Last updated 09/07/24: Online ordering is currently unavailable due to technical issues. We apologise for any delays responding to customers while we resolve this. For further updates please visit our website: https://www.cambridge.org/news-and-insights/technical-incident
We use cookies to distinguish you from other users and to provide you with a better experience on our websites. Close this message to accept cookies or find out how to manage your cookie settings.
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 08 July 2019
Adoniram Judson’s life and work have long been the subject of popular and scholarly interest, but the intellectual and exegetical background for his Burmese Bible translation has not been closely studied. This background was the biblical studies movement in New England, which began in the early nineteenth century and flourished before declining and eventually disappearing by about 1870. The opposing New England orthodox Calvinist and liberal Unitarian schools were equally involved in the movement. Judson was an early product of Andover Theological Seminary, the center for orthodox Calvinism in New England. From 1816 to 1840 Judson translated the Bible into Burmese and his references to the scholarly works he used, along with the text-critical and interpretive decisions in his Bible translation, identify him as an ongoing participant in the New England biblical studies movement. This scholarly background helps us understand interpretive decisions in the Judson Bible, which is still the main Burmese version used by Protestants in Myanmar.
1 In this article I will use “Burma” (now “Myanmar”) and “Rangoon” (now “Yangon”), as these names were used in the Judson era. “Burmese” will refer to the Myanmar language, and “Bama” to ethnically Burmese people, who now identify themselves as either “Bama” or “Myanmar.”
2 See the comprehensive bibliographic references in Laura, Rodgers Levens, “Reading the Judsons: Recovering the Literary Works of Ann, Sarah, Emily, and Adoniram Judson for a New Baptist Mission History,” ABQ 32 (2013) 37–73Google Scholar.
3 Helen, G. Trager, Missionary Views of the Burmese in the Nineteenth Century (Bombay: Popular Press, 1960Google Scholar), https://ia601604.us.archive.org/4/items/in.ernet.dli.2015.460969/2015.460969.Missionary-Views-Of-The-Burmese-In-The-Nineteenth-Century---Alien-Eyes.pdf.
4 La, Seng Dingrin, “The Conflicting Legacy of Adoniram Judson: Appropriating and Polemicizing against Burmese Buddhism,” Missiology 37 (2009) 485–97Google Scholar; idem, “Is Buddhism Indispensable in the Cross-Cultural Appropriation of Christianity in Burma?,” Buddhist-Christian Studies 29 (2009) 3–22; Khawsiama, K. M. Y., “Phayālogy: A Study of Adoniram Judson’s Naming God as Phayā from a Christian-Buddhist View in Myanmar Context,” AsJT 28 (2014) 16–34Google Scholar; William, H. Brackney, “The Legacy of Adoniram Judson,” International Bulletin of Missionary Research 22 (1998) 122–27Google Scholar; Phyllis, Rodgerson Pleasants, “Beyond Translation: The Work of the Judsons in Burma,” Baptist History and Heritage 42.2 (2007) 19–35Google Scholar; Graham, B. Walker, “Building a Christian Zayat in the Shade of the Bo Tree,” ABQ 32 (2013) 13–36Google Scholar; Rodgers Levens, “Reading the Judsons.”
5 For a recent treatment of Judson’s New England theological background, see Robert, Caldwell, “New England’s New Divinity and the Age of Judson’s Preparation,” in Adoniram Judson: A Bicentennial Appreciation of the Pioneer American Missionary (ed. Jason, Duesing; Nashville: B&H Academic, 2012) 31–54Google Scholar.
6 “The strangest feature of American critical biblical studies in this early period is the fact that it vanished so quickly and made so little impact on the development of American religion after the Civil War” (Jerry, W. Brown, The Rise of Biblical Criticism in America, 1800-1870 [Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press, 1969] 180Google Scholar).
7 William, Adams, A Discourse on the Life and Services of Professor Moses Stuart (New York: John Throw, 1852) 19Google Scholar, http://www.archive.org/details/discourseonlifes00adamiala.
8 Adams greatly respected the New England theologians of the 18th century: “Edwards, Hopkins, Bellamy, and Emmons.” Nevertheless, he complains that, “With the exception of occasional references to Pool’s Synopsis and Buxtorf on the etymology of particular words, I do not remember a single instance of what may be called Biblical criticism in the writings of Edwards” (ibid., 23).
