C

d

prose; and so also we find the writings of Tully, of Origen, of Lactantius, and others, who were all prose writers, reckoned by the number of verses, which could be no other than so many lines. And why then might not the Bible verses anciently have been of the same nature also? I mean when written in long lines as aforesaid. But the long lines often occasioning, that in reading to the end of one verse, they lost the beginning of the next, and so often did read wrong, either by skipping a line, or beginning the same again; fore the avoiding of this, they came to the way of writing in columns and in short lines, as is abovementioned. But all this I mean of their sacred synagogical books. In their common Bibles, they are not tied up to such rules, but write and print them so as they may best serve for their instruction and convenience in common use. If the Jews at present, in their synagogical books, leave out the two points Soph-Pasuk at the end of the verses, it proceeds from their wresting the rule abovementioned, against putting points or accents into their sacred books, to a too rigorous meaning; for by those points therein mentioned, seem to be understood no other points than the vowel points, and such other as affect the text in the reading. But these two points at the end of every verse only terminate the period, without affecting at all either the words or the letters. But it

a Asconius Pedianus Ciceronis verba citat, versu a primo octingentisimo quinquagesimo, &c.

b Hieronymus in Catalogo Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum, & alibi. c Hieronymus in Epistola 124, ad Damasum.

d Cornelius Nepos in Epaminonda. In hoc volumine vitas excellentium virorum complurium concludere constituimus, quorum separatim multis mil. libus versuum complures scriptores ante nos explicarunt.' And Josephus tells us in the conclusion of his Antiquities, That this work of his contained twenty books, and sixty thousand or verses. For the Greek sxs is the same with the Latin verses, and both the same originally with what we call a line in writing. For verses properly is a line, whether in prose or verse, and is so called a vertendo, because the writer, when he is got to the end of one line, turns back his hand, and begins the next, and so doth the reader also his eye, from the end of one line to the beginning of the next. Vide Menagii Observationes in Diogenis Laertii, lib. 4, No. 24. Jerome also, in his preface before his Latin version of the book of Daniel saith, that Methodius, Eusebius, and Apollinarius, answered the objections of Porphyry against the Scriptures, multis versuum millibus, i. e. by many thousands of verses, that is, lines; for they all wrote in prose, e Maimonides in Libro Legis. c. 7.

is no new thing for the Jews, out of an over superstitious interpretation of their traditions, to make innovations in their ancient usages, especially while they had their schools and universities in Mesopotamia, and there held their synedrial and consistorial assemblies of their rabbi's, in which they hammered their law, and also their ancient traditions, by a vast number of new constitutions and new determinations, into what form they pleased.

But the division of the holy Scriptures into chapters, as we now have them, is of a much later date. The Psalms indeed were always divided as at present: for St. Pauls in his sermon at Antioch in Pisidia, quotes the second Psalm. But, as to the rest of the holy Scriptures, the division of them into such chapters as at present, is what the ancients knew nothing of. Some attribute it to Stephen Langton, who was archbishop of Canterbury in the reigns of king John, and king Henry III. his son. But the true author of this invention was Hugo de Sancto Caro, who being from a Dominican monk advanced to the dignity of a cardinal, and the first of that order that was so, is commonly called Hugo Cardinalis. The whole occasion and history of this matter, and the progress of it to the state it is now in, is as followeth:

This Cardinal Hugo, who flourished about the year 1240, and died in the year 1262, had laboured much in the study of the holy Scriptures, and made a comment upon the whole of them. The carrying on of this work administered to him the occasion of inventing the first concordance that was made of the holy Scriptures, that is, that of the vulgar Latin Bible.

f They had these schools at Naerda, Sora, and Pombeditha in Mesopotamia, till about the year of our Lord 1040, when they were driven out thence by the Mahometan princes that reigned in those parts. g Acts xiii, 33.

h The Greek Bibles among Christians anciently had their títo and asparare; but the intent of them was rather to point out the sum or contents of the text, than to divide the books; and they were vastly different from the present chapters; for many of them contained only a very few verses, and some of them no more than one.

i Balzus cent. 3, p. 275.

k Buxtorfi Præfatio ad Concordantias Bibliorum Hebraicas. Morinus in Exercit. Bibl. part 2, exercit. 17, c. 3. Gerebradius in Chronico ad Annum Christi 1244. Sixtus Senensis Bibliothec. lib. 3. Hottingeri Thesaurus, lib. 3, c. 2, sec. 5. Capelli Arcanum Punctationis, lib. 2, c. 17, sec. 8.

