(1) THE sacred Council of Trent decrees, that || and totally suppress "worshipped God" in "the images of Christ, of the virgin mother of another? Is it not because they are afraid, lest God, and of other saints, are to be had and re- those expressions might warrant and confirm tained, especially in churches; and that due the Catholic and Christian manner of adoring honour and worship is to be imparted unto them: our Saviour Christ, towards the holy cross, or not that any divinity is believed to be in them; before his image, the crucifix, the altar, &c.? or virtue, for which they are to be worshipped; And though they make so much of the Greek or that any thing is to be begged of them; or particle, sm, as to translate it, "leaning upon,' that hope is to be put in them; as, in times past, rather than "towards ;" yet the ancient Greek the Pagans did, who put their trust in idols; but fathers (c) considered it of such little import, because the honour which is exhibited to them, that they expounded and read the text, as if it is referred to the archetype, which they resem- were for the phrase only, and not for any signible so that, by the images which we kiss, and fication at all; saying, "Jacob adored Joseph's before which we uncover our heads, and kneel, sceptre; the people of Israel adored the temple, we adore Christ and his saints, whose likeness the ark, the holy mount, the place where his feet they bear." (a) And the second Council of stood," and the like: whereby St. Damascene Nice, which confirmed the ancient reverence proves the adoration of creatures, named dulia ; due to sacred images, tells us, "That these to wit, of the cross, and of sacred images. If, I images the faithful salute with a kiss, and give say, these fathers make so little force of the an honorary worship to them, but not the true prepositions, as to infer from these texts, not latria, or divine worship, which is according to only adoration "towards" the thing, but adofaith, and can be given to none but to God him- || ration" of" the thing; how come these, our new self." (b) Between which degree of worship, translators, thus to strain and rack the little latria and dulia, Protestants are so loath to make particle, snu, to make it signify "leaning upon," any distinction, that, in this place, they restrain and utterly to exclude it from signifying any the scripture to the sense of one doctor; inso- thing tending towards adoration ? much that they make the commentary of St. Augustine, (peculiar to him alone,) the very text of scripture, in their translation; thereby excluding all other senses and expositions of other fathers; who either read and expound, that "Jacob adored the top of Joseph's sceptre ;" or I would gladly know of them, whether in else, that "he adored towards the top of his these places of the Psalms there be any force in sceptre:" besides which two meanings, there is the Hebrew prepositions? Surely no more than no other interpretation of this place, in all anti-if we should say in English, without preposiquity, but in St. Augustine only, as Beza him- tions, "adore ye his holy will: we will adore the self confesses. And here they add two words place where his feet stood: adore ye his footmore than are in the Greek text, Leaning stool;" for they know the same preposition is and God:" forcing avtov to signify durov, which used also, when it is said, "adore ye our Lord;" may be, but is as rare as virga ejus, for virga or, as themselves translate it," worship the sue; and turning the other words clear out of Lord;" where there can be no force nor signitheir order, place, and form of construction, fication of the preposition: and therefore, in which they must needs have correspondent and these places, their translation is corrupt and answerable to the Hebrew text, from whence wilful; when they say, we will fall down be. they were translated; which Hebrew words fore," or, "at his footstool," &c. Where they themselves translate in this order, "He worshun and avoid, first, the term of adoration, shipped towards the bed's head;" and if so, which the Hebrew and Greek duly express, by according to the Hebrew, then did he worship terms correspondent in both languages through"towards the top of his sceptre," according out the Bible, and are applied, for the most to the Greek; the difference of both being only part, to signify adoring of creatures. Secondly in these words, sceptre and bed; because the they avoid the Greek phrase, which is, at least, Hebrew is ambiguous as to both, and not in the to adore "towards" these holy things and order and construction of the sentence. places and much more the Hebrew phrase, which is, to adore the very things rehearsed. "To adore God's footstool," (as the Psalmist saith,)" because it is holy," or, "because he is holy," whose footstool it is, as the Greek read (2) BUT why is it, that they thus boldly add in one place, and take away in another? Why do they add "leaned, and God" in one text, : 66 And St. Augustine so precisely and reli giously reads, " adore ye his footstool," that he examines the case; and finds, thereby, that the blessed sacrament must be adored, and that no good Christian takes it, before he adores it. Concil. Trident., Sess. 25. (c) St. Chrys. Oecum, in Collection. St. Damasc., lib. 1, pro Imaginib, Leont. apud Damas. 