Calvin Synod Herald, 1974 (74. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1974-04-01 / 4-5. szám

REFORMÁTUSOK LAPJA

5

origin,13 and Emil Békési for the Roman Catholic origin of this first translation.14

The time of this first translation (still called the Hussite Bible) is estimated between 1420 and 1430.15

(To be continued)

NOTES

xFéja, Géza, Régi magyarság (Old Hungarian Literature),

pp. 61-62.

2Ibid.. p. 60.

3Kardos, Tibor, A huszita biblia keletkezése (The Origine of the Hussite Bible), p. 21.

4Pintér, Jenő, Magyar irodalomtörténete (History of the Hungarian Literature), Vol. I., p. 384.

5Ibid., p. 384.

6Tóth-Szabó, Pál, Dr., A cseh-huszita mozgalmak és uralom története Magyarországon (The Bohemian-Hussite Movement and its History in Hungary), pp. 161-163.

7Kniezsa, István, Helyesírásunk története a könyvnyomtatás koráig (The History of Hungarian Orthography till the Invention of Printing), p. 173.

8Tóth-Szabó, p. 162.

9Kniezsa, pp. 172-173.

10Zsilinszky, Mihály, A magyarhoni protestáns egyház története (The History of the Hungarian Protestant Church), p. 35.

11Kálvin és a Kálvinizmus (Calvin and the Calvinism), Varga, Zsigmond, Dr., A magyarországi közkönyvtárak értékes bibliai gyűjteményeinek ismertető leírása a XIV-ik század végéig), p. 443.

12Kniezsa, pp. 173-174.

13Ibid., p. 175.

14Ibid., p. 175.

15Szabó, Dénes, A magyar nyelvemlékek (The Hungarian Linguistic Documents ), pp. 36-37.

Francis Vitéz

THE BIBLE

We search the world for truth. We cull The good, the true, the beautiful,

From graven stone and written scroll,

And all old flowers-fields of the soul;

And, weary seekers of the best,

We come back laden from our quest,

To find that all the sages said Is in the Book our mothers read.

—John Greenleaf Whittier.

I'VE BEEN LEFT ALONE

From the Hungarian of the venerable Bishop László Ravasz, age 90, by Stephen Sziarto.

I’ve been left alone. My dear ones have gone their ways, each to his own. Those who were dearest to me have gone to their eternal home. Gone to Him, who loved them best and whom they could not have loved enough. The others have found mates in this world and serve each other with their lives. Only I have remained alone.

There are times when lonesomeness burdens my soul. I so long for those who have broken away from me, as the dried branch aches for its fallen leaves,

as the empty nest in the bush longs for its far flown inhabitant. There are dear souls ’round about me, surrounding me with gentleness and love, but generation gaps constrain us to view each other like tourists on ships meeting at sea: they approach each other only to depart forever.

There is none to understand, my memories are of no interest to others. My feelings find goodwill, but I sense no echo. It is as though a glass wall has been lowered between me and the world. It seems as though I am superfluous. As though living here is untimely, not unlike a forgotten lifeless leaf on a bough whose springtime is no longer the same as mine.

But when my soul is attentive to God’s word and becomes engulfed in understanding His counsel, then it is with everwarming spirituality that I realize that this is not a punishment, but rather a gift. God is preparing me to approach Him ever closer. Piece by piece His sacred hand takes from me all that the world has given, because He wants me unencumbered: me, alone. He had clothed me with this world’s thousand-fold relationships. Slowly now He frees me. He doesn’t want me to look backward as did Lot’s wife, to a burning city, to a passing world — seeking refuge from this temporal world, I heed His wel-