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THE IRISH ECCLESIASTICAL RECORD

MARCH, 1865.




THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND THE BIBLE.


There are few so foolish as to close their eyes against the brilliant
rays of the mid-day sun, and, at the same time, to assert deliberately
that the sun is not yet risen, and that the world is still enveloped in
darkness.

Nevertheless, something like this has been done quite recently by an
estimable Protestant nobleman, who has assured his Irish fellow-countrymen
that the Catholic Church, before the Reformation, "neither furthered
the interests of science nor disseminated the knowledge of God's written
word".[1] There was a time, indeed, when such a calumny would have been
received by the British public with applause, and when it would have
been echoed from Protestant pulpits by the predecessors of Colenso, and
by the ancestors of many who now hold a place in the councils of her
Majesty. But that calumny has been long since abandoned, even by the
enemies of our holy faith. Our assailants have laid aside the mask, and
revealed to the world the important fact, that whilst they clamoured for
the Bible, they were themselves its true enemies; and that, combating
the Church, their secret aim was to sap the foundations of inspired truth,
and thus undermine the very citadel which they pretended to defend. It is
not in England alone, but in France and Italy, and throughout the whole
continent, that this striking fact is seen. Everywhere society presents
the singular phenomenon of a sifting of its elements; and whilst all that
aspires to the supernatural life, or clings to revelation, virtue, or
truth, is gathered into the bosom of our holy Church, all that is without
the Catholic pale is hurried down the inclined plane of Protestantism,
and cast into the abyss of infidelity and rationalism. And yet, in the
face of this social miracle, a Protestant peer is bold enough to assert
that the Catholic Church is opposed to the progress of science and
inspired truth;--thus insulting the memory of his own illustrious
forefathers, and outraging the feelings of his fellow-countrymen. It is
not, however, as a matter of controversy that we wish to enter on the
present inquiry: we wish to view it merely as a matter of pure historic
truth. In a future number we hope to consider the relations of the Church
to science; our remarks to-day will only regard her solicitude during the
ante-Reformation period to diffuse among her children a salutary knowledge
of inspired truth as contained in the Holy Scriptures.

1. The first question that naturally suggests itself is, did the Church
seek to remove the sacred volume from the hands of her own ministers,
that is, of those whom she destined to teach her faithful children, and
to gather all nations into her hallowed fold? The whole daily life of
these sacred ministers of itself responds to such a question. Ask their
diurnal hours, or any page of the daily Liturgy of the Church; ask those
beautiful homilies which were delivered day by day in the abbeys of
Bangor, Westminster, or Certosa, all of which breathe the sweet language
of the inspired text; ask the myriad children of St. Columban, who in
uninterrupted succession, hour by hour, chanted the praises of God in
the accents of holy writ; ask the countless sanctuaries which decked the
hills and valleys not only of our own island, but of every land on which
the light of Christian faith had shone--the peaceful abodes of those who
renounced the world's smiles and vanities to devote themselves to the
service of God, and whose every orison recalled the teaching and the
words of inspired truth. Ask even the medieval hymns published by the
present Protestant Archbishop of Dublin, which, though shorn by the
editor of much of their Catholic beauty, yet bear in each remaining
strophe a deep impress of the language and imagery of the Bible, and prove
to conviction that, so devoted was the Church of the ante-Reformation
period to the study of the inspired text, that the very thoughts of her
clergy, their language, their daily life, seemed to be cast in its sacred
mould.

2. About 1450, long before Lutheranism was thought of, the art of printing
appeared in Europe. Now some of the first efforts, as well of the wooden
types of Gutenberg, as of the more perfect models of Faust and Schoeffer,
were directed to disseminate accurate editions of the Bible: "No book",
says one of the leading Rationalists of Germany, "was so frequently
published, immediately after the first invention of printing, as the
Latin Bible, more than one hundred editions of it being struck off before
the year 1520".[2] And yet the number of editions thus commemorated is
far below the reality. Hain, in his late _Repertorium Bibliographicum_,
printed at Tubingen, reckons consecutively _ninety-eight distinct
editions_ before the year 1500, independently of _twelve other editions_,
which, together with the Latin text, presented the glossa ordinaria or
the postillas of Lyranus. Catholic Venice was distinguished above all
the other cities of Europe for the zeal with which it laboured in thus
disseminating the sacred text. From the year 1475, when the first Venetian
edition appeared, to the close of the century, that city yielded no fewer
than _twenty-two complete editions_ of the Latin Bible, besides some
others with the notes of Lyranus. Many other cities of Italy were alike
remarkable for their earnestness in the same good cause, and we find
especially commemorated the editions of Rome, Piacenza, Naples, Vicenza,
and Brescia.

3. Italy, however, was not only remarkable for the number of its
editions; it deserves still greater praise for the solicitude with which
it compared the existing text with that of the ancient manuscripts,
and endeavoured to present to the public editions as accurate as the
then known critical apparatus would allow. One or two editions deserve
particular notice, and in our remarks we will take the learned Vercellone
for our guide, in his _Dissertazioni Accademiche_ (Roma, 1864, pag. 102,
seq. 9).

