Man, Natural nat'-u-ral, nach'-u-ral (psuchikos anthropos): Man as he is by nature, contrasted with man as he becomes by grace. This phrase is exclusively Pauline.
I. Biblical Meaning.
The classical passage in which it occurs is 1 Corinthians 2:14 King James Version: "But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned." In his anthropology Paul uses four groups of descriptive adjectives in contrasted pairs:
(1) the old man and the new man (Romans 6:6, Ephesians 4:22, Colossians 3:9, Ephesians 2:15, Ephesians 4:24, Colossians 3:10);
(2) the outward man and the inward man (2 Corinthians 4:16, Romans 7:22, Ephesians 3:16);
(3) the carnal man and the spiritual man (Romans 8:1-14, 1 Corinthians 3:1, 1 Corinthians 3:3, 1 Corinthians 3:4);
(4) the natural man and the spiritual man (2 Corinthians 2:14, 2 Corinthians 3:3, 2 Corinthians 3:4, Ephesians 2:3, 1 Corinthians 2:15, 1 Corinthians 3:1, 1 Corinthians 14:37, 1 Corinthians 15:46, Galatians 6:1).
A study of these passages will show that the adjectives "old," "outward," "carnal," and "natural" describe man, from different points of view, prior to his conversion; while the adjectives "new," "inward" and "spiritual" describe him, from different points of view, after his conversion. To elucidate the meaning, the expositor must respect these antitheses and let the contrasted words throw light and meaning upon each other.
1. The Old Man:
The "old man" is the "natural man" considered chronologically-prior to that operation of the Holy Spirit by which he is renovated into the "new man."
The old house is the house as it was before it was remodeled; an old garment is the garment as it was before it was re-fashioned; and the "old man" is man as he was before he was regenerated and sanctified by the grace of the Spirit. "Our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin" (Romans 6:6 the King James Version). Here the "old man" is called the "body of sin," as the physical organism is called the body of the soul or spirit, and is to be "crucified" and "destroyed," in order that man may no longer be the "servant of sin." "Put off concerning the former conversation the old man, which is corrupt. .... Put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness" (Ephesians 4:22, Ephesians 4:24 the King James Version). Here the "old man" is said to be "corrupt," and we are called upon to "put it off." The figure is that of putting off old clothes which are unclean, and putting on those garments which have come from the wash clean and snowy white. We have the same idea, in different language and with a slightly different imagery.
When Paul calls the "natural man" the "old man," and describes it as the "body of sin" which is "corrupt" in its nature and "deeds," and tells us that it must be "crucified" and "destroyed" and "put off" in order that we may "not serve sin," but may have "righteousness" and "true holiness" and "knowledge" and the "image" of God, we get some conception of the moral meaning which he is endeavoring to convey by these contrasts (Galatians 5:19-24). He has reference to that sinful nature in man which is as old as the individual, as old as the race of which he is a member, which must be graciously renovated according to that gospel which he preached to Corinthians, Colossians, Ephesians, Romans and all the world.
See OLD MAN; MAN, I, 3.
2. The Outward Man:
The apostle also establishes a contrast between "the inward man" and "the outward man." "Though our outward man is decaying, yet our inward man is renewed day by day" (2 Corinthians 4:16). Now what sort of man is the "outward man" as contrasted with the "inward man"? In Greek, the exo-anthropos is set over against the eso-anthropos.
See OUTWARD MAN.
"The contrast here drawn between the `outward' and the `inward man,' though illustrated by the contrast in Romans 7:22 between the `law in the members' and `the inner man,' and in Ephesians 4:22, Colossians 3:9 between `the old man' and `the new man' is not precisely the same. Those contrasts relate to the difference between the sensual and the moral nature, `the flesh' and `the spirit'; this to the difference between the material and the spiritual nature" (Stanley, in the place cited.).
