Art. XII. The Holy Bible, newly translated from the Original Hebrew ⚫ with Notes Critical and Explanatory. By John Bellamy, Author of "The History of all Religions.' 4to. pp. xl. 190. Price 16s. Large Paper, 24s. 1818.

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UR readers will have already noticed, that in our examination of this work, we have not cited the readings of the ancient versions, in support of the strictures which Mr. Bellamy's translation has drawn from us. This omission, however, does not by any means originate in a feeling of indifference towards those valuable exemplars, which we cannot but regard as of the utmost importance, and indispensably necessary to the translator of the Bible who would produce a version founded on a correct text. The readers of the Eclectic Review are not not now to be informed that its Conductors are favourable to the principles of a sound and enlightened criticism. But on the present occasion, we choose to limit our critical testimonies to the Hebrew witnesses, the Bible and the Targums, these being the authorities which Mr. Bellamy acknowledges; and these are quite sufficient to establish his incompetency for the work in which he has engaged. Restricting ourselves, therefore, to these sources of criticism, we proceed with our examination of this New Translation, and open the work at the following singular passage.

Ch. ix. 20. Now the man Noah cultivated the ground; also he planted a vineyard.

21. Then he drank of the wine, and he was satisfied: for he himself opened the inmost part of the tabernacle.

22. Where Ham the father of Canaan, exposed the symbols of his father; which he declared to his two brethren without.

23. But Shem with Japheth had taken the vestment, which both of them set up for a portion; thus they afterwards went, and concealed the symbols of their father: with their faces backward; but the symbols of their father, they saw not.

24. When Noah ended, his wine, for he knew that his younger son had offered, for himself;

25. Then he said, Cursed is Canaan: a servant of servants, he shall be, to his brethren.

26. But he said, Blessed of Jehovah God is Shem: for Canaan shall be a servant to them.

27. God will persuade by Japheth, for he shall dwell in the tabernacles of Shem: thus Canaan shall be a servant to them.'

In the copious notes which accompany this part of the Translation, Mr. Bellamy exhibits himself in his usual manner, as a most fanciful and erroneous writer. He pronounces the reading of the Common Version 'a departure from the spirit and

letter of the original.' The mistake of the Translators is, in his opinion, so obvious as to excite astonishment that no attempt has been made to wipe away, from the character of the man of God, the foul blot which their rendering attaches to it. It might indeed seem astonishing, that the sense uniformly given to this passage in all versions, and by all translators, should, for ages, have been the received sense, if the words of the original were of different import. Neither antiquity nor number, we well know, is in itself a criterion of truth; but that both ancient and modern translators, men of profound learning and independent of each other, should all agree in misunderstanding a plain narrative, so as to construe its language into an expression of an intoxicated state, where the writer intended nothing of the kind, is not to be credited without the most indubitable proofs of the fact-whether Mr. Bellamy has adduced such proofs of his assertion, remains to be considered.

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The word a va yishkaar, which is in the Common Version, rendered and he was drunken, can here have no such meaning. every part of scripture where it occurs, and is applied to intoxication with strong drink, it is always accompanied with its own application, by which it cannot be misunderstood. See 1 Kings xvi. 9, he was drinking himself drunk ;-xx. 16; Jer. xxiii. 9, I am like a drunken man, overcome with wine; 1 Sam. xxxv. 36; 2 Sam xi. 13; 1 Kings xx. 16; Job xii. 25; Psa. lxix. 12-cvii. 27; Isa. v. 11, 22; Jer. xxiii. 9; Joel i. 5; Lev. x. 9; Numb. vi. 3;-xxviii. 7. But the word in this verse has no reference to any other word by which it can be understood that Noah was in a state of drunkenness with strong drink. The proper words which are used by the sacred writers to mean drunkenness with strong drink, are; raavah, Deut. xxix. 19, drunkenness to thirst ;-xxi. 20, a glutton, so sobee, and a drunkard.'

