James Thomson and Bible Translation in the Andean Languages[1]
Bill Mitchell
Thomson's interests: Schools and Scriptures
In 1818 James Thomson[2] left Edinburgh for Argentina where he represented both the British and Foreign Schools Society and the British and Foreign Bible Society (BFBS). In 1821 he moved to Chile where, as in Argentina, he was granted honorary citizenship in recognition of his contribution to the country's educational development. In 1822 he went on to Peru, where the leader of the Independence cause, General José de San Martin, invited him to set up schools on the same Lancasterian model that he had used elsewhere.
Thomson was in Peru at the height of the struggle for independence, from June 1822 until September 1824, and during that time he devoted his efforts to the development of schools and to the distribution of Scriptures. From his earliest days in South America he had what he termed a "peculiar interest" in Bible translation into indigenous languages,[3] and this was seen later in his concern for those who spoke the "ancient language of Peru", Quechua.[4] According to his estimates they made up two-thirds of the population. He was also interested in the Aymara and Moche language groups.[5] This interest led him to develop Scripture translation into these languages.
Indigenous languages and the Christianisation of Peru
Following the conquest of Peru in the sixteenth century, the indigenous languages, especially Quechua, were used in the process of Christianisation of the region. Hymns, creeds, catechisms, confessionals, and books of doctrine were published both in Quechua and Aymara, but no Scriptures were published as such. Lectionary readings for Sundays and feast days were translated, but do not appear to have been published. They do appear in fragments in grammar books, and in fuller form in only one book of sermons.[6]
Thomson recognised the invaluable contribution of those priests who had done this work:
"The missionaries have done a great service, by their study of the original languages, and by the grammars and dictionaries of these which are published. The whole of these works are by the Jesuits, and not a volume has been published since their fall. These grammars and dictionaries are now extremely scarce in this place. It has cost me a great deal of labour to obtain some of them."[7]
There were, in fact, members of other religious orders who had produced grammars and dictionaries,[8] but Thomson's reference to the Jesuits enables us to identify the probable works that he consulted. The best known and most widely distributed were those by Diego Gonçalez Holguien[9] and Ludovico Bertonio.[10] He appears to have acquired such works as helps for the translation work.
The New Testament in Quechua
New Testament translation into Quechua began in mid-1823. In a letter dated 8 August 1823, he states that the Spanish re-occupation of Lima on July 18 interrupted the work:
"At the time the Spaniards.. drove us from our post here.. .we had in our school two descendants of the ancient Peruvians studying our system, with a view to carry instruction among their countrymen; whilst another of the same people was actually engaged in translating one of the Gospels into the Quichua language."[11]
Elsewhere, he refers to this translator as "a descendant of one of the Incas, or kings of Peru, and a native of the city of Cuzco".[12] Four others were enlisted to revise and correct the translation:
"One is a clergyman, another is a theological tutor in one of the colleges of this city, and the other two are of the medical profession. These four, along with the gentleman who made the translation, went over this gospel[13] verse by verse, with great care. The present corrected version, therefore, is the joint work of five persons, and I trust it may be relied on with some confidence."[14]
Thomson's standing in Peru and the social circles in which he moved, can be gauged by the fact that all four revisers were members of the recently formed Congress. Thomson hoped that their involvement would lend prestige and acceptability to the translation - "it will, as it were, authorise this translation, when it is considered that they have revised it".[15] No reference is made to the textual base of the translation, but as Thomson was distributing the Scio San Miguel version of the Spanish Bible, that and the Latin Vulgate would appear to have been the texts which were used. Luke, Matthew, Acts, and 1 and 2 Peter were the first books translated. Among the criteria which Thomson encouraged in the translation were faithfulness to the source text and intelligibility of the translated text: "I trust the translation to be very faithful, and at the same time, adapted to the capacities of the poor, to whom, in an especial manner, the gospel is preached".[16]
Despite the fact that the city changed hands a number of times, the translation work made rapid progress. On March 1 1824 he writes: "In about three months, or less, I expect the whole of the New Testament will be translated in the Peruvian tongue, the revision is going forward".[17] By March 20 he is even more hopeful: "In the course of a week, the whole New Testament will be translated into the vernacular language of Manco Capac, and by a descendant of that ancient race of kings".[18]
His later letters suggest that the translation as such was completed in mid-May, and that Luke's Gospel had also been "carefully revised and corrected".[19] This was done in a little under twelve months, a remarkable achievement in a city ravaged by war. The translation team's sudden flight from Lima did, however, prevent the completion of the revision, while the destruction of available printing presses meant that the Gospel of Luke was not printed.
By September of 1824 Thomson had decided to return to Britain, but first travelled to the northern coastal city of Trujillo. He hoped to meet with the translators there, and make plans with them to continue the work in his absence. He wanted them to complete the revision of the New Testament and begin work on Old Testament translation. He was frustrated to find his friends had left Trujillo by the time he arrived:
"I therefore carefully packed up the whole MS. and addressing it to one of our translators, gave it into the hands of an English gentleman going to Lima, to be delivered according to the address, when the expulsion of the Spaniards from Lima (which is soon expected) would enable our friends to return."[20]
Thomson then went on through Ecuador and Colombia, where he helped Congressmen and RC clerics set up the (short-lived) Colombian Bible Society, before returning to England late in 1825.
