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YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

THE LIBRARY OF THE
DIVINITY SCHOOL

#ttft;t|jtQi^^e^5t5£3moSgcac?ousf^fctt

THE FIRST TITLE-PAGE TO MATTHEW'S BIBLE, 1537.
(Siot of original wood-block, log by 7| inches.)

The
Printed English Bible
1525-1885

BY

RICHARD LOVETT, M.A.
EDITOR OF DEMAUS' ' WILLIAM TYNDALE, A BIOGRAPHY,' SECOND EDITION ;
AUTHOR OF 'JAMES GILMOOR, OF MONGOLIA,' ETC.

WITH PORTRAITS AND FACSIMILES

LONDON
THE RELIGIOUS TRACT SOCIETY*
4 BOUVERIE STREET, E.C. ; & 65 ST. PAUL'S CHURCHYARD
1909

First Edition, April, 1894.
Second Impression, 1909.

PREFACE
The object of this primer is to set forth briefly the
chief facts in the history of the Printed English
Bible, so far as they are known at present, and to
describe the principal editions. There is still much
that is obscure, much, probably, that we shall never
know, eagerly as the information would be wel
comed. A great deal also of what passes for history
in current works is partly or wholly fabulous. It
is only during the last five-and-twenty years that
a beginning has been made in the thorough and
scientific study of the great subject, by reflecting
the light furnished by the different early editions
back upon the external history. Such books as
Lewis' History of the Bible, Anderson's The Annals
of the English Bible, Cotton's Editions of the Bible
and Parts thereof, are — the first throughout, and
the last two in many most important respects —
quite unreliable, while many of their worst blunders
are repeated in various handbooks which have
copied their statements without any attempt at
verification. A brief bibliography of the most
reliable books is given at the end of this volume
5

PREFACE
for the guidance of those who wish to pursue the
study.
The same criticism applies even more severely
to many of the statements about, and even many
of the so-called quotations from, the different
editions of the Scriptures. These have often been
incorrectly quoted in some recognised book, and
then copied and recopied without verification, and
often with a further departure from accuracy.
Every quotation made in this little book has
been carefully verified by reference to the edition
quoted, either in the author's own collection of
Bibles, or in those of the British Museum and the
Bible Society. One result of this method, it is
hoped, will be that the reader will have nothing
whatever to unlearn in the way of inaccurate de
scription of and incorrect quotation from early
editions. In a subject involving so many minute
details it is, perhaps, too much to hope that errors
have been avoided. Any inaccuracy brought
under the writer's notice by any reader who has
first consulted some standard copy of the edition
referred to in the text, will be gratefully corrected
in future editions.
Many of the words in the extracts from the
early editions have been modernised in spelling
in order to render them more intelligible to the
reader unfamiliar with the forms and peculiarities
commonly met with in fifteenth and sixteenth
century English books.

CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
i. Introductory  9
n. William Tindale and his Work. ... 15
¦in. The Pentateuch of 1530  41
iv. The New Testament of 1534 .... 56
v. Coverdale's Bible, 1535  71
vi. Matthew's Bible of 1537  85
vn. The Great Bible of 1539  101
vni. The Geneva Bible  119
ix. The Bishops' Bible  135
x. The First Roman Catholic English Bible . 141
xi. The Authorised Version, 161 1 . . . . 156
xn. The Revised Version, 1881-85 • • • .181

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
The First Title-page to Matthew's Bible,
1537 ........ Frontispiece
William Tindale  18
A Page of Tindale's Octavo New Testament, 1525 . 29
Part of a Page of the Grenville Fragment (Tin-
dale's 1525 New Testament, Quarto) ... 37
A Page of Tindale's Pentateuch, 1330 ... 47
The Original Title-page of Coverdale's Bible,
1535  75
First Title-page of the Second Edition of Cover-
dale's Bible ... . 97
Miles Coverdale .... . -99
Thomas Cromwell ... . .103
First Title-page, Great Bible, 1539 .... 107
First Title-page, Geneva Bible, 1560 .... 125
The Wood-block Title-page to the Authorised
Version, 161 i  ity
The Engraved Title-page to the Authorised Ver
sion, 1611  !68

The Printed English Bible

Chapter I
INTRODUCTORY
THE history of the translation of the Bible The Men
into English, and the circulation of it by iltek i"ns"
means of the printing press, is one of the most
heroic and fascinating in our history. The long
succession of noble and famous men linked with
its story begins with John Wycliffe and William
Tindale, includes the sovereigns Henry VIII.,
Edward VI., Elizabeth, and James I. ; the states
men Thomas Cromwell, Sir Thomas More, and
Lord Burleigh ; the churchmen Wolsey, Gardiner,
Cranmer, Cuthbert Tunstal, and Matthew Parker ;
and a noble army of scholars — Miles Cover-
dale, Taverner, W. Whittingham, Reynolds of
Corpus Christi, Oxford, with hosts of others
who, in greater or lesser degree, have combined
to perfect the work so well begun by Tindale.
The English nation as a whole has not even yet
fully realised what it owes to these men and to
9

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
their work. Wherever the facts are known with
any accuracy and fulness, there admiration and
gratitude are strong ; but fifty Englishmen can
be found able to give a fairly complete sketch
of Henry VIII.'s deeds and misdeeds, for one who
can sketch correctly the life and work of Tindale.
Yet the man to whose scholarship and toil and
personality the character and quality of the
English translation of the Bible are due, and
who died a martyr's death in order to place that
translation within the reach of every plough-boy,
did far more for the welfare and progress of the
nation than the king who would have burnt him
at the stake if he could.
John The first complete English translation of the
Bible was the work of John Wycliffe, his friends
and followers. He was born (about) 1315, and
died in 1384. His great work, the translation
of the Vulgate, or Latin Bible, into English
laboured under two main defects, one internal,
one external. First of all, it was a translation of
a translation. It was, and in the age when it was
executed it could only have been, a rendering into
English of the Bible of the widespread Roman
Catholic Church, the translation made by Jerome
about the year 385 A.D., consisting of a revision
of the Old Latin New Testament, and a new
translation directly from the Hebrew of the Old
Testament. This gradually superseded all former
versions, and was known as the Vulgate. The
text of the Vulgate became in the course of time
10

INTRODUCTORY
very corrupt, and these corruptions of reading
were reflected in Wycliffe's Bible.
In the second place, Wycliffe's Bible was never
printed until modern days. Many readers may be
surprised to learn that it first issued from the press
in the year i S48. These facts do not, and ought
not in any way, lessen our sense pf indebtedness
to WyclifFe. His version preceded the invention
and general use of the printing press by at least
seventy years, and during all that time was
circulated, as all books at that date were, in
manuscript More than one hundred and fifty
manuscripts of Wycliffe's version are extant, and
are among the most precious of literary treasures.
The last which appeared in a bookseller's catalogue
was priced at £1,000 !
The work of Wycliffe and his coadjutors had an
influence of the most potent kind upon the develop
ment of religious life and thought in England. But
interesting and valuable as Wycliffe's version is to
all who study it closely, no one can now read it
without being thankful that it never became the
original and model version. Even by the year
1525 its English had become archaic, and it moved
somewhat stiffly within the limits prescribed by
its Latin original. Here is a specimen taken
from the version of Wycliffe's text, executed
shortly after the reformer's death by his friend
and fellow-worker, Purvey. The passage is
Luke x. 30-34, and the spelling is somewhat
modified. 11

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
'And Jhesu biheld, and seide, A man came doun
from Jerusalem in to Jerico, and fel among theves, and
thei robbiden hym, and woundiden hym, and wente
awei, and leften the man half alyve. And it bifel that
a prest cam down the same weie, and passide forth,
whanne he hadde seyn hym. Also a dekene, when he
was bisidis the place, and saw hym, passide forth. But
a Samaritan, goynge the weie, cam bisidis hym ; and he
saw hym, and had ruth on hym ; and cam to hym, and
bound together his woundis, and helde in oyle and
wynne : and laid hym on his beast, and ledde in to
an ostrie (inn), and dyd the cure of hym.'
Le|endlden ^"^e ^rst Prmted English book in which any
portion of the Scriptures appeared was the Golden
Legend, translated by William Caxton from French
and Latin originals, and issued by the father of
English printing. It was the largest book printed
by Caxton, and even he found it no easy task to
accomplish. The first edition appeared in 1483.
The work consists of a large number of legends of
saints and martyrs and bishops and monks, some
very beautiful, many full of the grossest supersti
tion. It was written in Latin by Jacobus de
Voragine, an Italian prelate, who was born in
1230, and who died in 1298. The Golden Legend
was first printed about 1470, in Latin, and for the
next sixty years no book save the Bible was so
frequently reprinted. Caxton, who was shrewd
and far-seeing, the keen man of affairs rather than
the martyr, was, apparently, quite alive to the
benefit that an English Bible would confer upon
12

INTRODUCTORY
his countrymen. But he was equally aware of the
tremendous risk to be run by the man who should
attempt this task. Caxton chose a middle course.
He printed this collection of monkish legends as a
book not obnoxious to the ecclesiastical authorities,
and he inserted into it a very much larger number
of Bible stories and Bible words than any other
edition of the Golden Legend contains. In this
way the English reader was enabled to gather the
outlines of the Gospel history and also of Old
Testament story from Adam to Job. The special
insertions made by Caxton practically covered the
whole of the Old Testament narrative, and a small
portion also of the Apocrypha. As the only book
in which for about twenty-five years Englishmen
had access in a printed form to any part of God's
Word, this sumptuous volume deserves to be held
in reverence. We quote one example of what Cax
ton describes as 'Shortly taken out of the Bible . . .
and but little touched.' Here is a famous incident
in the life of David as it stands in the 1483 edition
of the Golden Legend.
1 And when his oldest brother heard him speak to the
people, he was wroth with him, and said, Wherefore art
thou come hither and hast left the few sheep in the
desert ? I know well thy pride, thou art come for to
see the battle. And David said, What have I done ?
Is it not as the people have said? I dare fight wel
with this giant, and declined from his brother to other
of the people. And all this was shewed to Saul, and
David was brought to him, and said to Saul, I thy
13

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
servant shall fight against this giant, if thou wilt. And
Saul said to him, Thou mayest not withstand this Philis
tine, nor fight against him, for thou art but a child;
this giant hath been a fighter from his childhood.
David said to Saul, I thy servant kept my father's
sheep, and there came a lion and a bear, and took
away a wether from the middle of my flock, and I pur
sued after, and took it again from their mouths, and
they arose and would have devoured me, and I caught
them by the jaws and slew them. I thy servant slew
the lion and the bear, therefore this Philistine uncircum
cised shall be one of them. I shall now go and deliver
Israel from this opprobrium and shame. How is this
Philistine uncircumcised so hardy to curse the host of
the living God? And yet said David, The Lord that
kept me from the might of the lion and from the
strength of the bear, He shall well deliver me from
the power of this Philistine. Saul then said to David,
Go, and our Lord be with thee.'

14

Chapter II
WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
THE Bible of the English-speaking nations wiiiiam
was very largely the work of one heroic,
simple-minded, scholarly man, William Tindale.1
After Tindale there came a great army of workers,
from Coverdale, his friend and fellow-labourer,
down to the men who completed the revision of
1881. This great army of workers who have devoted
so much labour, thought, and scholarship to the
improvement of the English Bible have done little
more than polish up and improve Tindale's work.
We now know much more accurately than was
possible in 1520 to 1525 what is the true text of
the New Testament. Scholarship has developed,
and in a great number of minute ways the first
English Bible has been improved. Nevertheless,
it was given to William Tindale under God's grace
to be the first great worker. He was fitted for his
task by a discipline that none but a noble nature
1 This spelling is adopted as being unquestionably the
correct form. is

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
could have sustained. He entered deeply into the
abiding spirit of the Bible by close study, and
intimate knowledge of the original Greek and
Hebrew texts, before he began to translate. He
sought to render the Bible into English that his
fellow-countrymen might rejoice in the same
liberty and salvation which Jesus Christ had
revealed to him. In this work the fact that king
and church and all in authority were against him,
only made him the more determined to accom
plish it. He knew well that his life would be
forfeited, and for having given England the Word
of God in simple, clear, and abiding English, in
1536, eleven years after his first New Testament
appeared, he suffered martyrdom at Vilvorde, near
Brussels. The English Bible bears throughout its
phraseology the impress of a wholly consecrated
life. It was this combination — the right spirit,
actuating the right man, at the right epoch of
English history — which gives Tindale his pre
eminence. He says in his carefully revised and
corrected edition of the New Testament published
at Antwerp in 1534 : —
' I have also in many places set light in the margin to
understand the text by. If any man find faults either
with the translation or aught beside {which, is easier for
many to do than so well to have translated it themselves
of their own pregnant wits at the beginning without
forensample), to the same it shall be lawful to translate
it themselves.' 16

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
Tindale here touches upon his great feat. He
had no ' forensample ; ' and it was much better so.
The greatness of the man can now, after the lapse
of more than three centuries, be measured by the
permanence and influence of his work.
Of Tindale's early life very little is known in J^f^Life
addition to what Foxe tells us. He was born
about the year 1490, in Gloucestershire, possibly
at Slymbridge. Foxe simply says (first edition,
page 520) : ' This goodman, William Tyndall, the
faithful minister and constant martyr of Christ,
was born upon the borders of Wales, and brought
up even of a child in the Universitie of Oxford,
being alwayes of most upright maners and pure
lyfe.' In his later editions Foxe added, 'where
he, by long continuance grew up, and increased
as well in the knowledge of tongues, and other
liberal arts, as especially in the knowledge of the
Scriptures, whereunto his mind was singularly
addicted ; insomuch that he, lying then in Mag
dalen Hall, read privily to certain students and
fellows of Magdalen College, some parcel of
divinity ; instructing them in the knowledge and
truth of the Scriptures.' Recent research1 has
shown that a certain William Hychyns, scholar
in arts, was admitted to the degree of Bachelor,
July 4, 1512, and to that of Master of Arts,
July 2, 1515. As it is known that Tindale -in
his books often referred to himself as William
* Register of the University of Oxford. Edited by the
Rev. C. W. Boase, M.A. Vol. I., pages ix-xi.
17

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Hychyns, though not absolutely certain, it is
highly probable that the above dates are those
of his graduation. From Oxford Tindale went
to Cambridge, and about the year 1520 or 1521 he

WILLIAM TINDALE.

Tindale at
Little
Sodbury.

became tutor to the children of Sir John Walsh,
at Little Sodbury, in Gloucestershire.
In all probability Tindale acted, after the fashion
of those days, rather as a chaplain to the household
18

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
than as tutor to ' Master Welch's ' children. The
residence at Little Sodbury proved the turning-
point in Tindale's life. Again we quote Foxe : As
Sir John Walsh ' kept a good ordinary commonly
at his table, there resorted to him many times
sundry Abbots, Deans, Archdeacons, with other
divers Doctors, and great beneficed men ; who
there, together with Master Tyndall sitting at the
same table, did use many times to enter com
munication, and talk of learned men, as of Luther
and of Erasmus ; also of divers other controversies
and questions upon the Scripture. Then Master
Tyndall, as he was learned and well practised in
God's matters, so he spared not to show unto them
simply and plainly his judgment in matters, as he
thought ; and when they at any time did vary from
Tyndall in opinions and judgment, he would show
them in the book, and lay plainly before them the
open and manifest places of the Scriptures, to
confute their errors, and confirm his sayings.
And thus continued they for a certain season,
reasoning and contending together divers and
sundry times, till at length they waxed weary, and
bare a secret grudge in their hearts against him.'
It was at this time that Tindale began his work
as a translator, and thinking that he might convince
some by the authority of Erasmus, who refused
to be persuaded by his own arguments and by
Scripture, he rendered into English a book written
in Latin by Erasmus, called The Manual of a
Christian Soldier. This was a famous book at
19

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
that time, and had been translated into many
European languages. It was a bold, outspoken
protest against the whole method of theological
study of that age, and against the wicked lives of
so many of the monks and friars. ' Those things
which pertain to faith,' it asserts, ' let them be
expressed in the fewest possible articles ; those
which pertain to good living, let them also be
expressed in few words, and so expressed that
men may understand that the yoke of Christ is
easy and light, and not harsh ; that they may see
that in the clergy they have found fathers and not
tyrants, pastors and not robbers ; that they are
invited to salvation, and not dragged to slavery.'
There is no record that this translation was ever
printed, but Tindale appears to have lent it to such
as cared to read it, and especially to Sir John
Walsh and his wife ; and ' after they had read and
well perused the same, the Doctorly Prelates were
no more so often called to the house, neither had
they the cheer and countenance when they came
as before they had ; which thing they marking, and
well perceiving, and supposing no less but it came
by the means of Master Tyndall, refrained them
selves, and at last utterly withdrew, and came no
more there.'
Having won over Sir John Walsh and his
wife, and thus established himself firmly at Little
Sodbury, Tindale began preaching in the sur
rounding villages, and on the College Green in
Bristol. This practice at once aroused the hostility
20

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
of the ignorant and violent priests, who ' raged and
railed ' against him in the alehouses, and misrepre
sented his teaching. The bishop of the diocese,
after the fashion of that day, was an Italian prelate,
living in Italy ; and Wolsey, who farmed the
revenues, was also non-resident, so that Tindale
might have been left in peace, had not the chan
cellor who administered local matters happened
to possess a keen scent for heresy. At a special
sitting all the priests of the neighbourhood were
summoned to appear, Tindale being of course
included. He went, and has himself told what
took place. 'When I came before the chancellor,
he threatened me grievously, and reviled me, and
rated me as though I had been a dog ; and laid to
my charge whereof there could be none accuser
brought forth.' He seems to have successfully
refuted the charges, and to have escaped without
any penalty. But he began to see that ignorance
and superstition and wickedness die hard. The
men with whom he reasoned were more likely to
turn and rend him than to prize the pearls of truth
he cast before them. He unburdened his soul to
a friend in the neighbourhood, a man who had held
the post of chancellor to a bishop, who put into
language what Tindale had long been thinking.
'Do you not know,' he said, 'that the pope is
very antichrist, whom the Scripture speaketh of?
But beware what you say; for if you shall be
perceived to be of that opinion, it will cost you
your life.' 21

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Tjndaie's A train of thought like this having once been
Resolve. started, Tindale was not the man either to miss
the evidences of its soundness or to shrink from
its logical issue. Scripture had taught him, and
could teach others. He had begun to know the
truth, and the truth was setting him free from the
spiritual tyranny of Rome and from any fear of
man. In his Preface ' W. T. to the Reader' pre
fixed to the 1530 edition of his Pentateuch,
and, consequently, written nearly ten years later,
Tindale has traced for us his mental experience
at this time. Speaking of the desire felt by the
papists to suppress the Scriptures, he states : ' A
thousand books had they lever (rather) to be put
forth against their abominable doings and doctrines
than that the Scripture should come to light . . .
which thing only moved me to translate the New
Testament. Because I had perceived by experience,
how that it was impossible to establish the lay-
people in any truth, except the Scripture were
plainly laid before their eyes in their mother-
tongue, that they might see the process, order and
meaning of the text : for else, whatsoever truth is
taught them these enemies of all truth quench it
again.' Hence, not long after his visit to his friend, in a
discussion with a divine, ' recounted for a learned
man,' Tindale drove him to this rash assertion :
' We were better without God's laws than the
pope's.' To this Tindale rejoined, ' I defy the
pope and all his laws ; If God spare my life, ere
22

