is contrasted with the old.  It was probably in connection with this view that the Old Latin version of the Bible (made in the Old Testament not from the original Hebrew, but from the Greek Septuagint) everywhere rendered the Greek word diatheke by the Latin testamentum.  When Jerome undertook the work of correcting this version, he did not everywhere pursue the same plan.  The books of the Old Testament he rendered in general from the Hebrew; and here he employed for the Hebrew word denoting covenant the appropriate Latin words foedus and pactum.  But in the Psalms, and the whole New Testament, from deference to established usage, he gave simply a revision of the Old Latin, leaving the word testamentum, by which that version had rendered the word diatheke, covenant, untouched.  Hence in Latin usage we have in the New Testament the two covenants, the old and the new, expressed by the terms old testament (vetus testamentum, prius or primum testamentum) and new testament (novum testamentum), and sometimes in immediate contrast with each other, as in 2 Cor. 3:6, 14; Heb. 9:15-18.  The transfer of these terms from the covenants themselves to the writings which give an account of them was easy, and soon became established in general usage.  Hence the terms Old and New Testament for the two great divisions of the Bible.

Another Latin term for the two great divisions of the Bible was instrumentum, instrument, document; a term applied to the documents or body of records relating to the Roman empire, and very appropriate, therefore, to the records of God’s dealings with men.  But as early as the time of Tertullian, about the close of the second century, the word testamentum, testament, was more in use.  See Tertullian against Marcion, 4. 1.  A striking example of the superior accuracy of Jerome’s independent version above his simple revision of the old Latin is the passage Jer. 31:31-33 as compared with the quotation of the same, Heb. 8:8-10.  In the former, where the translation is made immediately from the Hebrew, we read:  “Behold the days shall come, saith the Lord, that I will make for the house of Israel and the house of Judah a new covenant (foedus):  not according to the covenant (pactum) which I made with their fathers,” etc.  In the same passage, as quoted in the epistle to the Hebrews, where we have only a revision of the old Latin, we read:  “Behold the days shall come, saith the Lord, that I will accomplish for the house of Israel and for the house of Judah a new testament (testamentum):  not according to the testament (testamentum) which I made for their fathers,” etc.

3.  The unity of the Bible has its ground only in divine inspiration.  So far as human composition is concerned, both parts of it have a great variety