Bellarmine · De Controversiis · On the Word of God · Book II: On the Editions and Versions of Scripture
Chapter 4: On the Syriac edition
Our translation, from the Latin of the Opera Omnia (Paris: Vivès, 1870–74), vol. I, De Verbo Dei, Book II: On the Editions and Versions of Scripture. The Latin source text is public domain; this English rendering is released with the site. Scripture quotations follow Bellarmine's Vulgate citations, rendered in Douay-Rheims wording where he quotes exactly. Click “Show the Latin” for the original (raw OCR of the scan; scanning errors remain — the scan itself is the authority).
Concerning the Syriac edition three things must be said. First, what the difference is between the Syriac tongue and the Chaldaic. Then, which sacred books are held to have been written in the Syriac tongue. Lastly, how great is the authority of this edition.
As to the first, the Syriac tongue is, as it were, a kind of offspring of the Hebrew and Chaldaic tongues. For the Hebrews, who down to the Babylonian captivity had been wont to speak only Hebrew, that is, their own tongue, when they were led away into Babylon, began to forget their own tongue and to learn the foreign, that is, the Chaldaic; but because they could not pronounce it perfectly, and always retained something of the Hebrew, it came about that a certain third tongue was born, mixed of the Hebrew and Chaldaic, and that is the one which the Hebrews thenceforth held as vernacular and mother-tongue. Which indeed was called Syriac from the region where its use most flourishes, or Hierosolymitan from the chief city of the Hebrews; just as the Chaldaic tongue, which has this name from the region of Chaldea, was called also Babylonian from the most noble city of Chaldea. Moreover these two tongues are distinguished by their characters, the conjugations of verbs, the affixes, the noting of the points, the sound of the vowels, the idioms, and almost the whole structure of the tongue, and also by many proper words.
As to the second: first, it is certain that no book of the Old Testament was written by its first author in this tongue, unless perhaps the first book of Maccabees and Ecclesiasticus, of which the former Jerome writes that he saw it in Hebrew, in the Helmeted Prologue, and of the latter he writes the same in the prologue to the Proverbs. For it is credible that these books were written in the vernacular tongue of the Hebrews, that is, the Syriac, which nevertheless are not now extant except in Greek. Of the other books it is established that they were written by their first authors either in Hebrew, or in Chaldaic, or in Greek.
Concerning the New Testament there is greater doubt; and indeed it is very probable that the Gospel of St. Matthew, and the epistle of St. Paul to the Hebrews, were written in the Syriac tongue. For this Albert Widmanstadt, chancellor of the Emperor Ferdinand (who first in Europe caused the Syriac New Testament to be printed), proves by most efficacious arguments; and Guido Fabricius, whose is the Latin interpretation of the Syriac New Testament in the royal Bibles.
Nor do the old writers contradict these — Irenaeus, Origen, Eusebius, Athanasius, Epiphanius, Jerome — who say that these books, and especially the Gospel of St. Matthew, were written in Hebrew; for they speak of the Hebrew tongue which in the time of the Apostles was vernacular, just as in the Gospel itself we read everywhere that something was said in Hebrew, which nevertheless is established to have been said in the vernacular tongue, that is, the Syriac, such as that of John 19: He went out to the place which is called Calvary, but in Hebrew Golgotha.
Of which words see St. Jerome in the book On Hebrew names, where he diligently noted all the words which are Syriac, though they are said to be Hebrew by the Evangelists. Besides these two books, the whole New Testament was translated from the Greek idiom into the Syriac, the author (as the Syrians themselves think) being St. Mark the Evangelist.
But if this were true, there would be no cause why the authority of this edition should be doubted (that we may now come to the last point). But I cannot easily be brought to believe that the Syriac edition of the whole New Testament was delivered by St. Mark to the Churches of Syria and Egypt, and that of that edition there is no mention at all extant in Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Eusebius, Athanasius, Theophilus, Epiphanius, Jerome, Cyril, Theodoret, John Damascene, and the other Fathers, who were either in Syria or in Egypt, either bishops or presbyters, and who either accurately disputed of the various editions of the Scriptures, or at least left many things written of the holy Scriptures to posterity.
But if the Syriac edition is later than the age of these Fathers, as I for my part am certainly persuaded, its authority cannot be so great that it may deservedly be compared with the Greek or Latin edition — to pass over meanwhile that there are also certain things in that edition which do not altogether please learned and pious men. Yet there is one notable advantage of that edition above others: that since in the titles and sections of the chapters mention is made of fasts, of the veneration of the cross, of prayers for the dead, of vigils, of the memory of the Saints, and of other such things, which the Lutherans detest as traditions of the Roman Pontiff, this very edition convicts the Lutherans of a most manifest falsehood. But of the Chaldaic and Syriac edition enough has been said for the brevity of the work undertaken; now let us come to the Greek.
Show the Latin (Vives edition, OCR)
CAPUT IV.
De editione Syriaca.
De editione Syriaca dicenda sunt tria. Pri¬
mum quid intersit inter linguam Syriacam
et Chaldaicam. Deinde, qui libri sacri Syria¬
ca lingua scripti habeantur. Postremo, quan¬
ta sit hujus editionis auctoritas.