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
many years I will cause a boy that driveth the
plough shall know more of the Scripture than thou
dost.' These words set forth the toil to which
henceforth his life was to be devoted.
The publication of a complete Greek Testament Theta^ee?
by Erasmus in 15 16 had given a great impulse to of Erasmus.
New Testament study, and among others, and
much more than others, Tindale worked in this
field. Like Luther, the more he came to know
of the New Testament, the less successful was he
in reconciling with its precepts and teachings the
practices and beliefs of the Roman Church. We
have traced above that as Tindale came more
and more to recognise how far the church had
wandered from apostolic doctrine, and how gross
and baneful were the errors and sins of the clergy,
he saw clearly that the influence which was setting
himself free from spiritual bondage could alone
avail for the people of England. They certainly
could not learn to read Greek or even Latin in
any appreciable numbers, to say nothing of
Hebrew. But if they could have free access to
the Word of God in their native tongue, much
might be hoped, and much might be done.
At first Tindale seems to have expected that
the result of Scripture study upon his own mind
was only an illustration of what the truth would
do for all. But in so doing he failed to allow for
the natural evil of the human heart, for vested
interests, for the fact that sometimes when the
face of truth is clearly seen, ' men love dark-
23

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
ness rather than light because their deeds are
evil.'
Tindale in As Tindale's purpose became known, in and
London . l 1
about Little Sodbury, his opponents grew more
and more bitter against him, and at length he
resolved to go to London, and there see what
help he could get for his great undertaking. He
reached London in July or August, 1523. The
first flush of Henry VIII.'s successes was over, and
troubles were beginning. Wars and pleasures had
emptied the treasury, and Wolsey, who had little
love for parliaments, was compelled to summon a
parliament, and then to submit to a tardy and
partial grant of his demands. for money. Into the
midst of the angry discussions, the rival sections,
the pomp, the pleasure, the wickedness of the
capital, Tindale came. He looked out upon all
things with the clear, unclouded vision of a pure
soul, and he saw much in the actions and words
of men which, when tested by Scripture, became
utterly corrupt. We cannot do better than tell in
his own words how he fared.
Tunstal, Bishop of London, had a reputation
for learning and liberality to scholars, and had
been praised by Erasmus. ' Then thought I,'
writes Tindale, 'if I might come to this man's
service, I were happy. . . . But God (which
knoweth what is within hypocrites) saw that I
was beguiled, and that that counsel was not the
next way to my purpose. And therefore He gat
me no favour in my lord's sight, whereupon my
24

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
lord answered me, his house was full, he had more
than he could well find, and advised me to seek in
London, where he said I could not lack a service.
And so in London I abode almost a year, and
marked the course of the world, and heard our
praters (I would say preachers) how they boasted
themselves and their high authority ; and beheld
the pomps of our prelates, and how busied they
were, as they yet are, to set peace and unity in the
world, and saw things whereof I defer to speak at
this time, and understood at the last not only that
there was no room in my lord of London's palace
to translate the New Testament, but also that there
was no place to do it in all England, as experience
doth now openly declare.'
After this year's experience of London life,
Tindale came to see clearly that the work was
greater than he at first imagined. He could
expect nothing from those high in rank, least of
all from those who claimed to be in an especial
degree the shepherds of Christ's flock, and slowly
he was driven to the conviction that the work
could not be done in England. Here came his
testing time. Why then should he trouble further ?
And here shines forth the great personality that
has so unalterably moulded the English Bible. If
the work could only be done in exile, in secret, and
in peril of life, these were but potent reasons why
it should be done, and done quickly and well. It
is this whole-souled, absolute loss of self in his
work that places Tindale in the position which
25

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE

The Print
ing of the
First English
Testament.

Foxe aptly describes by the words, 'the apostle
of England.'
These facts need to be borne in mind by all
who wish to form a true judgment about the
character of the English Bible. They not only
developed his noble self-sacrifice, but they also in
many not unimportant particulars determined the
character of Tindale's work.
In May, 1524, Tindale went to Hamburg, and
then, in all probability, visited Wittenberg, and
during a stay of some months completed there
his translation of the New Testament. For
reasons that can now only be guessed at, when
the work was nearly finished he went to Cologne,
a town then famous for its printers, to get the book
into type.
At first all went well. A printer named Peter
Quentel undertook the work, an edition of 3,000
was decided upon, and day by day Tindale saw
the end of his long labour of love drawing near.
But he was once again to feel the bitterness of
hope deferred, and once again to find how power
ful to hinder good work one misguided man may
be. At the very time when the New Testament
was taking on its English dress, Quentel was also
printing a book for one of the most watchful and
rancorous enemies of the Reformation, John
Cochlaeus. This man, in a book written years
afterwards, tells us he learnt that in Cologne
' were two Englishmen lurking, learned, skilful in
languages, eloquent, whom, however, he never could
26

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
see or converse with. Inviting, therefore, some
printers to his lodging, after they were excited
with wine, one of them in private conversation
disclosed to him the secret by which England was
to be drawn over to the party of Luther, viz., that
there were at that very time in the press 3,000
copies of the Lutheran New Testament, translated
into the English language, and that they had
advanced as far as the letter K in the order of
the sheets.'
This information, correct in all points except that
the work being printed was not a translation of
the ' Lutheran New Testament,' at once enraged
Cochlaeus and aroused him to instant action. An
order prohibiting the printing was obtained from
the Senate of Cologne ; but Tindale and his
amanuensis, Roye, warned of their danger, col
lected the sheets already printed, and sailed up
the Rhine to Worms. Cochlaeus sent tidings of
his discovery to Henry VIII., Cardinal Wolsey,
and to the Bishop of Rochester, in order that the
English ports might be strictly watched.
Nothing daunted, Tindale was no sooner safe
in Worms than he began to urge on his great
undertaking. The size and style of the book
were altered, and 3,000 copies of an octavo edition
were printed, and probably very soon afterwards
the original quarto edition was completed, making
in all 6,000 precious volumes. There are many
interesting details connected with these two
editions which we have no space here to consider,
27

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
and which belong more to the bibliographer than
to the general reader. The problems are rendered
more difficult of solution from the fact that of the
3,000 quarto copies only one mutilated fragment
has come down to us, and of the 3,000 octavo copies
only two are now known to exist.
These books reached England in 1526, and
from that hour Tindale's work has been exerting
an influence for good infinitely beyond any human
means of estimate. Naturally enough, the book
was speedily condemned by the authorities and
bishops. With a chancellor like Cardinal Wolsey,
and bishops like Tunstal, the last thing desired
was the popularisation of New Testament teach
ing. The great majority of bishops and clergy
were either ignorant of the Word of God, or
unmindful of its teaching. And they were
keen enough to see that many of their rights and
prerogatives were not worth five years' pur
chase if the common people, after reading the
New Testament, began to compare the Church
of the Apostles with the Romish Church under
Henry VIII. Hence it is not surprising that
very near the octagonal pavement in St. Paul's
Churchyard, hard by the eastern end of the great
cathedral, where in those days stood Paul's Cross,
and where now the pigeons are daily fed, in 1526
Tindale's translation should have been burnt, as a
book full of pestilent errors.
Fortunately we are able to judge for ourselves
what and how great were the errors. Out of those
28

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
6,000 books printed at Cologne and Worms in
1525, only three are known to exist. One, want
ing a good many leaves, is the greatest literary

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A PAGE OF TINDALE S OCTAVO NEW TESTAMENT, 1525.

treasure of the library of the Metropolitan Cathe
dral, at whose door many like it were solemnly
burnt in 1526. Another, wanting only the title-
page, is carefully preserved in the library of the
29

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Baptist College at Bristol. The British Museum
possesses a few pages of the Gospel of Matthew,
chapters i.-xxii. 12, the only fragment known to
exist of the original 3,000 begun at Cologne. The
octavo copy was published in beautiful facsimile
by the late Francis Fry, of Bristol, and the quarto,
known as the Grenville Fragment, from having
once being in the possession of the Right
Honourable Thomas Grenville, has been pub
lished in facsimile with a valuable and exhaustive
introduction by Mr. Arber.
ipies ot To enable the reader to judge how well Tindale
1525 Trans- did his work as a translator, and how far he fixed
both the quality and to a very large extent the
words and phrases of the English New Testament,
we shall quote two passages, both illustrating how
largely the Authorised Version and the Revised
Version have retained the words and phrases of
the Testament of 1525. Take, for example, two
familiar instances, one from the Gospel of John,
and the other from the Epistle to the Colossians.
John x. 7-10, in Tindale's 1525 Testament, runs
thus, the spelling being modernised : —
' Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say
unto you, that I am the door of the sheep. All, even as
many as came before Me, are thieves and robbers ; but
the sheep did not hear them. I am the door : by Me if
any man enter in, he shall be safe, and shall go in and
out, and find pasture. The thief cometh not but for to
steal, and kill, and destroy. I came that they might have
life, and have it more abundantly.' 30

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
The only words in this passage not in the
Authorised Version, are those printed in italics,
that is, a total of seven words out of eighty-seven.
The only words added by the Authorised Version,
and not in Tindale, are that ever, instead of ' even
as many as,' in v. 8 ; saved, instead of ' safe,' in
v. 9 ; the insertion of to before the verbs ' kill ' and
'destroy,' and am come for 'came,' in v. 10: four
alterations in all.
For immediate comparison we print here the
Revised Version of the same passage : — •
' Jesus therefore said unto them again, Verily, verily, I
say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. All that came
before Me, are thieves and robbers : but the sheep did
not hear them. I am the door : by Me if any man enter
in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and go out, and
shall find pasture. The thief cometh not but that he
may steal, and kill, and destroy. I am come that they
may have life, and may have it abundantly.'
We find it omits entirely the following words
from Tindale : that, in v. 7, and more, in v. 10. It
alters the order of words once or twice, and sub
stitutes the following improvements : therefore, for
then,' in v. 7 ; all that, for ' all, even as many
as,' in v. 8 ; saved, for ' safe,' and repeats go before
' out,' and shall before ' find,' in v. 9 ; but that he
may, for ' but for to,' may have, for ' might have,' in
v. 10. Hence the Revised Version drops two out
of Tindale's 87 words, and it leaves J"j just as he
rendered them in the 1525 Testament.
3i

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Now take a specimen, chosen almost at random,
from the Epistles, Colossians i. 9-17 : —
' For this cause we also, since the day we heard of it,
have not ceased praying for you, and desiring that ye
might be fulfilled with the knowledge of His will in all
wisdom and spiritual understanding, that ye might walk
worthy of the Lord in all things that please, being fruitful
in all good works, and increasing in the knowledge of
God ; strengthened with all might through His glorious
power, unto all patience and longsuffering with joyful-
ness ; giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made
us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of saints in
light. Which hath delivered us from the power of dark
ness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His
dear Son; in whom we have redemption through His
blood, that is to say forgiveness of sins ; which is the
image of the invisible God, first begotten before all
creatures, for by Him were all things created, things
that are in heaven and things that are in earth, things
visible and things invisible, whether they be majesty, or
lordship, or rule, or power ; all things are created by Him
and in Him ; and He is before all things, and in Him all
things have their being.'
This is not one of the easiest passages in the
Epistle, and it is one, moreover, into which recent
research has introduced some important variations
of reading. But a careful comparison with the
Authorised Version and Revised Version will
show that, whilst the number of small changes is
considerable, the passage is still, for all practical
purposes, Tindale's. version. To him we owe the
32

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
felicitous phrases : ' Meet to be partakers of the
inheritance of saints in light,' ' which delivered us
from the power of darkness, and hath translated
us into the kingdom of His dear Son'; 'The
image of the invisible God.' Out of the 202 words,
138 stand in the R.V. exactly as they did in 1525,
and many of the changes introduced by both
Authorised Version and Revised Version are but
slight verbal improvements upon Tindale ; as, for
example, ' ceased to pray,' for ' ceased praying.' A
careful comparison of the extracts with the texts
of 161 1 and of 1881 will prove an interesting and
instructive exercise.
The passage in John is an illustration — and
hundreds more could be produced if need be —
which shows how largely the very words of
Tindale have been retained in the English Bible.
The extract from Colossians — a confessedly diffi
cult Epistle to translate — shows how even the
Revised Version has done little more than give
exacter renderings of Greek tenses, and, in a lesser
degree, more strictly accurate renderings of the
more difficult words. As the Revisers say in their
preface, the Authorised Version 'was the work
of many hands, and several generations. The
foundation was laid by William Tindale. His
translation of the New Testament was the true
primary version. The versions that followed were
either substantially reproductions of Tindale's
translation in its final shape, or revisjogeaif-vtMatooj^
that had been themselves almo^T^ife^P' 6tfsfe(^
33

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
upon it.' Neither the scholars of James the First's
day, nor the revisers of 1881, produced a new
translation ; in both cases their work was the
revision of a superb primary version.
Transh£eale ^he octavo edition of the 1525 Testament was
Greek?6 published without prologues, marginal notes, or
chapter headings. It gave only the text of Scrip
ture, save that at the end Tindale appended a brief
address ' To the Reder ' filling three pages. There
are no flattering dedications to king or prelate, and
there is no hint of the translator's name. The
reason why he did not append his name, Tindale
gives in the preface to his Parable of the Wicked
Mammon, published in 1528. But having become
charged with deeds of which he himself did not
approve, done by his amanuensis Roye, Tindale
adopted the practice of putting his name to his
work. ' The cause why I set my name before this
little treatise, and have not rather done it in the
New Testament, is, that there I followed the
counsel of Christ, which exhorteth men (Matt, vi.)
to do their good deeds secretly, and to be content
with the conscience of well-doing, and that God
seeth us ; and patiently to abide the reward of the
last day, which Christ hath purchased for us : and
now would I have fain done likewise, but am
compelled otherwise to do.'
The quarto edition, begun at Cologne, had a
lengthy prologue and many marginal notes. In
appearance, this edition was intended to resemble
Luther's 1522 German Testament, although that
34

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
was folio in size. This fact may have led to the
erroneous impression, so often inaccurately asserted
since, that Tindale merely turned Luther's Testa
ment into English. Careful study of his text
shows that he translated direct from the text of
the Greek Testament of Erasmus. Of this, three
editions had been issued — 1516, "1519, 1522. He
made great use of the new Latin version printed
in parallel columns, which Erasmus had inserted
in his editions, and also of the 1522 edition of
Luther. He also consulted the Vulgate. But he
used all these helps with the independent judg
ment and the power of a scholar. He took from
them readily what he judged suitable for his pur
pose ; he refused to follow closely any one of them,
except the Greek text. Thus he broke free
from ecclesiastical habit, used ' congregation ' for
' church,' ' elder ' for ' priest,' and wherever possible
used words to which no exclusive ecclesiastical
sense attached. In the prologue to the quarto
fragment, he inserted two pages taken almost
word for word from Luther, so he constantly con
sulted Luther's text ; but only ignorance or wilful
prejudice can affirm that Tindale's text is merely
a translation of Luther.
Out of ninety-one marginal notes, or ' pestilent Tindale's
J ° r Marginal
glosses,' as the bishops called them, forty-eight are Notes.
wholly or partly from Luther, while forty-three are
Tindale's own. Many of them exhibit a profound
insight into Scripture, and throw a vivid light
upon many a passage. For instance, against the
35

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
verse, ' Whatsoever ye bind on earth shall be
bound in heaven,' Tindale notes, ' Here all bind
and loose,' a statement cutting at the root of
sacerdotal claims of both pope and ritualist.
Against the words, ' If thine eye be single, all thy
body is full of light,' he writes, ' The eye is single
when a man in all his deeds looketh but on the
will of God, and looketh not for laud, honour, or
any other reward in this world ; neither ascribeth
heaven or a higher room in heaven unto his deeds :
but accepteth heaven as a thing purchased by the
blood of Christ, and worketh freely for love's sake
only.'
The Pro- The address at the end of the octavo deals with
logue to the , . , r „ , , , , r
Grenville the right use of Scripture, and the duty of trans
lating it, and making it known. The prologue to
the quarto is longer, and enables us to look into
Tindale's very heart. It is through writings like
this that in the enjoyment of our manifold bless
ings and privileges, we can see what manner of
men they were who died in the dark ages of the
past to win religious freedom.
Tindale's modesty and singleness of purpose
appear clearly in the opening paragraph, where he
exhorts the readers, ' if they perceive in any places
that I have not attained the very sense of the
tongue, or meaning of the Scripture, or have not
given the right English word, that they put to
their hands to amend it, remembering that so is
their duty to do. For we have not received the
gifts of God for ourselves only, or for to hide
36

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
them ; but for to bestow them unto the honour
ing of God and Christ, and edifying of the con
gregation, which is the body of Christ'
Later on he shows how Christ sets men free

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0Utoftt>4 bcuffe/Qtibfatt bytbo feefybe/animos:
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is X»X>* ° w *"*• &* >»bofc«<)ir battuwtt: from biro fbalbe tafjma
nhit imiiipheti!? tDayeewtbaifame tbalbsbatb.CbeTfowfpjaEe^totkm
maWl) tbe poiple i'nfimiKruM: Jor tbanrjb (bey fe/trjev fevott: anblbforyTige
better. .where bit n tbcjibtate notmctber wnbcifftonbc.XfnbiTi tb«m ys folfylleb
ears Wt wminL tl" """^f" ef«fW»bichp:opWi fayH) : with. vorW/ans
smoJiith tbepoepie y«fballbeare/aiit> [ball not nnberftobe/ arrt> mitt) yoon«yta
T&ooife. ?«[baUf?/anbfbftilnPtpwceaw joubts pcoplrebertjS
PART OF A PAGE OF THE GRENVILLE FRAGMENT (TINDALE'S
1525 NEW TESTAMENT, QUARTO).

from the judgment of the Law. 'When we hear
the law truly preached, how that we ought to love
and honour God with all our strength and might,
from the low bottom of the heart ; and our neigh-
37

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
bours (yea, our enemies) as ourselves, inwardly,
from the ground of the heart, and to do what
soever God biddeth, and abstain from whatsoever
God forbiddeth,. with all love and meekness, with
a fervent and a burning lust, from the centre of
the heart, then beginneth the conscience to rage
against the law and against God. No sea (be
it never so great a tempest) is so unquiet. It
is not possible for a natural man to consent to the
law that it should be good, or that God should be
righteous which maketh the law. Man's wit,
reason, and will are so fast glued, yea, nailed and
chained unto the will of the devil. Neither can
any creature loose the bonds save the blood of
Christ. ' This is the captivity and bondage whence Christ
delivered us, redeemed and loosed us. His blood,
His death, His patience in suffering rebukes and
wrongs, His prayers and fastings, His meekness
and fulfilling of the utmost point of the law,
appeased the wrath of God, brought the favour of
God to us again, obtained that God should love
us first, and be our Father, and that a merciful
Father that will consider our infirmities and weak
ness, and will give us His Spirit again (which was
taken away in the fall of Adam) to rule, govern,
and strengthen us, and to break the bonds of
Satan, wherein we were so strait bound.
' When the woeful consciences feel and taste
how sweet a thing the bitter death of Christ is, and
how merciful and loving God is through Christ's
38

WILLIAM TINDALE AND HIS WORK
purchasing, and merits, they begin to love again
and to consent to the law of God, how that it
is good and ought so to be, and that God is
righteous which made it, and desire to fulfil the
law even as a sick man desireth to be whole.'
Looking then at this first great result of his
labour, viz., the complete English translation of
the New Testament, it is hardly too much to say
that Tindale succeeded as if inspired for this
special work. And he continued to toil at it with
a persistence that sprang from intense love for
the work, the keenest sense of its supreme im
portance, and a self-sacrifice willing to endure,
if need be, even martyrdom. Bishop Westcott,
than whom no scholar is better fitted to pass
judgment, says of Tindale, in his capacity as a
translator : —
' In rendering the sacred text, he remained
throughout faithful to the instincts of a scholar.
From first to last his style and his interpretation
are his own, and in the originality of Tindale
is included in a large measure the originality
of our English Version. ... It is of even less
moment that by far the greater part of his transla
tion remains intact in our present Bibles, than that
his spirit animates the whole. He toiled faithfully
himself, and where he failed he left to those who
should come after the secret of success. . . .
His influence decided that our Bible should be
popular, and not literary, speaking in a simple
39

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
dialect, and that so by its simplicity it should be
endowed with permanence.'
[Incomparably the best book for the study of Tindale's
life and work in detail is William Tyndale, A Biography,
by the Rev. R. Demaus. New Edition, revised by
Richard Lovett, M.A. (R.T.S., 1886). Much valuable
information is contained in The First Printed English
New Testament, edited by Edward Arber. Mr. Arber
quotes in full most of the important references to
Tindale in early sixteenth century literature. The
student should also consult Mr. Fry's introduction to
his facsimile reprint of the 1525 octavo. The three
volumes of Tindale's works, Doctrinal Treatises, Answer
to Sir T. More, and Expositions, published by the Parker
Society, are easy to procure, and should be read by all
who wish to understand Tindale's power.]

