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**List: Khasi Ministry the Bible ( the Bible )
KHASSEE. VERSION--1860 S. Bagster [Info only: BENGALEE CHARACTER n.d. John 1:1-11 unknown.] KHASSEE.--1860 S. Bagster [Info only: ROMAN LETTERS n.d. Matthew 5:1-12 unknown.] |
Khasi Bible History (3)
**List: Khasi Ministry
the Bible ( the Bible )
Khasi...
KHASSEE. "III.--VERSIONS OF SCRIPTURES. A lady was honoured by God to be the main instrument in preparing the first version of Holy Scripture
in this language. She was the widow of one of the rajahs or chieftains of the country; and Dr. Carey,
pleased with her intelligence, availed himself of her aid in translating the New Testament. Dr. Carey
had also recourse to the advice of his Assamese pundit, who, from the vicinity of the Cossyah hills
to his own country, had had opportunities of acquiring a tolerable acquaintance with the language.
The preparation of this version occupied ten years; it was printed in Bengalee characters, and an
edition of 500 copies left the Serampore press in 1824. For about seven years it remained a sealed
book, for no opportunity occurred of distributing it among the people for whom it had been prepared.
In 1832 some of the mies. at Serampore, being in ill health, visited Cherrapoonjee, a place in
the Khassee country noted for its salubrity. Here their attention was drawn afresh to the spiritual
destitution of the wild inhabitants of the hills, and great exertions were made for the establishment
of a mission among them. Mr. Lish, the first my. who entered upon the work, turned his
attention to the revision of the Khassee version, and in 1834 he produced a new or amended translation
of St. Matthew, which was printed at Serampore in Roman characters. In 1840 a My. Association
was formed by the Welsh Calvinistic Methodists; and finding this station unoccupied by any other
society, they sent the Rev. Thomas Jones as their my. to these hills. He reached Cherrapoonjee
in 1841, and after applying with diligence to the study of the language, he executed a new translation
of St. Matthew's Gospel in Roman characters, which in 1845 he offered to the British and Foreign
Bible Society. The Committee ordered a small edition to be printed as an experiment, and its value
and fidelity have been fully attested by competent persons, through the medium of the Auxiliary Society
at Calcutta. Since then the translation of the entire New Testament has been completed by the
mies. engaged on the above station.
The system of substituting Roman letters for the native characters of Indian alphabets in printededitions of the Scriptures and of other books, has of late years been extensively adopted in India;
and the advantages of this system, especially with reference to the Khassee (which in the former
edition of the New Testament had been printed in Bengalee characters, see Specimen, Plate I),
cannot be better stated than in the words of an eminent My., Dr. Duff, of Calcutta. In a
letter addressed to Mr. Jones, the My. of the Welsh Calvinistic Methodist Society at Cherra,
when the first books used in connection with the mission were about to be published, the doctor
thus writes--
"Thoroughly and absolutely do I approve of your determination to print your translated works
in the Roman characters. It is a strange delusion of Satan that men should strive to uphold varieties
of alphabetic characters anywhere, provided they could without violence be superseded by one, at
once uniform and effective, seeing that such variety is a prodigious bar and impediment to the
diffusion of sound knowledge, and especially Divine truth. But, in a case like yours, where the
natives had really no written characters of their own at all, to dream of introducing a clumsy,
awkward, expensive, and imperfect character like that of the Bengali, in preference to the clear,
precise, and cheaper Romanised alphabet, would seem to me to be voluntarily raising up new ramparts
to guard against the invasion of Truth. No, our object ought ever to be to facilitate, and not to
obstruct, the dissemination of true knowledge of every kind; and one of the ways of doing so is
everywhere to encourage the introduction and the use of the Roman alphabet in place of the native
alphabets, which are linked, and associated, and saturated with all that is idolatrous."
The Four Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles have been already carried through the press by
the Calcutta Bible Society, and other portions are in progress."--The Bible of Every Land. (1860, Second Edition) Samuel Bagster [Info only]KHASSEE. VERSION--1860 S. Bagster [Info only: BENGALEE CHARACTER n.d. John 1:1-11 unknown.]
KHASSEE.--1860 S. Bagster [Info only: ROMAN LETTERS n.d. Matthew 5:1-12 unknown.]
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