Quod igitur ad primum attinet , Syriaca
lingua quasi proles quaedam est Hebraicae et
Chaldaicae linguae. Hebraei siquidem, qui us¬
que ad captivitatem Babylonicam Hebraice
solum, id est, lingua sua loqui consueverant,
cum abducti essent in Babylonem, coeperunt
oblivisci linguam propriam, et addiscere alie¬
nam, id est, Chaldaicam; quia tamen non
perfecte eam pronuntiare poterant, et sem-
per aliquid ex Hebraica retinebant, factum
est, ut lingua quaedam tertia nasceretur mix¬
ta ex Hebraica et Chaldaica , atque ea est,
quam pro vulgari ac materna deinceps He¬
braei habuerunt. Quae quidem Syriaca dicta
est a regione ubi maxime ejus usus viget,
sive Hierosolymitana a civitate praecipue He¬
braeorum : quemadmodum lingua Chaldaica,
quae hoc nomen habet a regione Chaldaea,
vocata est etiam Babylonica a civitate Chal¬
daeae nobilissima. Porro distinguuntur hae
duae linguae characteribus , verborum con¬
jugationibus, affixis , punctorum notatione,
sono vocalium, idiotismis, ac tota fere linguae
structura , et multis etiam propriis dictioni¬
bus.
Quod autem pertinet ad secundum : primo
certum est, nullum librum veteris Testamenti
scriptum esse a primo auctore in hac lingua,
nisi fortassis liber primus Machabaeorum et
Ecclesiasticus, quorum priorem Hebraicum
se vidisse scribit Hieronymus in prologo Ga¬
leato , de posteriori idem scribit in prologo
Proverbiorum. Credibile enim est, lingua
vulgari Hebraeorum, id est, Syriaca scriptos
fuisse hos libros, qui tamen non exstant hoc
tempore nisi Graece. De caeteris libris con¬
stat, aut Hebraice, aut Chaldaice, aut Grae¬
ce a primis auctoribus scriptos esse.
De Testamento novo major est dubitatio;
et quidem valde probabile est , Evangelium
S. Matthaei, et epist. S. Pauli ad Hebraeos Sy¬
riaca lingua scriptos esse : id enim efficacis-
simis argumentis probat Albertus Widmesta-
dius Ferdinandi Imperatoris Cancellarius,
qui primus in Europa Testamentum novum
Syriacum imprimi curavit ; et Guido Fabri-
tius, cujus est Latina interpretatio novi Te¬
stamenti Syriaci in regiis Bibliis.
Neque his repugnant veteres Scriptores,
Irenaeus, Origenes, Eusebius, Athanasius,
Epiphanius, Hieronymus, qui hos libros, ac
praesertim Evangelium S. Matthaei Hebraice
scriptos fuisse dicunt : loquuntur enim de
lingua Hebraica quae Apostolorum tempore
vulgaris erat, quemadmodum in ipso Evan-
gelio passim legimus, dictum aliquid esse
Hebraice, quod tamen constat vulgari lin¬
gua, id est, Syriaca dictum esse, quale est
illud Joan. XIX. Exivit in eum , qui dicitur
Calvarice locum, Hebraice autem Golgotha { 1).
(1) Joan. XIX, 17.
4
CAPUT V.
127
De quibus vocibus vide S. Hieronymum in
lib. De nom. Hebr. , ubi diligenter notavit
omnes voces quae Syriacae sunt, cum tamen
Hebraicae esse dicantur abEvangelistis. Prae¬
ter hos duos libros, totmn novum Testamen¬
tum translatum est ex Graeco idiomate in
Syriacum, auctore (ut ipsi Syri arbitrantur)
S . Marco Evangelista.
Quod si verum esset, nulla esset causa,
cur de hujus editionis auctoritate, (ut jam
ad postremunfcaput veniamus) dubitaretur.
Sed non facile adduci possum ut credam, a
S. Marco traditam Ecclesiis Syriae et dEgypti
editionem Syriacam Testamenti novi uni¬
versi ; et 'ejus editionis nullam prorsus men¬
tionem exstare apud Clementem Alexandri¬
num, Origenem, Eusebium, Athanasium,
Theophilum, Epiphanium, Hieronymum,
Gyrillum, Theodoretum, Joannem Damasce¬
num, aliosque Patres, qui vel in Syria, vel
in iEgypto, aut Episcopi, aut Presbyteri fue¬
runt, et vel de variis Scripturarum editioni¬
bus accurate disputarunt, vel certe multa
de Scripturis sanctis posteritati scripta re¬
liquerunt.
Quod si editio Syriaca aetate horum Pa¬
trum posterior est, ut ego quidem mihi cer¬
to persuadeo, non potest ejus auctoritas
tanta esse, ut cum editione Graeca, aut La¬
tina merito comparari possit, ut interim illud
omittam, quod non desunt etiam quaedam in
ea editione, quae viris doctis et piis non ad¬
modum placeant. Unum tamen est praeter
alia ejus editionis commodum insigne, quod
cum in titulis, ac sectionibus capitum men¬
tio fiat jejuniorum, venerationis crucis, pre¬
cum pro defunctis, vigiliarum, memoriae
Sanctorum, aliarumque ejusmodi rerum,
quas Lutherani tanquam Romani Pontificis
traditiones detestantur : apertissimi menda¬
cii haec ipsa editio Lutheranos convincit.
Sed de editione Chaldaica et Syriaca satis
multa pro instituti operis brevitate dicta
sunt : nunc ad Graecam veniamus.