Page:The Holy Bible faithfvlly translated into English ovt of the authentical Latin, diligently conferred with the Hebrew, Greek, & other Editions in diuers languages.pdf/128

110

ANNOTATIONS. CHAP. XXXVII.

3. In his old age.) This being one cause why Iacob loued Ioseph aboue al his other sonnes, for that he was the yongest of the eleuen (for Beniamin the twelfth was yet an infant) it is alleadged in holie Scripture (saith S. Chrisostom. Epist. ad Olympiam) as least offensiue to his brethren. For a more special cause was for his mother Rachels sake, but most principal cause of al was, for his great vertues and mature iudgement; for which God also preferred him aboue them al, and now foreshewed the same by visions in sleep. Which they enuying and meaning to preuent, did indeed vnwitting cooperate therto, Gods prouidence turning their euil worke to infinite good. As the same holy Ioseph truly interpreteth it to them after their fathers death, when they iustly feared reuenge for so great and inhumane iniuries done vnto him, chap. 50. v. 20.

35. Into hel mourning.) Protestants denying more places for soules after this life, then Heauen for the iust, & Hel for the wicked, translate the Hebrew word Sheol, graue, for hel. Because if they should grant that Iacob or other holy fathers of the old Testament descended into hel, they must confesse some other hel, then where the damned are tormented, whither no Christian wil say that those fathers went. If they contended only about the sense and meaning of the text, it were more tolerable, for therin they speake according to their erronious opinion, as they thinke. But knowing as some of them doe, that Hel is the true word of the text, there is no sinceritie nor moral honestie in putting Graue in place therof. And that they know it, the second table of the Bible, printed at London 1602. witnesseth, noting for a common place, that in the 37. chap. of Genesis. v. 35. Hel is taken for graue, therby confessing, that the true English word of the holy Scripture in that place is Hel, but that they would haue it to signifie graue. Wherupon anie reasonable man would thinke to find the word Hel in the text, with some glosse to shew that graue were to be vnderstood. But in al their Editions, also in that which was printed the yeare next folowing, 1603. wherto the same table is adioyned, they reade graue & not hel in that place, though in some * other places, they much disagree in translating the same word.

As for the sense, it can not be that Iacob ment the graue: for when he said he would goe to his sonne, he supposed him to be deuoured by a wild beast, and not buried in a graue. And therfore must necessarily meane, that he would goe where he thought the soule of his sonne to be. Which was neither in heauen, for then he would rather haue ascended thither ioyful, then descended to any place mourning; neither did he meane the hel of the dammed, for that had been desperation; but to a low place, where the iust soules then remained in rest, which was called Limbus Patrum, or Abrahams bosome. That is, saith S. Augustin, in his answer to Bishop Euodius (Epist. 99.) secretæ cuiusdam quietis habitatio The habitation of a certaine secret rest. Rh