40

Chapter III
THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
IMMEDIATELY after the New Testament T^om
was completed, the great translator set to work ISa5-IBo-
upon the Old Testament Scripture. Progress was
necessarily slow in obtaining a sufficient mastery
of Hebrew to fitly qualify him for the task. And
for this it was difficult to secure either good books
or competent teachers. But Tindale never allowed
difficulties to do more than hinder his work, and
his version of the Pentateuch remains to this day
as a witness to his skill and perseverance. Five
years, however, elapsed between the publication of
the New Testament and the printing of the first
complete portion of the Old Testament in the
English language.
It has never yet been possible to trace accurately
and with certainty where Tindale lived from
1525 to 1530. The man whose life was sought by
kings, prelates, statesmen, and priests was not
likely to proclaim his whereabouts from the house
tops. During 1526 he lived at Worms, and either
there or at Strasburg printed the famous Prologue
41

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
to the Epistle to the Romans. In the course of
1527 he took refuge in Marburg, in Hesse-Cassel.
Here he was comparatively safe, because the land
grave, Philip, was a staunch friend of the Reforma
tion. Here stood one of the branch offices of the
far-famed printing-press of Hans Luft, and here
Tindale made the acquaintance of Fryth, his ' son
in the faith,' who was to obtain the martyr's crown
only a few years before himself. Here Hans Luft
in 1528 printed for Tindale his great book on
justification by faith, entitled The Parable of the
Wicked Mammon, and his still more famous The
Obedience of a Christian Man ; here, in all pro
bability, Tindale translated the Five Books of
Moses, and here certainly in 1530 Hans Luft
printed them.
Pentateuch ^e e^tj'° princeps of the English Pentateuch
is a curious composite volume. Genesis and
Numbers are printed in black letter ; Exodus,
Leviticus, and Deuteronomy in Roman type.
The page of type is about 5 by 2J inches,
and there are in all 384 folios, or 768 pages.
It is a thick little volume, and is embellished in
Exodus with eleven curious woodcuts of ' Aaron
with all his apparell,' and of the various objects
contained in the tabernacle. There are eight title-
pages, one to Genesis, in a fancy border, 'the fyrst
boke of Moses, called Genesis '; Exodus, Leviticus,
and Numbers, each have two title-pages, one for
the prologue and one for the text, but Deutero
nomy, like Genesis, has only one. At the end
42

THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
of Genesis is a colophon, which runs, ' Emprented
at Malborow, in the lande of Hesse, by me Hans
Luft, the yere of oure Lorde, M.CCCCC.XXX., the
xvii. dayes of Januarii.' The book was never re
printed as a whole, nor is there any evidence for
the statement not unfrequently made, that the
different books were circulated separately. The
Book of Genesis was reprinted in 1534, and copies
are in existence containing Genesis printed in
Roman type, having only the second prologue
(altered), and with marginal notes entirely different
from those in the 1530 edition. The other four
books in these copies of the so-called second
edition are identical in all respects with those in
the 1530 issue. The British Museum possesses a
perfect copy of the 1530 issue. Henry Huth, Esq.,
has one lacking only one corner of the first title-
page, and there are also copies in the Library of
the British and Foreign Bible Society, Sion
College, and the Lenox Library, New York. The
Baptist College, Bristol, and the John Rylands
Library contain good copies of the 1534 issue.
But now to the book itself. It begins with a The Pro-
° logues to the
preface, ' W. T. to the Reader,' in which Tindale Pentateuch.
gives a most interesting account of how he came
to translate the New Testament, and a scathing
exposure of the incompetence of English prelates
to rightly understand, or to prize the Scriptures.
Then comes a ' Prologe shewinge the use of
Scripture,' which begins with the beautiful
passage : — 43

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
' Though a man had a precious jewel and rich, yet if
he wist not the value thereof nor wherefore it served, he
were neither the better nor richer of a straw. Even
so though we read the Scripture and babble of it never
so much, yet if we know not the use of it, and where
fore it was given, and what is therein to be sought, it
profiteth us nothing at all. It is not enough, therefore,
to read and talk of it only, but we must also desire God
day and night instantly to open our eyes, and to make
us understand and feel wherefore the Scripture was
given, that we may apply the medicine of Scripture,
every man to his own sores, unless then we intend to be
idle disputers and brawlers about vain words, ever gnaw
ing upon the bitter bark without, and never attaining
unto the sweet pith within, and persecuting one another
for defending of lewd imaginations and phantasies of
our own invention.'
After showing that Scripture must be taken in
its plain literal sense — a truth almost entirely lost
sight of in the first half of the sixteenth century,
and referring to God's dealings with Abraham,
Jacob, Joseph, and others — it concludes : —
'These are ensamples written for our learning (as
Paul saith). to teach us to trust in God in the strong fire
of tribulation and purgatory of our flesh. And that
they which submit themselves to follow God should
note and mark such things for their learning and com
fort is the fruit of the Scripture and cause why it was
written. And with such a purpose to read it is the
way to everlasting life, and to those joyful blessings that
are promised unto all nations in the seed of Abraham,
44

THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
which seed is Jesus Christ our Lord, to whom be
honour and praise for ever, and unto God our Father
through Him, Amen.'
This prologue, the first ever printed to an English
Pentateuch, might well stand in the forefront of all
our Bibles to-day. All Tindale's prologues are
full of most helpful exposition of Scripture. They
were frequently reprinted in later editions of the
English Bible, and exerted a very powerful in
fluence upon the religious thought of the sixteenth
century. As specimens of Tindale's translation of the Old oPxYndaie's
Testament we give two extracts, one an easy Pentateuch-
narrative, the other a difficult verse translation.
The reader, by a comparison of both with the
Authorised Version and Revised Version, can
easily see for himself how few in number have
been the subsequent alterations. The first extract
is Genesis xiii. 8-10 : —
' Then said Abram unto Lot : let there be no strife, I
pray thee, between thee and me, and between my herd-
men and thine, for we be brethren. Is not the whole
land before thee? Depart, I pray thee, from me. If
thou wilt take the left hand, I will take the right ; or if
thou take the right hand, I will take the left. And Lot
lifted up his eyes and beheld all the country about
Jordan, which was a plenteous country of water every
where, before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah,
even as the garden of the Lord and as the land of Egypt
till thou come to Zoar.' 45

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
The other is Genesis xlix. 8-12 : —
'Judah, thy brethren shall praise thee, and thine
hand shall be in the neck of thine enemies, and thy
father's children shall stoop unto thee. Judah is a lion's
whelp. From spoil, my son, thou art come on hye : he
laid him down and couched himself as a lion and as a
lioness. Who dare stir him up ? The sceptre shall not
depart from Judah, nor a ruler from between his legs,
until Shiloh come, unto whom the people shall hearken.
He shall bind his foal unto the vine, and his asses colt
unto the vine branch, and shall wash his garment in
wine and his mantle in the blood of grapes ; his eyes are
ruddier than wine, and his teeth whiter than milk.'
Did Tindale Controversy has raged over the question whether
translate J b , , ,
from the Tindale was able to translate Hebrew, and whether
Hebrew ? he did so. This is obviously a matter that can only
be settled by a close scrutiny of his text, and a
careful comparison of it with the Hebrew, the
Vulgate, and Luther's German Pentateuch. Any
attempt to do this would lead us beyond the limits
of this primer. But among the general considera
tions that bear upon the point, we may mention
the following: (1) Tindale spent the years 1525—
1530 on the Continent, where he had access to
all the latest helps to scholarship, and where he
could hardly fail to meet with scholars competent
to teach him Hebrew. (2) He was a thorough
student himself, Humfrey Monmouth, with whom
he lived in London in 1523, saying of him, 'he
studied most part of the day and of the night at
46

THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
his book ' ; (3) Buschius when living at Spires,
only twenty miles from Worms, writing about
Tindale in 1526, states that he knew seven

i

;..¦-

CThethtfde Chapter.
MOfcsfccptcthclTicpcof fcthrohisfa. '
thcr in lam prcai r of Madian .and he
A-ouc the floe ke to the backcfjdc of the defer
ic.Sd cametothe mouta^nc ofGod, Horcb-'
And the angcllof the Lotdc apeajjel anion;
in-aflame of fyeoutofabufh.Andhrracc.
aued that the bufh burned with fjrc and con.
.fumednotThanMoresIayde.-l toil! goo he. '
« and fee this grcte fjgfitc, home it comrth
that thebu(ltebumrthnot.And»hc the Lor
oefattethathecameforio fce,hc called wito
hta out of the bufh and faydt: Moles Mofc.
AncUKanfocredteeam I.Andhefayotco
m: not hither, but put th> fhoocs off thl fete :
for the place tchcreon thou ftondeft is hoht
foundcAndhe fs>de : I am the God oftlw
thcr.the God of Abrabanvhc Godof Ifa.
acandthcGodoflacobAndMofeshydhis
fece.faheniasafraydefolofteijponGod. Than the Lordefajjc : 1 hauc finch, fene
the trouble of rny people which arc in Egipte
andhauehcrdetheir crje which the, hauc of
their taftemailets.For 1 knoasrtheire forocw
and am come downetodclyuer them out of,.
theliandesofthcEgiptians,andtobr^!gcthc..
out of that londe onto a good londe and a bt»
. geancj

A PAGE OF TINDALE'S PENTATEUCH, 1530.
languages, and he places Hebrew first on the list.
(4) Tindale himself at the end of the prologue
to Genesis says that he submits his work to all
47

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
them that submit themselves to God, 'to be
corrected of them, yea and moreover to be dis
allowed and also burned, if it seem worthy when
they have examined it with the Hebrew, so that
they first put forth of their own translating another
that is more correct.' It is inconceivable that
Tindale would have written words like these had
he not been himself able to translate from the
Hebrew. Scattered throughout his notes and
books are a large number of references to Hebrew
words, and to points of Hebrew grammar, quite
irreconcilable with any theory of his ignorance of
Hebrew. See, as one out of a large number that
might be quoted, the first note following.
At the end of Genesis is a curious collection
of explanations and notes, from which we take
the following : —
Marshall. In Hebrew he is called Sartabaim, as thou
wouldest say, lord of the slaughtermen ; and though that
Tabaim be taken for cooks in many places, for the cooks
did slay the beasts themselves in those days, yet it may
be taken for them that put men to execution also
(Tindale's version of Genesis xl. 2 is, ' And Pharaoh
was angry with them, and put them in ward in his
chief marshal's house.' A.V. and R.V. ' Captain of the
guard ').
' Enoch walked with God, and was no more seen ;
that is, he lived godly and died, God took him away ;
that is, God hid his body, as he did Moses and Aaron's ;
lest haply they should have made an idol of him, for
he was a great preacher and a holy man.'
48

THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
' See therefore that thou look not on the ensamples of
Scripture with worldly eyes ; lest thou prefer Cain before
Abel, Ishmael before Isaac, Esau before Jacob, Reuben
before Judah, Sarah before Pharez, Manasseh before
Ephraim, and even the worst before the best, as the
manner of the world is.'
Each of the five books contains marginal notes. T„he . ,
° Marginal
Many of these are extremely strong comments Notes.
upon the Roman Catholic ceremonies and
practices, showing how unscriptural they are.
Tindale has been severely attacked for printing
these in a copy of God's Word. But it must be
borne in mind that his great object was to arouse
the conscience of his countrymen to the errors and
superstitions of a corrupt church, and to give them
in the place of these the pure truth of God. He
did this at the risk of his own life, the men whose
errors of conduct and doctrine he exposed were
hunting him to death, and in Tindale's view their
greatest crime was that they would neither seek
the truth themselves nor would they allow the
people to possess it. Judged in the light of these
facts, his action will receive no condemnation from
those who share his belief in the supreme im
portance to both the individual and the nation
of an accurate knowledge of and an unswerving
obedience to the will of God. No one would
maintain now that it is either desirable or wise
to cumber the margins of our Bibles with con
troversial notes. But this is by no means the
same thing as to condemn Tindale. God's Word
49 D

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
is in every one's hand, and if a man to-day is led
away by unscriptural practices or by unsound
doctrine, it is his own fault, and upon himself
the responsibility rests. Even Tindale, in accord
ance with his own lofty principle of the absolute
sufficiency and supremacy of God's Word, in the
1534 Genesis omitted almost all the controversial
notes, inserting many others that were purely
explanatory. But that the reader may judge for himself, we
quote a few of these notes : —
Genesis iv. 15. — Of this place no doubt the pope
which in all things maketh himself equal with
God, took an occasion to mark all his creatures :
and to forbid under pain of excommunication that
no man (whether he were king or emperor) be
so hardy to punish them for whatsoever mis
chief they do. The crown is to them a license
to do what they list, a protection and a
sure sanctuary.
Genesis ix. 5. — This law and such like to execute,
were kings and rulers ordained of God, wherefore
they ought not to suffer the Popes Caimes * thus
to shed blood theirs not shed again, neither yet
to set up their abominable sanctuaries and neck-
verses z clean against the ordinance of God, but
unto their damnation.
1 Cains. In the notes at the end of Genesis, Tindale
says, ' Cain, so it is written in Hebrew, notwithstanding
whether we call him Cain or Caim it maketh no matter.'
2 When charged with a criminal offence, an offender who
claimed the privileges of the cleric, was not allowed them
So

THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
Genesis xlvii. 22. — The blind guides get privileges
from bearing with their brethren contrary to
Christ's law of love. And of these priests of
idols did our compassing ivy trees learn to creep
up by little and little and to compass the great
trees of the world with hypocrisy and to thrust
the roots of idolatrous superstition in to them
and to suck out the juice of them with their
poetry, till all be sere boughs and no thing green
save their own commonwealth.
Exodus vii. 11. — Even so do our charmers now
deceive all princes with their sophistry and turn
them clean from repentance toward the law of
God and from the faith that is in Christ.
Exodus xii. 26. — Our signs be dumb, we know not
the reason of our baptism ; yea and we must say
our prayers and our belief in a tongue we under
stand not. And yet if we answer not our prelates
when they be angry even as they would have
it, we must to the fire without redemption, or
forswear God.
Exodus xiii. 8. — The fathers nowadays may not be
suffered to know ought of God themselves, how
can they then teach their children what the
ceremony meaneth.
Exodus xviii. 4. — From hence unto the book's end
and throughout all the next book, thou shalt
see what moved the pope and whence he took
the fashion of the garments and ornaments that
are now used in the church and the manner of
unless he could repeat a verse of the Bible in Latin,
generally Psalm li. 1. Hence these came to be called
' neck-verses,' as the power to repeat . them sometimes
saved a man from the hangman. Si

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
hallowing of the church altar, chalice, font, bells,
and so forth, and is become as it were a priest of
the law and hath brought us into captivity as
it were under the ceremonies of the old law, save
theirs spake and ours be dumb.
Exodus xxxii. 32. — O pitiful Moses, and likewise O
merciful Paul Roma. ix. And O abominable
pope with all his merciless idols.
Exodus xxxiii. 16. — The popish say, my church, my
parish, my diocese, and the monks and friars
say all is ours.
Exodus xxxiv. 20. — That is a good text for the Pope.
(The text is, ' And see that no man appear
before me empty.')
Exodus xxxvi. 6. — When will the pope say hoo, and
forbid to offer for the building of Saint Peter's
church : and when will our spirituality say
hoo, and forbid to give the more land and to
make more foundations ? never verily until they
have all.
It would be a great mistake to suppose that
all the notes were so fiercely controversial as
these. Here are a few examples showing how
clearly Tindale apprehended the great evangelical
truths of Scripture.
Leviticus vi. 5. — Unto my neighbour pertaineth
satisfaction, but unto God repentance ; and then
the sacrifice of Christ's blood is a full satisfac
tion, and atonement, and appeasing of all wrath.
Leviticus x. i. — Hereof ye see the fruit of a man's
good intent without God's word. As we may
52

THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
do no less, so doth this ensample teach that we
may do no more than is commanded.
Leviticus x. 3. — God is sanctified when we obey
Him and mortify our will to do His.
Leviticus xx. 5. — If we transgress God's command
ments we may haply escape worldly judges, but
we cannot avoid the fierce wrath of God, but
it will surely find us out.*
Leviticus xxvi. 42. — Mercy is never denied unto
him that repenteth.
Deuteronomy vi. 25. — The outward deed is righteous
ness unto the avoiding of punishment, threaten-
ings and curses, and to obtain temporal bless
ings : but unto the life to come thou must have
the righteousness of faith and thereby receive
forgiveness of sins and promise of inheritance
and power to work of love.
Deuteronomy xiii. 4. — God giveth us His word and
confirmeth it with miracles to prove who hath
a true heart. We must take heed to the Scripture,
lest false prophets, or false miracles deceive us.
Deuteronomy xviii. 15. — Christ is here promised
a preacher of better tidings than Moses.
Deuteronomy xix. 6. — As hate maketh the deed evil,
so love maketh it good.
In fact, we have quoted these notes and extracts
because for the general reader of to-day much of
the interest in Tindale's Pentateuch centres in the
prologues and marginal notes. Questions concern
ing such points as the large amount of his transla
tion which stands word for word in the Authorised
Version and Revised Version, and whether he
S3

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
translated directly from the Hebrew, are for the
student. But all can feel the power and beauty of
his directions as to the right use of Scripture, and
what results it produces in the heart and life.
For instance, in the prologue to Exodus, Tindale
thus sums up the use of ceremonies : —
' Of the ceremonies, sacrifices and tabernacle with all
his glory and pomp, understand that they were not
permitted only, but also commanded of God to lead
the people in the shadows of Moses and night of the
Old Testament until the light of Christ and day of
the New Testament were come; as children are led
in the phantasies of youth until the discretion of man's
age be come upon them. And all was done to keep
them from Idolatry.'
Where, again, can a better contrast between the
Law and the Gospel be found than this ? —
' The Law was given to utter sin, death, damnation
and curse, and to drive unto Christ, in whom forgive
ness, life, justifying and blessings were promised, that
we might see so great love of God to usward in Christ
that we henceforth, overcome with kindness, might love
again, and of love keep the commandments.'
Here is how Tindale deals with the question of
faith and works : —
' If any man ask me, seeing that faith justifieth me,
why I work, I answer, Love compelleth me. For as
long as my soul feeleth what love God hath shewed
54

THE PENTATEUCH OF 1530
me in Christ, I cannot but love God again, and His
will and commandments, and of love work them, nor
can they seem hard unto me. I think not myself better
for my working, nor seek heaven nor an higher place in
heaven because of it.'
' Read God's Word diligently, and with a good
heart, and it shall teach thee all things,' is the
exhortation with which Tindale closes the prologue
to the Book of Numbers ; and in giving us the
exhortation he is at the same time giving us the
key to his own wonderful life.
[The most accessible form in which the student
can consult Tindale's Pentateuch is the reprint by
Dr. Mombert, published by Bagster in 1884,
entitled William Tyn dale's Five Books of Moses.
Though the lengthy prolegomena are not always
reliable in details the text of Tindale appears to be
very faithfully reprinted in this volume.]

