Corrections and Suggestions for Kuyper’s Stone Lectures
by Harry Van Dyke
August 2012
NOTE: These comments are based on a cursory reading and
comparison between Lectures on Calvinism (Grand Rapids, 1931) and Het
Calvinisme (Amsterdam, 1899). Alternatives follow the symbol L. They are in no way meant to be definitive; they merely
indicate my unhappiness with the English text as it now reads. Probably
a word-by word comparison would yield even more reasons for change.
BACKGROUND: The text of the Stone Lectures was originally
composed in Dutch and translated into English by the author. After it was
corrected by a Dutch-American friend, the author finalized the text with the
help of the family’s live-in English governess.
The first lecture was slightly revised aboard ship coming
over. For some reason the author did not submit the prepared English version
but a Dutch manuscript to Princeton with the request to have it translated.
Professor Warfield quickly assigned the six lectures to six different men. This
“Princeton text” was printed in a very limited run and one copy was used by
Kuyper as he presented the lectures. The following year the Stone Lectures were
published by Revell of New York and T & T Clark of Edinburgh. When Warfield
saw the published work he bemoaned the fact that the author had done some more
editing in the English which had not improved it. In the same year 1899 a Dutch
edition of the Stone Lectures was published by Höveker and Wormser of
Amsterdam. There is every reason to assume that this Dutch version is the only
authorial text of the lectures since it was in the author’s native tongue and
overseen by himself. Today, a new English translation should be based on this
1899 Dutch text.
Lecture One
“Life-system” is sometimes hyphenated, sometimes not.
3rd paragraph: to use another simile L . . . metaphor
. . . and although you are outstripping us in a most
discouraging way, you will never forget that . . . L this clause is
absent from the Dutch ed.
salutiferous L salutary, wholesome
“Down with the scoundrel”
L Crush the infamous
We no more need a God
L We no longer want
[OR wish to have] a God
circumference L periphery
with its threatening declensions L with its
questionable [OR dubious] declensions
life among those nations was spontaneous and devoid of
calculation
L those peoples lived a spontaneous, unexamined
life
strength for resistance
L power to resist
that Calvinism is not a partial, nor was a merely temporal
. . .
L . . . nor a merely temporal . . .
But this of course very really implied L But this of course
certainly implied
devoid of deliberate compact, none so unconventional . . .
L
devoid of agreement, of plan, of radiation from one central point, than . . .
the tendency and the construction of our life
L the style and direction of our life
to lord over one another
L to lord it over
one another
By better labor L By a
more solid work ethic
[for: deger
arbeidzaamheid]
. . . the world corrupted the Church
L . .
. the world in the Church corrupted the Church
placed to the front
L placed to the fore
stadium L stage [passim]
Just because in their progressive development L Precisely because . . .
Call to mind L Add to this
The struggle of the Boers in the Transvaal
L . .
. in the Transvaal during the past twenty years
[extra phrase
from the Dutch ed.]
NOTE: In general, the English translation has the mistaken
tendency to render the present perfect tense (heeft genomen) with the
present perfect in English (has taken) instead of the simple past (took).
Lecture Two
In the first part of Lecture II:
Calvinism and Religion, Kuyper writes:
. . . Frost and hail, snow and
vapor, the abyss and the hurricane— everything does praise God. But just as
the entire creation reaches its culminating point in man, so also religion finds
its clear expression only in man who is made in the image of God, and this is
not because man seeks it, but because God Himself implanted in man’s nature the
real essential religious expression, by means of the “seed of religion” (semen
religionis), as Calvin defines it, sown in our human heart.
God Himself makes man religious by
means of the sensus divinitatis, i.e., the sense of the Divine, which He
causes to strike the chords on the harp of his soul. . . .
—A. Kuyper, Lectures on Calvinism (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1931), 45f.
This is the version in the extant
English translation. Now I will translate the same passage from the original
Dutch and add some bold letters:
. . . Frost and hail, snow and
vapor, the abyss and the storm— all must praise God. But
just as the entire creation reaches its culminating point in man, so also
does praise find its fulfillment only in man who is made in the image of
God, and this not because man seeks it, but because God Himself implanted
the only genuine religious expression exclusively in man’s heart through the “seed
of religion” (semen religionis). God Himself makes man religious through the sensus
divinitatis, i.e., the sense of the Divine, which He causes to
play on the strings of his heart.
