Section III.

On the use of the Italic type by the Translators, and on the extension of their principles by subsequent editors.

The practice of indicating by a variation of type such words in a translation of the Bible as have no exact representatives in the original is believed to have been first employed by Sebastian Munster in his Latin version of the Old Testament published in 15341. Five years later this diversity of character (“a small letter in the text” as the editors describe it) was resorted to in Cranmer’s Bible, in order to direct attention to clauses rendered from the Latin Vulgate which are not extant in the Hebrew or Greek originals. A good example of its use occurs in Matt. xxv. 1 where “(and the bride)” is added to the end of the verse from the Old Latin, not from any Greek copy known in that age. As the readings of the Vulgate came to be less regarded or less familiar in England, subsequent translators applied the smaller type to the purpose for which Munster had first designed it, the rather as Theodore Beza had so used it in his Latin New Testament of 1556. Thus the English New Testament published at Geneva in 1557, and the Geneva Bible of 1560, “put to that word, which lacking made the sentence obscure, but set it in such letters, as may easily be discerned from the common text1.” The same expedient was adopted by the translators of the Bishops’ Bible (1568, 1572), somewhat too freely indeed in parts. It is one of the most considerable faults of this not very successful version, that its authors assumed a liberty of running into paraphrase, the ill effects of which this very difference in the type tended to conceal from themselves. From these two preceding versions, then held in the best repute, the Geneva and the Bishops’ Bibles, the small Roman as distinguished from the black letter (now respectively represented by the Italic and Roman type) was brought naturally enough into the Bible of 1611, and forms a prominent feature of it, whether for good or ill.

On this last point, namely, the wisdom or convenience of printing different words in the same verse or line in different kinds of type, with a view to the purpose explained above, it is not necessary for an editor of the Authorized Bible to express, or even to hold, an opinion. Italics, or whatever corresponds with them, may possibly be dispensed with altogether (though in practice this abstinence will be found hard to maintain); or they may be reserved for certain extreme cases, where marked difference in idiom between the two languages, or else some obscurity or corruption of the original text, seems to forbid a strict and literal translation. It is enough for the present purpose to say that our existing version was plainly constructed on another principle: those who made it saw no objection to the free use of a typographical device which custom had sanctioned, and would have doubtless given a different turn to many a sentence had they been debarred from indicating to the unlearned what they had felt obliged to add of their own to the actual words of the original; the addition being always either involved and implied in the Hebrew or Greek, or at any rate so necessary to the sense that the English reader would be perplexed or go wrong without it. Taking for granted, therefore, the right of the Translators thus to resort to the italic type, and the general propriety of the mode of their exercising it, the only inquiry now open to us is whether they were uniform, or reasonably consistent, in their use of it.

And in the face of patent and well-ascertained facts it is impossible to answer such a question in the affirmative. That undue haste and scarcely venial carelessness on the part of the persons engaged in carrying through the press the issues of 1611, which are only too visible in other matters (above, p. xii.), are nowhere more conspicuous than with regard to this difference in the type. If it be once conceded that the Translators must have intended to use or refrain from using italics in the selfsame manner in all cases that are absolutely identical (and the contrary supposition would be strange and unreasonable indeed), their whole case in this matter must be given up as indefensible. There is really no serious attempt to avoid palpable inconsistencies on the same page, in the same verse: and those who have gone over this branch of their work will be aware that even comparative uniformity can be secured only in one way, by the repeated comparison of the version with the sacred originals, by unflagging attention so that nothing however minute may pass unexamined. This close and critical examination was evidently entered upon, with more or less good results, by those who prepared the Cambridge Bibles of 1629 and more especially of 1638 (for before these appeared the italics of 1611, with all their glaring faults, were reprinted without change2), and in the next century by Dr Paris in 1762, by Dr Blayney and his friends in 17693. The rules to be observed in such researches, and the principles on which they are grounded, must be gathered from the study of the standard of 1611, exclusively of subsequent changes, regard being paid to what its authors intended, rather than to their actual practice.

