we would not use it, speaking of the body of our Saviour Christ, when it was dead. But you hunt yourself out of breath, when you would bring the same contempt to the Cadaver. Latin word cadaver, which Beza used. For cadaver signifieth generally a dead body of man or beast, and by your vulgar Latin translator is used for the dead bodies of sacrifices, of saints and holy men, as indifferently as for carrion To πμα. of beasts, or carcases of evil men: namely, in Job xxxix. 33, "Wheresoever the dead body is, thither will the eagle resort;” which similitude our Saviour Christ applieth to himself, Matt. xxiv. 28, "Wheresoever the dead body is, thither will the eagles be gathered;" where he compareth himself to the dead body, and the faithful to the eagles. MARTIN, 48. Now concerning the other Hebrew word, which you say signifieth hell, because the Greek and vulgar Latin interpreter do so translate it: when just occasion shall be given afterward, cap. vII., I will shew that it properly signifieth a grave, pit, or place for dead bodies; and that in this place of the xvi. psalm it must needs so signify, not only the latter part of the verse, expressing in other words that which was said in the former, but also the apostle's proving out of it the resurrection of Christ, do sufficiently declare. If you have no place therefore in the scriptures, to prove your limbus patrum, but where the Holy Ghost speaketh of the death and burial of the fathers, no marvel though you must strain the Hebrew word, which properly signifieth grave, and the Greek word, which properly signifieth a dark place, and especially the Latin, which signifieth generally a low place: none of all the three words signifying hell, as we commonly understand the word hell, properly and only, but by a figure, where mention is made of the death of the ungodly, whose reward is in hell. These be the poor shifts, turnings and windings, that you have to wreath in those fables of limbus patrum and purgatory, which the church of God from the beginning of the world unto the coming of Christ never heard of, nor many hundred years after Christ, until the Montanists, or such like heathenish heretics, brought in those fantasies. Martin. In the New Testament, we ask them, will you be tried by the ancient Latin translation, which is the text of the fathers and the whole church? No; but we appeal to the Greek. What Greek? say we; for there be sundry copies, and the best of them (as Beza confesseth) agree with the said ancient Latin. For example, in St Peter's words, "Labour that by good works you may make sure your vocation 2 Pet. i. and election," doth this Greek copy please you? No, say they; we appeal to that Greek copy which hath not these words, "by good works;" for otherwise we should grant the merit and efficacy of good works toward salvation. And generally, to tell you at once, by what Greek we will be tried, we like best the vulgar Greek text of the New Testament, which is most common and in every man's hands. 48. Fulke. We need not appeal to the Greek, for any FULKE, thing you bring out of the vulgar Latin against us. As for that text, 2 Pet. i. "Labour that by good works," &c., I have answered before in the 36th section. We like well the Latin, or that Greek copy which hath those words, "by good works;" for we must needs understand them where they are not expressed and therefore you do impudently believe us to say they do not please us. Calvin upon that text saith: Nonnulli codices habent bonis operibus; sed hoc de sensu nihil mutat, quia subaudiendum est etiam si non exprimatur. "Some books have, 'by good works'; but this changeth nothing of the sense, for that must be understood although it be not expressed." The same thing in effect saith Beza: "that our election and vocation must be confirmed by the effects of faith, that is, by the fruits of justice, &c.; therefore in some copies we find it added, 'by good works." So far off is it, that Beza misliketh those words, that he citeth them to prove the perpetual connection of election, vocation, justification, and sanctification. This is therefore as wicked a slander of us, as it is an untrue affirmation of the vulgar Latin, that it is the text of the fathers and the whole church; whereby you shew yourself to be a Donatist, to acknowledge no church, but where the Latin text is occupied so that in Greece, Syria, Armenia, Ethiopia, and other parts of the world, where the Latin text is not known or understood, there Christ hath no church by your unadvised assertion. That we like best the most common Greek text, I am sure that we do it by as good reason, if not by better, than you in so great diversities of the Latin text, who like best of that which is most common and in every man's hands. 49. Martin. Well, say we, if you will needs have it so, take your MARTIN, pleasure in choosing your text. And if you will stand to it, grant us that Peter was chief among the apostles, because your own Greek Matt. x. FULKE, 49. text saith, "The first, Peter." No, saith Beza, we will grant you no such thing; for these words were added to the Greek text by one that favoured Peter's primacy. Is it so? then you will not stand to this Greek text neither? Not in this place, saith Beza. Fulke. In granting Peter to be the first, we need not grant him to be the chief; and if we grant him to be the chief, it followeth not that he is chief in authority. But if that were granted, it is not necessary that he was head of the church. And albeit that were also granted, the bishop of Rome could gain nothing by it. But what saith Beza, where the text saith, "the first Peter"? If we must believe you, he saith, "No, we will grant you no such thing; for these words were added to the Greek text by one that favoured Peter's primacy." I pray you, Martin, where hath Beza those words? will you never leave this shameful forgery? Beza, in the tenth of Matthew, doth only ask the question : Quid si hoc vocabulum, &c. "What if this word were added by some that would establish the primacy of Peter? for nothing followeth that may agree with it.” This asketh Beza, but as an objection, which immediately after he answereth, and concludeth that it is no addition, but a natural word of the text found in all copies, confessed by Theophylact, an enemy of the pope's primacy, and defendeth it in the third of Mark (where