—A. Kuyper, Het
Calvinisme; zes Stone-Lezingen in October 1898 te Princeton (N.-J.) gehouden (Amsterdam:
Höveker
& Wormser, 1899), p. 39.
Thus the published text in English
differs from the Dutch text which flowed from Kuyper’s own pen. In two places
where Kuyper talks of the heart, the translation has nature and soul.
Discrepancies like this go back to the six people engaged in the work of
translating the text before the lectures were delivered; see Peter S. Heslam, Creating
a Christian Worldview: Abraham Kuyper’s Lectures on Calvinism (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), 59–63. The scrupulous claim that the English text must
be regarded as authoritative is therefore doubtful at best.
Lecture Three
My third lecture leaves the sanctuary of religion and
enters upon the domain of the State—the first transition from the sacred circle
to the secular field of human life. Only now therefore we proceed, summarily
and in principle, to combat the unhistorical suggestion that Calvinism
represents an exclusively ecclesiastical and dogmatic movement.
The religious
momentum of Calvinism has placed also beneath political Society a fundamental
conception, all its own, just because it not merely pruned the branches and
cleaned the stem, but reached down to the very root of our human life.
. . . That
Calvinism has led public law into new paths, first in Western Europe, then in
two Continents, and today more and more among all civilized nations, is
admitted by all scientific students, if not yet fully by public opinion.
Cf. Dutch ed. of 1899 (retranslated):
My third lecture leaves the field of religion, to enter
upon the domain of the State—the first transition from the sacred sphere to the
broad terrain of life in the world. Thus we shall now go on to present a
principled and substantial refutation of the misconception that Calvinism was a
movement in church and theology only.
Calvinism’s
religious momentum undergirded political society, too, with a distinctive fundamental
conception, precisely because it did not just prune the branches and purify the
stem but touched the very root of human life.
. . . That
Calvinism led constitutional law into new paths, first for Western Europe, then
in two continents, and today increasingly for all civilized nations, is
admitted in all scholarly studies, if not yet in public opinion.
NOTES: —In my dissertation about Groen’s Lectures,
pp. 214–16, I explain why “constitutional law” is to be preferred over “public
law.”
—Puzzling is the term in this sentence: “The testimony of
history is unassailable that this constitutional public law has not . . .” L “ .
. . that constitutionalism has not . . .”
—Down the page: Is the preferred spelling for “discernable”
not “discernible”?
—After the Bancroft quote, the Dutch ed. continues with a
reference to Groen van Prinsterer’s “Calvinism: Origin and Guarantee of Our
Constitutional Liberties.” This may be an addition for the benefit of Dutch
readers. Is it also in the “Princeton text”? The text is now available in The
Kuyper Reader edited by James D. Bratt.
—After the sentence “But Calvinism has done more.” the
Dutch ed. has a sentence about the “depth of sin.” Another later addition?
—Should the original German quotations from Von Holz and
later from Weitbrecht and Held remain, or should only the English translation
be kept (with perhaps the original German in footnotes)?
—In the quote from Weitbrecht, I would replace “responsibility”
with “accountability.”
—Is it possible that the German historian Von Holtz or Von
Holz later became the American historian H. von Holst? They sure sound alike in
their interpretation of the French Revolution! This deserves a closer look.
—The close of the paragraph containing the words “. . .
where that unity is broken, there liberty will dawn as a matter of course” is
very different in the Dutch ed.
—In the case of “. . . exaggerated Puritanism” for “puritistisch”
it is doubtful whether Kuyper intended a reference to that historical movement
rather than simply saying “puritanical” or even “purist.”
—Between the sentence ending in “ . . . from a Calvinistic
standpoint.” and the sentence starting with “The sovereignty of the State . . .” we do not have the very enlightening sentence
that appears in the Dutch ed.
—“Paternal authority” does not “root itself” but “is
rooted.”
—The sentence starting with “Knighthood . . . “ can be
improved L The order of knights, the rights of towns, guilds and so
much more at that time still led to the self-assertion of social “estates” or “order”
endowed with autonomy . . .
—Just above, after point 3, the Dutch ed. has this
sentence:
“But this is exactly what gives rise to friction and the
danger of collision.”
—At the beginning of the “third and last part of this
lecture” Kuyper refers to the “motto” he wrote above [at the top of?] his “Weekly
paper” “A free Church in a free State.” Was it not De Heraut? And
is such a motto not called an “epigraph”?