The cases in which the italic character has been employed by the Translators of our Authorized Bible may probably be brought under the following heads:—

(1) When words quite or nearly necessary to complete the sense of the sacred writers have been introduced into the text from parallel places of Scripture. Six such instances occur in the second book of Samuel:

ch. v. 8. “And David said on that day, Whosoever getteth up to the gutter, and smiteth the Jebusites, and the lame and the blind, that are hated of David’s soul, he shall be chief and captain.” The last clause is supplied from 1 Chr. xi. 6.

ch. vi. 6. “And when they came to Nachon’s threshing-floor, Uzzah put forth his hand to the ark of God.” Rather “his hand” (as in 1638) from 1 Chr. xiii. 9.

ch. viii. 4. “And David took from him a thousand chariots, and seven hundred horsemen, and twenty thousand footmen.” We derive “chariots” from 1 Chr. xviii. 4.

ver. 18. “And Benaiah the son of Jehoiada was over both the Cherethites and the Pelethites” (was over 1629). In 1 Chr. xviii. 17 “was over” (1611).

ch. xxi. 19. “…slew the brother of Goliath the Gittite.” In 1 Chr. xx. 5 we read “slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite.”

ch. xxiii. 8. “the same was Adino the Eznite: he lift up his spear against eight hundred, whom he slew at one time.” 1 Chr. xi. 11 supplies “he lift up, &c.”

Thus Num. xx. 26 is filled up from ver. 24; Judg. ii. 3 from Num. xxxiii. 55 or Josh. xxiii. 13; 1 Kin. ix. 8 from 2 Chr. vii. 21; 2 Kin. xxv. 3 from Jer. xxxix. 2 and lii. 6; 1 Chr. ix. 41 from ch. viii. 35; 1 Chr. xvii. 25 from 2 Sam. vii. 27; 1 Chr. xviii. 6 from 2 Sam. viii. 6; 2 Chr. xxv. 24 from 2 Kin. xiv. 14; Ezra ii. 6, 59 from Neh. vii. 11, 61. In the Bible of 1638 Jer. vi. 14 of the daughter is italicised as taken into the text from ch. viii. 11, This is the simplest case, for the words supplied in italics are doubtless lost in the one ancient text, preserved in the other.

(2) When the extreme conciseness of the Hebrew language produces a form of expression intelligible enough to those who are well versed in it, yet hardly capable of being transformed into a modern tongue. One or two of Bp. Turton’s (Text, &c. pp. 50, 51) examples will illustrate our meaning:

Gen. xiii. 9. “Separate thyself, I pray thee, from me: if the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if the right hand, then I will go to the left.”

Ex. xiv. 20. “And it was a cloud and darkness, but it gave light by night.”

Every one must feel that something is wanting to render these verses perspicuous; the latter indeed we should hardly understand, without looking closely to the context. It seems quite right, therefore, that supplementary words should be inserted in such places, and equally fit that they should be indicated by some contrivance that may shew that they form no part of the Hebrew original. In our version accordingly the verses stand as follows, except that in the former “thou” (twice over) was not in italics before 1629; italicise also the second “to”:

“If thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left.”

“It was a cloud and darkness to them, but it gave light by night to these.”

To this class we may most conveniently refer the numerous cases wherein what grammarians call the apodosis (that is, the consequence resulting from a supposed act or condition) is implied rather than stated, yet in English requires something to be expressed more or less fully: such are the following texts:

Gen. xxx. 27. “If I have found favour in thine eyes, tarry.”

2 Chr. ii. 3. “As thou didst deal with David my father, and didst send him cedars…even so deal with me.”

Dan. iii. 15. “If ye be ready that at what time ye hear the sound of the cornet,…ye fall down and worship the image which I have made, well.”

Luke xiii. 9. “And if it bear fruit, well.”

Occasionally our Translators, with happy boldness, have suppressed the apodosis entirely, as in the original (Ex. xxxii. 32; Luke xix. 42). In some few passages the seeming necessity for such insertion arises from a misunderstanding either of the sense or the construction: such is probably the case in Neh. iv. 12, and unquestionably so in Matt. xv. 6; Mark vii. 11.

(3) Just as little objection will probably be urged against the custom of our Translators in italicising words supplied to clear up the use of the grammatical figure known as the zeugma, whereby, in the Hebrew no less than in the Greek and Latin languages, an expression which strictly belongs to but one member of a sentence is made, with some violation of strict propriety, to do duty in another.

Gen. iv. 20. “And Adah bare Jabal: he was the father of such as dwell in tents, and cattle.” Supply, “of such as have cattle.”

Ex. iii. 16. “I have surely visited you, and that which is done to you in Egypt.” Our version here, with less necessity, inserts “seen” after “and.”