The New Testament in Aymara
In July 1824 the General Committee of the BFBS had authorised him to obtain a translation of one of the Gospels into Aymara. In December 1825, while travelling "in one of the Paddington coaches" in London, he spoke to one of his fellow passengers who was "a foreigner". That person was Vicente Pazos Kanki, a political exile from Alto Peru, present-day Bolivia. A former teacher of Quechua in the University of Cuzco, he had trained for the priesthood, and was a native speaker of Aymara.[21]
That conversation eventually led to the translation of the complete New Testament from the Vulgate to Aymara. Only Luke's Gospel was published.[22] The complete hand-written manuscript is in the Bible Society Collection in Cambridge University Library.[23]
In June 1828 Pazos offered to translate the New Testament to Quechua for the BFBS, but was informed by them that such a translation already existed. The 1825 BFBS Report had noted: "welcome intelligence has been received that the translation of the New Testament into the Peruvian language is now completed". Undeterred, Pazos proposed a translation of the Psalms in Quechua, which BFBS agreed to sponsor.
However, the BFBS Report for 1829 noted that "of the Quichua translation which Mr. Thomson procured while in Peru, no further information has been received." The 1831 Report stated: "Dr Pazos Kanki has completed his translation of the book of Psalms.. .of the New Testament, which exists in manuscript, no intelligence has been received." In 1832 Thomson, now BFBS agent in the West Indies, suggested to BFBS that they invite Pazos to translate Luke's Gospel into Quechua, as the one he had coordinated in 1823-4 had disappeared.
By this time Pazos had completed the translation of the Psalms, but was having difficulties with BFBS over the Spanish text of the proposed diglot edition,[24] and the work was not published. In addition, Pazos was now engaged on other writing projects and in diplomatic activities, and Thomson's suggestion was taken no further. No trace of the Psalms manuscript has been found to date.
The manuscript of Thomson's New Testament
Over a century later Paul Rivet noted the existence of an 1824 Quechua manuscript in the British Museum, containing Mark, Luke, John and Acts.[25] In fact, examination of Ms. 25.314, Gospels and Acts and Epistles in the Quichua Language, shows that it is the complete New Testament minus the Gospel of Matthew, bound in one volume. The Gospel of Luke bears the note "First trans." as do 1 and 2 Peter. The revised version of 1 and 2 Peter is also included.
Further searching in the British Library turned up Ms. 25.313, Gospels of Matthew and Luke in Quichua, Luke's Gospel is noted "carefully revised and corrected", the same phrase used by Thomson with regard to Luke in his letter of July 15, 1824.[26] Both manuscripts were bought in July 1863 from the London bookseller B. Quaritch, but the British Library holds no further information on their provenance. However, a preliminary examination of the manuscripts clearly shows them to be written in the Cuzco dialect of Quechua, and there is no doubt that this is the translation Thomson coordinated.
These Quechua manuscripts of the British Library, together with the Aymara manuscript of the Bible Society Collection in Cambridge are the earliest complete translations of the New Testament in South American languages, and are invaluable historical documents for the church, for those interested in Bible translation, and for those who seek a clearer understanding of the development of these two major Andean languages, as well as for social historians of that crucial period in South American history.
[1] Bible Translator, 41.3 (1990): 341-345.
[2] Or Diego Thomson.
[3] Letter to BFBS from Buenos Aires, 16th August 1820.
[4] Letters on the Moral and Religious State of South America, London, James Nisbet, 1827, p. 25.
[5] Ibid,, p. 103.
[6] Francisco De Avila, Tratado de los Evangelios, Lima: Jorge Lopez de Herrera, 1648.
[7] Letter dated 8 August 1823, op. cit., p. 95.
[8] The earliest Quechua grammar was written by the Dominican Domingo de Santo Tomas, and published
in 1560 in Valladolid.
[9] Grammatica y Arte Nueva de la Lengua General del Peru, Lima: Francisco de Canto, 1607; Vocabulario de la Lengua General de Todo el Peru Llamada Lengua Quichua, Lima: Francisco de Canto, 1608.
[10] Arte de la Lengua Aymara, Lima: Francisco de Canto, 1612; Vocabulario de la Lengua Aymara, Lima: Francisco de Canto, 1612.
[11] Thomson, op. cit., p. 95.
[12] Ibid., p. 101.
[13] The Gospel of Luke.
[14] Thomson, op. cit., pp. 152,3.
[15] Ibid., p. 102.
[16] Ibid., p. 117.
[17] Ibid.
[18] Ibid., p.128.
[19] Ibid., p.152.
[20] Ibid., p.166.
[21] Ibid., p.103. See also Charles H. Bowman, Vicente Pazos Kanki: Un Boliviano en la Libertad de
America. La Paz: Editorial Los Amigos del Libro, 1975, p. 202.
[22] El Evangelio de Jesu Christo segun San Lucas en Aymara y Español. London: BFBS and J. Moyes,
1829.
[23] Mss 81. See M. Rosaria Falivens (compiler) and Alan F. Jesson (editor), Historical Catalogue of
the manuscripts of Bible House Library. London: BFBS, 1982, p. 32.
[24] Bowman, op. cit., p. 214.
[25] Paul Rivet and Georges de Crequi-Montfort, Bibliographie des langues aymara et kicua, Vol.1 (1540-1875), Paris: Institut d'ethnologie, 1951, pp. 289f.
[26] Op. cit., p. 152.