VULGATE (vill'gat), (vulgata ; Gr. mull, Roy nap'), the name generally given to the Latin trans lation of the Bible used in the Western church.
(1) Old Latin Translations. There have been Latin translations of the Bible from the first ages of the Christian church. Of these Augustine ob serves (De Doet. Christ. ii. 11) : 'Those who have translated the Bible into Greek can be num bered, but not so the Latin versions. For in the first ages of the church, whoever could get hold of a Greek codex ventured to translate it into Latin, however slight his knowledge of either language.' (2) Itala and Other Recensions. In the fourth century a recension of the text took place. which from being made in Italy, was called the ltala. Augustine preferred the ltala to all other versions as being the most literal. The issue of the Itala was followed by other recensions, of which almost the only effect was to bring the text into confusion; till at length in A. D. 383 a Chris tian father, Jerome or Hieronymus, A. D. 329 or 331 to 42o, the most learned scholar of his day and a man of moral earnestness and piety, was requested by Damasus, bishop of Rome, to undertake a revision of the Latin New Testa ment by the help of the Greek original.
(3) Jerome and New Testament Revision. Some of the changes which Jerome introduced were made purely on linguistic grounds, but it is impossible to ascertain on what principle he pro ceeded in this respect. Others involved questions of interpretation. But the greater number con sisted in the removal of the interpolations by which the synoptic gospels especially were disfig ured. This revision, however, was hasty.
(4) Old Testament Revision. Jerome next, at the request of his friends, undertook a new version of the Old Testament from the Hebrew. This version was occasioned by the controversies with the Jews, who constantly appealed to the original, which the early Christians did not un derstand. As a youth he had pursued the study of Hebrew, and after his removal to Bethlehem he resumed it with the aid of Jewish teachers.
Samuel and Kings. prefaced by the famous Pro logus galleatus giving an account of the Hebrew canon, were issued in 392 A. D., and the entire work was completed in 405. His own generation gave him abuse rather than gratitude for the very important service he had rendered it; and the eminent father, whose temper was none of the best, retorted by expressing the contempt which knowledge feels for blatant and aggressive ig norance.
His work was by many condemned as heretical, and even his friend Augustine feared to make use of it, lest it might offend by its novelty, in troduce variety between the Greek and Latin churches, and distract the minds of Christians who had received the Septuagint from the Apos tles. In one instance, where an African bishop caused the book of Jonah to be read in church in this version, the people were panic-struck at hearing the word hedera (Jonah iv:6, 9) in place of the old reading cucurbita. Augustine after wards entertained a more favorable opinion of it, although he has not cited it in any of his ac knowledged works.
About two hundred years after Jerome's death his work had acquired an equal degree of respect with the ancient Vulgate, and in the year 604 we have the testimony of Gregory the Great to the fact, that 'the Apostolic see made use of both versions.' It afterwards became by degrees the only received version, and this by its intrinsic merits, for it received no official sanction before the Council of Trent. Baruch, Ecclesiasticus, Wisdom, and Maccabees were retained from the old version.
Jerome's version soon experienced the fate of its predecessor; it became sadly corrupted by a mixture with the old version, and by the uncrit ical carelessness of half-learned ecclesiastics, as well as by interpolations from liturgical writings and from glosses. In fact, the old and new ver sions were blended into one, and thus was formed the Vulgate of the middle ages.