Ex. xx. 18. “And all the people saw the thunderings, and the lightnings, and the noise of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking.” Here the order of the clauses renders it impossible to supply any single word which would not increase the awkwardness of the sentence: the passage is accordingly left as it stands in the original. Not so the sharper language of the parallel place:

Deut. iv. 12. “Ye heard the voice of the words, but saw no similitude, only a voice.” After “only” insert with 1611 “ye heard.”

2 Kin. xi. 12 (so 2 Chr. xxiii. 11). “And he brought forth the king’s son, and put the crown upon him, and the testimony.” Insert “gave him” before “the testimony.”

Luke i. 64. “And his mouth was opened immediately, and his tongue,” add “loosed.”

1 Cor. xiv. 34. “It is not permitted unto them to speak, but to be under obedience.” After “but” insert “they are commanded.” So “and commanding” before “to abstain” in the exactly parallel passage, 1 Tim. iv. 3.

The following examples, taken from the Apocrypha, have been neglected by all editors up to the present date:

2 Esdr. ix. 24. “Taste no flesh, drink no wine, but eat flowers only.”

xii. 17. “As for the voice which thou heardest speak, and that thou sawest not to go out from the heads.” This rendering, taken from the Coverdale and Bishops’ Bibles, is possibly incorrect.

Ecclus. li. 3. “According to the multitude of thy mercies and greatness of thy name.”

(4) Akin to the preceding is the practice of inserting in the Authorized Version a word or two, in order to indicate that abrupt transition from the oblique to the direct form of speech, which is so familiar to most ancient languages, but so foreign to our own:

Gen. iv. 25. “And she bare a son, and called his name Seth: for God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel.”

Ex. xviii. 4. “And the name of the other was Eliezer; for the God of my father, said he, was mine help.”

Our marginal references on the latter text supply several other instances of this construction. The inconvenience of a sudden change of person, unbroken by any such words supplied, may appear from Gen. xxxii. 30, “And Jacob called the name of the place Peniel: for I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved.” Just as abrupt is the construction in Gen. xli. 52 (compare ver. 51); Tobit viii. 21. In 2 Macc. vi. 24 “said he” continued in Roman type till 1638.

(5) Another use of italics is to indicate that a word or clause is of doubtful authority as a matter of textual criticism. Of this in the Authorized Version we can produce only one unequivocal instance in the Canonical books, 1 John ii. 23 (see Appendix E, p. cii.); for it is not quite certain that the change of type in Judg. xvi. 2; xx. 9, employed to point out words borrowed from the Septuagint, intimates any suspicion of a lacuna in the text. In subsequent editions occur the following instances, most of them being due to the Cambridge edition of 1638, those that are not so having another date affixed to them:

Deut. xxvii. 26 (“all”). Josh. xxii. 34 (“Ed”). 1 Sam. ii. 16 (“Nay” 1629 Camb.)1. 2 Kin. xix. 31 (“of hosts”)2; xx. 13 (the second “all” appears in most Hebrew Bibles, and we have restored the Roman character). 2 Chr. v. 1 (“all”); xvii. 4 (“LORD”). Job x. 20 (“cease then, and,” 1611 inconsistently: we should read with 1638, “cease then, and,” or leave all in Roman as 1629 Camb., since both particles are found in Keri). Ps. xli. 2 (“And he shall be,” Chetiv, not Keri); lxix. 32 (“and be glad”). Prov. xx. 4 (therefore: but ו of Keri is in Symmachus and the Vulgate, so that we restore the type of 1611). Jer. xiii. 16 (“and make,” yet ו of Keri is in the Septuagint and Vulgate). Lam. v. 7 (“and are not;” “And have.” These two conjunctions are both wanting in Chetiv, present in Keri, yet 1769 italicises the first, not the second). Mark ix. 42 (see Appendix E, p. c.). John viii. 6 (1769: see Appendix E, p. c.). 1 John iii. 16 (see Appendix E, p. c.).

Thus in the Apocrypha 1629 italicises on me in Tobit xi. 15, με being wanting in the Complutensian, but we have decided to return to the Roman type. For similar cases examine Ecclus. iii. 22 (1629 and 1769); 1 Macc. iii. 18 (1638); x. 78 (1638); xi. 15 (1638, partim rectè); xiv. 4 (1638).

