The Nineteenth-Century Biblical Studies Movement in New England

By the beginning of the nineteenth century, biblical studies in the USA had been waning for over one hundred years. This contrasted with the seventeenth century, when the religious ministers of the newly arrived settlers were products of Britain’s “golden age of Biblical learning.”^{Footnote 7} But biblical studies had subsequently declined in favor of philosophical (metaphysical) theology, with Jonathan Edwards as the most famous representative.^{Footnote 8} This situation changed in the early nineteenth century, with an interest in biblical studies developing around two opposing schools, the orthodox Calvinists of Andover Theological Seminary, and the liberal Unitarians at Harvard University. Both schools had their inspirational leaders, the long-lived Moses Stuart at Andover, and Joseph Stevens Buckminster at Harvard, who died in 1812 at the age of 28.^{Footnote 9} Although representing different schools, both Buckminster and Stuart saw in German biblical scholarship the key for achieving their goals. These goals were not qualitatively dissimilar. Buckminster believed that, with the help of German critical scholarship, the accretions of post-Apostolic theology could be exposed and removed, and the pure gospel message recovered. His hope for this was “to lead men to virtue and holiness … the promotion of Christian excellence.”^{Footnote 10} Stuart believed that the massive learning available from German biblical scholarship could only verify and prove the Bible and all its contents to be true. Both men, and both schools, rejected the skeptical rationalism that characterized much German critical scholarship, which denied supernatural elements in the Bible.

Andover Theological Seminary opened on 28 September 1808, the first Protestant seminary in the USA.^{Footnote 11} It was established to train ministers in the “Edwardsean school,” after Jonathan Edwards, of orthodox Calvinist theology, in express opposition to “Deism and Atheism … the Pelagian and Socinian heresies … ‘liberal Christianity’ … Unitarianism in the metropolis [Boston] and in Harvard College … [and] Arminian Calvinists, or Calvinistic Arminians.”^{Footnote 12}

Adoniram Judson, of impeccable New England Calvinist credentials, was part of the inaugural intake of students at Andover. Yet, although “a young man of excellent talents and scholarship … he could not be admitted as a member of the Seminary, because of his manifest want of piety.”^{Footnote 13} This was because Judson was not yet considered to be a professing Christian. His entry into Andover represents the final stage of a spiritual journey in which, during his time at Brown University (1804–1807), Judson had been attracted to Deism. A year after his graduation from Brown, in August and September 1808, he had gone on what would now be called a road trip. In this brief journey he had fallen in with a troupe of actors and, to some extent, enjoyed a dissolute lifestyle, albeit for only several weeks. On his return journey, while staying in a country inn, he witnessed the death of a friend from Brown who had influenced him in his Deism. This was a crisis point for Judson, propelling him back to an orthodox Christian faith.^{Footnote 14} He entered Andover only three weeks after returning from his journey, admitted as a “special student,” but shortly after announced his conversion to genuine Christian faith and was accepted as a “regular member” of the seminary.^{Footnote 15}

Judson graduated from Andover on 24 September 1810, while Moses Stuart had only joined the faculty in the spring of that same year.^{Footnote 16} This means that their overlap at Andover as teacher-student was only about 6 months. One of the peculiarities of Judson research is the lack of primary sources, and very little remains concerning the relationship between Stuart and Judson.^{Footnote 17} It appears that they were close, as Stuart supported Judson in establishing the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Mission and commended him for missionary service.^{Footnote 18} I have been unable to find anything, however, relating to Stuart’s scholarly influence on Judson. Circumstantial evidence would indicate that this influence was significant.

