The other two volumes in this comprehensive and magnificent historical source, produced by a fine team of scholars, are The Cambridge History of the Bible: Volume 1, From the Beginnings to Jerome The Cambridge History of the Bible: Volume 3, The West from the Reformation to the Present Day.



Chapters include "The Old Testament: Manuscripts, Text and Versions," "The History of the Text and Canon of the New Testament to Jerome," "The Medieval History of the Latin Vulgate," "The Study of the Bible in Medieval Judaism," "English Versions of the Scriptures Before Wyclif," "Vernacular Scriptures in Spain," etc.



Here are some representative quotations from this volume:



"(O)rthodox Judaism either refused to recognize it (the Septuagint) from an early period or quickly expunged it from among its Scriptures, for there are but few and indirect indications of its existence in any of the rabbinic works." (Pg. 14)

"In any case, it is necessary to remind ourselves that we ought not to speak too glibly of 'Jerome's' translation. It is certain that some books ... owe their revision for the 'Vulgate' to Jerome personally; others were taken over by him unchanged from the Old Latin. Thus the Vulgate form of at least the Catholic and Pauline epistles---perhaps of all the New Testament other than the Gospels---derives from an unknown editor, working at Rome, not later than the last decade of the fourth century." (Pg. 108)

"The conclusion to be drawn from this chronological sketch is that, from the sixth century till the twelfth, renewal of interest in the Bible coincided with periods of ecclesiastical, and especially monastic, reform." (Pg. 192)

"The restriction of complete bibles to the wealthy, or even to court circles, was perhaps economically inevitable. The Latin bible, assured of a wide sale, could be mass-produced. The vernacular bible appealed from the outset to a limited public, and an undecorated copy might have been an unsaleable commodity. Scriptural knowledge was never censored, merely rationed by the purse." (Pg. 451)

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