To these passages, which in the present volume have been italicised or the contrary, according to the circumstances in each case, we have added 2 Chr. xv. 8 “of Oded3,” to point out the doubt hanging over the reading or construction in that place. Also in Ecclus. i. 7; xvii. 5, italics have been substituted, as was stated above, p. xxvii., in the room of brackets, as a mark of probable spuriousness in the lines so printed. The portion of 1 John v. 7, 8 which is now for the first time set in italics, is probably no longer regarded as genuine by any one who is capable of forming an independent judgment on the state of the evidence.

(6) The last class to which we may refer the italicised words in our version, is that wherein the words supplied are essential to the English sense, although they may very well be dispensed with in the Hebrew or Greek; nay more, although they could not be received into the original without burdening the sense, or marring all propriety of style. This last head comprises a far greater number of cases than all the rest put together, and it may reasonably be doubted whether much advantage accrues from a change of type where the sense is not affected to an appreciable extent. Whether we say “the folk that are with me” (Gen. xxxiii. 15) with the Bible of 1611, or “the folk that are with me” with the Cambridge edition of 1629, could make no difference whatever, except to one who was comparing English with Hebrew idioms, and such a one would hardly need to carry on his studies in this fashion. One thing, however, is quite clear, that if it be well thus to mark the idiomatic or grammatical divergences between languages, all possible care should be devoted to secure uniformity of practice; cases precisely similar should be treated in a similar manner. Now this is just the point at which our Authorized Version utterly fails us; we can never be sure of its consistency for two verses together. To take one or two instances out of a thousand, why do we find “it be hid” in Levit. v. 3, 4, and “it be hidden” in ver. 2, the Hebrew being the same in all? Or why should the same Hebrew be represented by “upon all four” in Levit. xi. 20, but by “upon (or “on”) all four” in ver. 21, 27, 42? Even in graver matters there is little attempt at uniformity: thus οὗτος Heb. iii. 3 is “this man” in 1611, but “this man” in Heb. viii. 3, a variation retained to this day; in 1 Pet. iv. 11 “let him speak” is italicised in 1611, but the clause immediately following “let him do it” not before 1629. These gross oversights, with countless others, are set right by the revisers of 1629 and 1638, yet these later editors have been found liable to introduce into the printed text nearly as many inconsistencies as they removed. Thus, for example, whereas “which were left” Lev. x. 16 adequately renders the Hebrew article with the participle of the Niphal conjugation, and so in 1611 was printed in ordinary characters, the edition of 1638 wrongly italicises “which were” here, but leaves untouched “that were left” in ver. 12, a discrepancy which still cleaves to our modern Bibles. The same must be said of “ye are to pass” (“are” first italicised in 1629) Deut. ii. 4 compared with “thou art to pass” ver. 18: “even unto Azzah” ver. 23 (“even” correctly italicised in 1638, indeed the word is expressed in ver. 36), but “even unto this day” left untouched in ver. 22: “the slain man” (“man” first in 1629) Deut. xxi. 6, but “the slain man” ver. 3: “their backs” (“their” first in 1629) Josh. vii. 12, but “their backs” ver. 81. The reader will find as many instances of this nature as he cares to search for in any portion of our modern Bibles he may please to examine, and from the whole matter it is impossible to draw in the main any other conclusion than this:—that the changes introduced from time to time have been too unsystematic, too much the work of the moment, executed by too many hands, and on too unsettled principles, to hold out against hostile, or even friendly criticism.