"The outward man" is the body, and "the inward man" is the soul, or immaterial principle in the human make-up. As the body is wasted by the afflictions of life, the soul is renewed; what is death to the body is life to the soul; as afflictions depotentiate man's physical organism, they impotentiate man's spiritual principle. That is, the afflictions of life, culminating in death itself, have diametrically opposite effects upon the body and upon the soul. They kill the one; they quicken the other.
"The inward man" is the whole human nature as renewed and indwelt and dominated by the Spirit of God as interpenetrated by the spirit of grace. As the one is broken down by the adverse dispensations of life, the other is upbuilt by the sanctifying discipline of the Spirit.
3. The Carnal Man:
There is another Pauline antithesis which it is necessary for us to interpret in order to understand what he means by the "natural man." It is the distinction which he draws between the "carnal mind" and the "spiritual mind." The critical reference is Romans 8:1-14. In this place the "carnal mind" is identified with the "law of death," and the "spiritual mind" is identified with the "law of the Spirit." These two "laws" are two principles and codes: the one makes man to be at "enmity against God" and leads to "death"; the other makes him the friend of God, and conducts to "life and peace." The word "carnal" connotes all that is fallen and sinful and unregenerate in man's nature. In its gross sense the "carnal" signifies that which is contrary to nature, or nature expressing itself in low and bestial forms Nehemiah 3:7: "They sewed figleaves together, and made themselves breeches." This translation, however, is not peculiar to the Genevan version. It is the translation of perizomata in both the Wycliffe VSS; it is also found in Caxton's version of the "Golden Legende."
15. The Bishops' Bible:
Queen Elizabeth, the beginning of whose reign was beset with great difficulties, restored the arrangements of Edward VI. A copy of the Great Bible was required to be provided in every church, and every encouragement was given to the reading of the Scriptures. The defects of the Great Bible were admitted, and were the not unnatural result of the haste with which- notwithstanding its two revisions-it had been produced. These became more apparent when set beside the Geneva version, which, however, the archbishop and clergy could hardly be expected to receive with enthusiasm, as they had had nothing to do with its origin and had no control over its renderings and marginal notes. Archbishop Parker, moreover, who had an inclination to Biblical studies, had at the same time a passion for uniformity; and probably to this combination of circumstances may be traced the origin of the Bishops' Bible. Parker superintended the work, which was begun in 1563-64; he was aided by eight bishops-from whom the version received its name-and other scholars. It appeared in a magnificent volume in 1568, without a word of flattery, but with a preface in which the revisers express a lofty consciousness of the importance of their work. It was published in 1568: cum privilegio regiae Majestatis. A revised and in many places corrected edition was issued in 1572, and another in 1575, the year of the archbishop's death. The general aim of the version is a quaint literality, but along with this is found the use of not a few explanatory words and phrases not found in the original text. More exact notice also than in previous versions is taken of the use of the Greek article and of the particles and conjunctions. It bears marks, however, of the hand of the individual translators by whom the work was done; and of the want of the revision of each translator's work by the rest, and of some general revision of the whole. The Genevan version was the work of collegiate labor, to which much of its superiority is due. Though Parker did not object to the circulation of the Genevan version, Convocation after his death made some unsuccessful attempts to popularize the Bishops' Bible; but the Genevan translation was not easily thrust aside. "It grew," says Eadie (II, 35), "to be in greater demand than the Bishops' or Cranmer's. Ninety editions of it were published in the reign of Elizabeth, as against forty of all the other versions of Bibles, as distinct from New Testaments, there were twenty-five editions of Cranmer's and the Bishops', but sixty of the Genevan."