When Moses Stuart was appointed Professor of Sacred Literature at Andover in 1810, he was strong in Latin and Greek, the result of a typical classical education at Yale, but had little Hebrew. He was patently gifted in languages and taught himself Hebrew; he had also mastered Syriac, Aramaic (Chaldee), and Arabic by 1817.^{Footnote 19} Stuart also taught himself German by reading Johann Gottfried Eichhorn’s Einleitung in das Alte Testament, in 1812–1813.^{Footnote 20} Although most German scholarship was rationalistic, Stuart nevertheless regarded these works as essential to the development of American biblical studies. This demonstrates in Stuart, and his Andover circle, a willingness to use any resources available, and an appreciation of quality along with a selective appropriation of these works. Stuart maintained a high view of scripture, considering it divinely inspired and factually accurate in all its contents, and made use of whatever means possible to interpret it.^{Footnote 21} The fear of what was perceived as irreligious German rationalist impiety was a reality for both Calvinist and Unitarian in New England, and Stuart came under suspicion of “going over” to liberalism.^{Footnote 22} Stuart, while rejecting the German skepticism, nevertheless defended the importance of German biblical scholarship, writing in 1841, “there is more scientific knowledge of biblical criticism comprised in the German … than in all the other languages of the world taken together.”^{Footnote 23}

Stuart was both a leader and a representative of the biblical studies movement in early to mid-nineteenth-century New England. He was particularly interested, and prolific, in publishing biblical Hebrew and Greek grammars, mainly based on German works, and wrote a number of commentaries on OT and NT books.^{Footnote 24} He addressed at length technical “introduction” issues in the Bible, an interest sparked early by Eichhorn’s Einleitung.^{Footnote 25} His other chief interest was hermeneutics, and he translated, from Latin, J. A. Ernesti’s Elements of Interpretation.^{Footnote 26} Notable among Stuart’s students in the field of biblical studies were Calvin E. Stowe, who eventually succeeded Stuart at Andover, and Edward Robinson, who became professor at Union Theological Seminary. Robinson studied in Germany, and became the most prestigious biblical scholar of the entire New England nineteenth-century movement.^{Footnote 27}

The Unitarian side of the theological divide also produced its share of biblical scholars conversant with German scholarship. The sadly short-lived Buckminster preceded Stuart in this interest, introducing the NT textual criticism of Johann Griesbach to New England upon his return from Europe in 1807.^{Footnote 28} At Harvard, Andrews Norton became proficient in German scholarship, and both Edward Everett and George Bancroft were sent by Harvard to study theology at Göttingen.^{Footnote 29} The most accomplished biblical scholar in the Unitarian camp was George Rapall Noyes, Hancock Professor of Hebrew and Dexter Professor of Sacred Literature at Harvard from 1840 to 1868.^{Footnote 30}

Judson and the Burmese Bible

Adoniram and Ann Judson departed Salem for Calcutta on 19 February 1812, at which time Stuart had been at Andover less than two years and was only about to begin his study of German and German scholarship. Although the Judsons had not decided where they would undertake their missionary work, through a series of misadventures they arrived in Rangoon, Burma, on 13 July 1813. This would be their mission field for the remainder of their lives.

On their sea voyage from America to India, both Adoniram and Ann began an examination of scripture which culminated in their becoming Baptists and receiving believer’s immersionist baptism in Calcutta.^{Footnote 31} Adonriam’s time at Brown, which was a Baptist university, may have played a subconscious role in this change of views, but Judson claimed,

Judson immediately decided that he could not continue with the Congregationalist American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Mission, particularly with their directive to baptize “credible believers with their households.” Judson’s hitherto Congregationalist colleagues, Samuel Newell and Samuel Nott, apparently agreed, and Judson assumed that, “The Board will feel as unwilling to support a Baptist Missionary, as I feel to comply with their instructions [on baptism].”^{Footnote 33} For their part, the Board of Commissioners were generous with the Judsons, assisting them in their transition to becoming American Baptist missionaries,^{Footnote 34} and continuing to take an interest in their missionary work.^{Footnote 35} Judson also remained in contact with his former missionary colleagues.^{Footnote 36}

The Judsons were not the first Christian missionaries in Burma. English Baptist missionaries Richard Mardon and James Chater had arrived in Rangoon in 1807. Mardon left after only several months, and Chater was joined by Felix Carey, son of missions pioneer William Carey.^{Footnote 37} Before these Baptist missionaries had arrived, Barnabite Catholic missionaries, to be distinguished from the priests who acted as chaplains for the Portuguese traders, had been in Burma since the mid-eighteenth-century. Both the Catholics and English Baptists had already produced portions of scripture in Burmese – more on that below.