Dr Blayney in his Report to the Oxford Delegates (Appendix D, p. xcviii.) appeals to the edition of Dr Paris (1762) as having “made large corrections in this particular,” adding that “there still remained many necessary alterations, which escaped the Doctor’s notice” and had to be set right by himself and his friends. And it cannot be doubted that the two Bibles of 1762 and 1769 between them largely increased the number of the words printed in italics, but the effect was rather to add to than diminish the manifest inconsistencies of earlier books. Thus Blayney (and after him the moderns) in Luke xvii. 29 (ἅπαντας) italicises “them” before “all,” yet leaves untouched “them all” ver. 27: in Luke xix. 22 he reads “thou wicked servant,” retaining “thou good servant” in ver. 17. Nor can the correctness of Dr Paris be praised overmuch. In putting into Roman type the “good” of 1611, Eccles. vii. 1, he has been blindly followed by the rest, though a glance at the Hebrew would have set them right: yet some of his errors in italics were removed in 1769, e.g. “way-side” Matt. xiii. 4; Mark x. 46; Luke viii. 5. Hence it becomes manifest that in preparing a critical edition of our vernacular Translation, which shall aim at meeting the wants and satisfying the scholarship of the present age, nothing less than a close and repeated comparison of the sacred originals, line by line, with the English Bible, will enable us to amend the mistakes, which lack of time and consideration has led certain of the most eminent of our predecessors to pass by unnoticed, or even to exaggerate while attempting to remedy them. A task so laborious, yet promising from the first so little benefit from its most faithful execution, has been undertaken for the purposes of this volume only from a deep conviction of its necessity; and through the intervention of the Syndics of the Cambridge Press that task has been somewhat lightened by the use the editor has been allowed to make of the manuscript notes of the Rev. J. Gorle, Rector of Whatcote, whose acuteness, learning, and patience in the prosecution of researches so minute those who have toiled in the same field can best appreciate.

In the Apocrypha indeed the work had to be done almost afresh, inasmuch as the Company of Translators to whom these books were assigned took no sort of pains to assimilate their portion of the work to that executed by the others. They introduce this difference of type only 54 times in the whole Apocrypha, indeed only three instances occur at all later than Ecclus. xlv. 4, after which brackets [], or sometimes () are substituted in their room. No improvement worth mention seems to have been attempted before 1638, when 96 (e.g. Judith xiv. 18, but Tobit iv. 13 in 1629) fresh instances of italics were added, and most of the brackets were displaced to make room for italics, though a few yet survive in modern Bibles (2 Esdr. iii. 22. Wisd. xii. 27; xvii. 2, 3, 4. Ecclus. vi. 1, 2; viii. 11; xi. 30; xii. 5; xiv. 101). About ten places more were subsequently italicised (e.g. Wisd. v. 17; viii. 2. Baruch iii. 33. 2 Macc. xi. 33 and, all in 1769), so that the italics of modern Bibles are but 273 in all. Those that are employed are of much the same character as in the Canonical Scriptures; some for pointing out the zeugma (above, p. xxxiv.), as 1 Macc. vii. 192; x. 20, 24; 2 Macc. xi. 14: or a transition in the form of speech (Judith v. 23. Ecclus. ii. 18. 1 Macc. i. 50; xvi. 21; so 1 Esdr. i. 4 in 1629, and 2 Macc. vi. 24 in 1638): some for supplying a real or seeming grammatical defect (1 Esdr. iv. 11. Tobit viii. 10. Ecclus. xii. 5): one for indicating uncertainty in the reading (Tobit x. 53; see p. xxxv.): a few for no reason that is apparent (Wisd. vi. 9 O kings. Ecclus. xl. 4; xlv. 44), it would seem in mere error. As our version of the Apocrypha is so imperfectly revised as to resemble the Bishops’ version in other respects more closely than we find in the inspired books, so does it in this over-free use of italic type by way of commentary. The interpolations in Wisd. ii. 1; xvi. 10. 1 Macc. vii. 32 are derived from this source; that in Ecclus. vi. 2 from the note of Junius (ferociens incerto et vago impetu); and too many others are conceived in the same spirit, e.g. Wisd. x. 10; xiv. 12; xix. 14. Ecclus. viii. 11; xi. 30; xlvi. 6. 1 Macc. viii. 18. In 1 Macc. ix. 35, after Coverdale and the Bishops’ Bible, our Translation actually brings a Proper name into the text “[John],” avowedly on the authority of Josephus, for the slight evidence now produced in its favour (the Syriac and three recent Greek copies) was unknown to them.

After this general survey of the whole subject, it is proper to state certain rules, applicable to particular cases, which a careful study of the Bible of 1611 will shew that our Translators laid down for themselves, but which haste or inadvertence has caused them to carry out very imperfectly in practice. It will be seen that many of their omissions were supplied in one or other of those later editions which display care in the matter, while almost as many have remained to be set right in the present volume. “Whether the Translators, if they had foreseen and fully considered how far the system of italics which they adopted, when carried out, would lead, would have adopted it,…may be a question. And whether the abundance of the italics…does not in a measure defeat its own purpose by withdrawing attention from them, is perhaps a question also. But as it was, the course adopted by the editors of 1611 having been to mark by italics not important insertions only, but to aim at marking in this manner everything, even trifling pronouns and auxiliary verbs, not in the originals, carrying out however their intention very imperfectly: the choice for after editors lies between adopting a different system, and carrying out theirs to the full1.” Between these alternatives few perhaps will censure us for having chosen the latter without much hesitation.

