Andrew Willet (1562-1621) was arguably the most accomplished of the Church of England’s Hebrew exegetes, specifically of the Pentateuch, and a prolific and outspoken writer against the papacy. Except, however, for a few references to Willet as a Hebrew scholar and orthodox theologian, modern examination of Willet’s writings has been limited to his poetry, and specifically to his work as England’s first religious emblem writer.
Willet was born two years before the death of John Calvin (1509-1564) and died two years before the birth of Francis Turretin (1623-1687). He was a contemporary of William Ames (1576-1633) and a colleague of William Perkins (1558-1602), with whom he studied at Cambridge.
Both from his extensive citation of sources and from his methodology, called hexapla, or a “sixfold commentary,” the studied depth of Willet’s voluminous work is immediately evident. The six divisions are as follows: The text with its diverse readings, Argument and Method, The Questions Discussed, Doctrines Noted, Controversies Handled, and Moral Uses Observed. One exception Willet takes to his six-fold approach is in his exegesis of the short epistle of Jude. In the commentary on Jude, Willet followed a verse-by-verse format. The briefer hexapla on I Samuel and the commentary on Jude are written in a more pastoral tone. He draws upon every element of the exegetical tradition available to him and argues not merely within his contemporary exegetical era but for or against the entire scope of the exegetical tradition. To be noted specifically is Willet’s extensive use of the exegesis of the Church Fathers, especially Origen, Augustine, and Jerome; the exegetical approval and scope of the Septuagint for dogmatics; the many references to the medieval schoolmen; and a high and consistent view of the exegetical tradition of the Reformation. In his 877-page Exodus commentary, which he calls “a widow’s mite,” Willet states, “I have made use in this commentary, both of Protestant and Popish writers, old and new upon this book (as I have set them down in the margin) not rejecting the judgment of any witness for the truth.” His textual apparatus for critical references is as follows. First letters represent the various resources, and abbreviations represent grammatical or syntactical observations: S for Septuagint; H for the Latin thought to be Jerome’s; C for the Chaldee; P for Pagnius; A for Arius Montanus; B for the Great English Bible; G for the Geneva Bible; T for Tremellius, he for the Hebrew text and cat. For cateri, the rest.
Some comments on Willet’s labors are in order. Willet’s massive work, Synopsis Papismi is 1,352 folio pages exposing the error of Roman Catholicism and went through five editions, the fifth being published by special commendation of King James I.[1] Willet characterizes his work as “A general view of the Papistrie: Wherein the whole mystery of iniquity, and sum of anti-Christian doctrine is set down which is maintained this day by the synagogue of Rome against the Church of Christ. He then describes the first section of the work, “The first book or controversy: Wherein are handled the chief and principal controversies of the Scriptures, the church, general councils, the Pope, the clergy, monks and the civil magistrate.”[2] In short, this book is a survey and an analysis of all the doctrinal controversies of the era.
Willet’s renown reached far beyond his life’s calling as a country pastor. His popularity in England was complemented by his readership on the continent. The auction catalog of the library of Gomarus lists the Synopsis Papismi, Hexapla in Genesin and Contra Bellarminum as parts of his collection.[3] It is said of Willet that “Justly is he numbered by Bishop Hall (sometime his colleague in the service of Prince Henry) among the Worthies of the Church of England, to whom he gives this Elegy, Stupor mundi clerus Britannicus.”[4]
Willet’s Use of the Septuagint
The Septuagint was a persistent referent of Willet’s writings. For example, consider Willet’s comment on Exodus 34:35 and the controversy between the Latin reading that Moses’ face was horny and did not shine. Willet concludes,
Wherefore, the meaning of this place is, that Moses’ face shined, as the Chaldee paraphrase, “the brightness of his face was multiplied.” The Septuagint interprets didoxasai, “his face was glorious,” as S. Paul also called it, “the glory of Moses’ countenance,” 2 Cor. 3:7. So also read by the best interpreters, Vatabulus, Montanus, Paginus, Oleaster, Junius.[5]
Throughout his commentaries he is relentless in his attack upon the general validity of canonical authority of both the LXX and the Latin translations of the Bible. In his commentary on the book of Daniel, of the LXX he writes,
But Jerome sheweth that the translation of the Septuagint, whatsoever was the cause thereof, whether they did not express the Chaldee phrase, or some one ignorant of the Chalde tongue did set it forth under their name, multum discordat a veritate, doth differ much from the truth and recto judicio repudiatus est, etc. and therefore was upon right judgment rejected by the church.[6]
Roman polemicists argued that the New Testament penmens’ use of the LXX established the precedent for the authenticity of the vulgar Latin translation and its superiority to either the Hebrew Old Testament or the Greek New Testament.[7] To debunk these claims of canonical authority, the Reformation exegetes described the manner in which the LXX was utilized by the penmen of Scripture and from their exegesis qualified the extent of the LXX’s hermeneutical significance in both Testaments.