9 For Buckminster (1784–1812), see Brown, Rise of Biblical Criticism, 10–26. For Stuart (1780–1852), see John, Herbert Giltner, Moses Stuart: The Father of Biblical Science in America (BSNA 14; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988Google Scholar). See also Mark, Granquist, “The Role of ‘Common Sense’ in the Hermeneutics of Moses Stuart,” HTR 83 (1990) 305–19Google Scholar.
10 Eliza, Buckminster Lee, Memoirs of Rev. Joseph Bucksminster, D.D. and of His Son, Rev. Joseph Stevens Buckminster (Boston: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, 1851) 325–27Google Scholar, quoted in Brown, Rise of Biblical Criticism, 22–23.
11 Leonard, Woods, History of the Andover Theological Seminary (Boston: J. R. Osgood, 1885) 133Google Scholar, http://www.archive.org.details/historyofandover00woodrich.
12 Ibid., 27–28 [italics in original].
13 Ibid., 136.
14 See Stacy, R. Warburton, Eastward! The Story of Adoniram Judson (New York: Round Table, 1937) 8–14Google Scholar; Francis, Wayland, Memoir of the Life and Labors of the Rev. Adoniram Judson, D.D. (2 vols.; Boston: Phillips, Sampson, 1853) 1:22–26Google Scholar, https://archive.org/details/memoiroflifela01wayl.
15 Woods, History, 137.
16 Ibid., 151.
17 Two lots of Judson’s writings were lost in shipwrecks, and another lot in a housefire. When he was imprisoned in Ava (1824–1826), Ann destroyed all correspondence out of security concerns. After Ann’s death (1826), while suffering from depression, Judson made the decision to destroy all his personal writings, and urged his family and friends to do the same, as a way of glorifying God, not himself. He also renounced his honorary doctorate from Brown University at this time. His biographer, Francis Wayland, refers to this as Judson’s “peculiar views of duty” (Wayland, Memoir, 1:3). What remains are Judson’s letters and journal extracts which were published, especially in the Baptist Missionary Magazine, along with private letters that were preserved. Wayland also had access to Judson’s third wife, Emily Chubbuck Judson, who died the year after the two volumes of Memoir of the Life and Labors of the Rev. Adoniram Judson, D.D. were published.
18 Wayland, Memoir, 1:48, 56, 66, 75, 80.
19 Giltner, Moses Stuart, 7.
20 “It is clear that by the end of 1813, less than a year and a half after he begun studying German seriously, his mastery of the language was complete” (ibid., 10).
21 For a description of the encounter between critical German scholarship and Andover biblical scholarship, with Edward Robinson as the representative, see Jay, G. Williams, The Times and Life of Edward Robinson: Connecticut Yankee in King Solomon’s Court (BSNA 19; Atlanta: SBL Press, 1999Google Scholar), especially 113–74.
22 Nowhere is this more evident than in the 1925 Andover investigation into “the degree of attention which the students gave to the writings of lax and infidel writers and commentators, and by the unhappy effect which had already, in some instances, been produced upon the religious opinions of individuals, and upon the spiritual state of the Seminary” (Woods, History, 173–78, at 174).
23 Moses, Stuart, “Letter to the Editor on the Study of the German Language,” The Christian Review 6 (1841) 450Google Scholar [italics in original], quoted in Granquist, “Common Sense,” 306.
24 See the bibliography in Brown, Rise of Biblical Criticism, 192–95; Giltner, Moses Stuart, 89–110.
25 He did this through his “Public Lectures” (see Giltner, Moses Stuart, 29–44) and his publication, Moses, Stuart, A Critical History and Defence of the Old Testament Canon (Andover, MA: Allen, Morrill, & Wardwell, 1845Google Scholar).
26 Ernesti, J.A., Elements of Interpretation (trans. Moses, Stuart; Andover, MA: Flagg & Gould, 1822Google Scholar).
27 Brown, Rise of Biblical Criticism, 111–24.
28 Ibid., 23.
29 Ibid., 27–44.
30 Noyes “was the first thoroughly competent Old Testament scholar within the liberal movement and, in 1845, the only Unitarian who could match Stuart’s mastery of Old Testament criticism” (ibid., 127).
31 Gregory, A. Wills, “From Congregationalist to Baptist: Judson and Baptism,” in Adoniram Judson: A Bicentennial Appreciation of the Pioneer American Missionary (ed. Jason, Duesing; Nashville: B&H Academic, 2012) 149–66Google Scholar.