Mr. Bellamy must here mean, that the only words which are employed by the sacred writers, to denote drunkenness with strong drink, are and ND; his language admits of no other construction; and if so, they furnish another specimen of his perpetual self contradiction. He informs us in the preceding part of the extract, that, where w occurs in the Scriptures applied to intoxication with strong drink, it is always accompanied with its own application, by which it cannot be misunderstood; which is to say, that is a proper word to express intoxication. Let us examine, then, the passages cited by Mr. Bellamy, as instances of the use of this verb, w, in cases where its meaning is so defined as not to be misunderstood, that we may learn in what manner they vary from the present passage in which the word has, we are told, no reference to any other word by which it can be understood that Noah was in a state of drunkenness.

To begin with his first example; 1 Kings, xvi. 9. "he was Vol. X. N.S.

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"drinking himself drunk;" now nnw; what is the application which accompanies the word in this connexion, and limits its meaning to drunkenness, that is not required by Gen. ix. 20 Might not Noah become intoxicated in his tent, by drinking, as well as Elah in the house of his steward Arza? or Benhadad in the royal pavilions, 1 Kings, xx. 16? If now w (Jer. xxiii. 9,) be used positively to express drunkenness-" a “ drunken man," why may not in the passage before us be applied to an intoxicated person? Nabal is referred to by Mr. B. 1 Sam. xxv. 36, as being "drunk ;" but unless it be maintained that sumptuous feasts are the only occasions on which men indulge freely in the use of liquor, there is nothing to limit the application of in this fourth example. As for the next, 2 Sam. xi. 18, no passage could have been cited, tend-, ing more to the total subversion of Mr. Bellamy's conceit, or to confirm the sense given to the words of the text, by the trans-. lators of the Common Version. That David, in furtherance of his scheme of iniquity relative to Bathsheba, intended to make Uriah intoxicated, cannot be doubted. What are the words which the sacred historian has used, to describe this part of the bad and base design? now" rw, he drank, and made him drunk, the very same expressions as are applied to Noah, and which have no other kind of application to prevent their meaning from being understood in the one case, than in the other. Not a doubt can possibly exist as to the use of the word " to denote intoxication; the words in the text are therefore properly rendered, He drank of the wine and was intoxi-. cated," and in this state lay uncovered in his tent.

The word bam va yithgal, has been improperly translated as the third person singular in niphal, or the passive conjugation of kal: he was uncovered. But the verb being in the Hithpael conjugation, which means that the person himself does the thing mentioned, it should have been rendered accordingly, as verbs in the same conju». gation are necessarily translated in other scriptures.'

Surely some of the Noble or Right Rev. persons, whose names glitter in the list of Mr. Bellamy's patrons, and whose influence cannot fail to be successfully exerted in his behalf, will employ their good offices with some learned body by whose, meinhers Hebrew philology is properly appreciated, to obtainthe bestowal of its highest honours upon so erudite a scholar as Mr. Bellamy! His discovery is quite new, and in the absence of the other numerous and illustrious proofs with which his work abounds, the preceding criticism must satisfy every reader of the singular felicity with which he has applied his sagacity and learning to Hebrew lore. The Hithpael conjugation means that the person himself does the thing mentioned! This, Mr. Bellamy assures us, is its definite and proper use.

The kal conjugation, therefore, means that the person himself does not the thing mentioned, but that he does it by another person's aid, or that another person does it entirely for him! Thus, 8, yow, which have hitherto, being verbs in the kal conjugation, been understood to mean he heard, he ate, he learned, do not mean he himself heard, he him self ate, he himself learned, these latter modes of expres sion being examples of the Hithpael conjugation, denoting that the person himself does the thing mentioned.' So that there exists a wide and important difference between, he opens, and he himself opens! Mr. Bellamy dreams, is one thing, and Mr Bellamy himself dreams, is another and very different thing! How would this gentleman render a, a verb in the conjugation kal, and in the preter tense? Is its proper meaning any other than he himself opened? Does this conjugation not mean that the person himself does the thing mentioned? Had the meaning which Mr. Bellamy has given to the word, been the meaning of the sacred writer, the word would have occurred in the kal con jugation; its being in the Hithpael is a sufficient indication of the intention of the inspired author to express a notion very dif ferent from that which the ignorance or wantonness of the present translator would impose. The proper use of the Hithpael conjugation is, to express a reciprocal meaning after the manner of the middle verb in Greek; and therefore ban in the text in correctly translated, he uncovered himself,' or 'he was un"covered' by means of himself. It cannot be rendered he 'himself opened,' though, if it so please Mr. Bellamy, he may translate it, he opened himself,' or 'he himself was "opene l' by his own means; but to render it he opened' as a simple active verb, with an objective case, is an egregious blunder.