16. Rheims and Douai Version:
The production of an official version of the sacred Scriptures for English Roman Catholics was probably due more to rivalry with the Reformers than to any great zeal of the authorities of the Roman church for the spread of vernacular Scripture; though, according to the Arundelian Constitution above mentioned, it was only to the printing and reading of unauthorized translations that objection was then taken by the Roman authorities. but if there was to be a special version for Catholics, it was clearly reasonable that the work should be done by Catholics and accompanied by Catholic explanations. This was undertaken by some English Catholic scholars who, on the success of the Reformation in England, had left the country and settled at Douai in the Northeast of France, with a short transference of their seminary to Rheims. The version was probably produced under the influence of (Cardinal) Allen and an Oxford scholar, Gregory Martin. It was made from the Vulgate, the Bible of Jerome and Augustine, and not, like the Protestant VSS, from the Hebrew and Greek originals. The New Testament was issued from Rheims in 1582 and the Old Testament from Douai in 1609. The main objection to the version is the too close adherence of the translators to the words of the original and the too great Latinizing of the English, so that their translation "needs," as Fuller said, "to be translated." Still they have a few words which along with a few Latinisms were adopted by the translators of the King James Version, such as "upbraideth not," "bridleth his tongue," at his own charges, and others; and they have the special merit of preserving uniformity of rendering. The translation met with no great success and the circulation was not large.
17. The Authorized Version:
The King James Version owed its origin to a chance remark regarding mistranslations in the existing versions made at the Hampton Court Conference, a meeting of bishops and Puritan clergy held (1604) in the interest of religious toleration before James was actually crowned. The meeting was ineffectual in all points raised by the Puritans, but it led to the production of the English Bible. Dr. Reynolds, president of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, probably with some reference to the rivalry between the Bishops' Bible and the Genevan version, remarked on the imperfections of the current Bibles. The remark was not very enthusiastically received except by the King, who caught eagerly at the suggestion of a fresh version, "professing that he could never yet see a Bible well translated in English," and blaming specially the Genevan version, probably on account of the pointed character of its marginal notes. Probably with the aid of the universities, the King without delay nominated the revisers to the number of fifty-four from among the best Hebrew and Greek scholars of the day. Only 47 actually took part in the work which, however-officially at least-they were in no hurry to begin; for, although named in 1604 and with all the preliminaries arranged before the end of that year, they did not begin their work till 1607. Their remuneration was to be by church preferment, for which the archbishop was to take measures. The immediate expenses, the King suggested, should be supplied by the bishops and chapters who, however, did not respond. "King James' version never cost King James a farthing," says Eadie (II, 153 f), who here gives some interesting information on this aspect of the revision. They wrought in six companies of which two met respectively in Westminster, Cambridge and Oxford. Elaborate rules, given in full in most histories of the Bible, were laid down for the revisers' guidance, the King being particularly insistent upon Rule 9, which provided for the revision of the work of each Company by the rest. When any Company had finished the revision of a book, it was to be sent to all the rest for their criticism and suggestions, ultimate differences of opinion to be settled at a general meeting of each Company. Learned men outside the board of revisers were to be invited to give their opinions in cases of special difficulty.
18. The Apocrypha:
One of the Cambridge Companies was specially appointed to revise the Apocrypha, in which considerable license was taken, as the seven members composing the Company had probably no very firm belief in the inspiration of its books. The marginal notes, too, are freer in character than those of the Old Testament. by the early translators, Tyndale and Coverdale, the Apocrypha was simply accepted as part of the heritage of the church; it had a place likewise in the Great Bible, the Bishops' Bible and most even of the Gentvan copies. but by the middle of the 17th century opinion even in the Church of England had changed regarding it, and it was about this time that Bibles began to be printed having the canonical books only. The Apocrypha is now hardly at all printed otherwise than separately (note also should be taken of the treatment of the Apocrypha in the Revised Version (British and American), as stated below).
Impressed with the importance of their task, the revisers worked strenuously at it for two years; and nine months more were devoted to revision by a special committee consisting of two members from each center, and in 1611 the result of the work appeared. It is not wonderful that the work was described by a contemporary entitled to give a judgment on it (Selden, Table Talk) as "the best translation in the world"-a verdict that later opinion has abundantly ratified. It was the copestone of a work on which 90 years of solid labor had by different hands been expended, and it was done by half a hundred of the foremost scholars of the day who knew Hebrew and Greek, and who also knew English for three centuries it has grown in popular esteem, and it is justly regarded as one of the best possessions and one of the most unifying influences of the widely scattered English-speaking race.