1 Corinth. chap. x. verse 7. Corrected also in "Neque idolatre "Neither become "Be not wor sidaholargai, efficia-ye idolaters," as shippers of images," this. as some of them. ex ipsis. (1) BEFORE I proceed in this, let me ask our English translators, what is the most proper, and best English of ἔιδωλον, εἰδωλολάτρης, είδωλο. Largeia; idolum, idolatra, idolatria? Is it not idol, idolator, idolatry? Are not these plain English words, and well known in our language? Why then need they put three words for one, "worshipper of images," and "worshipping of images?" Whether is the more natural and convenient speech, either in our English tongue, or for the truth of the thing to say, as the holy scripture does, "covetousness is idolatry" and consequently, "the covetous man is an idolator;" or to say, as their first absurd translations have it, "covetousness is worshipping of images," and the "covetous man is a worshipper of images?" I suppose they will scarcely deny, but that there are many covetous Protestants, and, perhaps, of their clergy too, that may be put in the list with those of whom the apostle speaks, when he says, there are some "whose belly is their god." And though these make an idol of their money, and their bellies, by covetousness and gluttony, yet they would doubtless take it ill of us, if in their own scripture language, we should call them "worshippers of images." Who sees not, therefore, what great difference there is between "idol" and 66 image," "idolatry" and worshipping of images?" even so much is there between St. Paul's words, and the Protestant translation; but because in their latter translations they have corrected this shameful absurdity, I will say no more of it. 66 (2) IN this other, not only their malice, but their full intent and set purpose of deluding the poor simple people appear; this translation being made when images were plucking down throughout England, to create in the people a belief, that the apostle spoke against sacred images in churches? whereas his words are against the idols and idolatry of the Gentiles; as is plain from what goes before, exhorting them not to their children with it in their baptism, when they are first made Christians. By such wilful corruptions, in these and other texts, as, "Be not worshippers of images, as some of them;" and, " Babes, keep yourselves from images;" which, the more to impress on the minds of the vulgar, they wrote upon their church walls; the people were animated to break down, and cast out of their churches, the images of our blessed Saviour, of his blessed mother, the twelve apostles, &c., with so full and general a resolution of defacing and extirpating all tokens or marks of our Saviour's passion, that they broke down the very crosses from the tops of church steeples, where they could easily come to them. And though, in their latter translations, they have corrected this corruption; yet do some of the people so freshly, to this day, retain the malice impressed by it upon their parents, that they have presumed to break the cross lately set on the pinnacle of the porch of Westminster abbey: and the more to show their spite towards that sacred sign of our redemption-the holy cross-they placed it, not long since, upon the foreheads of bulls and mastiff-dogs, and so drove them through the streets of London, to the eternal shame of such as receive it in their baptism, and pretend to Christianity. What could Jews or Infidels have done more? Was it not enough to break it down from the tops of churches, and to put up the image of a dragon, (the figure wherein the devil himself is usually represented,) as on Bow Church, (a) in the midst of the city, but they must place it so contemptuously on the foreheads of beasts and dogs? In how great esteem the holy cross was had by primitive Christians, the fathers of those days have sufficiently testified in their writings : "This cross," says St. Chrysostom, "we may see solemnly used in houses, in the market, in the desert, in the ways, on mountains and hills, in valleys," &c., contrary to which, the pretendout of their houses, but out of their churches ed reformers of our times have not only cast it also they have broken it down from all market join with infidels; for, says he, "How agreeth the temple of God with idols?" not with images," for "images" might be had without sin, as we see the Jews had the images of the cherubim and the figures of oxen in the temple, and the image of the brazen serpent in the wilderness, by God's appointment; though, as soon as they began to make an idol of the serpent, and adore it as their god, it could no longer be kept without sin. By this corrupt custom of translating image, instead of idol, they so bewitched their deceived followers, as to make them despise, contemn, and abandon even the very sign and image of salvation, the cross of Christ, and the crucifix; whereby the manner of his bitter death and passion is represented; notwithstanding their signing and marking places, from hills, mountains, valleys, and high ways; so that in all the roads in England there is not one cross left standing entire, that I have which I have often seen, upon a wild heath or ever heard of, except one called Ralph cross, mountain, near Danby forest, in the north riding of Yorkshire. (b) (a) Why might not a cock (the animal by which our Saviour was pleased to admonish St. Peter of his sins) have been placed upon Covent Garden Church, rather than a serpent? or a cross on Bow Church, rather than a dragon? (b) The inhabitants of Danby, Rosdale, Westerdale, that they have a cross standing to this day in the midst and Ferndale, may glory before all parts of England, of them. The Book, Chapter, and Verse. 