Upon arriving, both Adoniram and Ann began studying Burmese. Adoniram’s study was more formal, sitting all day with his teacher, “a very learned man, [who] was formerly a priest, and resided at [the royal] court. He has a thorough knowledge of the grammatical construction of the language, likewise of the Pali, the learned language of the Burmans.”^{Footnote 38} From the beginning, Adoniram learned the literary register of Burmese, a language which to this day maintains a distinct diglossia between spoken and written forms, along with Pali, the Buddhist religious language which underlies Burmese.^{Footnote 39} This stood him in good stead for translating the Bible. Ann, on the other hand, took responsibility for running the household to allow Adoniram uninterrupted study. As a result, she wrote, “I am frequently obliged to talk Burman all day. I can talk and understand others better than Mr. Judson, though he knows much more about the nature and construction of the language than I do.”^{Footnote 40}

Precursors to Judson’s Bible Translation

The Judsons saw the translation of the Bible into Burmese as an essential element of their missionary work, and as soon as Adoniram’s Burmese was adequate he turned to this task. The project would employ him for the next 24 years, and its ebbs and flows can be traced through letters and journals, mainly found in the Baptist Missionary Magazine.^{Footnote 41} The translation project was interrupted by two related tragic events: Adoniram’s imprisonment for two years and Ann’s death.

Judson was not the first person to translate portions of the Bible into Burmese, although both Burmese and foreign Christians often believe this to be the case, as La Seng Dingrin points out.^{Footnote 42} According to the foreword of the new Myanmar Catholic Bible translation, the Barnabite missionary Giovanni Maria Percoto, appointed bishop of Myanmar in 1767, translated Genesis, Tobit, the Gospels, and Paul’s epistles. Whether any of these still exist is unknown, and the statement is qualified by, “According to Myanmar Catholic history….”^{Footnote 43} From the 1776 Catholic tract in Burmese, Compendium Doctrinae Christianae Idiomate Barmano Sive Bomano, Dingren has demonstrated that the Catholic missionaries had developed a number of key Christian theological terms that Judson used, which have become central to the Burmese Christian discourse.^{Footnote 44}

The English Baptist missionary, James Chater, had apparently translated Matthew into Burmese, and Felix Carey had printed a Burmese grammar. There are conflicting reports about the quality of these works. Wayland dismisses both the grammar as filled with “inaccuracies” and the translation of Matthew as “done so incorrectly that … it was never put into circulation.”^{Footnote 45} Francis Mason, by contrast, praised Carey’s Burmese grammar in 1852 as “still the best grammar that has yet been published on the Burmese language.”^{Footnote 46} An early letter from Judson throws light upon this situation.^{Footnote 47} Dated 18 January 1816, after two and a half years in Burma, Judson wrote, “I am now beginning to translate a little. I am extremely anxious to get some parts of scripture into an intelligible state, fit to be read to Burmans that I meet with.” This marks the beginning of Judson’s translation project. He continues, however, “I have nothing yet that I can venture to use,” indicating that Judson did not consider Chater’s translation of Matthew to be of sufficient quality. His assessment of the Catholic missionaries’ work was more positive: “The Portuguese missionaries have left a version of some extracts of scripture, not very badly executed, in regard to language, but full of Romish errors.” This is firm evidence that Judson used the work of the earlier Catholic missionaries for his Bible translation. It also identifies him as a typical member of the New England orthodox Calvinist biblical studies movement, which recognized and drew upon quality scholarship even when they rejected the theology of the scholars. Apparently, Judson did not think much of Carey’s grammar, as he completed his own by August 1816.^{Footnote 48} Nevertheless, the works of both Chater and Carey likely contributed positively to Judson’s early work.