On the title-page as issued in 1611 the version is described as "newly translated out of the original tongues" and as "appointed to be read in churches," two statements not easy to reconcile with the actual facts. The first rule for the revisers' guidance provided that the work was to consist in a revision of the Bishops' Bible: it was not said that it was to be a new translation. There is, further, no sanction of the version by King, Parliament, Convocation or Privy Council. Like Jerome's version twelve centuries before, it was left to find acceptance as best it might by its own intrinsic merit.
19. Further Revisions:
Already in the days of the Commonwealth proposals were made for a new version; but though several meetings were held of a committee appointed by Parliament for the purpose in 1657, nothing came of the movement (Lewis, History of Translations, 354). For nearly half a century the chief rival of the King James Version was the Geneva Bible which was in wide private use. Formal revision was not undertaken again till the reign of Queen Victoria. but between 1611 and the date of the recent revision not a few small alterations had been silently introduced into the King James Version, as was indeed only to be expected if the changes in the orthography of the language were to be correctly represented on the printed page. Advancing literary criticism, too, and minute linguistic study showed that since the days of the revisers many words had changed their meaning, and that verbal inaccuracies and a few less venial errors could be proved in the revisers' work. but what probably weighed most with scholars in inducing them to enter upon a new version was the extraordinary increase that since the last revision had taken place in our knowledge of the Hebrew text and more especially of the Greek text of Scripture. Important manuscripts had been brought to light of which the 17th-century revisers knew nothing, and scholars had with minute care examined and compared all the early copies of the Scripture studies which, without altering the main import of the gospel story, were shown to have considerable importance on the actual words' and sometimes on the meaning of the text. After much discussion of the subject in special volumes and in the leading magazines and reviews of Britain and America, there was a general agreement among scholars that a fresh version was advisable.
20. English Revised Version:
The history of the English revision is given at length in the preface to the English Revised Version of the New Testament. It originated with the Convocation of Canterbury of the Church of England in the year 1870, when a committee of 16 members was appointed with power to add to its numbers. by this committee invitations to join it were issued to the outstanding Hebrew and Greek scholars of the country, irrespective of religious denomination, and eventually two Companies were formed, one for the Old Testament and one for the New Testament, consisting each of 27 members, in which all the churches of the country were represented, the Roman Catholics alone excepted, and Dr. Newman had been invited to join the New Testament committee. The churches of America were also invited to cooperate, and this they did by forming two Companies corresponding to the British with due provision for the mutual comparison of results and suggestions. Where the suggestions from America were not accepted by the British revisers, they were recorded in an appendix to the published volume. The names of the revisers and the rules and principles laid down for the procedure of both Companies will be found in Eadie (II, 481 ff). The New Testament was published in May, 1881; the work occupied the Company for about 40 days in each year for 10 years. The Old Testament revision occupied the Company for 792 days in a period of 14 years. The entire Bible was published in May, 1885. It did not include the Apocrypha, a revision of which was issued separately in 1895.
21. American Revised Version:
This was undertaken, not by Convocation, but by the University Presses, a special Company being formed for the purpose from the Old Testament and New Testament Companies. For AMERICAN REVISED VERSION see separate article.
On REVISED VERSION see also BIBLE.
