Babel? 100 plus versions! The Bible as the Word of God written, but in which English version?

For Anglicans, and members of mainline denominations, there used to be The Bible, that is the The King James Version, and nothing else, except the Coverdale translation of the Psalter inside The Book of Common Prayer (1662 & 1789 USA). Then from the late nineteenth century and before World War II there appeared a new translation, sponsored by the Church of England and the mainline denominations in the USA – specifically The Revised Version (1881-1895) and The American Standard Version (1901).

All of these versions followed the original languages in terms of distinguishing between the second person singular (“thou” & “thee”) and plural (“ye” & “you”). Further, they were essentially literal and traditional translations in that they sought to convey as far as possible the meaning intended in their times for their readers by the writers of the Bible.

One difference between the KJV and the RV & ASV was that the latter used (what were believed to be) better original Greek texts than were available in 1611, and this led to many minor verbal changes (but not effecting doctrine) and some minor differences in content especially in the New Testament (e.g., a shorter ending to Mark’s Gospel).

Then in 1946-1957 appeared The Revised Standard Version which followed in the tradition of the KJV, the RV & ASV, except that the old English second person singular “thou/thee” was used only for God and not for human beings.

Because Evangelicals in the USA were not happy with minor aspects of the RSV (e.g. its rendering of “young woman” instead of “virgin” in Isaiah 7:14), they insisted on a new version which would be wholly in modern English (addressing God as “You”) and which preserved in translation the basis of evangelical beliefs about Christ and salvation. So there was born The New International Version of 1973-1978, the first English version of the Bible published specifically by and for one group of Christians, the conservative Evangelicals. This version did not on principle include the Apocrypha and it used “you” for both second person singular and plural. Further, it adopted in part, but only in part, the new philosophy of translating ancient texts known as “dynamic equivalency.”

Since the 1970s there has been a tremendous proliferation of versions of the English Bible, with the Roman Catholics joining in the production (e.g., with The Jerusalem Bible, 1966, & The New American Bible, 1970, both later revised). The majority of the versions from the 1960s have made use of dynamic equivalency either in general terms (as in The Good News Bible, The New Century Version, & The New Living Translation) or specifically to remove supposed patriarchalism and sexism from the English Bible (e.g., The New Revised Standard Version, The Revised English Bible and The New International Inclusive Version). Only The New King James Version, The English Standard Version, The New American Standard Version , the New Holman Christian Standard Bible, together with the Roman Catholic form of The Revised Standard Version (The Common Bible) have generally refused to make use of dynamic equivalency.

What is dynamic equivalency? A translation that claims to use dynamic equivalency translates the thoughts and ideas of the original text, Hebrew or Greek, while attempting to have the same impact on modern readers/hearers as it is believed the original had on its own readers/hearers. So, if the original in a traditional, English literal translation, is rendered, “So David slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city of David” (1 Kings 2:10, KJV), a “thought for thought” rendering would have, “Then David died and was buried in the city of David” (NLT). In the latter, to achieve immediacy and simplicity, what is lost is the Hebrew idea of death and its relation to the death of kith and kin, which is a real part of the original meaning.

Since this method can be used for any specific receptor audience (e.g., children, teenagers, women, blue-collar workers, liberal art students, etc., and for people being evangelized or catechized), and since the perceived mindset and cultural context of the receptor audience is all important in the rendering of “thought for thought,” there can in principle be a multitude of different English versions, aimed at different target audiences (and this is where this market has been and remains in the USA).

In contrast, the traditional approach to translation, which if often referred to these days as “essentially literal”, seeks to translate every word in the original text as understood within its own context, into the nearest English equivalent, and in an acceptable English word order and style. Here there is no specific target audience as such but rather is aimed at anyone who can understand and/or read English.

Bearing all this in mind, one has these days to think clearly before deciding which version to use. For example:

If one is using the traditional Book of Common Prayer for public worship then one will normally use a traditional Bible version to accompany it -- normally the KJV but also possibly the RV, ASV and RSV;

If the service is contemporary in language, liturgical in form and committed to women’s rights then a version like the NRSV will be the choice ( as is the case in most mainline churches);

If the service is the modern R C Mass then one will use (because printed in the official Missalette) the NAB.

If the service is wholly “contemporary” and is intended to be evangelistic then one will use (according to one’s taste and philosophy) one of the modern versions from the NIV to the NLT.

However, if in the contemporary service the preacher wishes to make serious use of the text of the Bible for expository preaching then he will need an essentially literal translation like the ESV or the NASV ( so that he/she does not have to keep on saying that “the original actually says this….”).

The general exception to these “rules” are many African American congregations which read from and preach from the KJV even though they address God as “you” in their prayers.

Turning now to versions of the Bible used for individual devotions and for family prayers, one finds here tremendous variety, where individual choice (like that of buying cars ) is usually determined more by advertising and peer group pressures than solely by objective study of the possibilities. And who can blame the average, devout Christian for “doing what others in church do” when there are so many possibilities available on the shelves of the local Christian bookstore, and making a choice is difficult and confusing.

What the proliferation of versions appears to have done is to make Americans less knowledgeable of the content and doctrine of the books of the Bible. Further, it seems to have made the memorization of key texts and passages a rare discipline and practice. And, worse, it has probably made the Bible into a kind of commodity so that, as we look for the new version of the computer, software, mobile phone and car, so we look for the latest version of the Bible to see what are its new features and whether they suit OUR needs.

In the case of Bible versions it is a case where “too many” has caused “too little” – too little real vital Christianity!

Further, the relation of the Bible to the Church has been diluted and distorted as the Bible has become the possession of Publishing Companies and the team of scholars employed and paid by them. Contemporary capitalism and modern individualism have joined hands to provide a Bible for the individual to use as he will.