The following observations, therefore, grounded on the practice of our Translators, will guide us in a vast number of doubtful cases.

(1) The English possessive pronoun, when it renders the Hebrew or Greek article, should be set in italics. Compare in 1611 Judg. iii. 20. 2 Sam. vi. 7; xvii. 23. 2 Kin. ix. 35; xiii. 3. 2 Chr. xiii. 10. Job i. 5; ii. 13. 1 Cor. i. 1. 2 Cor. i. 1. Gal. v. 10. Eph. iv. 28. Phil. ii. 13. So in 1629, Gen. xxvi. 11. Neh. xii. 42: in 1638, Matt. viii. 3; x. 24; xii. 10, 33; xiii. 15 (ter); xiv. 19, 31; xv. 5, &c. passim: in 1762, Matt. xii. 46; xxi. 31; xxvi. 23, 51; xxvii. 24: in 1769, Matt. xv. 8; xxv. 32. Mark v. 29; x. 16, &c.

(2) Since the definite article is only the unemphatic form of the demonstrative “that,” and has itself a demonstrative force2, it might not appear necessary to set “that” in italics when it represents the Greek or Hebrew article. In 1611, however, it is thus printed so often as to prove that our Translators designed to do so always with “this” and “that.” For their practice compare Gen. xviii. 32. Ex. ix. 27; xxxiv. 1. Num. xi. 32. Josh. iii. 4. 1 Sam. xiv. 8; xxv. 24. 1 Chr. xviii. 11; xxi. 22. 2 Chr. xx. 29; xxxvi. 18. Ezra ix. 2; x. 9. Eccles. vi. 12. Luke viii. 14. 2 Tim. ii. 4. In 1629 many more were added, e.g. Gen. xxxi. 43 (these ter); xliii. 16 (bis): in 1638, 1 Chr. vi. 64; vii. 21. 2 Chr. xxviii. 22. Ezra x. 4. Neh. viii. 10. Job xxxii. 5. Ps. li. 4. Eccles. viii. 8; ix. 9. Isai. xxxvii. 30 (yet not 2 Kin. xix. 29). Jer. ix. 26; xxxviii. 12. Ezek. xliv. 3; xlvi. 2, 8. Hab. i. 6. Mark iv. 11; ix. 42. John v. 13. Acts xxiv. 22. Rom. xvi. 22. 1 Cor. ix. 12; xi. 27. 2 Cor. v. 1, 4. 2 Thess. i. 11. 1 Tim. vi. 7, 14. 2 Pet. i. 14: a few in 1769, 2 Sam. xvi. 11; xviii. 32. Hos. ix. 10. Yet in the New Testament this rule is even now greatly neglected.

(3) The idioms of the English and the Hebrew differ so widely that no attempt has been made, in the great majority of cases, to print the English definite article in italics when the Hebrew one is wanting. The only apparent instance of such distinction being kept up by our Translators occurs in 1 Sam. xxvi. 8, and is a mere error, the Hebrew article being present: hence “the” is put into Roman type in 16383. Occasionally, however, the sense is so much affected, perhaps for the worse, by the presence of the English article, that we have been careful to note its absence in the Hebrew: e.g. Ps. xlv. 1. Ezek. iv. 1; x. 20; xxiii. 45. Hos. ii. 4; viii. 7; x. 10; xii. 4. Joel ii. 6. Amos vii. 10. Jonah iv. 10 marg. Mic. v. 5. In thus dealing with the Greek article rather more freedom has been assumed, regard being always had to the anarthrous style of certain of the sacred writers, and to the licence which permits the omission of the article in certain constructions. Compare Ecclus. xliv. 18. Rom. i. 6; ii. 14. 1 Cor. ix. 20. Gal. iv. 31. 1 Thess. ii. 6. 1 Tim. ii. 5. Heb. ii. 5. 1 Pet. i. 12; iv. 10. 1 John ii. 1. 3 John 3. Rev. xiv. 9; xv. 2; xxi. 17. The English indefinite article4, or none at all, would better suit most of these places.