55

Chapter IV
THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
AT the end of the 1525 New Testament,
Tindale, in a brief address, entitled 'To
the Reader,' beseeches the learned —
' to consider how that I had no man to counterfeit,
neither was helped with English of any that had inter
preted the same, or suchlike thing in the Scripture
beforetime. Moreover, even very necessity and cum-
brance (God is record) above strength, which I will not
rehearse, lest we should seem to boast ourselves, caused
that many things are lacking which necessarily are
required. Count it as a thing not having his full shape,
but, as it were, born afore his time, even as a thing
begun rather than finished. In time to come (if God
have appointed us thereunto), we will give it his full
shape, and put out if aught be added superfluously, and
add to if aught be overseen through negligence.'
In this work he asks the co-operation of the
learned, and closes with the words, ' Pray for us.'
But it was not until 1534, nine years later, that
Tindale was able to redeem his promise, and
meanwhile none of the learned rendered him any
56

THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
assistance. It is true that George Joye, in August,
1534, published an edition of the New Testament,
which he claimed to have diligently corrected. He
did it, he asserts, because Tindale was idle. Speak
ing of the interval, 1525-1534, he says, ' All this
while Tindale slept, for nothing came from him,
as far as I could perceive.' Joye's accuracy and
knowledge may be gauged by this wild statement,
for during those nine years, in addition to being
in constant peril of his life, Tindale had written, in
the midst of many other labours, his great books,
The Parable of the Wicked Mammon, The Obedience
of a Christian Man, The Practice of Prelates, the
Answer to Sir Thomas More, and had also trans
lated into English and published the Pentateuch.
This was a fair amount of work for the man whom
Joye seems to have thought had been sleeping all
this time. Hence it is not surprising to find that
Joye's Testament, of which only one copy, that
in the British Museum, is known to exist, should
turn out to be a mere reprint of Tindale's, altered
slightly, it is true, but almost invariably for the
worse. Yet, in addition to the enormous amount of
work indicated above, Tindale had given much
time to the fulfilment of his 1525 promise. He
had carefully revised the New Testament, and
in November, 1534, it was printed and published
by Martin Empereur, the well-known printer of
Antwerp. Copies of this little volume are ex
tremely rare, but most precious, as giving us the
57

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
riper work of the great translator. The extracts
and examples given in this chapter are from a
copy in the possession of the writer.
Although so long a time had elapsed since the
publication of the first edition, England had not
been left unsupplied with the Word of God. A
number of editions of Tindale's New Testament,
more or less incorrectly printed, had been issued
by various Dutch printers, and sent over to
England. This is an eloquent testimony to the
desire on the part of the English to possess the
pure Word of God, and a complete refutation of
the argument, very fashionable in some quarters
to-day, that the English Bible would not sell.
There may be a slight degree of truth in this
statement with regard to one or two special
editions, and the reasons for it could easily be
set forth ; but it is absolutely false as applied to
Tindale's Testament, Matthew's Bible of 1537, The
Great Bible, and the enormous number of editions
of the Geneva Bible. It was through these that
the Gospel reached the heart of the English nation
in the stirring years from 1525 to 1588.
Description But our purpose is to see what improvements
Testament. Tindale had made in his work, and for these we
must go to the text of 1534. The title runs, ' The
New Testament diligently corrected and compared
with the Greek by William Tindale ; and finished
in the year of our Lord God, 1534, in the month
of November.' The book abounds with evidence
of Tindale's scholarship and thoroughness. It is
58

THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
a small, thick octavo, very nearly the same size as
the 1530 Pentateuch, the page of type measuring
Si by 2\ inches. It is printed throughout in
Black Letter. Upon the back of the first title
begins an address, ' William Tindale to the
Reader,' seventeen pages long, which begins
thus : —
' Here thou hast, most dear reader, the new testament
or covenant made with us of God in Christ's blood,
which I have looked over again (now at the last) with all
diligence, and have compared it unto the Greek, and
have weeded out of it many faults which lack of help
at the beginning and oversight did sow therein. ... I
have also, in many places, set light in the margin to
understand the text by.'
Then follows ' A Prologue into the Four Evan
gelists, showing who and what they were, and
their authority.' This occupies three and a half
pages ; and then comes ' William Tindale yet
once more to the Christian reader,' in which he
exposes the real character of George Joye and his
work, nine pages. These preliminaries take up in
all sixteen leaves, or thirty-two pages. A second
title-page follows, and the text fills 384 leaves,
or 768 pages. This is followed by ' The Epistles
taken out of the Old Testament which are read in
the Church,' occupying thirty-two pages. Then
comes the Table of Epistles and Gospels, eighteen
pages, and the book ends with explanations of
seven special New Testament words and phrases,
59

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
two pages. There are a large number of marginal
notes.
'J^l, This section of the 1534 Testament is of very
Epistles
taken out of special value, as it contains the only examples we
Testament.' have of Tindale's translation of any part of the
Prophets. We quote one passage, Isaiah lviii. 4-14.
' Fast not as ye now do, to make your voice to be
heard up on high. Should it be such a manner of fast
that I should choose, a day that a man should hurt his
soul in ? Or to bow down his head like a bulrush ? Or
to spread sackcloth and ashes under him ? Shouldest
thou call this a fast, and a day acceptable unto the
Lord ? Or is not this rather the fast that I have
chosen : to loose wicked bonds and to unbind bundles
of oppression ; and to let the bruised go free ; and that
ye should break all manner yokes ; yea and to break the
bread to the hungry, and to bring the poor that are
harbourless unto house, and when thou seest a naked
that thou clothe him, and that thou shouldest [not]
withdraw thyself from helping thine own flesh. Then
should the light break out as does the dayspring, and
then health should shortly bud out. And thy righteous
ness shall go before thee, and the glory of the Lord
would come upon thee. Then shouldst thou call and
the Lord should answer : then shouldst thou cry, and
He shall say, Lo, here am I.'
Tindale as a We select the following examples as good
illustrations of Tindale's care and skill as a
reviser. In the Parable of the Prodigal Son, the
1525 text read, 'Then he remembered himself
and said, how many hired servants,' etc. In the
60

Reviser,

THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
1534 text we get the beautiful phrase, 'Then he
came to himself and said. . . .' And a few verses
further on the 1525 text read, 'I have sinned
against heaven and before thee, now I am not
worthy to be called thy son' ; the 1534 reads, 'I
have sinned against heaven and before thee, and
am no more worthy to be called thy son.' Again,
in 1525 the opening verses of John's Gospel read: —
'In the beginning was that Word, and that Word was
with God, and God was that Word. The same was in
the beginning with God. All things were made by it,
and without it was made no thing that made was. In
it was life, and the life was the light of men. And the
'light shineth in the darkness, and {but) the darkness
comprehended it not.'
In 1534, in addition to the three insertions of the
word ' the ' printed in italics in the above extract,
the first verse reads, ' In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word
was God ' ; ' was made ' is substituted for the
awkward ' made was ' in verse 3, and but for
'and ' in verse 5.
In verses sixteen to eighteen of the same
chapter, 1525 reads —
' And of his fulness have all we received, even favour
for favour. For the law was given by Moses, but favour
and verity came by Jesus Christ. No man saw God at
any time. The only begotten Son which is in the
Father's bosom hath declared him.'
61

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
But how much more correct and how familiar to
our ears is the 1534 —
' And of His fulness have all we received, even grace
for grace. For the law was given by Moses, but grace
and truth came by Jesus Christ. No man hath seen
God at any time. The only begotten Son which is in
the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.'
In the Sermon on the Mount some of the most
beautiful and expressive phrases which stand in
both Authorised Version and Revised Version are
due to Tindale's revision. ' If the salt have lost
her saltness,' takes the place of the earlier, ' If the
salt be once unsavoury.' ' Let your light so shine
before men,' replaces ' See that your light so
shine.' ' Think not that I am come to destroy
the law or the prophets,' is substituted for 'Ye
shall not think that I am come.' ' Consider the
lilies ' is immeasurably superior to the earlier,
' Behold the lilies ' ; and who does not recognise
the superior terseness and force in the later
rendering of the close of the sermon — ' And it
fell, and great was the fall thereof,' instead of
the earlier, ' It was overthrown, and great was
the fall of it ' ?
The rendering of Ephesians v. 15-21 in the 1534
edition is as follows : —
' Take heed, therefore, that ye walk circumspectly ;
not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, for the
days are evil. Wherefore be ye not unwise, but under-
62

THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
stand what the will of the Lord is ; and be not drunk
with wine, wherein is excess ; but be ye fulfilled with the
Spirit, speaking unto yourselves in psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the
Lord in your hearts, giving thanks always for all things
unto God the Father, in the name of our Lord Jesus
Christ ; submitting yourselves one to another in the fear
of God.'
This is very nearly the exact rendering of 1525
also, but it contains one very beautiful and charac
teristic alteration, the substitution of the phrase,
'making melody to the Lord,' for the older,
'playing to the Lord,' an alteration which has
deservedly kept its place in both Authorised
Version and Revised Version.
For every illustration of Tindale's skill and care
and thoroughness as a reviser given above, we
might easily adduce, did space allow, a score.
But enough has been said to prove that so far
from being asleep, Tindale had in a wonderful
degree fulfilled his promise to do what he could
to improve the 1525 text.
And now let us look at a few of typical mar- The IV[3.r£f in 9.1
ginal notes. These are explanatory, hortatory, Notes.
theological, but very rarely controversial. They
often exhibit Tindale's knowledge of the heart of
Scripture and of the heart of man. How pointed
and suggestive is that on Romans xv. 1, 'We
which are strong,' ' He is strong that can bear
another man's weakness.' On 1 Corinthians vii. he
writes — and it should be borne in mind that this
63

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
was at the time when celibacy in the church was
universal — ' If a man have the gift, chastity is
good the more quietly to serve God.' Here he
spoke from experience, for he himself never
married. And he continues, ' For the married
have often much trouble ; but if the mind of the
chaste be cumbered with other worldly business,
what helpeth it ? And if the married be the more
quiet-minded thereby, what hurteth it? Neither
of itself is better than the other or pleaseth
God more than the other. Neither is outward
circumcision or outward baptism worth a pin of
themselves, save that they put us in remem
brance to keep the covenant made between us and
God.' And on i Corinthians viii. i, the note is,
'A little love is better than much knowledge.' The
notes on the Epistle to the Hebrews are few, but
one or two give the full Gospel. On chap. vii. 27
Tindale writes, ' Christ once sacrificed purged all
sins ' ; and on chap. xi. ver. 1, ' Faith and trust in
Christ only is the life and quietness of the con
science and not trust in works, how holy soever
they appear.'
On Ephesians iii. 17, 'Christ may dwell in your
hearts by faith,' he writes : —
'Where true faith in Christ is there is love to the
neighbour; and faith and love maketh us understand
all things. Faith understandeth the secrets of God,
and the mercy that is given her in Christ. And love
knoweth her duty to her neighbour, and can interpret
all laws.'
64

THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
On James ii. 12, 'the law of liberty,' he com
ments : —
' To work of fear and compulsion is bondage, but to
love is liberty and the fulfilling of the law before God,
and maketh a man merciful to work of his own accord.
And to the merciful hath God bound himself to show
mercy ; and contrary unto the unmerciful, he threatened
judgment without mercy. And mercy rejoiceth and
triumpheth over judgment. For where mercy is there
hath damnation no place by God's promise. God hath
promised all mercy to the merciful only.'
One other example and we conclude. It is a
note on Revelation vii. 1 : ' And after that I saw
four angels stand on the four corners of the earth,'
and is as follows : —
' Angel is a Greek word, and signifieth a messenger.
And all the angels are called messengers because they
are sent so oft from God to man on message. Even so
prophets, preachers, and the prelates of the Church are
called angels j that is to say, because their office is to
bring the message of God unto the people. The good
angels in this book are the true bishops and preachers,
and the evil angels are the heretics and false preachers,
which ever falsify God's word, with which the Church of
Christ shall be thus miserably plagued unto the end of
the world, as is painted in these figures.'
The last clause refers to the curious set of
woodcuts with which the Book of Revelation is
illustrated in this edition.
In addition to side-notes like these, and short
65 E

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
prologues to the separate books, there are lengthy
prologues to the Epistles to the Romans and
Hebrews and the Epistle of James. Apart from
their intrinsic value they are of interest ; that on
Romans as showing to what extent Luther in
fluenced Tindale's views ; that on Hebrews as
showing how, when his judgment differed from
Luther's, he was quite as capable of putting his
argument in a clear and forcible style. Any
reader who wishes to fairly appreciate Tindale's
power, and who would at the same time enter
upon a most fascinating and helpful branch of
New Testament study, should read and ponder
his 1534 Testament. Although copies are very
scarce, they are to be found in some of our great
libraries, such as the British Museum, and the
British and Foreign Bible Society. The text
has been printed in an accessible form in Baxter's
Hexapla.
Tindale's We have already noted that Joye had incorrectly
altered by charged Tindale with being asleep, and had con-
1534. ' sequently endeavoured himself to remedy Tindale's
lack of industry. The result of this mistaken zeal
was an edition of the New Testament which has
become a literary curiosity, and which led to a
trenchant exposure of Joye's impertinence and
folly by Tindale. Joye issued in 1534 a little
thick i6mo Testament, of which only one copy
is known to exist, now in the Grenville Library at
the British Museum. The colophon runs, ' Here
endeth the New Testament, diligently overseen
66

THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
and corrected and printed, now again at Antwerp,
by me widow of Christopher of Endhoven.' This
book is Tindale's 1525 Testament with a series of
changes and insertions of such a nature as to
arouse Tindale's indignation. In his second
address to the reader in the 1534 edition Tindale
says, ' It is lawful for who will, to translate and
show his mind, though a thousand had translated
before him. But it is not lawful (thinketh me)
nor yet expedient for the edifying of the unity
of the faith of Christ, that whosever will, shall by
his own authority take another man's translation
and put out and in and change at pleasure, and
call it a correction.' The chief change made by
Joye in Tindale's text was due to the peculiar
views he held about the resurrection, ' where he
findeth this word Resurrection, he changeth it
into the life after this life, or very life, and such
like, as one that abhorred the very name of the
Resurrection.' As one example out of many, we
quote the rendering of Matthew xxii. 23, ' the Sad
ducees say there is no life after this.' Joye
attempted to defend himself from Tindale's just
criticism in ' An apology made by George Joye,
to satisfy (if it may be) W. Tindale' (1535), a
copy of which is in the University Library at
Cambridge. This tract possesses special interest
from the light it throws upon Tindale's life at the
time ; but neither it nor Joye's garbled edition of
the Testament had any great influence on the
course of Bible translation. The episode is valu-
67

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
able rather for the details given by Joye, which
help to throw light upon Tindale's life. Tindale's
second preface to the 1534 Testament, and Joye's
Apology, have been printed by Mr. Arber in ' The
English Scholars' Library.'
Editf ^ke revised Testament of 1534 was speedily
Tesfeulient'8 f°ll°wed by others, and the rapid sale of these
1534-1536. editions is a further proof of the eager desire felt
by Englishmen to gain full knowledge of the
Word of God. Tindale's day was fast drawing
to a close, but he worked with more and more
entire devotion at his great task. Although in
constant peril of his life, he accomplished results
at which we can only marvel. In 1535 appeared
what is known as the G. H. Testament. This is
a small octavo volume, and the title runs, ' The
New Testament yet once again corrected by
Willyam Tindale.' As usual in these early Tes
taments, there follows a Kalendar, ' Willyam
Tindale unto the Christian Reader,' ' A Prologue
to the iiii. Evangelists,' etc., in all twenty-eight
leaves, then comes a second title, dated 1534,
with a curious monogram upon it, from which
the edition takes its name. The printing was
probably begun in 1534, and finished in 1535.
Henry Stevens, in his Bibles in the Caxton
Exhibition (p. 41), hazards the ingenious guess
that G. H. stands for Guillaume Hytchins, the
assumed name of Tindale, and the other part of
the monogram for Jacob van Meteren, the printer.
Unfortunately for this theory, the late Henry
68

THE NEW TESTAMENT OF 1534
Bradshaw, of Cambridge, has proved by incon-
testible typographical evidence {Bibliographer,
vol. i. pp. 1-11) that the monogram is a well-
known trade mark, and indicates that Godfridus
Dumaeus, the Latin equivalent for Godfried
van der Haghen (G. H.), was the publisher, and
Martin Emperour the printer of this Testament.
We have here a good illustration of the danger
in the history of the English Bible of guessing,
and jumping to hasty and ingenious conclusions —
a practice far too common among those who have
written on the subject. The fate of this guess of
Henry Stevens does not invite acquiescence in
that other {Bibles, pp. 37-39) in which, with some
show of evidence, but no real basis of fact, he tries
to prove that Miles Coverdale ' set forth ' for Jacob
van Meteren, 'the probable translator,' the 1535
Bible. This theory involves that Coverdale did
not translate this famous book, but only read it
in proof. Stevens' guess is now often gravely
asserted as fact in articles on the History of the
English Bible.
The great significance and value of this G. H.
Testament consist in the fact that it represents a
further thorough and careful revision of his text
by Tindale himself, beyond that contained in the
1534 Testament. Mr. Fry has also proved1 that
the text of this volume practically became the
standard for later reprints. In the University
1 Bibliographical Description of the Editions of the New
Testament. 69

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Library at Cambridge there is a Tindale Testa
ment of 1535, the place of printing and name of
printer unknown. It is chiefly remarkable for its
extraordinary spellingSj e.g., battaeyle (battle),
daey (day), faeont (faint) etc. There have been
many attempts at an explanation of this, the most
probable, perhaps, being that these mis-spellings
are the attempts of Flemish compositors to ' set
up ' a foreign language.
In 1536 there were no less than seven editions
of Tindale's Testament. One of these is a beautiful
folio edition, a copy of which is among the treasures
of the Bodleian Library. There are three quarto
editions, all very much alike, but distinguished
from each other by means of an engraving of
St. Paul ; his foot rests upon a stone, which in
one edition is blank, in another contains an
engraving of a mole, and in the third an engraver's
monogram. Hence the three are known as the
Blank-stone, the Mole, and the Engraver's mark
editions. The name of printer and place are
unknown. All are well-printed handsome books,
and contain a large number of woodcuts. There
were also three and possibly four editions in 1536
in octavo. The John Rylands Library contains a
splendid perfect copy of one of these — probably
the finest Tindale Testament in existence, that
formerly in the Althorp Library.