In general, I would tell any person, whatever be his age or social class or education level, to stick with a traditional type of translation – KJV or RSV or ASV or NKJV or ESV. Better to be given the possibility of knowing what the original authors actually wrote, than what a group of translators think is the dynamic equivalent of God’s word of yesterday for today (and which may not apply tomorrow) and for this or that receptor audience

The Revd Dr Peter Toon drpetertoon@yahoo.com March 9, 2006

But there's still a problem even if you learn Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic.
And that problem is obvious to anyone who speaks a second modern language. No matter how good you are (and it's tough to get really good at any language that you don't hear spoken and see broadcast) a second language speaker just can never quite get inside the idiom. Idiom has to be explained, often idiom for idiom.

This is even true in our own native language.
Charles II said this of St. Paul's: "It is amusing. It is artificial. It is awful." So, did he like it, or didn't he?
Another example: "I doubt he's drowned."
Pure and simple English.
In 2006, it means "I really don't think he drowned."
In 1786, it means "I'm pretty sure he drowned."

George Washington wrote about having so many naked men at Valley Forge. My God, those poor men! Naked in the snow for months. They must have really suffered! Actually, they must all have DIED for certain, in about a DAY (never mind months) if they were really NAKED in the snow. Washington meant that they didn't have guns. If nobody told you that today, you would have no idea that's what naked meant, in the military jargon (but not the standard speech) of 1776.

The Second Amendment to the US Constitution (1789) refers to "A well regulated militia". Now, this one is really a political hot-potato. What does that MEAN? Does it mean a national guard under orders? Does it mean well armed men?
People will fight long and hard, because in 1787 it could have meant EITHER thing; today, well-regulated CAN'T mean simply "well-equipped", but "well-regulated" meant both things back then. This is particularly instructive because, like the Bible, the Second Amendment to the Constitution matters and is hotly disputed. There is, in fact, no way to tease out the ACTUAL meaning of the Second Amendment in 1787 speak, because it is worded ambiguously. And if you don't know the idiom of 1787, you have no idea of the ambiguity in the drafting. "Well-regulated" does not mean "well-equipped" to any native speaker of English in 2006. Somebody had to teach you that idiom, in your own native language. And how do you know HE'S not trying to manipulate you for political reasons on something as important as the Second Amendment?

So, go and learn Greek, Aramaic and Hebrew, and you're still going to be reading a translation. Be a native speaker of Hebrew and you're still reading the Hebrew Bible itself effectively in translation.

Go pick up either Chaucer or Shakespeare and read either WITHOUT footnotes or end-notes or a dictionary. No native speaker of the language can understand many passages without special training, and how do we even know that the special training is right? We can't consult Shakespeare to be sure of the idiom. We can only guess at it. And we speak English!

Another example. Hamlet says savagely to Ophelia: "Get thee to a nunnery!" Now, on the surface, this seems to be telling her to leave him alone, leave off loving him, and go join a convent. Of course, those with special education and knowledge will come in (usually pridefully and condescendingly) and demonstrate their superior knowledge by telling you "No, no, no. A nunnery was a WHOREHOUSE in the slang of the time. So Hamlet was telling Ophelia to get herself into a whorehouse!" This makes the story much more titillating. And when I read Hamlet in high school, and then again in college, both times both teachers did not fail to wisely instruct us of that fact, that THAT'S what Shakespeare REALLY meant.
But they're actually quite wrong.
Because in Shakespeare's day, "nunnery" was slang for whorehouse, but it was also standard English for...a convent. Which means that MAYBE Shakespeare was having Hamlet tell Ophelia to get to a whorehouse. Or MAYBE Shakespeare was making a pun. Or MAYBE Shakespeare didn't intend to use a pun at all, but was having Hamlet tell Ophelia to forget about love with him and turn to God and become a nun, renouncing sex forever because she couldn't have him. That later, straight, non-punning read would actually make Hamlet a more arrogant character in a different way than the way it is taught.
Which is RIGHT?
Ask Shakespeare when you die and go to heaven.

My point is demonstrated. Even in our own native tongue, once the language gets to be a couple of hundred years old, maybe less than that, the idioms and internal references become as foreign as any foreign tongue. And there is nothing one can do to understand them but rely on the best guesses of other scholars.

Now, anybody learning ancient Greek and ancient Hebrew is learning a very ancient idiom of languages that no longer exist. There are no native speakers of the ancient forms of either. Even modern Hebrew speakers, raised speaking Israeli Hebrew from birth, are doing a simultaneous translation when they read ANCIENT Hebrew, which is not the language they speak, just like WE do a simultaneous translation whenever WE attempt to read Chaucer.

What's more, even if you learn these languages, you will be learning from modern teachers and effectively doing a simultaneous translation. And the precision with which a student of ancient language focuses may very well result in seeing patterns and ideas that WOULD BE puns (like the nunnery business) but which the original writers never thought of or intended. We tend to see puns in other language that aren't really there.

Example: those of us who are French and English speakers see a near-pun in the name of the French car make "Citroen". Citroen in French is close to the word "citron", which means "lemon", in French. And so a bilingual anglo-francophone is likely to think it amusing that a French car maker is (almost) called "Lemon". Talk about bad branding! Of course, "lemon" has no meaning in French other than the fruit. Say "Ma bagnole est un citron" - my car is a lemon - and the French will just look wuizzical. Did he mispronounce "Citroen"? Does he have a yellow car? Sort of like "My car is an avocado", in English. Huh? (A French or Spanish speaker might try to figure out some sort of pun about your car as a lawyer, but you wouldn't get it unless you spoke French or Spanish, and it wouldn't be a very good pun even if you did get it).

I think I have made my point. Learn the ancient languages, that is a good exercise. You can learn some interesting things. But your teachers aren't native speakers either, so the best you're going to get is guesswork. And natural idioms and meanings will be lost on you even if you read those language correctly.