Willet was comfortable quoting church fathers usually considered supportive of the papacy, and Jerome was one such exegete. Of Jerome, Willet writes that he held the notion that the LXX was written in seventy-two separate cells and miraculously arriving at the same translation to be a fable.[8] Jerome succinctly captured the distinction between the reception of Scripture and its interpretation with the words, “It is one thing to be a prophet, another to be an interpreter.”[9] The evaluation of Willet with Jerome was that the “ancient and true translation of the Septuagint, is corrupted and violated, which, as Jerome saith, was agreeable to the Hebrew; but so is not the Greek copy now extant, which is full of corruptions, and seemeth to be a mixed and confused translation of many.”[10]
Willet takes exception with the translation of the LXX of 1 Samuel 9:5, “of the land of Zuph.”[11] He corrects the LXX rendering “the land of Ziph” for two reasons.[12] First, the LXX failed in pronouncing the letter tsaddi, which expresses the sound tz, and pronounced it with the letter samech, which gives the sound of a single “s.” Also, there was a mispronunciation of the vowel shuree, not chirec, which corresponds to our “u.”[13]
In this regard, Willet made exclusive recourse in his commentaries to pointed Hebrew texts, although he maintained that the points were later added to the sacred text.[14] This is consistent with Ainsworth’s view that the LXX translators worked only from consonantal texts.[15] Willet argues for the traditional pointing against the LXX phonetically, by showing the conjectural error of the Greek translators to properly translate the sound of the vowel from the consonantal text they had as their exemplar.[16]
Along the same line of argumentation within the consonantal text in 1 Samuel 12:11, Willet surveys the identification of Bedan. He points to the LXX entry, which reads Barak, “being deceived by the similitude of the letters for between daleth and resh, there is no great difference in the Hebrew characters.”[17]
This evaluation and many others like it throughout his commentaries do not displace Willet’s endorsement of either the LXX or Latin in many individual instances. For Willet to advance the superiority of the apographa, it was necessary for him to argue for the particulars of the issue. To accomplish this required a clear exegetical delineation of the hermeneutical limits of the LXX. For instance, when commenting on the translation “Israel worshipped toward the beddes head” (Gen. 47:31), Willet includes a marginal heading entitled, “How and when the Apostles do follow the Septuagint.”[18] To this issue Willet writes,
The apostles indeed do sometime follow the Septuagint, because it was a common translation, and of great authority, but they therein approve their errors, nor yet make it if equal authority to the original, citing only such testimonies, wherein the Greek translation keepeth the sense, though not the words. As in this place, whether, we say “Jacob leaning upon his staff” or, “turning to the bed’s head and, worshipped.” The principal sense is kept, that Jacob worshipped God, especially seeing the same word, with very little alteration in the points, signifieth both a bed, and a rod, or a staff.[19]
Willet has a special appreciation for Jerome, citing him often and likewise reinforcing the renderings of the Latin church fathers. Jerome observes that where the apostles and evangelists cite testimony out of the Old Testament “they follow not the words but the sense.”[20] Similarly Ainsworth at this place writes that, the
Greek interpreters, having a copy without vowels (mtth) did read mitteh which signifieth “staff” and so translated it: whom the Apostle followeth, saying “on the top of his staff,” Heb. 11.21 which might also well be, that he helped himself, by leaning on his staff, and resting on the bolster of his bed. Howbeit the two Chaldean paraphrases, and other Greek versions (save that of the LXXij) translate to the voweled Hebrew, “bed.”[21]
Where the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew, the penmen of expressed the Hebrew sense. Willet concludes by saying, “This then is no good argument the apostles follow the Septuagint, where they keep the Hebrew sense, though not the words, ergo, the Latin text must be received, where it differeth both in sense and words from the original.”[22]
The Septuagint and Two Daniels
In Willet’s commentary on Daniel, under “The Questions and Doubts Discussed,” Willet asks, “of the kindred of Daniel?” Willet writes,
Jerome in his preface writeth, that the Septuagint in the beginning of the history of Susanna, which they make the 14th chapter of this book, do affirm that Daniel was of the tribe of Levi, whereupon Bellarmine thinketh that there were two Daniels, one of the tribe of Judah who wrote this prophecy, and another of the tribe of Levi. But herein Perecius, of his own sect and society, contradicteth him, showing that neither the Synagogue of the Jews then, nor the Church of Christ now, ever acknowledged any more, than one Daniel to be the writer of Scripture.[23]
As an apocryphal account, Susanna refuses to be blackmailed and is arrested and about to be put to death for adultery when the young Daniel interrupts the proceedings, shouting that the elders should be interrogated to prevent the death of an innocent. An apocryphal young Daniel plays a prominent role in the story of Susanna.