Aheloh is rendered by his tent.' 'But,' says Mr. B." there is no pronoun possessive, so that the word cannot be • translated his tent.' Nor is there any pronoun possessive affixed to the very same word, n5 Gen. xii. 8. xiii. 3; in both of which examples, Mr. B. translates the word by his tuber"nacle.' na, is literally, as in the Common Version, in the midst of his tent.' The words are not as Mr. Bel lamy's translation represents them, the accusative after a transitive verb. n, with the particle 2 prefixed, can only mean, in the middle. Thus, in a passage exactly parallel, Josh. vii. 21,

Tina in Achan's confession, is in the midst of my tent." • The nakedness of his father,' is far too simple a phrase for our recondite philologist. my, he asserts, is not, as represented in the Common Version, a noun singular; another blun-* der! Not only it is a noun singular in construction, but Mr. B.

with his usual inconsistency, so renders it, Gen. xlii. 9, 12, the nakedness.' What does he mean by the symbols of his father? This expression can signify only that emblems or images of Noah were used in the first age of the postdiluvian worship, and that the patriarch himself was an idolater! The terms thus perverted are, however, of too frequent occurrence to

thy ערות אביך ערות אמך .leave their meaning at all doubtful

'father's nakedness,' thy mother's nakedness,' &c. Lev. xviii. 7. The numerous parallel passages in that chapter, are too explicit and too stubborn to be at all bent to our Author's purpose.

on cannot possibly mean And Hum exposed;' the verb is in kal, and simply signifies, as in the Common Version, And Ham suw. That this is its proper and only meaning, might be demonstrated by numberless examples.

Equally remote from true meaning and proper construction is Mr. Bellamy's strange rendering of the 23 and 24th verses; Setting up a vestment for a portion. now is a noun feminine without any relative pronoun answering to which,' interpolated by Mr. B., while the verb has the vau 1 prefixed, and must therefore be translated with the copulative and,' which does not appear in his version. bow, it is true, is a noun singular, but construed with Dw, it is properly rendered upon both their shoulders,' as in Exod. xii. 34,In their clothes

is the phrase used by על כתף על שכמם upon their shoulders *

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Onkelos, which indubitably proves that he understood in this passage to mean shoulder,' and not portion.' The singular is used by the prophet Isaiah, ch. xlvi. 7, precisely in the same manner, with a plural verb, an by in, they bear him upon the shoulder.'s backwards,' occurs twice in the verse in the former instance Mr. Bellamy renders it by' afterwards,' in the latter by backwards,' though it is identically, in consonants and vowels, the same word: the Common Version is uniform and correct.

24 "Noah awoke from his wine." For this translation" Mr Bellamy substitutes Noah ended his wine,' affirming that the word pp va yickets, does not mean awoke, neither is it connected with any word that means sleep." Nothing can be either more disingenuous or ignorantly erroneous. He himself translates this very word in more than one passage as being connected with sleep. Jacob waked (pp") from his sleep.' ch. xx. 16. Pharaoh awoke' rp, ch. xli. 4. 7 mwy rendered in the Common Version, had done,' Mr. Bellamy maintains 'should be translated according to idiom as it is in 1 Kings viii 64; 2 Chron. vi 7, offered:' there is, however, no similarity in the construction of these passages. The expression in 1 Kings viii. 64; 2 Chron. vii. 7, is nyn pw nwy and