So, is there any way at all to capture more of the ancient meaning?
I think there is. But, perhaps paradoxically, it comes from a particular ancient translation.
One of the real usefulnesses of the Rosetta Stone was that it didn't just let us break ancient scripts, but it gave us a glimpse of some idiomatic use between languages. Rosetta is particularly useful because it was written down at a time and in a culture when there were native speakers and users of at least two of the languages (and maybe all three), which means that the idiom in all three languages was current. Being able to see the ANCIENTS translate between their own languages when those languages were still living is advantageous to spotting idioms that would be missed even by a PhD of the modern languages.

There is an ancient version of the Bible which does act as a sort of Rosetta Stone for us. When St. Jerome translated the Vulgate Bible, from the Greek and Hebrew into Latin, he was doing so as a native Latin-speaking (and nearly native-Greek speaking) scholar living in the empire that was described in the New Testament, with those social norms. Both Latin and Ancient Greek were very much alive. Biblical Hebrew was not a spoken tongue except for religious purposes (much as Latin was in the Middle Ages), but the Middle East still spoke Aramaic.
So, with Jerome's Vulgate text, which get an ancient bilingual man, who was also very fluent in the ancient view of Hebrew, translating idiomatically, in culture, between two native or nearly native tongues.
Why is that so good?
Because when WE make our translations, there are choices to be made, and sometimes it's difficult to know which to make.
That was true when Jerome made his translation too. But when he made it, he was in culture and an actual user of, and resident of, a Latin and Koine Greek world. Jerome had to make the same choices, when translating into Latin from Greek (or Hebrew) as any other translator. But HIS choices are superior to any modern translator, precisely because HE, unlike anybody today, was a living native speaker (or nearly) of both languages in culture. So when HE made HIS choices, he does so with an authority that nobody working one thousand six hundred years later with three dead languages can every possibly come close to attaining.

Jerome faced the choices all translators face, but his translation has a double authority, because he was aiming at meaning, and among all of the possibilities, he chose the one that actually represented the idiom of two native tongues. We can't do that.
And that is why Jerome's Vulgate is a PARTICULARLY good text to translate. He already made a translation from Greek, and made choices, just like a modern translating from Greek. But his Latin is certainly a more accurate translation of what the Greek idiom MEANT, in the ancient world, than anybody can do today in English.
Any world class translator worth his salt translating from the Greek textus receptus into English will have Jerome's Latin Vulgate lying open, and when there are tough choices to be made with no clear way, will look at how Jerome handled it, and realize that Jerome spoke Latin and Ancient Greek with native fluency and lived in the Roman Empire in the very cultures described. So when HE made a choice, he knew what he was doing, and he's more authoritative than any modern could be.

"A translation is but an echo", said Ovid.
Nobody can read the Bible at all except in translation, and that is true even if one takes the time to learn ancient Hebrew and ancient Greek and finds the best original texts. You're STILL not a native speaker. You're STILL doing the simultaneous translation, and translating words into their modern meanings. You can try to learn as much as possible about ancient idioms, but you're certain to miss much of what's there, maybe even more than if you read in translation.

This, incidentally, is a key problem with the Douai-Rheims or "King James" Version: the idiom and dialect is old; we are often confused or deceived as to understanding ("It's amusing. It's artificial. It's awful." "Many of my soldiers are naked." "A well-regulated militia...") KJV and Douai-Rheims English is older than any of that. To read the KJV or Douai-Rheims, you have to make a simultaneous translation in your head.

What all of this tells ME is that if the Bible is the "Inspired Word of God", excessive and minute word-for-word literalism can't be achieved, because it's beyond our ken. By it, God must be trying to teach us more general principles and ideas, because the real minutiae doesn't survive the generations even in the SAME language, let alone across thousands of years and translations.

I thought this was an interesting page...surely biased toward Protestants (as am I!), but interesting for everyone.

Please note the technical use of the word "corrupt" means the translation, due to changes in time and meaning, is no longer accurate, according to the original languages (Hebrew and Greek in the Bible). Of course Jerome did a good job in the 4th Century with the Vulgate...but the medieval meanings of Latin changed a bit in 1000 years.

Anyway, enjoy the text below:

THE source for rare Bibles, antique Bibles, ancient Bible leaves, & antiquarian theology books is GREATSITE.COM

You are here: Home >> English Bible History

English Bible History

hourglass

The fascinating story of how we got the Bible in its present form actually starts thousands of years ago, as briefly outlined in our Timeline of Bible Translation History. As a background study, we recommend that you first review our discussion of the Pre-Reformation History of the Bible from 1,400 B.C. to 1,400 A.D., which covers the transmission of the scripture through the original languages of Hebrew and Greek, and the 1,000 years of the Dark & Middle Ages when the Word was trapped in only Latin. Our starting point in this discussion of Bible history, however, is the advent of the scripture in the English language with the “Morning Star of the Reformation”, John Wycliffe.

John Wycliffe

The first hand-written English language Bible manuscripts were produced in the 1380's AD by John Wycliffe, an Oxford professor, scholar, and theologian. Wycliffe, (also spelled “Wycliff” & “Wyclif”), was well-known throughout Europe for his opposition to the teaching of the organized Church, which he believed to be contrary to the Bible. With the help of his followers, called the Lollards, and his assistant Purvey, and many other faithful scribes, Wycliffe produced dozens of English language manuscript copies of the scriptures. They were translated out of the Latin Vulgate, which was the only source text available to Wycliffe. The Pope was so infuriated by his teachings and his translation of the Bible into English, that 44 years after Wycliffe had died, he ordered the bones to be dug-up, crushed, and scattered in the river!