70

Chapter V
COVERDALE'S BIBLE, 1535
BEFORE glancing at the close of Tindale's
life, we must turn to the great event of the
year 1535 — the publication of a complete printed
English Bible. This appeared exactly ten years
after the printing of Tindale's first New Testament
by Peter Schoeffer, at Worms. These ten years
had been a season of rapid and important social
and political changes. In 1529 Wolsey was
deposed from the office of chancellor; in 1531
Henry VIII. was declared supreme head of the
Church of England, and in 1533 he married
Anne Boleyn, and soon after abolished papal
authority in England. In 1520 Tindale's Tes
tament was formally condemned by Warham,
Archbishop of Canterbury, and Tunstal, Bishop
of London. In 1530 the condemnation was
reaffirmed, but a ' Bill in English to be published
by preachers ' was issued, stating that the king
and prelates did not think it well for ' the Scrip
ture to be divulged and communicated to the
people in the English tongue at this time,' but
71

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
promising on the part of the king ' that he would
cause the New Testament to be by learned men
faithfully and purely translated into the English
tongue, to the intent he might have it in his hands
ready to be given to his people, as he might see
their manners and behaviour meet, apt, and con
venient to receive the same.' Hugh Latimer in
I53°> by a letter to the king, and Cranmer in 1534,
by a petition from Convocation, urged the king to
fulfil his promise. But if the execution of the
work had depended upon kings and prelates, the
nation might have been waiting for it until this
day.
Piaceof At the very time Cranmer was laying his petition
before the king the last sheets of the first com
plete English Bible were passing through the
press. Where and by whom it was printed are
still unsolved problems. The commonly received
view is that it came from the press of Froschover
at Zurich. Up to the present date no book printed
in the same type as the 1535 Bible, and giving the
name of a printer, has yet been discovered. Mr.
E. Gordon Duff has in his possession a book in the
same type, but with no colophon, and Dr. Ginsburg
has one or two leaves of what he believes to have
been a Bible printed in the same type at Zurich.
We have seen above that Henry Stevens' guesses
are not very reliable. On the whole we are
inclined to believe that if ever the question is
settled beyond dispute, Froschover, the printer
of the 1550 quarto Coverdale, will prove to be
72

COVERDALE'S BIBLE, 1535
the man. However this may be, it is certain that
the precious volume began to circulate in England
m XS35) ar>d that its production was largely due
to the consecration, energy, and ability of one man
— Miles Coverdale.
Of the details of Coverdale's life we know hardly Miles
• 1 <• rr,. TT . Coverdale
more than in the case of Tindale. He was born in
1488, probably in Yorkshire. He was connected
with the monastery of Augustine Friars at Cam
bridge, of which Robert Barnes, who was martyred
in 1541, was the head ; and in 1526, when Barnes
was called upon to recant, Coverdale stood by
him. About this time Coverdale became intimately
associated with Thomas Cromwell, who was first
the assistant and friend of Wolsey, and after the
execution of Sir Thomas More, Lord Chancellor,
and the chief mover in the suppression of the
monastic houses. A series of letters written by
Coverdale to this great man are still extant. In
one, probably the earliest, written from St. Augus
tine's Monastery, about the year 1527, he thus
describes how the love of Bible study had pos
sessed his soul : —
' Now I begin to taste of holy Scripture ; now, honour
be to God ! I am set to the sweet smell of holy letters,
with the godly savour of holy and ancient doctors, unto
whose knowledge I cannot attain without diversity of
books, as is not unknown to your most excellent
wisdom.' From the time when this letter was written until
73

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
the publication of the Bible, that is, from about
1528 until 1535, we know nothing of Coverdale's
movements. It is certain that he must have spent
most, if not all, of these years on the Continent,
devoting himself to his great task. Foxe tells us
that at Hamburg he acted as assistant to Tindale,
and this, though often doubted, cannot be con
sidered impossible. From his own preface it is
clear that he knew about Tindale and his work,
and his Bible practically includes the whole of
Tindale's translations.
Description The volume is a handsome folio, and the copies
of Cover- ' r
dale's Bible. as they originally came from the binder measured
about 1 3 inches by 8 inches. No copy in the original
condition is known. There were originally four
preliminary leaves, printed in type similar to that
used in the body of the book. These contained
the title, ' The Books of the Bible,' the prologue,
and the contents of Genesis. There was no dedi
cation to the king. But for reasons unknown,
which may yet be surmised, these leaves were
cancelled. Nicolson, the English printer, reprinted
the preliminary leaves in English Black Letter,
adding a dedication to Henry VIII. These new
preliminary leaves extended in number to eight.
The volume is divided into six parts — the Penta
teuch, 90 leaves; Joshua to Esther, 120 leaves;
Job to ' Solomon's Ballettes,' 52 leaves ; Isaiah to
Malachi, 102 leaves ; Apocrypha, 83 leaves ; New
Testament, 113 leaves. The complete number of
leaves in the Bible is 568. Parts ii., iv., v., and
74

• "1

THE ORIGINAL TITLE-PAGE OF COVERDALE'S BIBLE, 1535-
{Size of original woodblock, iof by 6§ inches.)

75

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
vi. have separate titles. In some copies, placed
between Parts i. and ii., is a very curious map, and
scattered through the book and upon the title-
pages 68 separate woodblocks are used and by
repetition they are made to do duty for 158
distinct illustrations — one block being repeated
eleven times. The colophon runs : ' Prynted in
the yeare of oure Lorde M.D.XXXV., and fynished
the fourth daye of October.'
Origin of Controversy has raged over the question whether
Coverdale's _ , , , , r . . ,
Translation. Coverdale translated from the original texts of
Scripture or from other translations. His own
statements in his preface, ' Miles Coverdale to the
Christian Reader,' are quite clear, and only mis
taken zeal, based upon a false estimate of
Coverdale's greatness, could have ever raised the
question. Coverdale did not possess the sturdy
independence and noble heroism of Tindale. He
was not so much the pioneer as the adapter of
other men's labours. In the service of God,
and of man on His behalf, there is room for
both. Here are Coverdale's own words : —
'Considering how excellent knowledge and learning
an interpreter of Scripture ought to have in the tongues,
and pondering also mine own insufficiency therein, and
how weak I am to perform the office of a translator, I
was the more loath to meddle with this work. Not
withstanding, when I considered how great pity it was
we should want it so long, and called to my remembrance
the adversity of them which were not only of ripe know-
76

COVERDALE'S BIBLE, 1535
ledge, but would also with all their hearts have performed
that they began, if they had not had impediment. ... I
was fain to take it in hand. And to help me therein,
I have had sundry translations, not only in Latin, but
also of the Dutch {i.e., German) interpreters, whom,
because of their singular gifts and special diligence in
the Bible, I have been the more glad to follow for the
most part, according as I was required.'
The passage printed in italics can hardly have
any other reference than to Tindale himself, who
very shortly after it was written was imprisoned
and martyred. In the dedication to Henry VIII.,
with which the Bible of 1535 opens, Coverdale
says : —
' I have with a clear conscience purely and faithfully
translated this out of five sundry interpreters, having
only the manifest truth of the Scripture before mine
eyes.' One of the tasks of modern scholarship has
been from the text of Coverdale's Bible to identify
these ' five interpreters ' ; and there is little doubt
that they were the Vulgate, a Latin version of the
Scriptures by Pagninus, published in 1528, Luther's
Bible, as printed in the version published at Zurich
between the years 1524-15 29, and Tindale. The
New Testament, Pentateuch, and the Book of
Jonah are Tindale's work chiefly, the rest of the
Old Testament a translation of the Zurich Bible,
by the help of the aids above referred to.
77

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
coverdale's 0ne great part of Coverdale's work has con-
thTpsaims. tinued to the present day, viz., his version of
the Psalms. It is well known to all students of
the text of the Psalms that the Prayer Book
Version differs widely from both the Authorised
Version and Revised Version text, and the dif
ference is due to the fact that in Liturgy the text
stands practically as it was printed in the first
complete English Bible. What is known as Crom
well's or the Great Bible, published in 1539, was
also edited by Coverdale ; and the text of the
Psalms in that edition differs in many minor details
from the text of 1535, and this revised text is
nearly identical with that standing in the Prayer
Book. As a familiar example in proof of this, we
quote Psalm xxiii. in both versions. In the Bible
of 1535 it runs : —
' The Lord is my Shepherd, I can want nothing. He
feedeth me in a green pasture, and leadeth me to a fresh
water. He quickeneth my soul, and bringeth me forth
in the ways of righteousness for His name's sake.
Though I should walk now in the valley of the shadow
of death, yet I fear no evil, Thy staff and Thy sheep-
hook comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me
against mine enemies : Thou anointest mine head with
oil, and fillest my cup full. Oh, let Thy loving-kindness
and mercy follow me all the days of my life, that I may
dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.'
In the Great Bible it runs : —
78

COVERDALE'S BIBLE, 1535
'The Lord is my Shepherd; therefore can I lack
nothing. He shall feed me in a green pasture, and lead
me forth beside the waters of comfort. He shall con
vert my soul, and bring me forth in the paths of
righteousness for His name's sake. Yea, though I
walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will
fear no evil, for Thou art with me ; Thy rod and Thy
staff comfort me. Thou shalt prepare a table before me
against them that trouble me : Thou hast anointed my
head with oil, and my cup shall be full. But Thy
loving-kindness and mercy shall follow me all the days
of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for
ever.' If the reader will compare carefully these two
versions with the text of the Psalm as it stands in
the Authorised Version and Revised Version,
the exercise will give a good illustration of the
course of Bible text revisions from the days of
Henry VIII. to our own. As a remarkable con
trast to the simplicity -and beauty of the versions
already referred to, we quote the Psalm as it
stands in the Douay Bible of 1609 and 1610 — the
only English Bible ever given to the world by the
Roman Catholic Church. On the ground of
language as well as upon others we may be
thankful for our English Reformation.
' Our Lord ruleth me, and nothing shall be wanting to
me : in place of pasture there He hath placed me.
Upon the water of refection He hath brought me up :
He hath converted my soul. He hath conducted me
upon the paths of justice for His name. For although
79

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
I shall walk in the midst of the shadow of death, I will
not fear evils : because Thou art with me.. Thy rod and
Thy staff, they have comforted me. Thou hast prepared
in my sight a table against them that trouble me. Thou
hast fatted my head with oil : and my chalice inebriating
how goodly is it ! And Thy mercy shall follow me all
the days of my life : and that I may dwell in the house
of our Lord in longitude of days.'
We have space for only one more example of
Coverdale's style — the opening verses of Isaiah liii.
' But who giveth credence unto our preaching ? or to
whom is the arm of the Lord known ? He shall grow
before the Lord like as a branch, and as a root in a dry
ground. He shall have neither beauty nor favour.
When we look upon Him there shall be no fair
ness ; we shall have no lust unto Him : He shall be
the most simple and despised of all ; which yet hath
good experience of sorrows and infirmities. We shall
reckon Him so simple and so vile that we shall hide our
faces from Him. Howbeit of a truth He only taketh
away our infirmity and beareth our pain : yet we shall
judge Him as though He were plagued and cast down
of God : whereas He, notwithstanding, shall be wounded
for our offences and smitten for our wickedness. For
the pain of our punishment shall be laid upon Him, and
with His stripes shall we be healed.'
These passages give the reader some idea of
Coverdale's version. The book abounds in render
ings that sound very quaint and homely to our
ears; such, for example, as Jeremiah viii. 21, 22 —
80

COVERDALE'S BIBLE, 1535
' I am heavy and abashed : for there is no more
Triacle at Galaad, and there is no Physician that
can heal the hurt of my people ' ; Psalm xci. 5 —
' So that thou shalt not need to be afraid for any
bugges by night, nor for the arrow that flyeth by
day ' ; Psalm cxxix. 8 — ' We wish you good luck
in the name of the Lord.'
On the other hand, to Coverdale we owe not a
few of the most beautiful Bible phrases, e.g., ' the
pride of life ' ; ' the world passeth away ' ; ' Enter
not into judgment with Thy servant, O Lord, for
in Thy sight shall no man living be justified ' ;
' Cast me not away from Thy Presence, and take
not Thy Holy Spirit from me.'
The old time-worn volume will always have the
highest value among English Bibles from the fact
of its being the first complete copy ever printed.
No absolutely perfect copy is known. Some few,
closely approaching perfection, are valued at from
£500 to £750 each. To the student it will ever
have a very high value, from the fact that in its
renderings, the gentle, loving, but faithful nature of
Coverdale shines no less clearly forth than does
the heroic spirit of Tindale in the translations that
came from his mind and heart. The Lord needs
and the Lord uses in His Church the varied gifts
of men, that by them all His glorious Gospel may
be both enjoyed and set forth for the benefit of
others. About the middle of 1534, Tindale went to live Tindale's
JJ^' Martyrdom.
at the house of the English Merchant Adventurers
81 F

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
in Antwerp, which was under the care of Thomas
Poyntz, and Tindale doubtless owed a great deal
of his safety to the powerful protection of that
corporation. In the English house he was safe
from arrest, outside of it he was in constant
danger. In 1535, Tindale, who was of an un
suspecting nature, was betrayed by a scoundrel
named Henry Phillips, who had wormed himself
into his confidence. This man went to Brussels,
and brought back officers with him, and went to
the English house, entered into chat with Tindale,
borrowed forty shillings of him, ' the which was
easy to be had of him, if he had it : for in the wily
subtilties of this world he was simple and un-
expert.' Tindale had an engagement to keep, and
as he was leaving the house he was followed by
Phillips, who pointed him out to the officers lying
in wait. He was arrested and carried off to the
Castle of Vilvorde, eighteen miles from Antwerp
The arrest took place on May 23 or 24, 1535.
Notwithstanding energetic efforts on the part of
Poyntz and other friends, he was kept many
months in this prison. Early in 1536, his trial by
the Council of Brabant began, and on August 10,
1536, he was 'degraded and condemned into the
hands of the secular power.' The only letter of
Tindale's which has yet been discovered, is one
written in Latin at Vilvorde in the winter of 1535,
and addressed to the governor of the castle. It
asks for warmer clothing, and then ' but above all
I entreat and beseech your clemency to be urgent
82

COVERDALE'S BIBLE, 1535
with the Procureur that he may kindly permit me
to have my Hebrew Bible, Hebrew Grammar, and
Hebrew Dictionary, that I may spend my time
with that study. And in return, may you obtain
your dearest wish, provided it be consistent with
the salvation of your soul.' Thus, up to the last,
Tindale's thoughts and desires were towards his
life-work. Two months passed between his sen
tence and execution. On October 6, 1536, he was
strangled, and then his body was burned. ' He
cried,' says Foxe, ' at the stake with a fervent, great
and a loud voice, " Lord, open the King of Eng
land's eyes."' A noble end to the noble life of
' the Apostle of England.' To calculate his
influence for good upon the life of the English
nation, we have no adequate standard of measure
ment. Here are one or two examples of this
influence. Bilney, one of the early converts to Protestantism
in Henry VIII.'s reign, in 1529 recanted, from fear
of Tunstal's threats, and for two years suffered the
stings of an accusing conscience. At the end of
that time ' he came at length to some quiet of con
science, being fully resolved to give over his life
for the confession of that truth which before he
had denounced. He took his leave in Trinity
Hall of certain of his friends and said he would
go up to Jerusalem. . . . And so, setting forth
on his journey toward the celestial Jerusalem, he
departed from thence to the anchoress in Norwich,
and there gave her a New Testament of Tyndale's
83

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
translation and The Obedience of a Christian Man,
whereupon he was apprehended and carried to
prison, there to remain till the blind bishop Nixe
sent up for a writ to burn him.'
Bainham, a London lawyer, had also recanted,
but afterwards ' was never quiet in mind or con
science until the time he had uttered his fall to all
his acquaintance and asked God and all the world
forgiveness. And the next Sunday after he came
to St. Austin's with the New Testament in his
hand in English and The Obedience of a Christian
Man in his bosom, and stood up there before all
the people in his pew, there declaring openly, with
weeping tears, that he had denied God.' ' After
this,' adds Foxe, ' he was strengthened above the
cruel death by fire with remarkable courage.'
Incidents like these are the measure of Tindale's
power and the influence he had exerted over the
religious thought and action of many of the noblest
men of his day.
[Bagster reprinted the 1535 Coverdale Bible in
1838 in a quarto volume. This can often now be
found at the second-hand booksellers, and is a
reliable reprint]