Willet’s Use of the Septuagint for the arguing that the Gospel of Matthew was initially written in Greek and not Hebrew.
As his only New Testament commentary written in hexapla, the introduction to Romans served as a platform for Willet to exposit his position on the authority of the New Testament text. “Of the language and tongue wherein the New Testament was originally written” Willet writes that the New Testament was “set forth by the Apostles and Evangelists in the Greek tongue, which was then general, and used of the most famous nations, because it concerned the Church of God, which was dispersed in all countries.”[24]
Having made this assertion, Willet presents the contentions of others that either Hebrew, Syriac or Latin languages were the primary languages in parts or for the whole of the New Testament. Iraneaus, for instance, held that the Gospel of Matthew had been initially written in Hebrew and subsequently translated into Syriac.[25] Athanasius also thought that Matthew was again translated into Greek by either St. James or St. John. Willet also says that others (whom he does not name) thought the Epistle to the Hebrew had been first written in Hebrew and adds, “but neither of these is certaine.”[26]
In response to these ideas, Willet looks to the Septuagint for support. Rather than following the Hebrew, which one would expect to be the case if Matthew were translated from the same, “in many places,” Willet says, the New Testament follows the Septuagint in translation. He cites the quotation of Isaiah 40:3 in Matthew 3:3, Psalm 22:18 in Matthew 27:35 and others to be found elsewhere as evidence for Matthew not having been written initially in Hebrew. He also notes that the interpretation of Matthew 27:46, “Eli, Eli, Lama sabacthani,” would have been superfluous if the text had been written originally in the Syriac or Hebrew. Another example was the necessity to render Melchisedek in Greek, the king of righteousness, an unnatural addition if the text was first written in Hebrew. From these observations and others that he chose not to enlist, Willet concluded that the New Testament was not originally written in Hebrew but in Greek.
Conclusion
Willet can isolate the two issues involved by quoting the LXX: rejecting the LXX canonically because of its blatant inadequacies while arguing for exegetical and interpretive continuity between the Old Testament Hebrew and the New Testament penmen who utilized the LXX. Finding no common ground for the LXX and the original language texts canonically, Willet argued that when the LXX is cited in the New Testament interpretive continuity exists between the sense of the LXX, the Greek in the New Testament, and the Hebrew original in the Old Testament.
This paper briefly considered Willet’s sense for the authority of Scripture. For Willet this was far more than a theological loci. It struck at the very foundations of the Reformation. Hermeneutical method was an essential element for maintaining the good of the English commonwealth so close to Willet’s heart. It also determined ecclesiastical control. An allegorical approach to the text diminished the emphasis upon the perspicuity of Scripture and heightened the significance of an external authoritative source of interpretation. Willet’s apologetic for the inspiration and authority of Scripture held that the extant copies of Scripture available to him possessed the qualities of the “pure Originals.” Fully cognizant of the textual questions raised in both the Hebrew and Greek texts, Willet held that the words of the original manuscripts were preserved for him in the apographa and were the source of his exegesis. This commonly held belief and critically proven fundamental element of Reformation exegesis was the basis for all discussion relating to the authority to make the exegetical and subsequent doctrinal claims of Protestantism. Scripture was the practical thing, necessary for the spiritual life of the church and the authoritative bulwark against attempts for continued, nonexegetically-based inclusiveness.