Progress of the Translation

Judson’s translation of the Burmese Bible falls into two periods – before and after his imprisonment by the Burmese authorities from 8 June 1824 to 25 February 1826, due to the first Anglo-Burman War, and Ann’s death shortly after, on 24 October 1826. Begun in 1816, the translation would not be completed until 1840. Throughout these many years, Judson would follow a pattern of translating sections of the Bible, printing them, then revising the translation for later printing. Matthew was first completed on 17 June 1816, with 500 copies printed.^{Footnote 49} In March 1817, Judson was already revising Matthew in order to reprint it “by way of trial, and as introductory to a larger edition of the whole New Testament.”^{Footnote 50} U Shwe Ngong, a Burmese scholar, baptized on 18 July 1820, became Judson’s translation assistant.^{Footnote 51} Judson, ever the perfectionist, met his match in this scholarly Bama.

Even though he was not always with Judson, U Shwe Ngong played a significant role in the ultimate quality of Judson’s Burmese translation of the Bible.^{Footnote 53} Momentum was building in the translation. Ephesians and “the first part of Acts” were sent to Serampore for 600 of each to be printed on 15 May 1821.^{Footnote 54} By 14 July 1821, Judson had finished the Gospel and Epistles of John, and was working on “the latter part of Acts.”^{Footnote 55}

Yet progress was frequently interrupted by illness. On 4 August, Judson wrote, “The second day after I was taken [by fever], Mrs J. was taken with the same; and, for several days, we lay side by side, unable to help one another.”^{Footnote 56} Ann was now suffering from a “liver complaint,” which led to the decision to send her back to the USA.^{Footnote 57} Political issues also began to interfere in the translation project, as U Shwe Ngong was persecuted for his Christian faith and fled Rangoon in September 1821. Judson continued to translate, presumably with other Burmese language assistants. He was by this time entirely focused on the project: “About half the New-Testament is now finished, and I am desirous of finishing the whole, if possible, before making any further missionary movement.”^{Footnote 58} By March 1822 he had finished yet another revision of Matthew, completed Mark and Luke, and was beginning on Romans.^{Footnote 59}

But the two enemies, illness and politics, which over the next four years would ravage both their lives and ultimately take Ann’s, were frequently emerging. On 30 June 1822:

Then, in a journal entry on 20 July:

“Some footing in the palace” referred to the hope of gaining religious tolerance for Christian religion and missionary work in Burma. Before leaving for Ava, Judson had completed Second Corinthians, Ephesians, Hebrews, and the epistles of John.^{Footnote 62}

From 28 August 1822 to 2 February 1823, Judson accompanied his missionary colleague Jonathan Price to Ava. Price, a doctor, had been summoned by the king to live in the royal city.^{Footnote 63} At that time the king was interested in the outside world and made a good impression on the missionaries.^{Footnote 64} The visit was positive, resulting in an invitation for the Judsons to live there when Ann returned from America. This positive situation would change after the outbreak of war between Britain and Burma.^{Footnote 65}

Returning to Rangoon on 2 February 1823, Judson continued the NT translation and, though plagued by ill-health,^{Footnote 66} completed it in June that year, each section having already been revised several times.^{Footnote 67} The completion of the NT brings the first period of Judson’s Bible translation to a close. Ann returned from the USA on 5 December 1823, whereupon the Judsons promptly moved from Rangoon to Ava, taking up the invitation of the royal court. Shortly after settling there, war broke out and Britain invaded Burma. The war would last for two years, for the duration of which Judson, Price, and a handful of other westerners who lived in upper Burma were incarcerated in the so called “Death Prison.”^{Footnote 68} Not only were they kept in inhuman conditions, they had all been sentenced to death, and fully expected this to be carried out. The threat of torture was also ever present, and they regularly saw Burmese prisoners both tortured and executed.^{Footnote 69} Ann was not imprisoned and spent the two years free in Ava, where she advocated on behalf of Adoniram and the other prisoners. The stress was immense for both Adoniram and Ann, with Ann suffering severe illness. After the British victory and Adoniram’s subsequent release, they moved to what was now British controlled territory in Amherst (Kyaikami), southern Burma. Ann died there on 24 October 1826, leaving Adoniram in a state of profound depression.

