THE PARAGRAPH BIBLE AND HOW TO USE IT.
[From Prof. T. D. Witherspoon, D.D., in (Baptist) Examiner.] The division of the Bible into chapters and verses is not of inspired origin nor of divine authority. The earliest Hebrew writings have only a point between words to distinguish them; in other respects the text is without break of any kind. In the earliest manuscripts of the New Testament, even the point between words is lacking. Parchment was costly, space was precious, and so the words were run together; every letter possible was crowded into a line, and the page looked as if one great word extended from the top to the bottom. As later copies were made, spaces were introduced between the words; then, for convenience of public reading, sectional divisions of various kinds; but it was not until the thirteenth century that our present division into chapters was made, probably by Cardinal Hugo, and not until the sixteenth century that Robert Stephens, a printer of Paris, gave us the division into verses. For purposes of quotation and reference the division into chapters and verses is highly convenient, and, indeed, almost indispensable. But for consecutive reading and for connected study of the Word, these divisions, which break the text mechanically into minute and often disjointed segments, are of serious disadvantage. What other book that we love to read would we consent to have broken up in this way? Think, for instance, of an edition of Shakespeare, or Bunyan, or Macaulay, in which the text should be broken into chapters of about five or six hundred words each, and these chapters into paragraphed and numbered verses of fifteen or twenty words each. How much we would lose in the continuity of thought and in the vividness of impression! How much we should prefer the present simple and natural arrangement of the writings of these authors! To preserve, for purposes of quotation and reference, the notation by chapters and verses, and at the same time give a text that is arranged according to natural and normal rules of division, is the object of the Paragraph Bible. The text is printed in solid column by paragraphs, just as any other book would naturally be, and the figures which indicate the chapters and verses, are arranged along the margin, so that with a glance of the eye the reader can see the number of chapter and verse of any sentence or clause he is reading. It is more than fifty years since the Bagsters of London issued their celebrated Paragraph Bible. Many editions abroad and in this country have appeared since. One of the most noted and admirable is the Revised Version, which came forth from the Jerusalem Chamber, Westminster, fifteen years ago, and which every earnest student of the Bible ought to possess. Supposing yourself provided with some good Paragraph Bible, what are you to do with it? First, use it in your daily reading of the Scriptures, accustoming yourself to read by paragraphs and not by chapter and verse. You will find how delightful it is to follow an incident or a line of thought to the end of the paragraph, and not simply to the end of the chapter, which in many cases (as Matt., chapter 9, Mark, chapter 8, etc.) cuts sharply and abruptly across the line of narration. Second, use it in your daily study of the Word of God. Learn to study by paragraph and not by chapter and verse. We are too much accustomed to look upon the Bible as a collection of distinct and isolated texts. Finding every verse in the editions commonly in use paragraphed to itself and separately numbered, we are prone to study each verse by itself, and not in its relations to the verses that precede and follow. Take your Paragraph Bible; study the whole paragraph of which any verse in which you are interested forms a part. Catch the main thought of the paragraph. See the relationship of every sentence to this central thought. You will not only better understand the particular passage you are studying, but you will get an impression of the fulness of Scripture, its variety, its richness, its many-sidedness, that you could not get in any other way. The Word will have for you a spiritual significance, and come home to you with a spiritual power otherwise impracticable. Third, use the Paragraph Bible for the occasional reading of the books of the Bible, each at a single sitting. One great defect of our reading of the Scripture is that it is to so large an extent fragmentary. We read a little here to-day, and a little there to-morrow. We lose sight of the fact that each book of the Bible has a great central thought to which every chapter and verse bears reference, and that we can not understand or appreciate any part fully until we have viewed it in its relations to the whole. It will help us greatly if, with the aid of a Paragraph Bible, we read a book through from end to end, noting, as indicated by the paragraphs, the divisions into which the subject matter of the book falls, and the respective relations of these to its great central theme. It would be difficult to overestimate the value of this practice of reading the books of the Bible through, each as a whole, each at a sitting, and each as the embodiment of some one great thought of God which finds expression in every paragraph. Every book would come to have for us peculiar significance as a part of the inspired revelation from God. It would be seen to fill its own appropriate place in the canon of Scripture. Its treasures would seem to us all the richer, because of their relation to each other and to the whole storehouse of divine revelation.