84

Chapter VI
MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
IT is a noteworthy fact that all the men to whose
efforts the first six editions of either parts or
the whole of the English Bible in the sixteenth
century were due perished, with one exception, by a
violent death. Tindale, as we have already seen,
was martyred at Vilvorde in 1536; Cromwell, to
whose efforts the Great Bible of 1539 was due, was
executed in 1540 ; Cranmer, by whom the circula
tion of that Bible was extended in several subsequent
editions, was martyred in 1555 under Mary Tudor;
and Matthew, or, to call him by his right name,
John Rogers, was the first victim of the Marian
persecution. For circulating the Bible among the
English people, and implanting deeply within the
national heart Bible truth, here, as elsewhere, the
blood of the martyrs was the seed of the Church.
Coverdale's Bible of 1535, like Wycliffe's version,
being a translation of a translation, and not a
version direct from the original Hebrew and
Greek, could not hold its own against the more
perfect work of Tindale. And hence while of the
85

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
highest value in the eyes of the bibliographer,
Coverdale's Bible is relatively of smaller value in
the eyes of the student who is looking closely into
the history of the text of the English Bible.
Nothing can take from Coverdale the glory of
having sent forth the editio princeps of the English
printed Bible ; nothing can rob William Tindale
of the honour of having given to the English Bible
its literary form. Hence it was that, although
Coverdale's Bible was issued in 1535, it was
speedily supplanted by the large folio Bible of
1537. As representing the text finally incorpo
rated in both our A.V. and R.V., this, and not
Coverdale's, is the true editio princeps.
Bibieew'S Uncertainty and obscurity envelop the origin
of the 1537 Bible, no less than that of 1535. It is
by no means clear where it was printed, although
there is hardly room for doubt as to the man by
whose energy it was given to the English people.
It is a large folio volume, enriched with nearly
eighty woodcuts, and the page of print measures
twelve by six and a half inches. The first title runs
' The Byble which is all the Holy Scripture : in
whych are contayned the Olde and Newe Testa
ment truly and purely translated into English by
Thomas Matthew. Esaye i. Hearken ye heauens
and thou earth geaue eare : for the Lord speaketh.
m.d.xxxvii.' * This is printed in the centre of a
fine and elaborate woodcut which conveys the
lesson that the Law condemns and leads to death,
1 See the Frontispiece. 86

MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
while looking to the crucified Saviour redeems and
saves ; and at the foot of the page is printed, in a
very bold type, the words, ' Set forth with the
Kinge's most gracyous lycense.' Tindale had
offered in 1531 to come to England, give up all
further work in Bible translation, and even, if need
be, to die, if Henry VIII. would but consent to
publish the bare words of Scripture in the English
tongue. This was refused, and Tindale was
martyred in 1536, with the prayer on his lips,
' Lord, open the King of England's eyes.' In 1537
Matthew's Bible was licensed, containing not only
the bare words of Scripture, but also introductions,
summaries, and marginal notes. How had this
come about?
Tindale, towards the close of his life, had held
the post of chaplain to the English Company of
Adventurers or Merchants at Antwerp, and after
his arrest was succeeded in this office by John
Rogers. Although the Pentateuch, Book of Jonah,
and the New Testament, were the only portions of
his translation published in Tindale's lifetime, he
appears to have left such of his papers as escaped
the search of the officers who arrested him to
Rogers, as his literary executor, and among these
in MS. a translation of Joshua to 2 Chronicles in
clusive. Cranmer and Cromwell were both eager
for the circulation of the English Bible, and when
Matthew's edition was ready both used their
influence with Henry VIII. to get his sanction for
it. It is not certain yet by whom it was printed,
87

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
probably by Martin Emperour or by Jacob van
Meteren at Antwerp. A very able, persuasive,
and, considering the age in which it was written,
not unduly flattering Dedication to the king had
been prefixed to this edition of the Bible, and
signed ' Youre Grace's faythfull and true subject,
Thomas Matthew.' Although the evidence is not
absolutely convincing, there seems no reason to
doubt the generally received tradition that Thomas
Matthew was a name assumed by John Rogers to
conceal his identity, and the fact of his close
association with Tindale, whose books and trans
lations had been so recently condemned by the
king. A letter from Cranmer to Cromwell is
extant, dated August 4, 1537, in which the arch
bishop says —
' You shall receive by the bringer thereof a Bible in
English, both of a new translation and of a new print,
dedicated unto the King's Majesty as farther apparent
by a pistle unto his grace at the beginning of the book,
which in my opinion is very well done, and therefore I
pray your lordship to read the same. And as for the
translation, so far as I have read thereof, I like it better
than any other translation heretofore made; yet not
doubting that there may and will be found some fault
therein, as you know no man ever did or can do so
well, but it may be from time to time amended. And
forasmuch as the book is dedicated unto the King's
Grace, and also great pains and labour taken in the
setting forth of the same, I pray you, my lord, that you
will exhibit the book unto the King's Highness, and that

MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
you will obtain of his Grace, if you can, a licence that
the same may be sold and read of every person, without
danger of any Act, or proclamation, or ordinance hereto
fore granted to the contrary, until such time that we,
the bishops, shall set forth a better translation, which I
think will not be until a day after doomsday.'

Cromwell probably, and Cranmer possibly, did
not know that this ' New Translation ' was so largely
Tindale's work. Cromwell laid the book before
the king, obtained the royal licence, and it at once
began to circulate. This book having been printed
abroad, could only find an entrance into England
by being sold complete in sheets to some English
printer, and hence the expenses of the edition of
1,500 copies were borne by Richard Grafton and
Edward Whitchurch.
The text is a composite work, made up of the Description
. f , ' , J~ ofMatthew's
translations of Tindale and Coverdale. The only Bible.
part which Rogers seems to have added was the
Prayer of Manasses in the Apocrypha. This was
not given in Coverdale's Bible, and Rogers himself
translated it from the French Bible of Olivetan
(1535). A noteworthy feature of the book is the
elaborate preliminary matter, and the kind of
running commentary, explanatory and expository,
furnished by numerous side-notes. The title-page
is followed by a ' Kalendar ' occupying two leaves ;
then a page devoted to ' An Exhortation to the
Study of the Holy Scripture gathered out of the
Bible,' a collection of the chief texts enforcing
89

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
the duty of Scripture study. At the foot of this
page are printed the large capitals I.R., probably
standing for John Rogers. The presence of large
initials is one curious feature of the book. H.R.
stand at the end of the Dedication ; on the verso
of the title to Part ii. are R.G. and E.W., the
initials of the English printers who published the
books ; and at the close of Malachi are W.T.,
the initials of Tindale. After the exhortation
follows ' The Sum and Content of all the Holy
Scripture,' filling two pages, followed by the
Dedication, three pages, and ' A Table of the
Principal Matters contained in the Bible ' — a kind
of concordance, which fills thirteen leaves, and is
taken from Olivetan's French Bible. The last of
the twenty preliminary leaves has on the obverse
' The Names of all the Books of the Bible,' and
on the reverse a very large engraving of Adam
and Eve in Paradise. To each chapter of the
text is prefixed a brief summary of its contents ;
e.g., i Samuel xv. : —
'Saul is commanded to slay Amalek. He is dis
obedient to the voice of God, and saveth the spoil to
offer it to the Lord ; for which the Lord rejecteth
him and casteth him away. Samuel mourneth for
Saul.' The book is divided into four sections ; Genesis
to ' Solomon's Ballet,' 247 leaves ; Part ii., Isaiah
to Malachi, with separate title, 95 leaves ; Apo-
90

MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
crypha, separate title, 82 leaves ; New Testament,
separate title, in leaves; 556 leaves in all. The
colophon runs, ' To the honoure and prayse of God
was this Byble prynted and fynysshed in the yere
of oure Lorde God a, M.D.XXXVII.'
In addition to the handsome title engraving, the
Adam and Eve referred to above, and two fine
large engravings, one at the head of the Psalms,
and the other at the head of Proverbs, there are a
large number of small woodcuts inserted in the
text of the Old Testament, many of them identical
with those used in the 1535 Bible. The title-pages
to Parts ii. and iii. have sixteen and fifteen respec
tively of these small blocks arranged as an
ornamental border. Scattered through the New
Testament are blocks representing the various
apostles, and there are twenty-one illustrations in
the Apocalypse. Altogether there are ninety-three
distinct wood-blocks.
We select the following : 1 Samuel xv. <S-2E, specimens
0 of the Trans
In all English Bibles prior to the Geneva, pub- Jjj&'o?. ai}d
lished in 1560, the text is not broken up into Notes.
verses. It was uniformly printed in paragraphs,
as in the R.V., and for convenience of reference,
the letters 8, 33, <&, etc., were used for the suc
cessive portions of each chapter, and were printed
in the margin. It is a great misfortune that the
verse divisions were ever introduced. Nothing has
done more mischief in the way of conducing to
the misreading of the Bible. The section chosen
corresponds to verses 10-15, 22, 23.
91

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
' Then came the word of the Lord unto Samuel, say
ing, It repenteth me that I have made Saul king. For
he is turned from me, and hath not performed my com
mandments. Wherefore Samuel was evil afraid, and
cried unto the Lord all night. And it was told Samuel
that Saul was come to Carmel, and had set him up a
pillar of triumph, and was turned, and departed, and
gone to Gilgal. . . . And when Samuel was come to
Saul, Saul said unto him : Blessed be thou in the Lord,
I have done the commandment of the Lord. And Samuel
answered : What meaneth then the bleating of the sheep
in mine ears, and the noise of the oxen which I hear ?
And Saul said : They have brought them from the
Amalekites, for the people spared the best of the shepe
and of the oxen to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God,
and the remnant we have destroyed. . . . Then sayde
Samuel ; hath the Lorde as great pleasure in burnt
sacrifices and offerings as he hath that thou shouldst
obey his voice ? Behold to obey is better than offering,
and to give heed is better than the fat of rams. For
rebelliousness is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubborn
ness is wickedness and idolatry. Because therefore thou
has cast away the word of the Lorde, therefore hath the
Lord cast away thee also from being king.'
The marginal note on the first verse bravely
attacks the difficulty in this passage as follows :
' The repentance of God is only the changing of
the deed. And as the affection of mercy and of
fatherly love is attributed to God, even so doth
the Scripture attribute to God, after his (its)
manner of speech, the affection of anger, and of
fury, and of repentance also ; for men cannot
92

MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
otherwise speak of God. Genesis vi. a,' Upon
the latter part the marginal note runs : ' To obey
what ? Man's inventions, man's dreams and tradi
tions ? Nay, verily, but God's holy words, His
blessed commandments ; yea, and to obey them is
better than to offer sacrifice which yet was ordained
and appointed of God Himself. How much better
then is it than our offerings, which are invented
without any God's Word, or any mention thereof
made the whole Scripture through ?
' To be cast away from the Lord is to be
blinded, and to despair of the goodness of God.'
Upon the closing section of 2 Kings ii., the
story of the children who mocked Elisha, the
note is : —
' The contempt of godly men, chiefly preachers, is an
offence most grievous, whose authority ought to be most
holy and reverent to all the people, whom he that
receiveth or againsaieth receiveth or rejecteth God.
Fathers while they correct not the wantonness of their
children, while they hold them not under nurture, while
they suffer them to jest and scoff with every man, and
let them attempt everything unpunished, the Lord
punisheth them with the children in many ways.'
As an example of the large section of this
Bible, taken from Coverdale's translation, and of
the marginal commentary added by Rogers, we
quote the first Psalm : —
'Blessed is the man that goeth not in the counsel
of the ungodly ; that abideth not in the way of sinners,
93

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
and sitteth not in the seat of the scornful. But
delighteth in the law of the Lord, and exerciseth
himself in His law both day and night. Such a man
is like a tree planted by the waterside, that bringeth
forth his fruit in due season'. His leaves shall not
fall off, and look, whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.
As for the ungodly it is not so with them ; but they
are like the dust which the wind scattereth away
from off the ground. Therefore the ungodly shall not
be able to stand in the judgment, neither the sinners
in the congregation of the righteous. For the Lord
alloweth the way of the righteous, but the way of the
ungodly shall perish.'
The marginal notes affixed to this Psalm are
as follows : —
a. ' The way of sinners is their manners and or
dinances, in which they walk, as it were, in a way.
Way in the Scripture is taken for whatsoever we do
or go about, be it good or evil, as in the last verse
of this Psalm.'
b. 'To sit in the seat of the scornful is to conspire
with them, and to become fellows of their mischief,
as in the Psalm xxv. 36.'
c. ' To stand in judgment is to win the process and
to have sentence pronounced on their sides ; as to
rob judgment is to let the process, and to have
sentence pronounced against right and truth. Isaiah
x. 3. So then this text meaneth no more but that
the wicked shall have such a terrible sentence given
upon them, that they shall not be able to abide when the
Lord shall come to the general judgment ; it meaneth
not that the wicked shall not appear in the judgment.'
94

MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
From 2 Chronicles to the end of the Apocrypha,
the text of Matthew's Bible is taken from the
Coverdale 1535 Bible. The only addition which
Rogers seems to have made is that already noted,
' the Prayer of Manasses,' from the Olivetan
French Bible of 1535. The New Testament is,
of course, Tindale's, and approximates closely to
the text of the 1535-34 G. H. Testament. It
is both appropriate and instructive, that this
great primary version of the English Bible
should contain the best work of the two chief
translators — the Testament and the Pentateuch
of Tindale, and the Psalter of Coverdale.
In the year which saw the issue of Matthew's otherEditions of
Bible, two other editions of the English Bible 1537.
appeared, both reprints of Coverdale's Bible, and
both printed by Nicolson, at St. Thomas's Hos
pital, in Southwark. One of these is a large
handsome folio, printed throughout in bold
English Black Letter. It is, if anything, rarer
than the 1535 Bible, and is generally believed
to be the first complete Bible printed in England.
It is divided into six sections, Genesis to Ruth,
1 Samuel to Esther, Job to Solomon's Ballettes,
Isaiah to Malachi, Apocrypha and New Testa
ment. All except Part iii. have separate titles.
There are many wood-blocks, all but one, a cut
of Jonah, being identical with those in the
1535 Bible. Three in the 1535 — Gideon's men,
Ark in Dagon's House, and David and Bathsheba
— are not found in the 1537. Although described
95

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE

Coverdale's Latin-Eng lish Testa
ments.

on the first title as ' newly overseen and corrected,'
the text is identical with the 1535.
The quarto edition is a handsome well printed
book, of which the only known perfect copy is
in the John Rylands Library.
Coverdale differed in many important respects
from Tindale. The martyr was cast in the heroic
mould. The iron of Romish wrong and super
stition had entered deeply into his soul, and he
would have no compromise with it. He yearned
to set his brethren free, and to enable them to
enjoy the freedom he had himself found. Hence,
he rejected as far as possible the Vulgate, he
dropped all technical words, he poured the
bitterest scorn upon all unscriptural Romish
ceremonies. He was the bold and progressive
reformer. Coverdale, on the other hand, though
none the less eager to circulate the Scriptures,
so that all might read them, looked much more
tenderly on the old text, and preferred to alter
only where alteration was inevitable. To meet
the case of those who knew only Latin, Coverdale
in 1538 prepared an edition of the New Testament
in quarto, giving in parallel columns the Latin
New Testament, with a literal English version,
Having to leave England, this was entrusted to
Nicolson to see through the press, and in 1538
it was published. Coverdale, then in Paris,
received in due time a copy, and upon inspecting
it was greatly chagrined to find it full of what
he considered very serious printer's errors. He
96

MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
went so far as to get Francis Regnault, the
famous Paris printer, to print him a beautiful
little Latin-English Testament, to replace that

FIRST TITLE-PAGE OF THE SECOND EDITION OF
COVERDALE'S BIBLE.

which Nicolson had so bungled. Then in his
turn Nicolson appears to have issued a second
edition of his Latin-English Testament. From
the fact that some copies of this edition have
97 G

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
upon the title-page ' translated by Johan Holly-
bushe,' this edition is sometimes described as
the Hollybush Testament. In this way it came
to pass that 1538 saw no less than three issues
of this diglot Testament. In the same year
also, two quarto editions of Tindale's Testament
appeared, one printed in London, by Robert
Redman, and of this the Bodleian has a perfect
copy ; of the other, printer unknown, the Library
of Canterbury Cathedral possesses a copy.
In 1538 Matthew Crom, an Antwerp printer,
issued an edition of Coverdale's New Testament
in octavo. Although the text is Coverdale's,
these volumes contain Tindale's prologues. It
is, moreover, the most handsomely illustrated of
all these early Testaments, having about two
hundred woodcuts, all of those found in the
Apocalypse being full pages, and identical with
those in the 1536 quarto Tindale Testaments.
Many of the chapters have notes at the end,
and these do not appear to be the same as in
the Matthew's 1537 folio. There are copies in
the Libraries of the British Museum and of the
British and Foreign Bible Society.
Tavemer's This rare volume is a revision of Matthew's
folio by Richard Taverner, who, like Frith, had
been selected by Wolsey as a fellow of Cardinal
College, Oxford, now Christ Church. He was
arrested on the charge of reading Tindale's
Testament, but being released, studied law, was
admitted to the Inner Temple, and coming into
98

Bible.

MATTHEW'S BIBLE OF 1537
contact with Cromwell while the latter was
Chancellor of Cambridge, in 1537 became Clerk
of the Signet to Henry VIII. He published
his edition of the Bible in folio in 1539. The
title runs, 'The Most Sacred Bible which is the

MILES COVERDALE.

Holy Scripture, containing the Old and New
Testament, translated into English, and newly
recognised with great diligence after most faith
ful exemplars by Richard Taverner.' Taverner
was a good Greek scholar, and many of his
corrections are illustrations of this. His Bible
99

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
does not appear to have had any great influence
upon the revision of the text. His edition has
no woodcuts, and not a large number of notes.
It is said to have been issued also in quarto, in
parts, in 1539, so that those who could not afford
the whole might be able to buy a portion. In
1540 it appeared in several volumes in i2mo,
and the Old Testament was reprinted in a folio
Bible printed by John Day, in 1551. Though
imprisoned a second time after Cromwell's death,
he was again released, and lived until 1577. He
was licensed to preach in the reign of Edward VI.,
and Wood, in his Atheno3 Oxonienses, quotes him
as saying in a sermon at St. Mary's : ' Arrived
at the Mount of St. Mary's, on the stony stage
where I now stand, I have brought you some
fine biscuits, baked in the oven of charity,
carefully conserved for the chickens of the
church, the sparrows of the spirit, and the sweet
swallows of salvation.'