After these disastrous events, Judson was left to pick up the pieces and start both missionary and translation work again. It took several years before momentum began to build. In the following year, he began revising the NT and then started translating the book of Psalms.^{Footnote 70} The Old Testament translation had begun. Never a voluminous correspondent at the best of times, after Ann’s death Judson wanted to withdraw from the public sphere as much as possible, and his published letters and journals become less frequent for some time. The revision of the NT was completed on November 1829,^{Footnote 71} but the demands of missionary work meant progress on the Psalms was slow.^{Footnote 72} Yet momentum began to gather, and by 5 February 1831, Psalms and Daniel were completed, and Judson was about to begin Isaiah.^{Footnote 73} By June that same year he had finished Isaiah and Genesis, as well as Song of Solomon.^{Footnote 74} Exodus followed.^{Footnote 75} In 1832, Judson was back in Maulmein (Maulamyine) to supervise the printing of the NT in Burmese and continue the OT translation, now one third complete.^{Footnote 76} He calculated “that I could finish the whole in two years, if I confined myself exclusively, to the work; otherwise it would hang on, four years or more... I concluded, that it was my duty to adopt the former course.”^{Footnote 77}

The printing of the NT was completed on 19 December 1832, and momentum continued with the OT translation, although illness regularly intervened.^{Footnote 78} The OT translation was completed, without much fanfare, on 31 January 1834, according to an announcement in the Baptist Missionary Magazine.^{Footnote 79} Judson continued his strategy of printing portions of the translated scripture and then revising.^{Footnote 80} This he did over the following years.^{Footnote 81} For the second half of 1836 and early 1837, he again revised the NT, with ten thousand copies “sent to press on the 22^d of March.”^{Footnote 82} In a letter dated 30 June 1838, Judson wrote that he was “anxious to make a thorough revision of the Psalms, and the prophets, with the help of the latest exegetical works that I have been able to procure.”^{Footnote 83} There is little further correspondence from Judson, until the announcement that “the quarto revised edition of the Burman Bible … was committed to the press Oct. 25, 1840.”^{Footnote 84} Thus the great project was completed, having taken twenty-four years and coming at immense personal cost.

A New England Exegete

In the surviving Judson literature, there are occasional yet enlightening references to the scholarly tools he used. In a relatively early letter, announcing the completion of the NT in Burmese, Judson wrote, “But I never read a chapter without a pencil in my hand and Griesbach and Parkhurst at my elbow.”^{Footnote 85} John Parkhurst (1728–1797) was an English scholar, and the work Judson refers to must have been his Greek and English Lexicon to the New Testament, first published in 1769. Johann Jakob Griesbach (1745–1812) was an important NT textual critic, whose work had been introduced to New England in 1807 by the forerunner of the biblical studies movement there, Joseph Stevens Buckminster.

In a letter from 1834, when he had nearly completed the first edition of the OT translation, Judson mentioned that he had “just received a complete set of Rosenmüller on the Old Testament, and some other valuable works, in studying which I am very desirous of going over the whole ground once more.”^{Footnote 86} The “complete set” by Ernst Friedrich Karl Rosenmüller (1768–1835), professor at University of Leipzig from 1792, is the Scholia in Vetus Testamentum, written in Latin. It was released in two series, an earlier larger set, and a later six volume Compendium. It is not clear which set Judson is referring to, but since the Compendium was published between 1828 and 1836, he may be referring to the earlier set.^{Footnote 87} Both sets were massive repositories of detailed bibliographical, textual, philological, and interpretive scholarship.^{Footnote 88}

With a letter to Judson dated 14 July 1838, Solomon Peck, Corresponding Secretary for the Baptist Mission, sent “Robinson’s Hebrew Lexicon and Ripley’s Notes.”^{Footnote 89} In a letter to Peck, dated 5 January 1839, Judson apologized for not contributing more to the Baptist Missionary Magazine, “but what can be expected from a man who spends his days at a study table, poring over Hebrew and Greek, and Gesenius and Rosenmüller, &c., &c., and Burmese manuscripts interlined to illegibility.”^{Footnote 90} Several weeks later, in a letter dated 21 January 1839, Judson requested Peck to send “the exegetical works of Stuart, Robinson, Stowe, Ripley, Bush, Noyes, and such like with some of the best German works” as soon as they are published.^{Footnote 91} In another letter to the Corresponding Secretary, dated “Maulmein, April 24, 1839,” Judson wrote that he was “anxiously hoping to receive a copy of Bloomfield’s Greek Testament,” to help with the final revision before printing, along with “whatever other helps to biblical exegesis may have been recently published.”^{Footnote 92} Finally, after completing the entire Bible translation in 1840, Judson refers to “the critical emendations of Lowth, Horsley,” and the Greek NT “text of Knapp.”^{Footnote 93}