John Hus

One of Wycliffe’s followers, John Hus, actively promoted Wycliffe’s ideas: that people should be permitted to read the Bible in their own language, and they should oppose the tyranny of the Roman church that threatened anyone possessing a non-Latin Bible with execution. Hus was burned at the stake in 1415, with Wycliffe’s manuscript Bibles used as kindling for the fire. The last words of John Hus were that, “in 100 years, God will raise up a man whose calls for reform cannot be suppressed.” Almost exactly 100 years later, in 1517, Martin Luther nailed his famous 95 Theses of Contention (a list of 95 issues of heretical theology and crimes of the Roman Catholic Church) into the church door at Wittenberg. The prophecy of Hus had come true! Martin Luther went on to be the first man to print the Bible in the German language. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs records that in that same year, 1517, seven people were burned at the stake by the Roman Catholic Church for the crime of teaching their children to say the Lord’s Prayer in English rather than Latin.

Johann Gutenberg

Johann Gutenberg invented the printing press in the 1450's, and the first book to ever be printed was a Latin language Bible, printed in Mainz, Germany. Gutenberg’s Bibles were surprisingly beautiful, as each leaf Gutenberg printed was later colorfully hand-illuminated. Born as “Johann Gensfleisch” (John Gooseflesh), he preferred to be known as “Johann Gutenberg” (John Beautiful Mountain). Ironically, though he had created what many believe to be the most important invention in history, Gutenberg was a victim of unscrupulous business associates who took control of his business and left him in poverty. Nevertheless, the invention of the movable-type printing press meant that Bibles and books could finally be effectively produced in large quantities in a short period of time. This was essential to the success of the Reformation.

Thomas Linacre

In the 1490’s another Oxford professor, and the personal physician to King Henry the 7th and 8th, Thomas Linacre, decided to learn Greek. After reading the Gospels in Greek, and comparing it to the Latin Vulgate, he wrote in his diary, “Either this (the original Greek) is not the Gospel… or we are not Christians.” The Latin had become so corrupt that it no longer even preserved the message of the Gospel… yet the Church still threatened to kill anyone who read the scripture in any language other than Latin… though Latin was not an original language of the scriptures.

John Colet

In 1496, John Colet, another Oxford professor and the son of the Mayor of London, started reading the New Testament in Greek and translating it into English for his students at Oxford, and later for the public at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London. The people were so hungry to hear the Word of God in a language they could understand, that within six months there were 20,000 people packed in the church and at least that many outside trying to get in! (Sadly, while the enormous and beautiful Saint Paul’s Cathedral remains the main church in London today, as of 2003, typical Sunday morning worship attendance is only around 200 people… and most of them are tourist). Fortunately for Colet, he was a powerful man with friends in high places, so he amazingly managed to avoid execution.

Erasmus

In considering the experiences of Linacre and Colet, the great scholar Erasmus was so moved to correct the corrupt Latin Vulgate, that in 1516, with the help of printer John Froben, he published a Greek-Latin Parallel New Testament. The Latin part was not the corrupt Vulgate, but his own fresh rendering of the text from the more accurate and reliable Greek, which he had managed to collate from a half-dozen partial old Greek New Testament manuscripts he had acquired. This milestone was the first non-Latin Vulgate text of the scripture to be produced in a millennium… and the first ever to come off a printing press. The 1516 Greek-Latin New Testament of Erasmus further focused attention on just how corrupt and inaccurate the Latin Vulgate had become, and how important it was to go back and use the original Greek (New Testament) and original Hebrew (Old Testament) languages to maintain accuracy… and to translate them faithfully into the languages of the common people, whether that be English, German, or any other tongue. No sympathy for this “illegal activity” was to be found from Rome… even as the words of Pope Leo X's declaration that "the fable of Christ was quite profitable to him" continued through the years to infuriate the people of God.

William Tyndale

William Tyndale was the Captain of the Army of Reformers, and was their spiritual leader. Tyndale holds the distinction of being the first man to ever print the New Testament in the English language. Tyndale was a true scholar and a genius, so fluent in eight languages that it was said one would think any one of them to be his native tongue. He is frequently referred to as the “Architect of the English Language”, (even more so than William Shakespeare) as so many of the phrases Tyndale coined are still in our language today.

Martin Luther

Martin Luther had a small head-start on Tyndale, as Luther declared his intolerance for the Roman Church’s corruption on Halloween in 1517, by nailing his 95 Theses of Contention to the Wittenberg Church door. Luther, who would be exiled in the months following the Diet of Worms Council in 1521 that was designed to martyr him, would translate the New Testament into German for the first time from the 1516 Greek-Latin New Testament of Erasmus, and publish it in September of 1522. Luther also published a German Pentateuch in 1523, and another edition of the German New Testament in 1529. In the 1530’s he would go on to publish the entire Bible in German.

William Tyndale wanted to use the same 1516 Erasmus text as a source to translate and print the New Testament in English for the first time in history. Tyndale showed up on Luther's doorstep in Germany in 1525, and by year's end had translated the New Testament into English. Tyndale had been forced to flee England, because of the wide-spread rumor that his English New Testament project was underway, causing inquisitors and bounty hunters to be constantly on Tyndale's trail to arrest him and prevent his project. God foiled their plans, and in 1525-1526 the Tyndale New Testament became the first printed edition of the scripture in the English language. Subsequent printings of the Tyndale New Testament in the 1530's were often elaborately illustrated.

They were burned as soon as the Bishop could confiscate them, but copies trickled through and actually ended up in the bedroom of King Henry VIII. The more the King and Bishop resisted its distribution, the more fascinated the public at large became. The church declared it contained thousands of errors as they torched hundreds of New Testaments confiscated by the clergy, while in fact, they burned them because they could find no errors at all. One risked death by burning if caught in mere possession of Tyndale's forbidden books.