(4) Annexed to proper and common appellations of places the Hebrew He, the old accusative termination, is regarded as denoting motion to, and its absence, or that of a corresponding preposition, is indicated by italics: e.g. Job xxx. 23; Ps. v. 7 in 1611. But He prefixed, which may be the article, and sometimes accompanies He annexed (compare 2 Sam. xiii. 10), is not so regarded. Prepositions of motion in English, which have no Hebrew equivalent, are systematically set by us in italics, the rather, since it is not always certain that the right one is employed, e.g. 1 Sam. xxiii. 25. 2 Kin. xvi. 8.

(5) When an article is prefixed to a participle, but not otherwise, and it is rendered by “which are,” “that is” &c. (“such as were” Eccles. iv. 1), these words are best printed without italics, as in 1611 they are pretty uniformly, e.g. Lev. x. 16. Deut. xx. 11; xxv. 6, 18; xxix. 291. In 1638 italics came to be employed in some cases of this kind, e.g. “that was built” Judg. vi. 28; “which is shed” Ps. lxxix. 10; “she that looketh” Cant. vi. 10; “one that accuseth” John v. 45. We have retained italics in the last place (perhaps wrongly), discarding them in the rest. In Judg. xi. 30 marg. “that which cometh forth” of 1611 is properly changed in 1629 into “that which cometh forth.”

(6) But even if the article be prefixed to an adjective, the correct practice is to italicise the words supplied. Thus in 1611 “that are wise,” “that are mighty” Isai. v. 21, 22; “who is holy” Heb. vii. 26, in which passages there is no article. In Judg. viii. 15, where the article is found, we have “that are weary” 1611, “that are weary” 1629, “that are weary” 1638 correctly. This last edition is very careful on the point, having rightly put into italics what had previously been Roman in 1 Sam. xv. 9. Neh. iv. 14. Ps. lxxxv. 12. Ezek. xxii. 5. Yet in Judg. xvii. 6; xxi. 25 and such like passages we adopt (not very consistently) “that which was right,” to intimate the presence of the article, as 1 Sam. ix. 24 in 1638.

(7) In such phrases as “and it came to pass…that,” if the Hebrew copulative וְ be not expressed at the beginning of the second clause, its absence is denoted by italicising “that,” which otherwise would stand in Roman type. This nice distinction is observed by our Translators with as much consistency as they display in greater matters. Thus 1611 in Gen. iv. 14. Ex. xxxiii. 8. Num. xvi. 7. 2 Kin. xviii. 1. 1 Chr. xiv. 15. Esther v. 2. Isai. x. 12, 20, 27; xxiv. 18. So in 1629, Ex. xxxiii. 7. Lev. ix. 1. Num. xvii. 5: in 1638, Neh. iv. 16: in 1762, Matt. xiii. 53; xix. 1. Luke xx. 1. Compare Luke v. 1, 17; vii. 12; viii. 1, &c.

(8) The personal pronoun, when omitted with the Hebrew infinitive (occasionally with some risk of ambiguity in the sense), should always, when supplied in the version, be printed in italics. This comprehensive rule is abided by in 1611 Gen. vi. 19, 20 “to keep them alive;” Ex. xxx. 12 (second case, but overlooked in the first), 15; xxxi. 13. Deut. xxvi. 18. 1 Kin. xii. 6 (“I” overlooked by 1629 and later Bibles). 1 Chr. xxviii. 4. 2 Chr. xxxv. 6. Isai. l. 4 (“I” again overlooked in 1629 and its successors). Thus also in 1629, Ex. xxviii. 28. Esther iv. 11: in 1638, Gen. iii. 6. Acts xii. 19. Rom. xiii. 5: in 1769, Ex. xxxv. 1. Deut. xxix. 29. Heb. xii. 10.

(9) Where in Hebrew the first of two nouns is in the state of construction, the word “of” between them is not italicised in English: but if the preceding noun be susceptible of a change by reason of the state of construction, and yet be not so changed, “of” or its equivalent is italicised. Compare, for example, Ex. xxxvii. 24 with Ex. xxv. 39. The Masoretic points are necessarily taken for true under this head.