32 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter to Lucius Bolles, Calcutta, Sept. 1, 1812,” The Massachusetts Baptist Missionary Magazine 3 (1813) 268Google Scholar. Religious studies was not part of the general curriculum at Brown, like all universities in New England at the time, which was the reason for the advent of the seminaries. It was not unusual for a Congregationalist like Judson to study at Brown. See Warburton, Eastward, 5–7.
33 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter to Rev. Dr. Worcester, Corresponding Secretary of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Mission, Calcutta, Sept. 1, 1812,” The Massachusetts Baptist Missionary Magazine 3 (1813) 267Google Scholar.
34 “Religious Intelligence: American Missionaries,” The Panoplist, and Missionary Magazine 5 (1813) 372–78, at 376–77.
35 E.g., The Panoplist, and Missionary Magazine 11 (1815) 435; 12 (1816) 283; 13 (1817) 409; 14 (1818) 32–425; 15 (1819) 363.
36 Newell’s journal, in Colombo, mentions a letter from Judson received on July 15, 1813. Samuel, Newell, “Mr. Newell’s Journal,” The Panoplist, and Missionary Magazine 11 (1815) 186–87Google Scholar.
37 Wayland, Memoir, 1:157. Edward Pritchett and Jonathan Brain, from the London Missionary Society, had also come to Rangoon, but Brain died shortly after arriving and Pritchett only stayed one year. Ibid., 157–58.
38 Letter from Ann Judson to Samuel Newell, Rangoon, 23 April 1814, quoted in Wayland, Memoir, 1:167.
39 Burmese and Pali are from different language families, similar to the relationship between English and Latin, but more linguistically removed. See Dingrin, “Is Buddhism Indispensable?,” 6–7.
40 Ann Judson’s journal, 3 September 1815, quoted in Wayland, Memoir, 1:171.
41 Most volumes of the Baptist Missionary Magazine are available on https://archive.org/ and https://www.hathitrust.org.
42 Dingrin, “Is Buddhism Indispensable?,” 5.
43 CBCM, New Testament, Psalms, Proverbs and Deuterocanonical Books (Myanmar: Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Myanmar, 2012Google Scholar) (Burmese).
44 Dingrin, “Is Buddhism Indispensable?,” 8. The tract is available digitally: http://reader.digitale-sammlungen.de/de/fs1/object/display/bsb10397806_00005.html. Among the terms Dingrin identifies are: p’ăyà (God); p’ăyà -thăk’in (Lord God); k’ămèh-taw (God the Father); thà-taw (God the Son); win-nyin-taw (Holy Spirit); thoùn-pà-p’ăyà-tă-s’u (Trinity); ba-tha (religion); tăyà (law); pyin-nyaq (commandment); ăpyiq (sin); dàw-thá (anger); ceì-zù-taw (grace); c’àn-tha (happiness); p’òn (glory). The transliteration system is from John Okell, Burmese By Ear or Essential Myanmar, 136-143, http://www.soas.ac.uk/sea/burmese/. Even U Pe Maung Tin, leading 20th century Burmese and Pali scholar, himself a Christian, seems unaware of this previous work, assuming that Judson himself had developed all of these words. Alan Saw U, “Professor U Pe Maung Tin: A Gentle Genius, a Meek Master,” The Journal of Burma Studies 9 (2004) 35–41, at 37.
45 Wayland, Memoir, 1:158.
46 Francis, Mason, Burmah: Its People and Natural Productions (London: Trubner, 1860) 619Google Scholar, quoted in Trager, Missionary Views, 21.
47 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter to Mr. Ward, Rangoon, Jan. 18, 1816,” The American Baptist Magazine 1 (1817) 28–29Google Scholar.
48 Adoniram, Judson, “Extract of a Letter from Mr. Judson to Mr. Rice, Rangoon, August 3d, 1816,” The American Baptist Magazine 1 (1817) 184Google Scholar.
49 “From Burmah,” The American Baptist Magazine 1 (1817) 265.
50 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter from Mr. Judson to the Corresponding Secretary of the Baptist Board of Foreign Missions. Rangoon, March 7, 1817,” The American Baptist Magazine 1 (1818) 329Google Scholar.
51 Wayland, Memoir, 1:282.
52 Adoniram, Judson, “Extracts of Letters from Rev. A. Judson to Rev. G. H. Hough, Now at Serampore, Rangoon, Jan. 22, 1821,” The American Baptist Magazine 3 (1822) 255–56Google Scholar, at 255.