Having God's Word available to the public in the language of the common man, English, would have meant disaster to the church. No longer would they control access to the scriptures. If people were able to read the Bible in their own tongue, the church's income and power would crumble. They could not possibly continue to get away with selling indulgences (the forgiveness of sins) or selling the release of loved ones from a church-manufactured "Purgatory". People would begin to challenge the church's authority if the church were exposed as frauds and thieves. The contradictions between what God's Word said, and what the priests taught, would open the public's eyes and the truth would set them free from the grip of fear that the institutional church held. Salvation through faith, not works or donations, would be understood. The need for priests would vanish through the priesthood of all believers. The veneration of church-canonized Saints and Mary would be called into question. The availability of the scriptures in English was the biggest threat imaginable to the wicked church. Neither side would give up without a fight.

Today, there are only two known copies left of Tyndale’s 1525-26 First Edition. Any copies printed prior to 1570 are extremely valuable. Tyndale's flight was an inspiration to freedom-loving Englishmen who drew courage from the 11 years that he was hunted. Books and Bibles flowed into England in bales of cotton and sacks of flour. Ironically, Tyndale’s biggest customer was the King’s men, who would buy up every copy available to burn them… and Tyndale used their money to print even more! In the end, Tyndale was caught: betrayed by an Englishman that he had befriended. Tyndale was incarcerated for 500 days before he was strangled and burned at the stake in 1536. Tyndale’s last words were, "Oh Lord, open the King of England’s eyes". This prayer would be answered just three years later in 1539, when King Henry VIII finally allowed, and even funded, the printing of an English Bible known as the “Great Bible”. But before that could happen…

Myles Coverdale

Myles Coverdale and John “Thomas Matthew” Rogers had remained loyal disciples the last six years of Tyndale's life, and they carried the English Bible project forward and even accelerated it. Coverdale finished translating the Old Testament, and in 1535 he printed the first complete Bible in the English language, making use of Luther's German text and the Latin as sources. Thus, the first complete English Bible was printed on October 4, 1535, and is known as the Coverdale Bible.

John Rogers

John Rogers went on to print the second complete English Bible in 1537. It was, however, the first English Bible translated from the original Biblical languages of Hebrew & Greek. He printed it under the pseudonym "Thomas Matthew", (an assumed name that had actually been used by Tyndale at one time) as a considerable part of this Bible was the translation of Tyndale, whose writings had been condemned by the English authorities. It is a composite made up of Tyndale's Pentateuch and New Testament (1534-1535 edition) and Coverdale's Bible and some of Roger's own translation of the text. It remains known most commonly as the Matthew-Tyndale Bible. It went through a nearly identical second-edition printing in 1549.

Thomas Cranmer

In 1539, Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, hired Myles Coverdale at the bequest of King Henry VIII to publish the "Great Bible". It became the first English Bible authorized for public use, as it was distributed to every church, chained to the pulpit, and a reader was even provided so that the illiterate could hear the Word of God in plain English. It would seem that William Tyndale's last wish had been granted...just three years after his martyrdom. Cranmer's Bible, published by Coverdale, was known as the Great Bible due to its great size: a large pulpit folio measuring over 14 inches tall. Seven editions of this version were printed between April of 1539 and December of 1541.

King Henry VIII

It was not that King Henry VIII had a change of conscience regarding publishing the Bible in English. His motives were more sinister… but the Lord sometimes uses the evil intentions of men to bring about His glory. King Henry VIII had in fact, requested that the Pope permit him to divorce his wife and marry his mistress. The Pope refused. King Henry responded by marrying his mistress anyway, (later having two of his many wives executed), and thumbing his nose at the Pope by renouncing Roman Catholicism, taking England out from under Rome’s religious control, and declaring himself as the reigning head of State to also be the new head of the Church. This new branch of the Christian Church, neither Roman Catholic nor truly Protestant, became known as the Anglican Church or the Church of England. King Henry acted essentially as its “Pope”. His first act was to further defy the wishes of Rome by funding the printing of the scriptures in English… the first legal English Bible… just for spite.

Queen Mary

The ebb and flow of freedom continued through the 1540's...and into the 1550's. After King Henry VIII, King Edward VI took the throne, and after his death, the reign of Queen “Bloody” Mary was the next obstacle to the printing of the Bible in English. She was possessed in her quest to return England to the Roman Church. In 1555, John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers and Thomas Cranmer were both burned at the stake. Mary went on to burn reformers at the stake by the hundreds for the "crime" of being a Protestant. This era was known as the Marian Exile, and the refugees fled from England with little hope of ever seeing their home or friends again.

John Foxe

In the 1550's, the Church at Geneva, Switzerland, was very sympathetic to the reformer refugees and was one of only a few safe havens for a desperate people. Many of them met in Geneva, led by Myles Coverdale and John Foxe (publisher of the famous Foxe's Book of Martyrs, which is to this day the only exhaustive reference work on the persecution and martyrdom of Early Christians and Protestants from the first century up to the mid-16th century), as well as Thomas Sampson and William Whittingham. There, with the protection of the great theologian John Calvin (author of the most famous theological book ever published, Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion)and John Knox, the great Reformer of the Scottish Church, the Church of Geneva determined to produce a Bible that would educate their families while they continued in exile.

John Calvin

The New Testament was completed in 1557, and the complete Bible was first published in 1560. It became known as the Geneva Bible. Due to a passage in Genesis describing the clothing that God fashioned for Adam and Eve upon expulsion from the Garden of Eden as "Breeches" (an antiquated form of "Britches"), some people referred to the Geneva Bible as the Breeches Bible.