(10) It would seem natural to italicise “own” in the expressions “your own,” “his own” &c. where the original has but the simple possessive pronoun. Yet in 1611 we find it so written only in 2 Sam. xviii. 13. Job v. 13; ix. 20. Prov. i. 18 (bis). Blayney has “his own” in Gen. i. 27, and in no other place, as if he shrunk from making about 200 changes in respect to one word. We have italicised “own” only in Job xix. 17, where its presence excludes one very possible sense, and in Acts xxi. 11, where it is important to mark that ἑαυτοῦ is not in the text.

(11) The Hebrew preposition לְ “to,” with or without the verb “ to be,” is considered as equivalent, idiom for idiom, with the English verb “to have.” It is so treated in the book of 1611 usually (e.g. Gen. xii. 20; xvi. 1), but not always (e.g. Gen. xi. 6 “they have,” ver. 30 “she had”). But “pertained” in such phrases is always italicised, as Judg. vi. 11 in 1611. Hence we would not follow Scholefield1, who reads “what have I” 1 Cor. v. 12.

(12) We have adopted, with some hesitation, Mr Gorle’s refined distinction, confirmed by 1611 in Jer. xli. 16, between אַחַר “after that” and אַחֲרֵי־כֵן “after that;” not however with infinitives, as 2 Chr. xxvi. 2. Jer. xxxvi. 27; xl. 1.

(13) When in different parts of Scripture a phrase or expression is given with more or less fulness, it is right to distinguish the shorter form, by setting the missing part of it in italics. Examples are in 1611 “dead men” Ex. xii. 33; “mighty man” Ps. cxx. 4 marg. (compare Ruth ii. 1. 1 Sam. xiv. 52. Jer. xli. 16 where “man” is expressed): in 1638, Job xvii. 8, 10. Isai. xxix. 8; xliv. 25: in 1769, Isai. xli. 2. Again in 1611, “fill with” Gen. xliv. 1. Ps. lxxi. 8 (bis); lxxii. 19, a preposition being supplied after the verb (מָלֵא) in Ex. xvi. 32. 2 Kin. ix. 24. Ezra ix. 11. Job xli. 7. Ezek. xxxii. 6. Care, however, should be taken to put in italics no more than is really wanting: thus in Matt. viii. 25 προσελθόντες ought to be “came to him;” Matt. x. 1 προσκαλεσάμενος “called unto him” as it is given in 1762, not as the same word is represented by 1769 in Matt. xv. 32 “called unto him.” This rule extends very widely, and is difficult to be observed with perfect consistency.

(14) The verb substantive is italicised before the participle passive (Paül), to distinguish it from the Niphal conjugation of the verb (e.g. Gen. xxix. 31, 33 “was hated” in 1629 Camb.); but more licence has been granted to the auxiliaries that render the active participle (Poel). In Num. x. 29 we have given “we are journeying,” though in other places the present “is” “are” &c. is in Roman type, but not “was” or “were.”

Such are the principal rules which the Translators of the Authorized Version designed to follow in the arrangement of italics for the standard Bible of 1611. How little what they printed was systematically reviewed and corrected in the preparation of later editions is evident from the numerous glaring errors, committed by them, which have remained undetected down to this day. The reader will perceive what is meant by comparing the present volume with any modern Bible in 1 Chr. vii. 6. 2 Chr. x. 16. Neh. v. 19. Job i. 5; xxii. 24; xli. 20. Ps. lv. 21. Prov. xv. 26. Cant. v. 12. Isai. xxii. 18 (“like” a little doubtful). Jer. xi. 4, 7; xxxvi. 22; xlvi. 13. Ezek. iv. 4, 9; xiii. 18; xxii. 20 marg.; xxxix. 11; xliii. 3 marg. Dan. i. 7; viii. 26; ix. 23 marg. Obad. 6. Hab. iii. 9. 1 Esdr. viii. 63. Tobit iii. 3. Wisd. ii. 1; xix. 14. 1 Macc. viii. 18; x. 24; xii. 37. Tit. ii. 3. 3 John 12. Indeed some more recent corrections are positively false, e.g. 2 Chr. iii. 11 “one wing of the one” (1638): Luke x. 30 “man” (1762).

What Blayney intended to do, and seems to have lacked time for (Appendix D, p. xcviii.), has been regarded as a matter of imperative duty by the editor of the present work. He has made out a full list of all the changes with respect to italics, in which this volume differs from his standard, the Cambridge small pica octavo of 1858, together with such reasons for them as each case might require; and has deposited the list for future reference in the Library of the Syndics of the University Press.