22. Has the Revised Version (British and American) Displaced the American Version?:
The Revised Version (British and American) has been before the English-speaking world for a quarter of a century and it can hardly be said with safety that it has as yet made any progress in displacing the King James Version in public esteem. Of course as much could be said for the King James Version in its day. It was very slow in gaining acceptance with the people: and yet unreasoning affection for its very words and phraseology is now one of the main obstacles to the acceptance of an admittedly more scientifically based original text and a more correct and not displeasing rendering of the same. A large number of the changes are certainly not such as appeal strongly to popular sympathy. "The Greek text of the New Testament of 1881 has been estimated to differ from that of 1611 in no less than 5,788: readings, of which about a quarter are held notably to modify the subject-matter; though even of these only a small proportion can be considered as of first-rate importance" (Kenyon, 239). On the other hand Hebrew, and especially the cognate Semitic languages, are now a great deal better known than before 1611, and considerable improvement is noticeable in the bringing out of the meaning in the poetical and prophetical books. The Revised Version (British and American) contains the best results of the scholarship of the Victorian age and cannot fail to be regarded as of the greatest utility to the reader and student of the King James Version. In the religious life the mind is essentially conservative, and nothing but time will show whether the undoubted merits of the Revised Version (British and American) are such as to outweigh the claims of sentiment and affection with which the King James Version is held.
See further AMERICAN REVISED VERSION.
23. LITERATURE.
Perhaps the most complete work on the subject in all its aspects is that by Dr. John Eadie, The English Bible: an External and Critical History of the Various English Translations of Scripture, 1876. Eadie was himself one of the revisers of 1870, and some of his concluding chapters contain "Remarks on the Need of Revision of the English New Testament." He is also highly appreciative but judiciously critical of his predecessors in the same field, eg. of Lewis, Complete History of Several Translations of the Holy Bible and New Testament into English, 1731, 1818; and Christopher Anderson, The Annals of the English Bible, 2 volumes, 1845, 1 volume rev. edition, 1862. An earlier and also very good book is Westcott's General View of the History of the English Bible, 1868. Westcott was also one of the revisers of 1870 and criticizes the work of the various translators as well as narrates the succession of the translations. A good discussion of the internal history of the text will also be found in the History of the English Bible by Dr. Moulton, another of the revisers. Kenyon, Our Bible and Ancient manuscripts, 1895, considers specially the text on which the successive English versions were based. He writes judiciously also on the Wycliffe period and on the Revised Version (British and American). The Wycliffe period should also be studied in Forshall and Madden, 4 volumes, 4to, Oxford, 1850; England in the Age of Wycliffe, by G. M. Trevelyan; Dr. Gasquet's Our Old English Bible and Other Essays, 1908; and Lechler's John Wycliffe and His English Precursors, translated and edited by Lorimer. For the Reformation period generally Foxe's History of the Ac and Monuments of the Church still deserves to be studied. "Foxe's story is doubtless substantially true, although disfigured by credulity and bitter prejudice." For Tyndale's special work see William Tyndale, a Biography, by R. Demaus, new edition by Lovett, 1886; and Fry's Bibliographical Descriptions of the Editions of the New Testament, Tyndale's Version in English Fry has also written special works on the Great Bible, Cranmer's Bible and the Genevan Version. The King James Version is very fully described in the works above mentioned, and in this connection notice is due to Scrivener, The Authorised Edition of the English Bible, 1884, and more especially to his careful and thorough "Introduction" to the Quarto Paragraph Bible, 1873. More popular histories of the Bible are those of Stoughton, Pattison, 1874, and Professor Milligan of Glasgow, 1895. General histories of England and of English literature may also be profitably consulted on the history of the Bible and its translation into the vernacular, such as those of Hume, Burnet, Hallam, Froude, Green and Gardiner. The revision of the King James Version called forth a large literature, either in the way of preparation for it or of criticism of it when carried through. To this literature many of the revisers themselves contributed, among whom may be mentioned Eadie, Ellicott, Westcott, Humphry, Newth and Kennedy; nor should the important contributions of Archbishop Trench and Dean Alford, though of a slightly earlier generation, be overlooked. The American revisers also republished a series of Essays written by some of their number on Biblical Revision: Its Necessity and Purpose, 1879; and account should be taken also of the Documentary History of the American Committee on Revision prepared by that committee for the use of its members.
J. Hutchison