The scholars in these passing references can be divided into two general categories: slightly older technical works from Germany and Britain, and biblical scholarship from Judson’s contemporaries in New England.^{Footnote 94} This places Judson squarely in the nineteenth-century New England biblical studies movement, which is quite remarkable because he left New England when that movement was in its infancy. Yet it is evident that by the time Judson left New England in 1812 he had already been shaped by the incipient movement, which was underway before Moses Stuart joined Andover in 1810. The 1807 Constitution of the Theological Seminary already stipulated, under the heading “Sacred Literature,” that the “formation, preservation and transmission of the Sacred Volume,” original languages, Septuagint, NT Greek, textual criticism, biblical criticism, apocryphal books, modern translations, and exegesis should be taught.^{Footnote 95} Judson continued to participate in the movement over many subsequent years while geographically, and logistically, far removed. Maintaining contact with the New England movement was difficult at the beginning of their time in Burma when correspondence was possible but haphazard due to the lack of regular ships sailing in and out of Rangoon.^{Footnote 96} Although most of Judson’s writings have been lost, the published letters that remain show he was in regular contact with his New England base. In the first few years in Burma, he was entirely focused on language acquisition, but by 1816 he had turned to translation, for which he required ever more scholarly works. One of Ann’s tasks when she returned to America in 1821 was to obtain such works for Judson. Wayland refers to this:

Judson continued to acquire the latest works in biblical scholarship for the entire time of his translation project, which would have become easier after the British annexation of Lower Burma in 1826. Judson’s letter of 1839 gives an insight into his ongoing participation in the biblical studies movement, and also the difficulties this entailed, requesting that the latest exegetical works be shipped to him as soon as they are published:

It is evident that throughout the time Judson was translating the Bible he maintained ongoing contact with the biblical studies movement in New England.

No correspondence remains between Judson and the Andover school, and Moses Stuart in particular, but the ongoing influence of this school is apparent. For the Andover scholars, critical scholarship was always used in the service of understanding the scriptures.^{Footnote 99} As they considered the Bible to be inspired they did not fear critical scholarship, believing it could only ultimately prove the scriptures to be true. This led to an ecumenical approach to scholarship, making use of anything they found useful, regardless of whether they agreed with the theology of the writer or not. Judson’s appreciation of the earlier Catholic missionaries’ work, in contrast to the work of his Baptist colleagues who preceded him in Burma, is an example of this. He made use of critical German and British scholarship, and even appreciated the work of the gifted Harvard Unitarian scholar, George R. Noyes. Along with these scholars, Judson also valued the works of his fellow evangelicals, Stuart, Robinson, Stowe, Ripley, and Bush.

The detailed, technical scholarship made possible by the New England movement suited Judson’s personality perfectly. In February 1808, shortly after graduating from Brown University, only 19 years old, he had published Elements of English Grammar. Five months later he published The Young Lady’s Arithmetic.^{Footnote 100} In his first few years in Burma, not only did he set about learning Burmese but also compiled a Pali-English dictionary, a Burmese-English dictionary, and wrote a Burmese grammar. After completing the Bible translation, he spent the last ten years of his life writing a comprehensive Burmese-English dictionary. This technical, scholarly bent put him in good stead for translating the Bible into Burmese, which occupied him for twenty-four years. Yet it appears his critical ardor abated somewhat as he neared the end of the project. After his final edition of the Burmese Bible had been printed, he wrote,

Nevertheless, Judson’s translation of the Burmese Bible remains the product of the New England biblical studies movement that flourished during the whole time he was at work on the project. This can be shown by some examples from the Bible itself.