it is not in the common Greek copies, nor in the vulgar Latin) against Erasmus, who, finding it in some Greek copies, thought it was untruly added out of Matthew. But Beza saith, Ego vero non dubito quin hæc sit germana lectio: "But I doubt not but this is the true and right reading of the text;" and therefore he translateth Primum Simonem, "the first Simon," out of the few copies Erasmus speaketh of. Therefore it is an abominable slander to charge him with following the common received text, where it seemeth to make against you, when he contendeth for the truth against the common text, yea, and against your own vulgar Latin, to give you that which you make so great account of, that Peter in the catalogue of the apostles was first. So greatly he feareth to acknowledge that Peter was called first! and so true it is that you charge him to say, "No, we will grant you no such thing; for these words were added to the Greek text by one that favoured Peter's primacy!" I hope your favourers, seeing your forgery thus manifestly discovered, will give you less credit in other your shameless slanders at the leastwise this in equity I trust all papists will xxiii. 16, 17. grant, not to believe your report against any man's writing, except they read it themselves. Now that this word "the first" argueth no primacy or superiority, beside those places quoted by Beza, Acts xxvi. 20, Rom. i. 8, and iii. 2, you may read 1 Par. xxiii. xxiv. where the posterity of Levi and Aaron are [1 Chron. rehearsed, as they were appointed by David in their orders xxiv. 7.] or courses: Subuel primus, Rohobia primus, sors prima Joiarib, &c. where lest you should think of any headship or principality, because the Hebrew is sometime , and the Greek apyou, you may see that Subuel is called primus of the sons of Gerson, when there is no more mention; and more expressly, Rohobia is called primus of the sons of Eleazer, of whom it is said, that he had no more sons; and that signifieth here the first in order, it appeareth by those generations, where the second, third, or fourth; is named, as in the sons of Hebron and of Oziel. Also in the sons of Semei, where Jehoth is counted the first, Riza the second, Jaus and Beria, because they increased not in sons, were accounted for one family. In all which there is no other primacy than in the first lot of Joiarib, where the Hebrew word is harishuon, and so follow the rest in order, unto four and twenty courses. Therefore there is no cause why we should not stand to the Greek text in that place, neither did Beza ever deny to stand to it. הראשון 50. Martin. Let us see another place. You must grant us (say we) MARTIN, by this Greek text, that Christ's very blood which was shed for us is really in the chalice, because St Luke saith so in the Greek text. No, saith Beza; those Greek words came out of the margin into the text, and therefore I translate not according to them, but according to that which I think the truer Greek text, although I find it in no copies in the world: and this his doing is maintained and justified by our See chap. i. English Protestants in their writings of late. num. 37: chap. xvii. num. 11. Fulke. Still Beza speaketh as you inspire into him, while FULKE, he speaketh through your throat or quill. The truth is, Beza 50. saith, that either there is a manifest solacophanes, that is, an appearance of incongruity; or else those words" which is shed for you" seem to be added out of St Matthew; or else it is an error of the writer's, placing that in the nominative case which should be in the dative: for in the dative case did Basil read them in his Morals', 21. definition. [ Τοῦτο τὸ ποτήριον ἡ καινὴ διαθήκη ἐστὶν ἐν τῷ αἵματί μου, τῷ ὑπὲρ ὑμῶν ἐκχυνομένῳ. Hic calix novum testamentum est in sanguine MARTIN, 51. Nevertheless, all our old books, saith Beza, had it so written, as it is commonly printed, in the nominative case. Here are three several distinctions, yet can you find none but one proposition that you set down, as though it were purely and absolutely affirmed by Beza. Likewise, where you speak of no copies in the world, you say more than Beza, who speaketh but of such copies as he had; who, if he were of no better conscience than you would have him seem to be, might feign some copy in his own hands to salve the matter. But the truth is, that since he wrote this, he found one more ancient copy, both in Greek and Latin, which now is at Cambridge, where this whole verse is wanting. But of this matter, which somewhat concerneth myself particularly, I shall have better occasion to write in the places by you quoted, cap. 1. 37, and cap. xvII. 11, where I will so justify that which I have written before touching this place, as I trust all learned and indifferent readers shall see how vainly you insult against me, where you bewray grosser ignorance in Greek phrases than ever I would have suspected in you, being accounted the principal linguist of the seminary at Rhemes. Martin. Well, yet, say we, there are places in the same Greek text, as plain for us as these now cited, where you cannot say, it came 1 Thess. ii. out of the margin, or it was added falsely to the text. As, "Stand and hold fast the traditions," &c.: by this text we require that you grant us traditions delivered by word of mouth, as well as the written word, that is, the scriptures. No, say they, we know the Greek word signifieth tradition, as plain as possibly; but here and in the like places we rather translate it "ordinances," "instructions," and what else soever. Nay, sirs, say we, you cannot so answer the matter, for in other places you translate it duly and truly "tradition;" and why more in one place than in another? They are ashamed to tell why; but they must tell, and shame both themselves and the devil, if ever they think it good to answer this treatise: as also, why they changed "congregation," which was always in their first translation, into "church" in their later translations, and did not change likewise "ordinances” into “ traditions," "elders" into "priests." FULKE, 51. Fulke. That the Thessalonians had some part of christian doctrine delivered by word of mouth, that is, by the apostle's preaching, at such time as he did write unto them, meo, qui pro vobis funditur. Basilii Moralia. Regula xx1. c. 3. Opera, v. iii. p. 254. Edit. Garnier, Parisiis, 1722.] |