53 U Shwe Ngong died “at the close of the war,” early 1826. Adoniram, Judson, “Journal of the Rev. Dr. Judson (Beginning Jan. 24th, 1827),” The American Baptist Magazine 7 (1827) 369–71Google Scholar, at 369.no. 12 (1827). Thus, he assisted Judson with sections of the New Testament, but his death came before Judson began translating the Old Testament. Hence, Khoi Lam Thang’s assertion that “Judson’s Bible translation draft was corrected by U Shwe Ngong” is not entirely correct (Khoi, Lam Thang, “‘Eagle’ in the Myanmar Bible,” BT 60 [2009] 195–200Google Scholar, at 195).
54 Adoniram, Judson, “Journal of Mr. Judson, Continued from March 11, 1821,” The American Baptist Magazine 3 (1822) 416–20Google Scholar, at 417.
55 Ibid., 420.
56 Adoniram, Judson, “Journal Continued from June 14, 1821,” The American Baptist Magazine 3 (1822) 420–21Google Scholar, at 421.
57 Ibid. Ann left Rangoon on 21 August 1821, and returned on 5 December 1823.
58 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter from Mr. Judson to Dr. Baldwin, Rangoon, Feb. 6, 1822,” The American Baptist Magazine 3 (1822) 458Google Scholar.
59 Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson’s Journal, Continued from November 18, 1821,” The American Baptist Magazine 4 (1823) 97–101Google Scholar, at 98.
60 Ibid.
61 Ibid., 99.
62 Adoniram, Judson, “Extract of a Letter from the Rev. Mr. Judson to Dr. Baldwin. Rangoon, Aug. 21, 1822,” The American Baptist Magazine 4 (1823) 63Google Scholar.
63 Henry Gouger, Judson and Price’s prison companion from 1824 to 1826, writes that Price “had acquired a smattering of medical science, by attending some hospitals in America,” and was far from impressed by his medical skills (Henry, Gouger, Personal Narrative of Two Years’ Imprisonment in Burmah [London: John Murray, 1860] 179–80Google Scholar, 212–13, https://archive.org/details/apersonalnarrat01gouggoog). Gouger’s book, while a valuable historical account of the imprisonment of the foreigners in Ava in its own right, also gives a different perspective from most of the Judson sources that have survived. These sources were written to other Christians, and often for the public, thus are quite formal and pious. Gouger gives a less guarded account, such as his take on Price’s medical skills, and even reports Judson’s contemplation of suicide to escape from the living hell of their imprisonment (ibid., 244-45).
64 Jonathan, Price, “From Dr. Price to the Cor. Sec. Dated Ava, Oct. 1, 1823,” The American Baptist Magazine 4 (1823) 101–2Google Scholar, at 102.
65 For Judson’s account of the journey to Ava, see Adoniram, Judson, “Dr. Judson’s Journal Continued from August 21, 1822,” The American Baptist Magazine 4 (1823) 211–18Google Scholar.
66 Adoniram Judson, “Letter from Dr. Judson, to Dr. Baldwin, of Boston. Rangoon, Feb. 11, 1823,” The American Baptist Magazine 4 (1823) 210.
67 Adoniram, Judson, “Extract of a Letter from Rev. A. Judson, to the Rev. Mr. Sharp, Dated Rangoon, August 5, 1823,” The American Baptist Magazine 4 (1824) 330Google Scholar.
68 Judson was arrested on 8 June 1824, and released on 25 February 1826. See Adoniram, Judson, “Dr. Judson’s Letter to Dr. Baldwin. British Camp, Yantabo, Feb. 25, 1826,” The American Baptist Magazine 6 (1826) 314Google Scholar.
69 In the end, none of them were executed, and only one, the Spaniard Mr. Lanciego, suffered torture (Gouger, Personal Narrative, 240).
70 Adoniram, Judson, “Dr. Judson’s Journal,” The American Baptist Magazine 8 (1828) 129–31Google Scholar.
71 “Annual Report,” The American Baptist Magazine 8 (1828) 164–74, at 167.
72 Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson’s Journal, Rangoon, Nov. 21, 1830,” The American Baptist Magazine 11 (1831) 207–8Google Scholar.
73 Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson’s Journal. Rangoon, Feb. 5, 1831,” The American Baptist Magazine 11 (1831) 343–44Google Scholar, at 343.