Examples from the Judson Bible

Judson never saw his translation as a finished product, and he expected others to revise it, as he had constantly done throughout the translation process. This never happened, but instead, his translation became virtually canonized by the Protestant church in Myanmar, much like the KJV among some English-speaking Christian groups. As a result, the Burmese Bible that is used most in Myanmar today is nearly 200 years old. It is an outdated translation, in need of revision, but it is also often misunderstood. Judson’s warning, as old as the translation itself, still needs to be heard. He looked forward to his successors improving the translation, but urged them “not prematurely to correct a supposed error, without consulting the various authors which I have consulted, and ascertaining the reasons of my position.”^{Footnote 102}

Hosea 5:11 is a good example. A literal translation from the JB reads: “Ephraim has suffered oppression, he has met divine judgment and been ruined. This is because he has acted according to the divine/royal command (אַחֲרֵי־צָֽו).” The principal difficulty lies at the end of the verse with the Hebrew word צו, ostensibly “precept” or “command” (otherwise only in Isa 28:10, 13). A first reading of Judson’s translation seems to support the criticisms that are sometimes levelled against him, for example, that his Hebrew was weak, he followed the KJV, or his translation is woodenly literal. Yet none of these criticisms is justified. For Hos 5:11, Samuel Horsley’s book can be consulted, a resource Judson almost certainly used.^{Footnote 103} Horsley examines the variants in the “versions of the LXX and the Syriac … St Jerome and the Vulgate … the reading of Jonathan [Targum].” But ultimately, he defends the reading of the MT because “no trace of … [these] readings, or of any other variety, appears in any one of the numerous MSS collated by Kennicott and De Rossi [Masoretic texts].” He concludes that “commandment” is the best rendering, while “declaring, however, that I consider שוא [LXX, Syriac], צא [Vulgate] and צו as three various readings, each of high authority, among which the learned reader is at full liberty to make his own choice.”^{Footnote 104} This shows the depth of scholarship that underlies Judson’s interpretive decision, and while it may not be a satisfying reading and need correction, it is not an uninformed one. And even today, the exact meaning of the line remains elusive.

As the references to Griesbach and Rosenmüller indicate, Judson gave careful consideration to textual criticism of both the Old and New Testaments.^{Footnote 105} This is apparent as early as Gen 4:8, where he includes the phrase from the LXX, “Let us go out to the field.”^{Footnote 106} The NRSV follows the LXX over the MT twenty times in the book of Genesis, and the JB agrees with five of these.^{Footnote 107} This illustrates that Judson had no firm commitment to the MT over the LXX. Another example is Ps 20:9 (MT 20:10), where the MT reads, “O YHWH, save the king. May he answer us on the day we call,” but Judson follows the LXX, “O Eternal God, save the king. Hear when we call.”

A more striking example is the second line of Ps 92:10 (MT 92:11): בַּלֹּ֣תִי בְּשֶׁ֣מֶשׁ רַעֲנָן. The verb בלל means “to pour,” and the KJV, followed by the older English versions, reads the form as a passive: “I shall be anointed with fresh oil.”^{Footnote 108} Judson translates it quite differently: “God will anoint me with new oil.” With this Judson seems to be following the Targum and Syriac versions, emending the verb as בַּלֹּתַ֣נִי, “you have anointed me.”^{Footnote 109} This reading does not appear in the English versions until the RSV in 1952, illustrating the extent to which Judson used the scholarly resources made available by the New England movement. A similar example is Mic 6:14, where the second line is very difficult to make sense of: וְיֶשְׁחֲךָ בּקִרְבֶּ֣ךָ וְתַסֵּג. (And your dung in your midst shall be displaced [?]).^{Footnote 110} Judson rendered this verse, “You will suffer hunger.” It is unclear how Judson arrived at this, but while different from the older English versions (e.g., KJV, “Thy casting down shall be in the midst of thee”^{Footnote 111}), it is how most modern English versions render the line.^{Footnote 112}

Along with prescient interpretive decisions, there are also those that have not stood the test of time, equally the result of the New England movement. One such example is in Gen 10:4 where דֹדָנִים (Dodanim) is sometimes emended “Rodanim,” following the LXX (̔Ρόδιοι) and the parallel genealogy in the MT of 1 Chr 1:7, רוֹדָנִים (Rodanim).^{Footnote 113} Judson, however, emends 1 Chr 1:7, changing it to “Dodanim,” based on Gen 10:4.^{Footnote 114} This decision seems to be rooted in the discussion of the time, where, according to Moses Stuart, the genealogies in Chronicles were considered to be prone to scribal errors.^{Footnote 115} It appears Judson considered the genealogy in Genesis 10 to be better preserved.