John Knox

The Geneva Bible was the first Bible to add numbered verses to the chapters, so that referencing specific passages would be easier. Every chapter was also accompanied by extensive marginal notes and references so thorough and complete that the Geneva Bible is also considered the first English "Study Bible". William Shakespeare quotes hundreds of times in his plays from the Geneva translation of the Bible. The Geneva Bible became the Bible of choice for over 100 years of English speaking Christians. Between 1560 and 1644 at least 144 editions of this Bible were published. Examination of the 1611 King James Bible shows clearly that its translators were influenced much more by the Geneva Bible, than by any other source. The Geneva Bible itself retains over 90% of William Tyndale's original English translation. The Geneva in fact, remained more popular than the King James Version until decades after its original release in 1611! The Geneva holds the honor of being the first Bible taken to America, and the Bible of the Puritans and Pilgrims. It is truly the “Bible of the Protestant Reformation.” Strangely, the famous Geneva Bible has been out-of-print since 1644, so the only way to obtain one is to either purchase an original printing of the Geneva Bible, or a less costly facsimile reproduction of the original 1560 Geneva Bible.

With the end of Queen Mary's bloody reign, the reformers could safely return to England. The Anglican Church, now under Queen Elizabeth I, reluctantly tolerated the printing and distribution of Geneva version Bibles in England. The marginal notes, which were vehemently against the institutional Church of the day, did not rest well with the rulers of the day. Another version, one with a less inflammatory tone was desired, and the copies of the Great Bible were getting to be decades old. In 1568, a revision of the Great Bible known as the Bishop's Bible was introduced. Despite 19 editions being printed between 1568 and 1606, this Bible, referred to as the “rough draft of the King James Version”, never gained much of a foothold of popularity among the people. The Geneva may have simply been too much to compete with.

By the 1580's, the Roman Catholic Church saw that it had lost the battle to suppress the will of God: that His Holy Word be available in the English language. In 1582, the Church of Rome surrendered their fight for "Latin only" and decided that if the Bible was to be available in English, they would at least have an official Roman Catholic English translation. And so, using the corrupt and inaccurate Latin Vulgate as the only source text, they went on to publish an English Bible with all the distortions and corruptions that Erasmus had revealed and warned of 75 years earlier. Because it was translated at the Roman Catholic College in the city of Rheims, it was known as the Rheims New Testament (also spelled Rhemes). The Douay Old Testament was translated by the Church of Rome in 1609 at the College in the city of Douay (also spelled Doway & Douai). The combined product is commonly referred to as the "Doway/Rheims" Version. In 1589, Dr. William Fulke of Cambridge published the "Fulke's Refutation", in which he printed in parallel columns the Bishops Version along side the Rheims Version, attempting to show the error and distortion of the Roman Church's corrupt compromise of an English version of the Bible.

King James I

With the death of Queen Elizabeth I, Prince James VI of Scotland became King James I of England. The Protestant clergy approached the new King in 1604 and announced their desire for a new translation to replace the Bishop's Bible first printed in 1568. They knew that the Geneva Version had won the hearts of the people because of its excellent scholarship, accuracy, and exhaustive commentary. However, they did not want the controversial marginal notes (proclaiming the Pope an Anti-Christ, etc.) Essentially, the leaders of the church desired a Bible for the people, with scriptural references only for word clarification or cross-references.

This "translation to end all translations" (for a while at least) was the result of the combined effort of about fifty scholars. They took into consideration: The Tyndale New Testament, The Coverdale Bible, The Matthews Bible, The Great Bible, The Geneva Bible, and even the Rheims New Testament. The great revision of the Bishop's Bible had begun. From 1605 to 1606 the scholars engaged in private research. From 1607 to 1609 the work was assembled. In 1610 the work went to press, and in 1611 the first of the huge (16 inch tall) pulpit folios known today as "The 1611 King James Bible" came off the printing press. A typographical discrepancy in Ruth 3:15 rendered a pronoun "He" instead of "She" in that verse in some printings. This caused some of the 1611 First Editions to be known by collectors as "He" Bibles, and others as "She" Bibles. Starting just one year after the huge 1611 pulpit-size King James Bibles were printed and chained to every church pulpit in England; printing then began on the earliest normal-size printings of the King James Bible. These were produced so individuals could have their own personal copy of the Bible.

John Bunyan

The Anglican Church’s King James Bible took decades to overcome the more popular Protestant Church’s Geneva Bible. One of the greatest ironies of history, is that many Protestant Christian churches today embrace the King James Bible exclusively as the “only” legitimate English language translation… yet it is not even a Protestant translation! It was printed to compete with the Protestant Geneva Bible, by authorities who throughout most of history were hostile to Protestants… and killed them. While many Protestants are quick to assign the full blame of persecution to the Roman Catholic Church, it should be noted that even after England broke from Roman Catholicism in the 1500’s, the Church of England (The Anglican Church) continued to persecute Protestants throughout the 1600’s. One famous example of this is John Bunyan, who while in prison for the crime of preaching the Gospel, wrote one of Christian history’s greatest books, Pilgrim’s Progress. Throughout the 1600’s, as the Puritans and the Pilgrims fled the religious persecution of England to cross the Atlantic and start a new free nation in America, they took with them their precious Geneva Bible, and rejected the King’s Bible. America was founded upon the Geneva Bible, not the King James Bible.

Protestants today are largely unaware of their own history, and unaware of the Geneva Bible (which is textually 95% the same as the King James Version, but 50 years older than the King James Version, and not influenced by the Roman Catholic Rheims New Testament that the King James translators admittedly took into consideration). Nevertheless, the King James Bible turned out to be an excellent and accurate translation, and it became the most printed book in the history of the world, and the only book with one billion copies in print. In fact, for over 250 years...until the appearance of the English Revised Version of 1881-1885...the King James Version reigned without much of a rival. One little-known fact, is that for the past 200 years, all King James Bibles published in America are actually the 1769 Baskerville spelling and wording revision of the 1611. The original “1611” preface is deceivingly included by the publishers, and no mention of the fact that it is really the 1769 version is to found, because that might hurt sales. The only way to obtain a true, unaltered, 1611 version is to either purchase an original pre-1769 printing of the King James Bible, or a less costly facsimile reproduction of the original 1611 King James Bible.