[1]Smith, Ten Excellent Men, 60. Willet’s commentaries are full of dedications to officers of state and principally King James I. For example, Willet’s first tome of his Genesis commentary, the first tome of his Exodus commentary, his commentary on Psalm 122, Ecclesia Triumphans, upon the king coming to the throne, and his Romans commentary are all dedicated to King James I.
[2]SP, 1-2.
[3]The Auction Catalogue of the Library of F. Gomarus, a facsimilie edition with an introduction by E. Dekker, J. Knoop, C. M. L. Verdegaal (Utretcht: Hes Publishers, 1996), 16, 49.
[4]Smith, Ten Excellent Men, 60-61. “The astonishment of the British clergy.”
[5] HE, 840.
[6]HD, 2.
[7]HG, 443. On Genesis 47:31 Willet writes, “Further, whereas the Apostle seemeth to follow the translation of the Septuagint, rather than the Hebrew text. The Rhemists do infer thereupon, that after the same manner the vulgar Latin text may be received as authentical, though it does vary from the Hebrew.”
[8]SP, 130.
[9]Ibid.
[10]Ibid.
[11]H1S, 27-28.
[12]Ibid., 27. See the variety of consonantal and vowel changes in the LXX as cited in James Orr, ed., International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1978), p. 3158-3159. Biblica Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 2nd ed. Amended (Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1984), 1470, 1 Chr. 6:20 reads, “Many manuscripts and versions have ziph has the Qere. Compare with v. 11 (zophai), Ketib, zeph.” At v. 11 the BHS entry reads, “the LXX reads zuphi at 1 Samuel 1, 1a.”
[13]Ibid.. 27-28.
[14]SP, 132. Citing Bellarmine favorably, Willet writes, “the alteration is in the pricks or points, which as Bellarmine himself saith…were added outwardly; that is, by other writers and interpreters of Scripture, and do not change the text, which consisteth of the letters, not of the points.” Also see Richard A. Muller, “The Debate over the Vowel Points and the Crisis in Orthodox Hermeneutics,” Journal of Medieval and Renaissance Studies 10/1 (1980), 53-72.
[15]See Ainsworth, Annotations, 56, fn. 141.
[16]H1S, 28. Appealing to Josephus and the rendering of the Chaldee paraphrase Willet understands “Zuph” to be interpreted “the land where was a prophet.” He concludes that Zuph was the country where Ramah, Samuel’s city, was located, and therefore was called “Ramah of the Zophims” (1:1); Poole, Commentary, 533. “The land of Zuph; in which was Ramah, called also Ramah, or Ramathaim-zophim, the place of Samuel’s birth and habitation, 1 Sam. I.1; vii. 17.”
[17]Ibid., 41. Willet thinks that Junius’s opinion is more probable. He thinks Bedan was Jair the Menashite of Judges 10:3 because it is consistent with the order of time. Jair was before Jepthah, and there is one Bedan of Machir of Manesseh mentioned in 1 Chr. 7:17. Jair might be called Bedan beside his ordinary name by way of distinction, because there was an elder Jair, Num. 32:41 of Manesseh of whom certain towns were called havoth Jair; Biblica Hebraica Stuttgartensia, 463: Septuagint, Jerubaal (–boam), Barak, Jefta (Septuagint, codex versionis Graecea, + Simson), Samuel; Syriac, Debora, Barak, Gideon, Jefta, Simson; Targum, Gideon, Simpsin (codex Reuchlinianus, Bedan), Jefta, Samuel. The Heb. Reads bedan.
[18]HG, 443.
[19]Ibid.
[20]Ibid.
[21]Ainsworth, Annotations, 161. Poole, Commentary, vol. 1, 105. “Israel bowed himself…to God…Others read bed for staff.” vol. 3, 864, Commentary on Heb. 11:21, “For having sent for Joseph, he raised himself on the pillow at the bed’s head, and for his support, used his staff, leaning on the head of it.”
[22]HG, 443.
[23] HD, 3
[24]HR, 1-2. Notice the similarity of Willet’s wording to that of the Westminster Confession. This discussion over the “authentical and most approved edition of the scriptures” is also taken up in SP, 129ff.
[25]HR, 2. Irenaeus: “Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul were preaching at Rome, and laying the foundations of the Church.”
[26]HR, 2.
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