One final area of analysis arises from a letter dated 5 August 1823, announcing the completion of the NT translation, where Judson also mentions he had produced

This was his first foray into translating the OT, and it is interesting to see if Judson’s evangelistic program influenced his translation. This can be tested by examining whether any of the 62 LXX quotations in the NT prejudiced his translation of the respective OT texts.^{Footnote 117} For the most part, where the LXX and MT are different, Judson followed the MT, meaning that the NT passage reads differently than its OT counterpart.^{Footnote 118} There are several cases where the LXX and MT are essentially the same and Judson’s Burmese accurately translates both texts.^{Footnote 119} In each of these cases Judson replicates the OT quotation in the NT text. Then there are eight texts where Judson follows the LXX over the MT, replicating that text in the NT quotation.^{Footnote 120} These eight cases present an anomaly in Judson’s translation. Of these eight passages in which Judson follows the LXX instead of the MT, only two could be accepted as justified decisions. These are Ps 19:4/Rom 10:18, and Ps 69:22–23/Rom 11:9–10, where Judson follows the LXX in v. 22, but the MT in v. 23.^{Footnote 121} The remaining six cases represent a departure from Judson’s careful text-critical work and the translations seem to be driven by a desire to match the NT quotation.^{Footnote 122} This may represent the residual influence of the earlier “Epitome,” the first OT texts Judson translated in order to show how prophecies were fulfilled in the NT.^{Footnote 123}

Judson always considered his translation the beginning, not the end. On 25 December 1840, Judson wrote,

Sadly, despite these hopes, his Bible translation has remained in use unchanged since 1840.

Conclusion

Judson left New England in 1812, when the biblical studies movement there was just beginning to take shape. Yet he had already been influenced by the burgeoning movement, and continued to participate in it from a distance. This is evident in a number of ways, not least his ecumenical approach to scholarship, which is today a hallmark of biblical studies. While he himself was a theologically conservative New England Calvinist, he enthusiastically availed himself of quality scholarship regardless of who produced it: the earlier Barnabite Catholic missionaries in Burma, the rationalist German scholars who denied the supernatural in the Bible, and even New England Unitarians. The detailed, technical work of textual criticism and biblical interpretation that characterized the New England movement suited Judson’s personality. As a result, he produced a high-quality translation that, though out of date after nearly 200 years, is still usable due to its solid exegetical foundations. Judson was a careful yet adventurous translator, not reluctant to follow the ancient versions over the Hebrew Bible, and often departing from traditional interpretations. Some of his interpretive decisions seem odd, but these are not idiosyncrasies; rather they are exegetical fossils from the best scholarship of his era.^{Footnote 125}

One area in which Judson’s translation will remain unique is its Burmese language. This is the result of a situation that can never be replicated. When Judson began translating, although he inherited some key terms from the Barnabite missionaries, there was no Burmese Christian discourse, as there is today. His language teachers and translation assistants were all trained in the scholarly Burmese of Buddhism as well as Pali. As a result, according to one of Myanmar’s leading Burmese and Pali scholars of the twentieth century, compared with the British and Foreign Bible Society translation of 1927, “the Judson Bible approached nearer the style of the Burmese Buddhist writings, so that it was found more readable by the Buddhist monks unacquainted with English.”^{Footnote 126}

The JB is a product of the nineteenth-century New England biblical studies movement, which flourished through the early and middle part of the century, but then declined and eventually disappeared. Unlike the other works produced by that movement, now increasingly available through online digital archives, the JB never faded into obscurity. It remains the most widely used Burmese Bible, a living remnant of a past period of biblical scholarship, and it continues to resonate with the energy of that New England movement.