John Eliot

Although the first Bible printed in America was done in the native Algonquin Indian Language by John Eliot in 1663; the first English language Bible to be printed in America by Robert Aitken in 1782 was a King James Version. Robert Aitken’s 1782 Bible was also the only Bible ever authorized by the United States Congress. He was commended by President George Washington for providing Americans with Bibles during the embargo of imported English goods due to the Revolutionary War. In 1808, Robert’s daughter, Jane Aitken, would become the first woman to ever print a Bible… and to do so in America, of course. In 1791, Isaac Collins vastly improved upon the quality and size of the typesetting of American Bibles and produced the first "Family Bible" printed in America... also a King James Version. Also in 1791, Isaiah Thomas published the first Illustrated Bible printed in America...in the King James Version. For more information on the earliest Bibles printed in America from the 1600’s through the early 1800’s, you may wish to review our more detailed discussion of The Bibles of Colonial America.

Noah Webster

While Noah Webster, just a few years after producing his famous Dictionary of the English Language, would produce his own modern translation of the English Bible in 1833; the public remained too loyal to the King James Version for Webster’s version to have much impact. It was not really until the 1880’s that England’s own planned replacement for their King James Bible, the English Revised Version(E.R.V.) would become the first English language Bible to gain popular acceptance as a post-King James Version modern-English Bible. The widespread popularity of this modern-English translation brought with it another curious characteristic: the absence of the 14 Apocryphal books.

Up until the 1880’s every Protestant Bible (not just Catholic Bibles) had 80 books, not 66! The inter-testamental books written hundreds of years before Christ called “The Apocrypha” were part of virtually every printing of the Tyndale-Matthews Bible, the Great Bible, the Bishops Bible, the Protestant Geneva Bible, and the King James Bible until their removal in the 1880’s! The original 1611 King James contained the Apocrypha, and King James threatened anyone who dared to print the Bible without the Apocrypha with heavy fines and a year in jail. Only for the last 120 years has the Protestant Church rejected these books, and removed them from their Bibles. This has left most modern-day Christians believing the popular myth that there is something “Roman Catholic” about the Apocrypha. There is, however, no truth in that myth, and no widely-accepted reason for the removal of the Apocrypha in the 1880’s has ever been officially issued by a mainline Protestant denomination.

The Americans responded to England’s E.R.V. Bible by publishing the nearly-identical American Standard Version (A.S.V.) in 1901. It was also widely-accepted and embraced by churches throughout America for many decades as the leading modern-English version of the Bible. In the 1971, it was again revised and called New American Standard Version Bible (often referred to as the N.A.S.V. or N.A.S.B. or N.A.S.). This New American Standard Bible is considered by nearly all evangelical Christian scholars and translators today, to be the most accurate, word-for-word translation of the original Greek and Hebrew scriptures into the modern English language that has ever been produced. It remains the most popular version among theologians, professors, scholars, and seminary students today. Some, however, have taken issue with it because it is so direct and literal a translation (focused on accuracy), that it does not flow as easily in conversational English.

For this reason, in 1973, the New International Version (N.I.V.) was produced, which was offered as a “dynamic equivalent” translation into modern English. The N.I.V. was designed not for “word-for-word” accuracy, but rather, for “phrase-for-phrase” accuracy, and ease of reading even at a Junior High-School reading level. It was meant to appeal to a broader (and in some instances less-educated) cross-section of the general public. Critics of the N.I.V. often jokingly refer to it as the “Nearly Inspired Version”, but that has not stopped it from becoming the best-selling modern-English translation of the Bible ever published.

In 1982, Thomas Nelson Publishers produced what they called the “New King James Version”. Their original intent was to keep the basic wording of the King James to appeal to King James Version loyalists, while only changing the most obscure words and the Elizabethan “thee, thy, thou” pronouns. This was an interesting marketing ploy, however, upon discovering that this was not enough of a change for them to be able to legally copyright the result, they had to make more significant revisions, which defeated their purpose in the first place. It was never taken seriously by scholars, but it has enjoyed some degree of public acceptance, simply because of its clever “New King James Version” marketing name.

In 2002, a major attempt was made to bridge the gap between the simple readability of the N.I.V., and the extremely precise accuracy of the N.A.S.B. This translation is called the English Standard Version (E.S.V.) and is rapidly gaining popularity for its readability and accuracy. The 21st Century will certainly continue to bring new translations of God’s Word in the modern English language.

As Christians, we must be very careful to make intelligent and informed decisions about what translations of the Bible we choose to read. On the liberal extreme, we have people who would give us heretical new translations that attempt to change God’s Word to make it politically correct. One example of this, which has made headlines recently is the Today’s New International Version (T.N.I.V.) which seeks to remove all gender-specific references in the Bible whenever possible! Not all new translations are good… and some are very bad.

But equally dangerous, is the other extreme… of blindly rejecting ANY English translation that was produced in the four centuries that have come after the 1611 King James. We must remember that the main purpose of the Protestant Reformation was to get the Bible out of the chains of being trapped in an ancient language that few could understand, and into the modern, spoken, conversational language of the present day. William Tyndale fought and died for the right to print the Bible in the common, spoken, modern English tongue of his day… as he boldly told one official who criticized his efforts, “If God spare my life, I will see to it that the boy who drives the plowshare knows more of the scripture than you, Sir!”

Will we now go backwards, and seek to imprison God’s Word once again exclusively in ancient translations? Clearly it is not God’s will that we over-react to SOME of the bad modern translations, by rejecting ALL new translations and “throwing the baby out with the bathwater”. The Word of God is unchanging from generation to generation, but language is a dynamic and ever-changing form of communication. We therefore have a responsibility before God as Christians to make sure that each generation has a modern translation that they can easily understand, yet that does not sacrifice accuracy in any way. Let’s be ever mindful that we are not called to worship the Bible. That is called idolatry. We are called to worship the God who gave us the Bible, and who preserved it through the centuries of people who sought to destroy it.

