of Meursius on Grecian Antiquities, are but specimens of the thorough-going manner in which the scholars of that day handled every subject which they attempted. It is impossible even to glance at their productions without a profound veneration of their scholarship, only equalled by our amazement at the effrontery which would call it in question. Their very printers were learned men. Even their books of devotion are so crowded with Greek and Hebrew that many a sciolist of these days could not read a page in them without his Lexicon and Grammar, who yet would not blush to call himself a scholar, or to attempt with some " consulted aids " to make "a new translation of the Bible." (p. 510-511)
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Steven
Richard Gladney's words apply of course to the hundreds of translations, usually from corrupt texts, by a wide variety of incompetents, paid hirelings and amateurs.
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Yet, they also apply to our modern seminarian pidgin Greek and halting Hebrew-reading scholars, who attain total non-fluency from semesters in seminary.
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Then, from their position of complete non-fluency, they feel they have the expertise to correct the fifty giants, the learned men of the AV-1611. And they want us to waste precious years to match their level of incompetence. (Waste years studying Greek so you can get a big head, thinking you understand a language you can not even speak, then be sure you pick up the bogus ideas of the modern Wallace and Dahood types, a special breed of charlatan.)
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Have you run into some of these on the forums and in various articles?
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By contrast the learned men were in an environment where competency was required even before entering the university, and the classics, Bible, and church writers were read daily, and discourse was the norm, and, e.g. public debates would be held in Greek. They knew the Biblical languages fluently. Those days are long gone.
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Steven Avery
One more related note, given by Gladney.
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Dr. George Hakewell, a cotemporary, in a work first published in 1627, says,
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'This latter age hath herein so far excelled, that all the great learned scholars, who have of late risen, especially if they adhered to the Reformed Churches, have been by friars and such like people, in a kind of scorn, termed grammarians. But these grammarians are they who presented us with so many exact translations out of Hebrew and Greek. into Latin, and again out of Latin into other languages. To which may be added the exquisite help of dictionaries, lexicons and grammars, in this latter age, beyond the precedent, not only for the easier learning of the western languages, Latin, Italian, Spanish, and French, but especially the eastern, the Hebrew, the Chaldaic, the Syriac, the Arabic. Of all the ancient fathers, but only two (among the Latins, St. Jerome, and Origen among the Grecians), are found to have excelled in the Oriental languages; this last century having afforded more skillful men in that way than the other fifteen since Christ.'
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Now is it probable that, only twenty years before this testimony was written, the monarch of an enlightened nation, himself proud of being thought a learned man, and ambitious to effect a version of the Scriptures that might be quoted as the great glory of his reign, should not be able, out of fifty-four of the principal scholars in the Kingdom, including the Hebrew and Greek professors of the Universities, and the most distinguished heads and fellows of the several Colleges, to obtain any learned and honest enough to "translate directly from the original." But laying aside all probabilities, what are the known facts of the case as recorded by unquestioned contemporary historians ? Who were the venerable men called by King James to this celebrated undertaking ? (the article continues with the specific translators)" — (p. 510-512)
The George Hakewill work is :
Apologie or Declaration of the Power and Providence of God (1627).

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Price is a doozy charlatan. What he did to try to accuse the AV of multiple "emendations" is a textbook case of deliberate deception. Using the example case of Joshua 21:36-37 Price was well aware that this was not remotely, even in any strained sense, an emendation. As the term is used in Bible text circles. And he was well aware of the wide range of knowledge of the learned men of Hebraic sources.
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Price deliberately and consciously made up a totally bogus definition for the sole purpose of trying to sell more copies of his counterfeit (which Greek text he does not accept as authentic) and to try to throw his mud on the pure AV.
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As a charlatan, I would say he is more skillful than James White and more a conscious deceiver than Daniel Wallace. Think Mo, Larry and Curly. The three stooges of the modern version industrial complex. Today's pharisees of the corrupt and conflicting versions. The multi-modern version teaching, fresh from the hortian fog, is one leaven of the pharisees .. we are finding the word of God, come to us, you supplicants, and we will parcel it out to you.

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Jack McElroy
Thanks for the link Steven
Price was an enigma to me.
He seemed to be on the up and up but some of his comments were little disingenuous.
Rick Norris just asks rhetorical questions.
I think he may have been a student of Price's at Tennessee Temple.

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Steven Avery
Admin
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Could be. Norris uses a Jesuit probabilism style of writing, including accusation by proxy. The questions, often loaded, are not really rhetorical, they are meant as a shield to prevent taking responsibility, since he does not want to be accountable by taking a position. And he wants to imply accusation without having to take his own position and without having to actually examine evidence as a whole. He will even place in quotes that he is fully aware are false and bogus, and then stand by them as what somebody said, therefore they are 'valid' even if totally false. Norris is simply a trickster, but it does take awhile to understand his tricks. There is a spriotual principality bondage involved, nobody with any heart for the word of God could write that way on their own.
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Here I went into this Price rigging in a bit more depth, with additional examples.
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Examining 146 Unjustifiable Emendations in the KJV
http://www.fundamentalforums.com/.../77014-examining-146...

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Peter Heisey
"Mo", "Larry", and "Curly" [in my estimation] all evidence the Jesuit style, although in slightly different ways; and it seems to me that their purpose coincides with that of the Jesuits when it comes to the KJB. Just my take on it.

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Steven Avery
While it is often a bit tricky to fully ascribe motives (lucre and status and pharisitical positioning have their allures) and to categorize techniques, your take is at the very least ... reasonable and sensible. And definitel
y the purposes coincide.
 
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Steven Avery

Administrator
John Donne and the Protestant Reformation: New Perspectives (2003)
Mary Arshagouni Papazian
https://books.google.com/books?id=jOuoAv5J_BAC&pg=PT208
p. 208-209

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https://books.google.com/books?id=jOuoAv5J_BAC&pg=PT211
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Steven Avery

Administrator
Separate post on the James Price thread on the editions from Ginsburg,
https://purebibleforum.com/index.ph...the-masoretic-text-by-the-av.2024/#post-10729

and soon Dibdin

(1827) Dibdin, Thomas Frognell - An introduction to the knowledge of rare and valuable editions of the Greek and Latin Classics: Together with an account of Polyglot Bibles, Polyglot psalters, Hebrew Bibles, Greek Bibles and Greek Testaments; the Greek fathers, and the Latin fathers
 
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