100

Chapter VII
THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
CROMWELL, as we have seen, was successful
in obtaining the licence of Henry VIII. for
the circulation of the 1537 Bible. It is surprising
that he was able to do so, when we bear in mind
the fact that, although Rogers had toned down
many of Tindale's references to the Romish
Church, some still remained, and the noted
Prologue to the Romans, a treatise that had
been openly condemned and prohibited, was
printed by Rogers in full. But even if he were
ignorant of these facts when he laid the book
before the king, Cromwell soon became ac
quainted with them and their probable influence.
This affords at any rate a reasonable explanation
of the way in which he pushed forward the Bible
of 1539. Possibly because the 1,500 copies of
Matthew's Bible were quickly sold, but more
probably from fear that the facts of the case
should come to the king's ears, or that they
might lead to serious trouble, Cromwell de
termined to have an edition of the Bible free
101

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
from these objections. To this end he appears
to have enlisted Coverdale's services, practically
as editor, for a series of letters are extant relating
to the matter, written by Coverdale to his patron,
Thomas Cromwell.
Permission to print this Bible was obtained
from the French king, and the work was nearly
completed at the Royal Press, in Paris, which
was then famous for the style of its work ; and
yet, notwithstanding Cromwell's influence — he
then being at his zenith — the enemies of the
English Bible were able to get a decree em
powering them to suppress and seize the work.
Prior to this, and largely by the aid of Bishop
Bonner, then ambassador at Paris, after the
printing had been stopped, a large portion of
the printed sheets had been sent to London. A
quantity of the printed sheets that had been
seized and sold by the officer of the Inquisition
were afterwards re-purchased ; and finally, Crom
well, determined not to be beaten, empowered
Coverdale and Grafton, the London printer who
had gone over specially to assist Coverdale, and
who had a large financial risk in the enterprise,
to bring over to London suitable presses, types,
and workmen. This happened at the close of
1538, and by April, 1539, the needful printing
in London was finished, and the book was
complete. Henry VIII. issued a declaration 'to
be read by all curates upon the publishing of
the Bible in English,' enforcing the duty and
102

THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
right method of reading and studying the volume.
Cromwell, as vicar-general, enjoined upon every
incumbent ' that one book of the whole Bible
of the largest volume in English, should be set
up in some convenient place within the church,'
the cost to be shared by pastor and parishioners

THOMAS CROMWELL.

and urged them to ' expressly provoke, stir, and
exhort every person to read the same.'
While some of the descriptions of the eagerness
with which the English Bible was welcomed and
perused by the people generally may be too
highly coloured, there is no doubt that it was
eagerly welcomed by many, and that the reading,
103

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
marking, learning, and inwardly digesting the
Word of God — revealed for the first time to the
rank and file of English men and women by
Tindale's Testaments and Pentateuch, and by
the Bibles of 1535, 1537, and 1539 — developed
the true force that brought about the English
Reformation. A document published in 1539
states : —
' Englishmen have now in hand in every church and
place, and almost every man, the Holy Bible and New
Testament in their mother tongue, instead of the old
fabulous and fantastical books of the Table Round,
Lancelot du Lac, etc., and such other, whose impure
filth and vain fabulosity the light of God has abolished
utterly.' Strype, in his Life of Cranmer, says : —
' It was wonderful to see with what joy this Book of
God was received, not only among the learneder sort
and those that were noted lovers of the Reformation,
but generally all England over among all the vulgar and
common people ; and with what greediness God's Word
was read, and what resort to places where the reading of
it was. Everybody that could bought the book or
busily read it, or got others to read it to them, if they
could not themselves, and divers more elderly people
learned to read on purpose. And even little boys
flocked among the rest to hear portions of the Holy
Scripture read.'
This large folio, known as the Great Bible, is
not inaptly styled ' the whole Bible of the largest
104

THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
volume in English,' inasmuch as the page of type
measures 13J by f\ inches. In it also appears
for the first time the celebrated engraved title-
page which is attributed to Holbein, and which
enshrines a long chapter of contemporary history
and thought. It occupies the whole page, with
the exception of a small space in the centre for
the printed title. At the top, the Saviour is
represented in the clouds of heaven, and two
labels contain His words in the Latin of the
Vulgate — that on the left, ' So shall My word
be that goeth forth out of My mouth ; it shall
not return unto Me void, but it shall accomplish
that which I please ' ; that on the right, ' I have
found a man after Mine own heart, which shall
fulfil all My will.' This latter is directed towards
the king, who has laid aside his crown, and is
kneeling, repeating Psalm cxix. 105 : ' Thy word
is a lamp to my feet' This occupies about two
inches of the top portion of the engraving,
extending over its whole breadth. In the centre,
directly beneath the figure of the Saviour, is
another representation of Henry VIII. He is
seated on his throne, with the royal arms and
motto beneath his feet. With his right hand
he is giving the Word of God to Cranmer,
behind whom stand the bishops, with the words
of 1 Tim. iv. 1 1 : ' These things command and
teach ' ; and with his left hand he is presenting
a similar volume to Cromwell, behind whom
stand the nobles, with the words of Deut. i.
105

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
16, if: 'Judge righteously ... ye shall hear the
small as well as the great.' Lower still, on the
right hand of the central printed title, Cromwell
is pictured again, his coat-of-arms at his feet,
giving the book to laymen, with the words of
Psalm xxxiv. 14 : ' Depart from evil, and do
good : seek peace, and pursue it.' On the left
side stands Cranmer, with the mitre on his
brow, and his coat-of-arms at his feet, giving
the book to the clergy and saying, ' Feed the
flock of God which is among you.' The whole
of the lower third of the engraving is filled with
figures representative of the life of the time. A
preacher is expounding 1 Tim. ii. 1, 2. Around
him is seated a company of men and women,
exactly like the assemblies at St. Paul's Cross
depicted in early engravings, crying out, Vivat
Rex ! and ' God save the king ! ' In the right
hand lower corner, men and women, children,
and even prisoners, are represented as uttering
the same cries. The whole picture, in short,
whether the work of Holbein or not, is a true
reflex of the feelings and opinions of the time,
and not only indicates the general thanksgiving
for the boon of the pure Word of God, but also
immortalises the two men to whom the English
nation is much more deeply indebted than it
has always realised — Thomas Cromwell and
Archbishop Cranmer.
The centre of this elaborate wood engraving
contains the following letterpress : ' The Bible in
106

FIRST TITLE-PAGE, GREAT BIBLE, I53O.
{Size of woodblock, 13I by <$ inches.)

107

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
English that is to say the content of all the
Holy Scripture both of the Old and New
Testament truly translated after the verity of
the Hebrew and Greek texts by the diligent
study of divers excellent learned men expert in
the foresaid tongues.' The colophon runs, ' The
end of the New Testament and of the whole
Bible, finished in April, Anno. M.CCCCC.XXXIX.,
a Domino factum est istud.' Including the title
there are six preliminary leaves, and the text
is in five sections, Genesis to Deuteronomy, 84
leaves; Joshua to Job, separate title, 122 leaves;
Psalms to Malachi, separate title, 133 leaves;
Hagiographa, separate title in same border as
first, 79 leaves ; New Testament, separate title,
103 leaves.
The Great Bible of 1539 was followed by no
less than six editions of practically the same
book, issued in the brief space of time comprised
between April, 1540, and December, 1541. These
were printed in this rapid succession in order to
meet the demand for the copies that had to be
placed in the churches, and also to satisfy the
general desire for them, so clearly indicated by
the extracts given above. It has been calculated
that no less than twenty thousand of these great
folios were thus issued. These six editions are
commonly described as Cranmer's Bible, not
because he had any active share in the translation,
but because he wrote an admirable introduction
which is prefixed to them all, entitled, 'A Prologue
108

THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
or Preface made by the most reverend father in
God, Thomas, Archbishop of Canterbury, Metro
politan and Primate of England.' This is a
most characteristic production, exhibiting many
of Cranmer's strong points, illustrating the spirit
of the time, and worth the careful study of every
student of the English Bible.
We have space for only the opening sen
tences : —

' For two sundry sorts of people, it seemeth much
necessary that something in the entry of this book,
by the way of a preface or prologue, whereby hereafter
it may be both the better accepted of them, which
hitherto could not well bear it ; and also the better used
of them which heretofore have misused it. For truly
some there are that be too slow and need of the spur ;
some others seem too quick and need more of the
bridle. Some lose their game by short shooting, some
by over shooting. Some walk too much on the left
hand, some too much on the right. In the former sort
be all they who refuse to read, or to hear read, the
Scripture in the vulgar tongue, much worse they that
also let (hinder) or discourage the others from the
reading or hearing thereof. In the latter sort be they
which by their inordinate reading, indiscreet speaking,
contentions, disputing, or otherwise, by their licentious
living, slander or hinder the Word of God most of
all other, whereof they would seem to be greatest
furtherers. These two sorts, albeit they be most far
unlike each other, yet they both deserve in effect like
reproach. Neither can I well tell whether of them
I may judge the more offender, him that doth
109

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
obstinately refuse so godly and goodly knowledge ; or
him that so ungodly and so ungoodly doth abuse the
same. And as touching the former I would marvel
much that any man should be so mad as to refuse
in darkness light, in hunger food, in cold fire, for
the Word of God is light, "Thy Word is a lamp
to my feet " ; food, " Man doth not live by bread
alone, but by every word of God " ; fire, " I came
to send fire on the earth, and what will I if it be
already kindled?" I would marvel, I say, at this,
save that I consider how much custom and usage
may do. So that if there were a people, as some
write, which never saw the sun by reason that they
be situated far toward the North Pole, and be inclosed
and overshadowed with high mountains, it is credible
and like enough that if by the power and will of
God, the mountains should sink down, and give place,
that the light of the sun might have entrance to them,
some of them would be offended therewith.'
In the 1539 Bible the engraved title-page
already described stands as the first title, and
also before the Apocrypha ; in the six Cranmer
Bibles it stands as both Old Testament and
New Testament title. Cromwell was executed
in July, 1540, and in the editions issued sub
sequent to that date the circle occupied by his
coat-of-arms is left a blank.
The English printers, Grafton and Whitchurch,
undertook the issue of the 1539 and six sub
sequent editions of this Bible, assisted by a
wealthy citizen named Anthony Marler. The
fixed price was twelve shillings bound, and ten
no

THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
shillings unbound. These sums represent in the
money of to-day about £g and £y ios. respec
tively. Church records show that copies were
sometimes sold at a lower figure — e.g., at Ash-
burton there is the following entry: 'A.D. 1 540-1.
Paid vs. \xi\d. for a new booke called a Bybyll.
Paid vu\d. for a chaine for fastenynge the saide
booke.' Assuming this to be a bound copy, it
cost less than half what the printers were
authorised to charge.
Many interesting questions arise in connection
with the text of these seven editions. There is
now no room for doubt that Coverdale took
the text of Matthew's Bible as the basis, and
that his chief guide in the revision, the one to
whom he owed most, was a new Latin version
of the Old Testament, with the Hebrew Text,
and a commentary taken mainly from Hebrew
sources by Sebastian Miinster, published in
1534-35. To this source may be traced nearly
all the alterations introduced into Genesis to
2 Chronicles. That part of the Old Testament
which was more especially Coverdale's work,
viz., Ezra to Malachi, exhibits much the larger
number of alterations. The revision of the
New Testament was the result chiefly of a
more careful study of the Vulgate and of the
Latin version of Erasmus. To the influence of
the Vulgate were due such insertions as ' that ye
may rejoice, and that your joy may be full,' in
1 John i. 4 ; and ' He that knowledgeth the Son
in

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
hath the Father also', ii. 23 ; but these, like the
interpolation 1 John v. 7, are printed in smaller
type, to mark their Latin origin. To the same
source may be traced that very unfortunate
rendering in John x. 16, 'onefold' instead of 'one
flock.' A further revision of the text also took
place between the publication of the 1539 Bible
and the editions of April and November, 1540.
For example, in the former, James i. 13 reads,
' For God cannot tempt unto evil, because He
tempteth no man'; in the 1540 Bibles it stands,
' For as God cannot be tempted with evil, so
neither He Himself tempteth any man,' a change
due to the version of Erasmus.
The Book of Psalms, as it stands in the Great
Bible, is of very special interest, since it is the
translation which passed into the Prayer Book in
Edward VI. 's time, and amid all subsequent
changes and revisions has there maintained its
ground. When the Prayer Book was last revised,
so far back as 1662, the direction was given that
the other lessons were to be taken from the
Authorised Version, but the Psalms were not to
be altered. The phraseology of Coverdale's
version had become too familiar by long use to
allow of alteration, and choirs found it, or thought
they did, smoother and easier to sing. As else
where, in the Psalms insertions from the Vulgate
are marked by being printed in smaller type in the
1539 Bible. Unfortunately this is not done in the
Prayer Book, and few who use the latter are aware
112

THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
that it contains many whole sentences and phrases
that form no part of the true text of the Psalms.
Compare, for instance, Psalm xiv. in the Prayer
Book and Authorised Version, and in the former
three whole verses, and parts of two others, will be
found which do not stand in the latter.
This series of seven large folio editions of the
Bible came into existence at one of the most
critical periods of English history ; in their pro
duction and circulation were associated a group of
very notable and very able men ; and now the
ambition of great collectors — a very difficult and
costly one — is to secure fine and perfect copies of
each, such as may be seen either at the British
Museum, or at the library of the British and
Foreign Bible Society.
From both the bibliographical and the textual
points of view, the Great Bible and the six sub
sequent editions present difficult problems. No
subsequent edition is an exact reprint of the 1539,
and all alike exhibit indications of careful editorial
revision. That published in April, 1540, was
further revised by Coverdale ; those of November,
1540, and of May, 1541 are nearer the 1539 text.
Upon the title-page of the editions of November,
1540 and 1 541, appear the words, 'overseen and
perused at the commandment of the King's
Highness by the right reverend fathers in God,
Cuthbert, Bishop of Durham, and Nicolas, Bishop
of Rochester.' There is no doubt, further, that
each of these seven editions was set up in type
113 H

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
independently; and yet they are so much alike
that it is very common indeed to find copies of
one edition containing leaves which belong to
another. But those who wish to pursue this
subject must consult the late Francis Fry's elabo
rate book, A Description of the Great Bible, folio,
1865.
Accession of The close of the reign of Henry VIII. was
stormy and reactionary, and after the last edition
of the Great Bible in December, 1541, no further
editions were printed until Henry's death. Con
troversy was raging throughout the country. The
Word of God in English was accessible to almost
every one, and bitter Romanist antagonism had
been stirred up by the reading of the Bible, and
the suppression of the monasteries. Henry him
self grew more and more arbitrary and tyrannical,
while the Act of Supremacy on the one hand, and
the Statute of the Six Articles on the other,
brought both Roman Catholics and Protestants
under the charge of treason and the penalty of
death. With the accession of Edward VI. a better
state of things began, and at once gave new influ
ence and force to Cranmer and the Protestant
party. The change immediately reacted upon
Bible circulation. According to Dr. Eadie {The
English Bible, vol. i. p. 423), 'In the reign of
Edward numerous editions of former versions
were published, amounting to thirty-five editions
of the New Testament, and thirteen of the whole
Bible.' None of these exerted any special influ-
114

THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
ence upon the English text, but they all helped to
familiarise the mind of the common people with
the words and promises and spirit of Scripture,
and thus laid the foundation of the true English
Reformation. Neither Henry's politic break with
Rome, nor the fact that nobles, and prelates, and
statesmen, tried to play with the spirit of reform,
and to direct it for their own selfish and often
base ends, enabled the nation to resist the reaction
under Mary. The force which resisted all her
passion, and craft, and power, mercilessly employed
to thrust the nation's neck once more beneath the
cruel yoke of Rome, was the knowledge of Scrip
ture, and the belief in its saving power, which had
sunk so deeply into the hearts of multitudes of
her subjects. The reign of Edward had been a
seedtime, the harvest was the noble army of
martyrs, rich and poor, high and lowly, educated
and illiterate, who chose to die rather than bow
the knee again to the Pope of Rome.
It would be beside the purpose of this little Editions of
book to do more than mention a few of these 1553.
editions. In 1549, there were issued three folio
Bibles; an exact reprint of Matthew's 1537, by
Raynalde and Hyll, a book which has the dis
tinction of being the worst printed of all the early
English Bibles ; an edition of Matthew's, revised
by Edmund Becke, and printed by Day & Seres ;
and an edition of Cranmer's Bible, printed by
Edmund Whitchurch. In 1550, there appeared a
quarto volume — a new edition of Coverdale's (1535)
U5

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE

Editions of
New Testa
ment, 1547-
1553.

Bible, which had been printed by Froschover, at
Zurich, and which was re-issued in London with
preliminary leaves, printed in England, first by
Andrew Hester, and then in 1553, by Richard
Jugge. Of the New Testaments issued between 1547
and 1553 we can mention only a few. Mr. Fry
in his most valuable book, The Editions of the
New Testament, Tyndale's Version, 1525 to 1566,
describes no less than fifteen editions, printed in
England. Of these, the most noteworthy are
William Powell's quarto (1548), containing also
the Latin version of Erasmus ; one in octavo,
printed by Thomas Gaultier, also with the Latin
of Erasmus (1550); and the three handsome
quarto editions, with many woodcuts, printed by
Richard Jugge in 1552 and 1553. Upon the
reverse of the title of the first of these editions is
printed a royal warrant authorising the edition,
and stating, ' Upon due examination of his
(Richard Jugge's) charges and expenses we have
estimated that the price of twenty-and-twopence
for every book in papers (sheets) and unbound is
a reasonable and convenient price for the same
according. At Greenwich the X. of June,
M.D.LI I.' Reckoning money as fifteen times
more valuable then than now, Jugge sold his
Testaments unbound for twenty-seven shillings
and sixpence.
The reign of Mary Tudor was a season of
Persecution. reactiori) ancj jn her determined but fruitless effort
116

The Marian

THE GREAT BIBLE OF 1539
to restore the Papacy in England, unrelenting war
was waged against the English Bible. But the
nation which had become permeated with the
spirit of Tindale, and which had read and re-read
and deeply studied the New Testament, nobly
vindicated his expectation. He had been moved
to translate the New Testament ' because,' to use
his own words, ' I had perceived by experience
how that it was impossible to establish the lay
people in any truth except the Scripture were
plainly laid before their eyes in their mother
tongue.' This he had done, and in doing it he
had raised up a barrier against which all the might
and all the fanaticism of Mary Tudor and Reginald
Pole were powerless.
Fascinating from this point of view as the Rogers'
details of Mary's reign are, we linger only upon
one incident. As noted above, there is no reason
to doubt what has been the steady tradition
since 1 5 36, that John Rogers as Tindale's literary
executor saw through the press the splendid Bible
°f 1 537- Eighteen years later, he was to pay
dearly for his courage, and for the steadfastness
with which he clung to the simple truth of Scrip
ture. In 1548 he returned to England, after years
of exile. On May 10, 1550, he became Vicar of
St. Sepulchre's Church, the handsome building
standing at the Newgate Street end of Holborn
Viaduct, and known to the last and to this gene
ration as the church which tolled for the executions
in Newgate. On August 24, 1551, he became a
117

Martyrdom.