74 Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson’s Journal, June 1831,” The American Baptist Magazine 12 (1832) 30–31Google Scholar.
75 Adoniram, Judson, “Extracts from Mr. Judson’s Journal,” The American Baptist Magazine 12 (1832) 126Google Scholar.
76 Entry dated 25 June. Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson’s Journal,” The American Baptist Magazine 13 (1833) 41–45Google Scholar, at 44.
77 Ibid.
78 Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson to Dr. Bolles. Moulmein, Sept. 24, 1833,” The American Baptist Magazine 14 (1834) 360Google Scholar.
79 “Maulmein,” The American Baptist Magazine 15 (1835) 79.
80 See Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson’s Journal,” The American Baptist Magazine 15 (1835) 79Google Scholar; idem, “Letter of Mr. Judson to Dr. Bolles. Maulmein, Dec. 8, 1834,” The American Baptist Magazine 15 (1835) 343–46, at 344.
81 Adoniram, Judson, “Extract of a Letter from Mr. Judson, Dated Maulmein, June 30, 1835,” The American Baptist Magazine 16 (1836) 109Google Scholar; “Extract of a Letter from Mr. Judson, Dated Maulmein, Dec. 31, 1835,” The American Baptist Magazine 16 (1836) 249–50, at 250.
82 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter of Mr. Judson, Dated Maulmein, Jan. 31, 1837,” The American Baptist Magazine 17 (1837) 295–96Google Scholar, at 295; “Twenty-Fourth Annual Report,” The Baptist Missionary Magazine 18 (1838) 121–63, at 149.
83 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter of Mr. Judson, Dated Maulmein, June 30, 1838,” The Baptist Missionary Magazine 19 (1839) 34Google Scholar.
84 “Twenty Seventh Annual Report of the Board,” The Baptist Missionary Magazine 21 (1841) 153–95, at 186.
85 Judson, “Rev. A. Judson, to the Rev. Mr. Sharp,” 330.
86 Judson, “Mr. Judson to Dr. Bolles. Maulmein, Dec. 8, 1834,” 344.
87 For publication details, see http://www.cjconroy.net/bib/rosenm.htm.
88 The 1821 volume on Genesis is 800 pages; the 1822 volume on Exodus 550 pages; a single volume Leviticus to Deuteronomy is a mere 681 pages, but Psalms 1–20 runs to 556 pages. The Compendium Redacta is considerably abridged, the one volume of the Pentateuch only 818 pages, the one volume on the Psalms 711 pages.
89 Wayland, Memoir, 2:124, https://archive.org/details/memoiroflifela02wayl.
90 Ibid., 128–29.
91 Ibid., 129.
92 Ibid., 144.
93 Adoniram, Judson, “Letter, Dec. 28, 1840,” The Baptist Missionary Magazine 21 (1841) 186Google Scholar. G. C. Knapp was a Halle professor who issued his first Greek NT edition in 1797, a second edition in 1813, and a third in 1824. He has fallen out of the pages of history to some extent, and I thank Peter Head for this information (private communication, 5 May 2017).
94 It is difficult to ascertain whether Judson read German, although I tend to think he did not. When he left New England in 1812, Moses Stuart was just beginning to learn German, and he was a forerunner in that field. Judson never refers to learning German, as he does to French (see Wayland, Memoir, 1:176). Furthermore, the German works referred to above were published in Latin, a language in which Judson was fluent, e.g. Griesbach, J. J., Novum Testamentum Grӕce (London: Mackinley, Cuthell, and Martin, 1809Google Scholar), https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_4WAzgbUFE94C.
95 Woods, History, 235.
96 Described in Adoniram, Judson, “Extract of a Letter from Rev. A. Judson, to the Rev. Mr. Emerson of Beverly,” The Massachusetts Baptist Missionary Magazine 4 (1815) 147–48Google Scholar.
97 Wayland, Memoir, 2:165.
98 Ibid., 129.
99 Giltner, Moses Stuart, 103.
100 Wayland, Memoir, 1:25.
101 Judson, “Letter, Dec. 28, 1840,” 186. For an analysis of Judson’s NT textual criticism, with particular reference to his changing attitudes to Griesbach, see John, de Jong, “Textual Criticism, the Textus Receptus, and Adoniram Judson’s Burmese New Testaments,” PJBR 13 (2018) 51–60Google Scholar.