We are also called to preserve the ancient, original English translations of the Bible… and that is what we do here at WWW.GREATSITE.COM

Consider the following textual comparison of the earliest English translations of John 3:16, as shown in the English Hexapla Parallel New Testament:

1st Ed. King James (1611): "For God so loued the world, that he gaue his only begotten Sonne: that whosoeuer beleeueth in him, should not perish, but haue euerlasting life."
Rheims (1582): "For so God loued the vvorld, that he gaue his only-begotten sonne: that euery one that beleeueth in him, perish not, but may haue life euerlasting"
Geneva (1560): "For God so loueth the world, that he hath geuen his only begotten Sonne: that none that beleue in him, should peryshe, but haue euerlasting lyfe."
Great Bible (1539): "For God so loued the worlde, that he gaue his only begotten sonne, that whosoeuer beleueth in him, shulde not perisshe, but haue euerlasting lyfe."
Tyndale (1534): "For God so loveth the worlde, that he hath geven his only sonne, that none that beleve in him, shuld perisshe: but shuld have everlastinge lyfe."
Wycliff (1380): "for god loued so the world; that he gaf his oon bigetun sone, that eche man that bileueth in him perisch not: but haue euerlastynge liif,"
Anglo-Saxon Proto-English Manuscripts (995 AD): “God lufode middan-eard swa, dat he seade his an-cennedan sunu, dat nan ne forweorde de on hine gely ac habbe dat ece lif."

Timeline of Bible Translation History

1,400 BC: The first written Word of God: The Ten Commandments delivered to Moses.

500 BC: Completion of All Original Hebrew Manuscripts which make up The 39 Books of the Old Testament.

200 BC: Completion of the Septuagint Greek Manuscripts which contain The 39 Old Testament Books AND 14 Apocrypha Books.

1st Century AD: Completion of All Original Greek Manuscripts which make up The 27 Books of the New Testament.

315 AD: Athenasius, the Bishop of Alexandria, identifies the 27 books of the New Testament which are today recognized as the canon of scripture.

382 AD: Jerome's Latin Vulgate Manuscripts Produced which contain All 80 Books (39 Old Test. + 14 Apocrypha + 27 New Test).

500 AD: Scriptures have been Translated into Over 500 Languages.

600 AD: LATIN was the Only Language Allowed for Scripture.

995 AD: Anglo-Saxon (Early Roots of English Language) Translations of The New Testament Produced.

1384 AD: Wycliffe is the First Person to Produce a (Hand-Written) manuscript Copy of the Complete Bible; All 80 Books.

1455 AD: Gutenberg Invents the Printing Press; Books May Now be mass-Produced Instead of Individually Hand-Written. The First Book Ever Printed is Gutenberg's Bible in Latin.

1516 AD: Erasmus Produces a Greek/Latin Parallel New Testament.

1522 AD: Martin Luther's German New Testament.

1526 AD: William Tyndale's New Testament; The First New Testament printed in the English Language.

1535 AD: Myles Coverdale's Bible; The First Complete Bible printed in the English Language (80 Books: O.T. & N.T. & Apocrypha).

1537 AD: Tyndale-Matthews Bible; The Second Complete Bible printed in English. Done by John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers (80 Books).

1539 AD: The "Great Bible" Printed; The First English Language Bible Authorized for Public Use (80 Books).

1560 AD: The Geneva Bible Printed; The First English Language Bible to add Numbered Verses to Each Chapter (80 Books).

1568 AD: The Bishops Bible Printed; The Bible of which the King James was a Revision (80 Books).

1609 AD: The Douay Old Testament is added to the Rheims New Testament (of 1582) Making the First Complete English Catholic Bible; Translated from the Latin Vulgate (80 Books).

1611 AD: The King James Bible Printed; Originally with All 80 Books. The Apocrypha was Officially Removed in 1885 Leaving Only 66 Books.

1782 AD: Robert Aitken's Bible; The First English Language Bible (KJV) Printed in America.

1791 AD: Isaac Collins and Isaiah Thomas Respectively Produce the First Family Bible and First Illustrated Bible Printed in America. Both were King James Versions, with All 80 Books.

1808 AD: Jane Aitken's Bible (Daughter of Robert Aitken); The First Bible to be Printed by a Woman.

1833 AD: Noah Webster's Bible; After Producing his Famous Dictionary, Webster Printed his Own Revision of the King James Bible.

1841 AD: English Hexapla New Testament; an Early Textual Comparison showing the Greek and 6 Famous English Translations in Parallel Columns.

1846 AD: The Illuminated Bible; The Most Lavishly Illustrated Bible printed in America. A King James Version, with All 80 Books.

1885 AD: The "English Revised Version" Bible; The First Major English Revision of the KJV.

1901 AD: The "American Standard Version"; The First Major American Revision of the KJV.

1971 AD: The "New American Standard Bible" (NASB) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Word for Word English Translation" of the Bible.

1973 AD: The "New International Version" (NIV) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Phrase for Phrase English Translation" of the Bible.

1982 AD: The "New King James Version" (NKJV) is Published as a "Modern English Version Maintaining the Original Style of the King James."

2002 AD: The English Standard Version (ESV) is Published as a translation to bridge the gap between the accuracy of the NASB and the readability of the NIV.

This English Bible History Article & Timeline is ÃƒÂ‚Ã‚Â©2002 by author & editor: John L. Jeffcoat III. Special thanks is also given to Dr. Craig H. Lampe for his valuable contributions to the text. This page may be freely reproduced or quoted, in whole or in part, in print or electronically, under the one condition that prominent credit must be given to “WWW.GREATSITE.COM” as the source.

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