For, conceiving that such an index of all the words and phrases in the holy Scriptures would be of great use for the attaining of a better understanding of them, he projected a scheme for the making of it; and forthwith set a great number of the monks of his order on the collecting of the words under their proper classes, in every letter of the alphabet, in order to this design, and, by the help of so many hands, he soon brought it to what he intended. This work was afterwards much improved by those who followed him, especially by Arlottus Thuscus, and Conradus Halberstadius, the former a Franciscan, and the other a Dominican friar, who both lived about the end of the same century. But the whole end and aim of the work being for the easier finding of any word or passage in the holy Scriptures, to make it answer this purpose, the cardinal found it necessary, in the first place, to divide the books into sections, and the sections into under divisions, that by these he might the better make the references, and the more exactly point out, in the index, where every word or passage might be found in the text. For till then every book of the holy Scriptures, in the vulgar Latin Bibles, was without any division at all; and therefore, had the index referred only to the book, the whole book, perchance, must have been read over, ere that could be found which was sought for; but, by referring to it by this division and subdivision, it was immediately had at first sight. And these sections are the chapters which the Bible hath ever since been divided into. For, on the publishing of this concordance, the usefulness of it being immediately discerned, all coveted to have it; and, for the sake of the use of it, all divided their Bibles in the same manner as Hugo had done. For the references in the concordance being made by these chapters, and the subdivisions of them, unless their Bibles were so divided too, the concordance would be of no use to them. And thus this division of the several books of the Bible into chapters had its original, which hath ever since been made use of in all places, and among all people, wherever the Bible itself is used in these western parts of the world. But the

subdivision of the chapters was not then by verses as now. Hugo's way of subdividing them was by the letters A. B. C. D. E. F. G. placed in the margin at an equal distance from each other, according as the chapters were longer or shorter. In long chapters all these seven letters were used, in others fewer, according as the length which the chapters were of did require. For the subdivision of chapters by verses, which is now in all our Bibles, was not introduced into them till some ages after, and then it was from the Jews that the use hereof, as now among us, first had its original on this occasion. About the year 1430, there lived here, among the western Jews, a famous Rabbi, called by some Rabbi Mordecai Nathan, by others Rabbi Isaac Nathan, and by many by both these names, as if he were first called by one of them, and then, by a change of it, by the other. This Rabbi being much conversant with the Christians, and having frequent disputes with their learned men about religion, he thereby came to the knowledge of the great use which they made of the Latin concordance composed by Cardinal Hugo, and the benefit which they had thereby, in the ready finding of any place in the Scriptures that they had occasion to consult; which he was so much taken with, that he immediately set about the making of such a concordance to the Hebrew Bible for the use of the Jews. He began this work in the year of our Lord 1433, and finished it in the year 1445; so that he was just seven years in the composing of it. And the first publishing of it happening about the time that printing m was first invented, it hath, since that time, undergone several editions from the press. That which was printed at Basil by Buxtorf the son, anno 1632, is the best of them for Buxtorf the father had taken great pains about it, to make it more correct and complete; and Buxtorf the son added also his labours to those of his father, for the perfecting of it, and published it, with

1 Præfatio Buxtorfii ad Concordantias Bibliorum Hebraicas. Morinus Exercit. Bibl. part 2, exercit. 17, c 3.

m Printing was first invented at Mentz, in Germany, by John Faust and John Gutenberg, A. D 1440. See Calvisius under that year, and Pancirollus with Salmuth on him, part 2, tit. 12.

both their improvements, in the year I have mentioned; and, by reason of the advantages it hath received herefrom, it deservedly hath the reputation of being the perfectest and best book of its kind that is extant, and indeed is so useful for the understanding of the Hebrew Scriptures, that no one who employs his studies this way can well be without it, it being the best dictionary, as well as the best concordance to them. In the composing of this book, Rabbi Nathan finding it necessary to follow the same division of the Scripture into chapters, which Hugo had made in them, it had the like effects as to the Hebrew Bibles, that Hugo's had as to the Latin, that is, it caused the same division to be made in all the Hebrew Bibles, which were afterwards either written out or printed for common use. For this concordance being found of excellent use among those for whom it was made, they were forced to comply with this division for the sake of having the benefit of it. For the references in Nathan's concordance being every where by chapters according to Hugo's division, they could no otherwise have the benefit of finding in their Bibles the places referred to, than by dividing them in the same chapters also. And from hence the division of the scriptural books into chapters first came into the Hebrew Bibles. But, Nathan, though he followed Hugo in the division of the scriptural books into chapters, yet did not so in the division of the chapters by the letters A. B. C. &c. in the margin, but refined upon him in this matter by introducing a better usage, that is, by using the division which was made by verses. This division, I have shewn, was very ancient; but it was till now without any numbers put to the verses. This was first done by Rabbi Nathan for the sake of bis concordance: for therein all his references being by the chapters and verses, as there was a necessity that those who used this concordance should have their Bibles thus divided into chapters and verses also; so was it, that both should be numbered in them. For it was by the numbers of the chapters and verses that they were to find the places sought for, in the same manner as is now practised in our English concordan