in Bohemia.^421 Another copy is preserved in the college library at Freiberg in Saxony.^422 Both are
from the fourteenth century, and agree almost word for word with the first printed German Bible,
but contain, besides the New Testament, the apocryphal letter of St. Paul to the Laodiceans, which
is a worthless compilation of a few sentences from the genuine writings of the apostle.^423
After the invention of the printing-press, and before the Reformation, this mediaeval German
Bible was more frequently printed than any other except the Latin Vulgate.^424 No less than seventeen
or eighteen editions appeared between 1462 and 1522, at Strassburg, Augsburg, Nürnberg, Cöln,
Lübeck, and Halberstadt (fourteen in the High, three or four in the Low German dialect). Most of
them are in large folio, in two volumes, and illustrated by wood-cuts. The editions present one and
the same version (or rather two versions,—one High German, the other Low German) with dialectical
alterations and accommodations to the textual variations of the MSS. of the Vulgate, which was in
a very unsettled condition before the Clementine recension (1592). The revisers are as unknown
as the translators.
The spread of this version, imperfect as it was, proves the hunger and thirst of the German
people for the pure word of God, and prepared the way for the Reformation. It alarmed the hierarchy.
Archbishop Berthold of Mainz, otherwise a learned and enlightened prelate, issued, Jan. 4, 1486,
a prohibition of all unauthorized printing of sacred and learned books, especially the German Bible,
within his diocese, giving as a reason that the German language was incapable of correctly rendering
the profound sense of Greek and Latin works, and that laymen and women could not understand
the Bible. Even Geiler of Kaisersberg, who sharply criticised the follies of the world and abuses
of the Church, thought it "an evil thing to print the Bible in German."
Besides the whole Bible, there were numerous German editions of the Gospels and Epistles
(Plenaria), and the Psalter, all made from the Vulgate.^425
Luther could not be ignorant of this mediaeval version. He made judicious use of it, as he
did also of old German and Latin hymns. Without such aid he could hardly have finished his New
Testament in the short space of three months.^426 But this fact does not diminish his merit in the
(^421) By P. Philipp Klimesch (librarian of the convent), Der Codex Teplensis, enthaltend "Die Schrift des newen Gezeuges." Aelteste
deutsche Handschrift, welche den im 15 Jahrh. gedruckten deutschen Bibeln zu Grunde gelegen. Augsburg and München, 1881-1884, in
3 parts. The Codex contains also homilies of St. Augustin and St. Chrysostom, and seven articles of faith. The last especially have induced
Keller and Haupt to assign the translation to Waldensian origin. But these Addenda are not uncatholic, and at most would only prove
Waldensian or Bohemian proprietorship of this particular copy, but not authorship of the translation. See Notes below, p. 353.
(^422) See Dr. M. Rachel’s Gymnasial program: Ueber die Freiberger Bibelhandschrift, nebst Beiträgen zur Gesch. der vorlutherischen
Bibelübersetzung, Freiberg, 1886 (31 pages).
(^423) This apocryphal Epistle was also included in the Albigensian (Romance) version of the 13th century, in a Bohemian version, and
in the early English Bibles, in two independent translations of the 14th or 15th century, but not in Wiclif’s Bible. See Forshall and Maddan,
Wycliffite Versions of the Bible (1850), IV. 438 sq.; Anger, Ueber den Laodicenerbrief (Leipzig, 1843); and Lightfoot, Com. on Ep. to
the Colossians (London, 1875), p. 363 sq. On the other hand, the same pseudo-Pauline Epistle appears in many MSS. and early editions
of the Vulgate, and in the German versions of Eck and Dietenberger. It can therefore not be used as an argument for or against the
Waldensian hypothesis of Keller.
(^424) Ninety-seven editions of the Vulgate were printed between 1450 and 1500,—28 in Italy (nearly all in Venice), 16 in Germany, 10
in Basel, 9 in France. See Fritzsche in Herzogii, vol. VIII. 450.
(^425) In the royal library of Munich there are 21 MSS. of German versions of the Gospels and Epistles. The Gospels for the year were
printed about 25 times before 1518; the Psalter about 13 times before 1513. See besides the works of Panzer, Kehrein, Keller, Haupt,
above quoted, Alzog, Die deutschen Plenarien im 15. und zu Anfang des 16. Jahrh., Freiburg-i-B., 1874.
(^426) Luther’s use of the older German version was formerly ignored or denied, but has been proved by Professor Krafft of Bonn (1883).
He adds, however, very justly (l.c. p. 19): "Es gereicht Luther zum grössten Verdienst, dass er auf den griechischen Grundtext
zurückgegangen, den deutschen Wortschatz zunächst im N. T. wesentlich berichtigt, dann aber auch mit seiner Genialität bedeutend
vermehrt hat." See Notes below, p. 352.