1 Corinth. chap. v. ver. 9, 10. I wrote to you in Corruptions in the Pro- I wrote to you The last Translation of the Protestant Bible, Ed. Lon. an. 1683. It is corrected in Scripsi vobis in But now I have But "that ye" 66 Romans chap. xi. verse 4. Reliqui mihi sep- I have left me seven thousand men that have not bowed their knees to "the image of" Baal. (2) I have left me seven thousand men that have not bowed their knees to "the image of" Baal. Acts of the Apos. chap. xix. verse 35. Viri Ephesi, quis Ye men of Ephe- Instead of "Ju- And here they enim est hominum, sus, for what man is piter's child," they translate, "the imqui nesciat Ephesio- there that knoweth translate "the image age which fell down rum civitatem cultri- not the city of the which came down from Jupiter." magne Ephesians to be a from Jupiter." cem esse Dianæ et "Jovis worshipper of great prolis?" te dioлçius? Diana, and "Jupi ter's child?" (1) How malicious and heretical was their intention, who, in this one sentence, made St. Paul seem to speak two distinct things, calling the Pagans "idolaters," and such wicked Christians as should commit the same impiety, "worshippers of images;" whereas the apostle uses but one and the self-same Greek word, in speaking both of Pagans and Christians? It is a wilful and most notorious corruption; for, in the first place, the translators, speaking of Pagans, render the word in the text "idolater;" but, in the latter part of the verse, speaking of Christians, they translate the very same Greek word, "worshipper of images," and what reason had they for this, but to make the simple and ignorant reader think, that St. Paul speaks here not only of Pagan idolaters, but also of Catholic Christians, who reverently kneel in prayer before the holy cross, or images of our Saviour Christ and his saints; as though the apostle had commanded such to be avoided? All the other words, covetous, fornicators, extortioners, they translate alike, in both places, with reference both to Pagans and Christians: yet the word "idolaters" not so, but Pagans they call "idolaters," and Christians, "worshippers of images." Was not this done on purpose, to make both seem alike, and to intimate that Christians doing reverence before sacred images, (which Protestants call worshipping of images,) are more to be avoided than the Pagan idolaters? whereas the apostle, speaking of Pagans and Christians that committed one and the self-same heinous sin, commands the Christian in that case to be avoided for his amendment, leaving the Pagan to himself, and to God, as not caring to judge him. (2) BESIDES their falsely translating "image" instead of "idol," they have also another way of falsifying and corrupting the scripture, by introducing the word "image" into the text, when, in the Hebrew or Greek, there is no such thing; as in these notorious examples: "to the image of Baal: the image that came down from Jupiter:" where they are not content to understand "image" rather than "idol," but they must intrude it into the text, though they know full well it is not in the Greek. Not unlike this kind of falsification, is that which has crept as a leprosy through all their Bibles, and which, it seems, they are resolved never to correct, viz., their translating sculptile and conflatile, graven image, and molten image; namely, in the first commandment; where they cannot be ignorant, that in the Greck it is "idol," and in the Hebrew, such a word as signifies only graven thing," not including this word "image." They know that God commanded to make the images of cherubim, and of oxen in the temple, and of the brazen serpent in the desert; and therefore, their wisdoms might have considered, that he forbad not all graven images, but such as the Gentiles make, and worshipped for gods; and therefore, Non facies tibi sculptile, coincide with those words that go before," Thou shalt have no other gods but me." For so to have an image, as to make it a god, is to make it more than an image: and therefore when it is an idol, as were the idols of the Gentiles, then it is forbidden by this commandment. Otherwise, when the cross stood many years upon the table, in Queen Elizabeth's chapel, pray was it against this commandment? or was it idolatry in her majesty, and her counsellors, that appointed it there? Or do their brethren the Lutherans beyond seas, at this day, commit idolatry against this commandment, who have in their churches the crucifix, and the holy images of the mother of God, and of St. John the evangelist? Or if the whole story of the Gospel concerning our Saviour Christ, were drawn in pictures and images in their churches, as it is in many of ours, would they say, it were a breach of this commandment? Fie for shame! fie for shame! that they should with such intolerable impudence and deceit abuse and bewitch the ignorant people against their own knowledge and consciences. 66 For do they not know, that God many times farbad the Jews either to marry or converse with the Gentiles, lest they might fall to worship their idols, as Solomon did, and as the psalm reports of them? This then is the meaning of the commandment, neither to make the idols of the Gentiles, nor any other, either like them, or as Jeroboam did in Dan and Bethel. (a) By this commandment we are forbidden, (not to make images, but) to make idols, or to worship images, or any thing else, as God. "I do not," says St. John Damascene, worship an image as God; but by the images and saints I give honour and adoration to God; for whose sake I respect and reverence those that are his friends." (b) "All over the world," says Pope Adrian I., "wheresoever Christianity is professed, sacred images are honoured by the faithful, &c. By the image of the body which the Son of God took for our redemption, we adore our Redeemer who is in heaven; far be it from us, that we (as some calumniate) should make gods of images; we only express the love and zeal we have for God, and his saints: and as we keep the books of the holy scripture, so do we the images, to remind us of our duty, still preserving entire the purity of our faith." (e). Learn from St. Jerom, after what manner they made use of holy images in his time; he writes in the epitaph of Paula, " that she adored prostrate on the ground, before the cross, as if she saw our Lord hanging on it." And in Jonas, chap. iv., he proves, that out of the veneration and love they had for the apostles, they generally painted their images on the vessels, which are called Saucomaries. And will Protestants say, that this was idolatry? (a) 3 Kings xii. 28; Psal. cv. 19. (b) St. Jo. Damas., Orat. 3. (c) Adrian I, pontif., Ep. ad Constan. et Irenæ. Impp. |