house. If he had done nothing else, he would be one of the greatest benefactors of the
German-speaking race.^419
His version was followed by Protestant versions in other languages, especially the French,
Dutch, and English. The Bible ceased to be a foreign book in a foreign tongue, and became
naturalized, and hence far more clear and dear to the common people. Hereafter the Reformation
depended no longer on the works of the Reformers, but on the book of God, which everybody could
read for himself as his daily guide in spiritual life. This inestimable blessing of an open Bible for
all, without the permission or intervention of pope and priest, marks an immense advance in church
history, and can never be lost.
Earlier Versions.
Luther was not the first, but by far the greatest translator of the German Bible, and is as
inseparably connected with it as Jerome is with the Latin Vulgate. He threw the older translation
into the shade and out of use, and has not been surpassed or even equaled by a successor. There
are more accurate versions for scholars (as those of De Wette and Weizsäcker), but none that can
rival Luther’s for popular authority and use.
The civilization of the barbarians in the dark ages began with the introduction of Christianity,
and the translation of such portions of the Scriptures as were needed in public worship.
The Gothic Bishop Wulfila or Wölflein (i.e., Little Wolf) in the fourth century translated
nearly the whole Bible from the Greek into the Gothic dialect. It is the earliest monument of Teutonic
literature, and the basis of comparative Teutonic philology.^420
During the fourteenth century some unknown scholars prepared a new translation of the
whole Bible into the Middle High German dialect. It slavishly follows the Latin Vulgate. It may
be compared to Wiclif’s English Version (1380), which was likewise made from the Vulgate, the
original languages being then almost unknown in Europe. A copy of the New Testament of this
version has been recently published, from a manuscript in the Premonstratensian convent of Tepl
(^419) The testimony of the great philosopher Hegel is worth quoting. He says in his Philosophie der Geschichte, p. 503: "Luther hat die
Autorität der Kirche verworfen und an ihre Stelle die Bibel und das Zeugniss des menschlichen Geistes gesetzt. Dass nun die Bibel selbst
die Grundlage der christlichen Kirche geworden ist, ist von der grössten Wichtigkeit; jeder soll sich nun selbst daraus belehren, jeder
sein Gewissen daraus bestimmen können. Diess ist die ungeheure Veränderung im Principe: die ganze Tradition und das Gebäude der
Kirche wird problematisch und das Princip der Autorität der Kirche umgestossen. Die Uebersetzung, welche Luther von der Bibel gemacht
hat, ist von unschätzbarem Werthe für das deutsche Volk gewesen. Dieses hat dadurch ein Volksbuch erhalten, wie keine Nation der
katholischen Welt ein solches hat; sie haben wohl eine Unzahl von Gebetbüchlein, aber kein Grundbuch zur Belehrung des Volks. Trotz
dem hat man in neueren Zeiten Streit deshalb erhoben, ob es zweckmässig sei, dem Volke die Bibel indie Hand zu geben; die wenigen
Nachtheile, die dieses hat, werden doch bei weitem von den ungeheuren Vortheilen überwogen; die äusserlichen Geschichten, die dem
Herzen und Verstande anstössig sein können, weiss der religiöse Sinn sehr wohl zu unterscheiden, und sich an das Substantielle haltend
überwindet er sie." Froude (Luther, p. 42) calls Luther’s translation of the Bible "the greatest of all the gifts he was able to offer to
Germany."
(^420) Hence repeatedly published from the remaining fragmentary MSS. in Upsala (Codex Argenteus, so called from its silver binding),
Wolfenbüttel and Milan, by H. C. von Gabelenz and J. Loebe (1836), Massmann (1857), Bernhardt (1875), Stamm (1878), Uppström
(1854-1868, the most accurate edition), R. Müller and H. Hoeppe (1881), W. W. Skeat (1882). Comp. also Jos. Bosworth, The Gothic
and Anglo-Saxon Gospels in Parallel Columns with the Versions of Wycliffe and Tyndale, London, 2d ed., 1874 (with a fac-simile of the
Codex Argenteus).