One thing I have asked from the Lord, that I shall seek:
That I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life,
To behold the beauty of the Lord
And to meditate in His temple.
—Psalm 27:4 (NASB-U)
In this verse, the word translated as meditate is the Hebrew word baqar, which means inquire or seek. This image is not of a person sitting passively, awaiting inspiration, like a Buddha in an eastern Temple, but of a student or disciple eagerly probing, asking questions, seeking after truth.
This calls to mind the Biblical scholars of the Reformation. These were not aloof and cloistered eggheads, but men of passion, conviction, and courage. Think of Martin Luther risking his life to translate the Bible into German. Or William Tyndale who did lose his life for translating the Bible into English. I think of the team of scholars and printers who labored to create the Complutensian Polyglot Bible, the first complete original language Bible, and forerunner of the parallel Bible. Planned and financed by Francisco Jimenez de Cisneros, Spanish statesman, cardinal, and philanthropist, (he was the friend of Queen Isabella who provided the funds to send Columbus on his historic voyage) the top religious scholars of the day spent 15 years obtaining numerous rare manuscripts from around the world and comparing them to determine the most accurate readings. The printers had to carve and cast lead type for the Greek alphabet. There were no Greek fonts available. (And the typography was so elegant that it is still in use today. The Greek Font Society distributes a computer font called GFS Complutensian Greek.) When it was finished, Pope Leo X blocked it’s publication. It seems that a few months earlier, a Dutch printer had learned of the project, and realized that the first one to publish a complete original language Bible would make a mint. So he had secured the services of the only scholar of Classical languages he knew locally, the noted Humanist philosopher, Desiderius Erasmus, to arrange a publishing coup. Erasmus obtain the few manuscripts available locally, and where there were no Greek originals available, he translated the Latin of the Vulgate back into Greek to finish the job. This was not critical edition, or work of scholarship. From idea to publication took less than six months. And in the meantime, the printer had secured from Emperor Maximillian and Pope Leo X, exclusive publication rights for the Greek New Testament. The Polyglot was eventually published, but Cisneros did not live to see his masterpiece in print.
Greek scholars were outraged by the outrageous number of errors in Erasmus’ version. Nevertheless, it was a runaway best-seller. Its success prompted him to deal with the countless complaints about the text, and he published five more revisions during his lifetime. Later editors produced many fore revisions over the next century until his edition, which had come to be known as Textus Receptus, fell into disuse. And despite the problems, controversy, and corruption, the Polyglot was published, and first editions are still in existence. And though, neither of these is used for the translation of modern Bibles, the work these scholars started continues in the Nestle-Aland, the IBS, and the Byzantine Majority—the original language Bibles used by modern translators and scholars. And most important, the fruit of their labors made the dreams of Luther and Tyndale possible. Bibles are now available in practically every human language, and anyone who wants to seek out God’s truth can learn it directly form the source. Anyone who has the desire can now “meditate (baqar=inquire, probe, seek) in His temple.” And through the restoration of the Word to the people, the gospel of salvation by grace through faith alone was rediscovered. The Dark Ages were over and the Light of Truth dawned.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God.
—Ephes. 2:8 (ESV)