102 Judson, “Letter, Dec. 28, 1840,” 186.
103 Samuel, Horsley, Biblical Criticism on the First Fourteen Historical Books of the Old Testament; Also on the First Nine Prophetical Books (London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme & Brown, and F. C. & J. Rivington, 1820) 69–70Google Scholar, https://books.google.com.mx/books?id=WdErAAAAYAAJ.
104 Ibid., 70. שׁוא “worthless,” from the LXX μάταιος, so NRSV, NJPS; צא “filth,” so ESV, JPS, NAB.
105 In the following examples from the JB, I will stay with my area of expertise, the OT. For NT analysis of the JB, see Anna Sui Hluan, “Silence in Translation: Interpreting 1 Corinthians 14:34–35 in Myanmar” (PhD diss., University of Otago, 2016).
106 Whether this line from the LXX should be included remains debated, but most translations until well into the 20th century do not include it.
107 Gen 4:8; 36:2, 14; 41:22; 49:4. Of these, the ESV follows the MT each time, and the NIV follows the LXX only twice (Gen 4:8; 49:4).
108 Similarly, the WEB (1833), ERV (1885), ASV (1901), JPS (1917).
109 Marvin, E. Tate, Psalms 51–100 (WBC 20; Dallas: Word, 1998) 462Google Scholar.
110 According to Dilbert Hillers, “It is impossible to say what is intended by the MT, and already the ancient versions seem at a loss” (Dilbert, R. Hillers, Micah [Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984] 80Google Scholar).
111 Similarly ASV, DRA, ERV, JPS.
112 ESV, NRSV, HCSB, NKJV, RSV; NIV is similar.
113 The NRSV and NIV read “Rodanim” in Gen 10:4.
114 As do KJV, DRA, NJB.
115 Giltner, Moses Stuart, 36.
116 Judson, “Rev. A. Judson, to the Rev. Mr. Sharp,” 330. Judson continued revising this “Epitome” over the years: “[W]e have finished revising the New Testament, and the Epitome of the Old, - a work, in which we have been closely engaged for above a year” (Adoniram, Judson, “Mr. Judson’s Journal, 1829, Nov. 29th,” The American Baptist Magazine 10 [1830] 245–46Google Scholar, at 245).
117 According to the list in Nestle-Aland Greek New Testament, Fourth Revised Edition (ed. Barbara Aland et al.; Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1994) 887–88.
118 E.g., Gen 5:24 and Heb 11:5; Deut 17:7 and 1 Cor 5:13; Ps 2:1–2 and Acts 4:25–26.
119 E.g., Exod 19:6 and 1 Pet 2:9; Ps 16:10 and Acts 13:35; Ps 104:4 and Heb 1:7; Ps 140:3 and Rom 3:13; Prov 25:21–22 and Rom 12:20.
120 Exod 19:6 and 1 Pet 2:9; Ps 8:4–6 and Heb 2:6–8; Ps 16:8–11 and Acts 2:25–28; Ps 19:4 and Rom 10:18; Ps 69:22–23 and Rom 11:9–10; Ps 102:25–27 and Heb 1:10–12; Isa 7:14 and Matt 1:23; Isa 40:3–5 and Lk 3:4–6.
121 In v. 22 וְלִשְׁלוֹמִים is read by the LXX and Syriac as the noun שִׁלּוּם “recompense, vengeance, bribe, retribution,” which Judson follows. See Tate, Psalms 51–100, 190. In v. 23, מָתְנַ֣יִם could be “loins” or “hips/lower back”; JB “make their backs always tremble,” i.e., following MT.
122 This continues to be the case for many modern versions for Isa 7:14, “the virgin shall conceive,” from Matt 1:23. So ESV, NIV, HCSB, NAB, NASB, NKJV. For עלמה as “young woman,” see NRSV, NJB, NJPS.
123 For further analysis of Judson’s translation, see John, H. de Jong, “An Analysis of Adoniram Judson’s Translation of Zephaniah,” BT 68 (2017) 64–87Google Scholar.
124 Wayland, Memoir, 2:160.
125 E.g., John, de Jong, “A ‘Sin Offering’ Crouching at the Door? Translation Lessons from an Exegetical Fossil in the Judson Bible,” BT 61 (2010) 89–92Google Scholar.
126 U Pe Maung Tin, quoted in Alan Saw U, “Professor U Pe Maung Tin,” 37.