The most famous edition of the fifteenth century was that of Rome in
1471. It was published under the guidance of John Andrew de Bossi,
Bishop of Aleria, and was dedicated to Pope Paul II. The printers were
Conrad Sweynheym and Arnold Paunartz. Their press was in the princely
palace of the illustrious Massimi family. Five hundred and fifty copies
were struck off in the edition; and on the death of Pope Paul II., his
successor, Sixtus IV., was its zealous patron.

The Venice edition of 1495 is also of great critical importance. The
religious superior of the Camaldolese of Brescia superintended its
publication. It consisted of four volumes in folio, and presented,
together with the Latin Bible, the gloss and notes of Lyranus. This
great work was dedicated to Cardinal Francis Piccolomini, who was soon
after raised to the popedom under the name of Pius III. From its preface
we learn that not only the best preceding editions, but also _five
ancient manuscripts_, were made use of in preparing this edition.

Still more accurate, however, is another edition, published without name
of place in 1476, but which Pauzer and Vercellone refer to the city of
Vicenza. Its editor was the learned Leonard Acate. He first sought out
with great care the most ancient and correct manuscript of the Latin
text, and then he devoted all his care to have it accurately printed.
In a short preface, he merely says: "Lector, quisquis es, si Christiane
sentis, non te pigeat hoc opus sanctissimum... Codex practiosissimus
in lucem emendatissimus venit"; and it must be confessed that this
statement was not made without reason, since, notwithstanding all the
critical researches of the last four centuries, that edition still holds
its place amongst the most accurate and most conformable to the ancient
Latin text.

4. Thus, then, in regard to the Latin text at least, Lord Clancarty must
admit that the Church in the ante-Reformation period was not negligent
in disseminating the Bible. And here we must remark that Latin was the
literary language of that age, and that whosoever could read at all,
was sure to be versed in the Latin tongue. How justly, then, does Mr.
Hallam, when speaking of this period, state: "There is no reason to
suspect any intention in the Church of Rome to deprive the laity of the
scriptures";[3] and how truthful are the words of another eloquent man:
"The Catholic Church is not the enemy of the Bible. I affirm it, and
I shall prove it.... She has been the guardian of its purity and the
preserver of its existence through the chances and changes of eighteen
hundred years. In the gloom of the Catacombs, and the splendour of the
Basilica, she cherished that holy book with equal reverence. When she
saw the seed of Christianity sown in the blood of the martyrs, and
braved the persecutions of the despots of the world, and when those
despots bowed before the symbol of Redemption, and she was lifted from
her earthly humbleness, and reared her mitred head in courts and
palaces, it was equally the object of her unceasing care. She gathered
together its scattered fragments, separated the true word of inspiration
from the spurious inventions of presumptuous and deceitful men, made its
teachings and its history familiar to her children in her noble liturgy;
translated it into the language which was familiar to every one who
could read at all; asserted its divine authority in her councils;
maintained its canonical authority against all gainsayers; and transmitted
it from age to age as the precious inheritance of the Christian people.
The saints whom she most reveres were its sagest commentators; and of
the army of her white-robed martyrs whom she still commemorates on
her festal days, there are many who reached their immortal crowns by
refusing on the rack and in the flames to desecrate or deny the holy
book of God".[4] And yet, if we are to believe Lord Clancarty, it is
precisely this holy Church that is opposed to science and to the
dissemination of the written word of God!

5. But perhaps Catholics were in dread at least of the original text
of the sacred Scriptures, and placed some obstacles in the way of its
diffusion. Here, again, we appeal to the testimony of facts. The only
editions of the Old Testament which appeared in the original Hebrew
language in the fifteenth century, were all printed beneath the shadow
of the Inquisition in the Catholic land of Italy. Soncino, near Cremona,
in 1488, Naples in 1491, and Brescia in 1494, are the cities to which
belongs the glory of thus giving birth to the first editions of the
Hebrew text. Bologna, too, was privileged in being the first to publish
the Chaldaic paraphrase of Onkelos: its edition appeared in 1482; and
for the next two editions, which appeared towards the close of the
century, we are indebted to Catholic Portugal.[5]

As to the Greek text of the New Testament, its first edition was printed
in 1514, under the auspices of an illustrious Spanish Franciscan,
Cardinal Ximenes. Though the New Testament is only the fifth volume
in the great Polyglot of Ximenes, yet it was first of all in order of
time, its text being completed on the 10th of January, 1514. Five other
editions followed in quick succession, in 1516, 1519, 1522, 1527, 1535,
all bearing the name of Erasmus.[6] The only portions of the Greek text
of the Old Testament that were printed in the fifteenth century all had
their origin in Italy, and bear the date of 1481, 1486, and 1498.

6. It is time, however, to refer to the first great Biblical
Polyglots--those vast repertories devised by master minds, and which,
presenting in parallel columns the original texts of the Old and
New Testaments, together with the various ancient versions, are
an incalculable aid in the study of Biblical criticism and in the
interpretation of the sacred books. Even in the publication of these
great works Protestants only came to glean where the Catholics had
already reaped an abundant harvest. It was the privilege of the
illustrious order of St. Dominick to give to the world the first