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
prebendary of St. Paul's along with Grindal, after
ward Archbishop of Canterbury, and Bradford,
who, like himself, was a victim in the Marian
persecution. He also held for a brief season a
lectureship in divinity at St. Paul's. Life brings
about strange changes, and among his fellow pre
bendaries was a certain Gabriel Dunne or Donne,
infamous in history as having been concerned in
the plot which led to Tindale's betrayal. Rogers,
as one of the foremost popular champions of
Reformed doctrine, was among the very first to
feel the force of the Romanist reaction. Ordered
in August, 1553, to keep to his house, he was
next sent to Newgate under a gaoler, whom Foxe
describes, his name being Alexander Andrew, as
' a right Alexander, a coppersmith indeed.' His
trial is fully detailed in Foxe, and should be read
by every one desiring to gain a correct idea of
what the reformers taught, and what the Romish
bishops of the sixteenth century condemned.
From the chancellor, Stephen Gardiner, no mercy
could be expected. He was finally condemned,
together with Bishop Hooper, in the Lady Chapel
of St. Saviour's, Southwark, an ancient part of that
building, very much the same in appearance now
as when Rogers defended himself there ; and on
February 4, 1555, in the presence of an immense
concourse of onlookers, he was burnt in Smithfield
— the first of the Marian martyrs.

118

Chapter VIII
THE GENEVA BIBLE
THE accession to the throne of the daughter
of Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn marked a
step forward in the history of the English Bible.
Greatly as Elizabeth disliked the growing Puritan
party in the Church of England, and heavily as
she laid her hand upon all who dared to think for
themselves in religious matters, the era had passed
when for either reading or translating the Bible
any Englishman could be condemned to death.
But in her reign, as in that of her father, the
impulse in the direction of Bible revision came
from without rather than within. It was due,
not so much to the dignitaries and scholars of the
Church, as to the men who had been driven into
exile by their evangelical belief and godly life.
Geneva, under the influence of John Calvin, had The Exiles
become the great centre of the Reformation life atGeneva-
and influence upon the Continent. Upon the
death of Edward VI. many influential English
reformers had fled, some to Strasburg, some to
Zurich, and some to Frankfort and other German
119

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
towns. But in 1555 a little company of influential
men, displeased with the result of discussions upon
matters of ritual which took place at Frankfort,
removed to Geneva, and became closely associated
there with Calvin. Chief among these were John
Knox, Miles Coverdale, Thomas Cole, Christopher
Goodwin, formerly Professor of Divinity at Oxford,
and later an extreme Nonconformist leader ; John
Pullain, Anthony Gilbey, Thomas Sampson, and
William Whittingham. Of the last three, Gilbey
was a Cambridge man, the other two were from
Oxford. It is to the labours of these three men,
in the main, that the translation known as the
Geneva Bible, which was for over seventy-five
years the version in daily use among the English
people, was due. Gilbey returned to England,
became Vicar of Ashby-de-la-Zouch, and died in
1584. Sampson had been Dean of Chichester in
the reign of Edward VI.; in 1561 he became
Dean of Christ Church, Oxford, but in 1564 was
deprived of his office for holding Nonconformist
views. William Whittingham was born near
Durham in 1524, he was educated at Brasenose
College, Oxford, and in 1545 was a Fellow of All
Souls'. He left England in June, 1554, and at
Geneva, in 1555, he married the sister of John
Calvin. In 1559 he succeeded John Knox as
pastor of the English Church at Geneva ; in 1560
returned to England, and in 1563 was made Dean
of Durham. He contributed a number of the
metrical or singing psalms to what was known as
120

THE GENEVA BIBLE
Sternhold and Hopkins' collection, and died in
1579- In the year 1557 Conrad Badins, a well-known Testamentof
Geneva printer, issued a small thick octavo volume, I557-
with the title, ' The New Testament of our Lord
Jesus Christ, conferred diligently with the Greek
and best approved translations. With the argu
ments as well before the chapters as for every book
and epistle, also diversities of readings, and most
profitable annotations of all hard places : where-
unto is added a copious Table.' The centre of the
title-page is adorned with an odd little woodcut,
in which Time is depicted as bringing Truth (a
female figure very much unadorned) out of the
tomb, with the motto, ' God by Time restoreth
Truth and maketh her victorious.' The book is
printed in Roman letter, and is the first example
of a portion of Scripture printed in English broken
up into verses. Prefixed to the text are : (1) ' The
Epistle declaring that Christ is the End of the
Law,' by John Calvin ; (2) ' To the Reader mercy
and peace through Christ our Saviour.'
This latter gives the main reasons why the book
was printed, and the principles upon which it was
based. It points out that —
' In the Church of Christ there are three kinds of men :
some are malicious despisers of the Word and graces of
God, who turn all things into poison, and a farther
hardening of their hearts : others do not openly resist
and contemn the Gospel, because they are struck as it
were in a trance with the majesty thereof, yet either they
121

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
quarrel and cavil, or else deride and mock at whatsoever
thing is done for the advancement of the same. The
third sort are the simple lambs which partly are already
in the fold of Christ, and so willingly hear their Shep
herd's voice, and partly wandering astray by ignorance
tarry the time till the Shepherd find them and bring
them unto His flock. To this kind of people in this
translation I chiefly had respect, as moved unto zeal,
counselled by the godly, and drawn by occasion, both of
the place where God hath appointed us to dwell, and
also of the store of heavenly learning and judgment
which so aboundeth in this city of Geneva, that justly
it may be called the patron and mirrour of true religion
and godliness.'
This edition of the New Testament, which
appears to have been done by Whittingham un
aided, has been reprinted by Bagster, and later
the text was included in Bagster's Hexapla, in
which book it would have been much more useful
to have reproduced the New Testament from
the Geneva Bible of 1560. Whittingham, after
emphasising the fact that he has translated from
the best Greek texts, and has had ' conference of
translations in other tongues,' refers to the annota
tions wherewith ' I have endeavoured so to profit
all thereby that both the learned and others might
be helped : for to my knowledge I have omitted
nothing unexpounded, whereby he that is anything
exercised in the Scriptures of God might justly
complain of hardness ; and also in respect of
them that have more profited in the same, I have
122

THE GENEVA BIBLE
explicated all such places by the best learned
interpreters, as either falsely expounded by some,
or else absurdly applied by others.' The book
fully bears out this statement, inasmuch as there
is hardly a page without marginal notes, and most
pages 'are full of them. They possess a special
interest as being the first example of the Geneva
notes, afterwards so famous.
Three years after the appearance of Whitting- The Geneva
ham's Testament, that is, in the year 1 560, there
issued from the press in Geneva a noble edition of
the whole Bible in English. It is a quarto volume,
the page being nine inches long by six and a
quarter inches broad. The title-page runs : ' The
Bible and Holy Scriptures contained in the Old
and New Testament. Translated according to the
Ebrue and Greke, and conferred with the best
translations in divers languages. With most pro
fitable Annotations upon all the hard places, and
other things of great importance, as may appear
in the Epistle to the Reader.'
Below this stands a woodcut of the crossing of
the Red Sea, with the words of Exod. xiv. 13
above it : ' Fear not, stand still, and behold the
salvation of the Lord, which He will show to you
this day.' Running up the left side of the cut are
the words, ' Great are the troubles of the righteous,'
and down the right side, ' But the Lord delivereth
them out of all. Psa. xxxiv. 19.' Below the cut,
' The Lord shall fight for you, therefore hold you
your peace. Exod. xiv. 14.' The imprint is, 'At
123

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Geneva. Printed by Rouland Hall, M.D.LX.' On
the back of the title is ' The Names and Order of
all the Books of the Old and New Testament, with
the number of their chapters, and the leaf where
they begin.' The order of the books is the same
as in the A.V. and R.V., and the ' Books called
Apocrypha' are included. The book is folioed,
not paged, in Arabic numerals, the Old Testament
and Apocrypha extending to 474 folios, the New
Testament to 122 folios, a total in all of 596 folios,
or 1,192 pages. The New Testament has a separate
title, very similar to the first title, and containing
the same wood-block. Prefixed to the Old
Testament are —
1. 'To the most virtuous and noble Queen Elizabeth
Queen of England and France and Ireland, etc., Your
humble subjects of the English Church at Geneva, wish
grace and peace from God the Father through Jesus
Christ our Lord ;
2. 'To our Beloved in the Lord, the Brethren of
England, Scotland, Ireland, etc., Grace, mercy, and
peace, through Christ Jesus.'
These two addresses cover three folios, or six
pages. After the New Testament come —
1. 'A brief table of the interpretation of the Proper
Names which are chiefly found in the Old Testament,
wherein the first number signifieth the chapter, the
second the verse.
2. 'A table of the principal things that are contained
in the Bible, after the order of the alphabet.
124

HE BIBLE

OL YSC R I P T V RES

f 8^ A^S l A T E ¥> sA C C Of^-

[

AT GENEVA-
- M D- L X-

... ' - I

FIRST TITLE-PAGE, GENEVA BIBLE, 1560.
(Size of original c,\ by 6J inches.)

125

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
3. *"A Perfite Supputation of the Yeres and Times
from Adam unto Christ, proved by the Scriptures, after
the collection of divers authors," followed by the words,
in large type, of "Joshua i. 8. Let not this book of the
Law depart out of thy mouth, but meditate therein day
and night, that thou mayest observe and do according to
all that is written therein : so shalt thou make thy way
prosperous,, and then shalt thou have good success."
4. 'The order of the years from Paul's conversion,
showing the time of his peregrination, and of his Epistles
written to the Churches.'
The Address These pieces occupy fourteen folios, or twenty-
eight pages.
The address to Queen Elizabeth is a very
different composition from some of the earlier
Biblical dedications to Henry VIII., and from the
fulsome flattery of James I., which still disfigures
the A.V. It begins by showing how hard it is ' to
enterprise any worthy act,' and that nothing is
more difficult than 'the building of the Lord's
Temple, the House of God, the Church of Christ,
whereof the Son of God is the head and perfection.'
It continues : —
' Considering, therefore, how many enemies there are,
which by one means or other, as the adversaries of
Judah and Benjamin went about to stay the buildings
of that Temple, so labour to hinder the course of this
building (whereof some are Papists, who, under pretence
of favouring God's Word, traitorously seek to erect
idolatry and to destroy your Majesty ; some are world
lings, who as Demas have forsaken Christ for the love
126

THE GENEVA BIBLE
of this world ; others are ambitious prelates, who as
Amaziah and Diotrephes can abide none but them
selves ; and as Demetrius many practice sedition to
maintain their errors), we persuaded ourselves that there
was no way so expedient and necessary for the preserva
tion of the one and destruction of the other, as to present
unto your Majesty the Holy Scriptures faithfully and
plainly translated according to the languages wherein
they were first written by the Holy Ghost. For the
Word of God is an evident token of God's love and our
assurance of this defence, wheresoever it is obediently
received : it is the trial of the spirits, and as the Prophet
saith, it is as a fire and hammer to break the stony hearts
of them that resist God's mercies offered by the preach
ing of the same. Yea, it is sharper than any two-edged
sword to examine the very thoughts and to judge the
affections of the heart, and to discover whatsover lieth
under hypocrisy, and would be secret from the face of
God and His Church. So that this must be the first
foundation and groundwork, according whereunto the
good stones of this building must be framed, and the
evil tried out and rejected.'
After pointing out that impediments must be
removed, the kind of wisdom needful to the work,
the necessary zeal and diligence, that reliance upon
God is essential, and that without faith in Christ,
and good works as the result of faith, the building
cannot proceed, the address concludes : —
' For considering God's wonderful mercies toward you
at all seasons, who hath pulled you out of the mouth of
the lions, and how that from your youth you have been
brought up in the Holy Scriptures, the hope of all men
127

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
is so increased that they cannot but look that God should
bring to pass some wonderful work by your grace to the
universal comfort of His Church. Therefore, even
above strength you must show yourself strong and bold
in God's matters; and though Satan lay all his power
and craft together to hurt and hinder the Lord's build
ing : yet be you assured that God will fight from heaven
against this great dragon, the ancient serpent which is
called the devil and Satan, till He have accomplished
the whole worke, and made His Church glorious to
Himself without spot or wrinkle. For albeit all other
kingdoms and monarchies, as the Babylonians, Persians,
Grecians, and Romans have fallen and taken end : yet
the Church of Christ even under the Cross hath from
the beginning of the world been victorious, and shall be
everlastingly. Truth it is, that some time it seemeth to
be shadowed with a cloud, or driven with a stormy per
secution, yet suddenly the beams of Christ, the Sun of
justice, shine and bring it to light and liberty. If for a
time it lie covered with ashes, yet it is quickly kindled
again by the wind of God's Spirit. Though it seem
drowned in the sea, or parched and pined in the wilder
ness, yet God giveth ever good success, for He punisheth
the enemies and delivereth His, nourisheth them, and
still preserveth them under His wings. This Lord of
lords and King of kings, who hath ever defended His,
strengthen, comfort and preserve your Majesty, that you
may be able to build up the ruins of God's house to His
glory, the discharge of your conscience, and to the com
fort of all them that love the coming of Christ Jesus our
Lord. From Geneva, 10 April, 1560.'
The Address In the address 'To our Beloved,' the method
to the '
Readers. followed is described. The translators assert —

THE GENEVA BIBLE
' This we may with good conscience protest, that we
have in every point and word, according to the measure
of that knowledge which it pleased Almighty God to give
us, faithfully rendered the text, and in all hard places
most sincerely expounded the same. For God is our
witness that we have by all means endeavoured to set
forth the purity of the word and right sense of the Holy
Ghost for the edifying of the brethren in faith and
charity. Now, as we have chiefly observed the sense,
and laboured always to restore it to all integrity, so have
we most reverently kept the propriety of the words, con
sidering that the Apostles, who spake and wrote to the
Gentiles in the Greek tongue, rather constrained them
to the lively phrase of the Hebrew, than enterprised far
by mollifying their language to speak as the Gentiles did
and for this and other causes we have in many places
reserved the Hebrew phrases, notwithstanding that they
may seem somewhat hard in their ears that are not well
practised and also delight in the sweet sounding phrases
of the holy Scriptures. Yet, lest either the simple
should be discouraged, or the malicious have any occa
sion of just cavillation, seeing some translations read
after one sort, and some after another, whereas all may
serve to good purpose and edification, we have in the
margin noted that diversity of speech or reading which
may also seem agreeable to the mind of the Holy Ghost
and proper for our language.'
We give a few extracts of the text and marginal sPffim?ns
notes, which the reader can readily compare with version.
the A.V. and R.V. Gen. iii. 1-7 runs : —
1 Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of
the field, which the Lord God had made : and he said to
129 I

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
the woman, Yea, hath God in deed said, Ye shall not eat
of every tree of the garden ?
2 And the woman said unto the serpent, We eat of
the fruit of the trees of the garden,
3 But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of
the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither
shall ye touch it, lest ye die.
4 Then the serpent said to the woman, Ye shall not
die at all.
5 But God doth know that when ye shall eat thereof,
your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods
knowing good and evil.
6 So the woman (seeing that the tree was good
for meat, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a
tree to be desired to get knowledge) took of the fruit
thereof, and did eat, and gave also to her husband with
her, and he did eat.
7 Then the eyes of them both were opened, and they
knew that they were naked, and they sewed fig leaves
together, and made themselves breeches.
From the last word in this extract the absurd
custom has arisen of calling this Bible, and the sub
sequent editions of it, the ' Breeches Bible.' This
is akin to the senseless habit of calling the great
Gutenberg Latin Bible, the first book ever printed
from movable type, the Mazarine Bible, because
a copy was found in the library of that prelate.
It is true that all preceding translations had used
the word ' apurns ' (aprons), but the term breeches
was used in Wycliffe's MS. Bible, and in Caxton's
edition of the Golden Legend, printed in 1483. The
true title of this translation is that which places it
130

THE GENEVA BIBLE
in the proper historical setting and reveals also
something of its nature, viz., the Geneva Bible.
The reader will also notice that here, for the
first time in the Old Testament, we get the text
broken up into verses ; and the fact that this was
the first Bible to introduce the misleading and
injurious practice is the most serious charge that
can be brought against the masterpiece of
Whittingham and his associates.
The marginal notes on Gen. iii. 1-7 are interest- The • ,
0 ' Marginal
ing in themselves, and may serve as samples of Notes.
those which occur throughout the whole book.
1 Subtil. — As Satan can change himself into an
Angel of Light, so did he abuse the wisdom of the
serpent to deceive man.
2 He said. — God suffered Satan to make the serpent
his instrument, and to speak in him.
3 Lest ye die. — In doubting of God's threatenings,
she yielded to Satan.
4 Die. — This is Satan's chiefest subtilty, to cause us
not to fear God's threatenings.
5 Knowing good. — As though he should say, God
doth not forbid you to eat of the fruit, save that He
knoweth that if you should eat thereof, you should be
like to Him.
6 He did eat. — Not so much to please his wife, as
moved by ambition at her persuasion.
7 Knewe. — They began to feel their misery, but they
sought not to God for remedy.
As an example of the New Testament transla-
131

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
tion, we take the opening verses of Luke's
Gospel : —
i Forasmuch as many have taken in hand to set
forth the story of those things whereof we are fully
persuaded, 2 As they have delivered them unto us, which from
the beginning saw them theirselves, and were ministers
of the word,
3 It seemed good also to me (most noble Theophilus)
as soon as I had searched out perfectly all things from
the beginning, to write unto thee thereof from point to
point, ,
4 That thou mightest acknowledge the certainty of
those things whereof thou hast been instructed.
It was only to be expected that the notes in
this Bible should exhibit some decided traces of
Calvinistic doctrine, but on the whole they are not
so strongly tinged in this respect as might be
expected. It is true that two or three are some
times paraded, as though they were fair samples
of the whole. For example, on Rom. ix. 15 the
note is : —
' As the only will and purpose of God is the chief
cause of election and reprobation : so His free mercie
in Christ is an inferior cause of salvation, and the
hardening of the heart an inferior cause of damnation.'
On Rev. ix. 3 : —
'Locusts are false teachers, heretics, worldly, subtle
prelates, with monks, friars, cardinals, patriarchs, arch-
132

THE GENEVA BIBLE
bishops, bishops, doctors, bachelors, and masters, which
forsake Christ to maintain false doctrine.'

But in the great mass of instances the notes are
careful, scholarly, and very well calculated to in
struct and edify the reader. Many of them were
transferred bodily into the Bishop's Bible of 1568.
Not unfrequently there is a pithy directness about
them, as, for example, that on Genesis xiii. 13.
' Lot,"thinking to get paradise, found hell.' More
over, in both text and notes, the English is well
worthy careful study. No earlier Bible can com
pare with it in regard to the helps afforded to the
reader. The only illustrations admitted were cuts
of the tabernacle and its contents, and the temple
of Ezekiel, and several maps — very good for their
day. It is curious to observe that the text of the 1557
New Testament is not the one included in the
1560. As noted above, the 1557 text was the work
of Whittingham, but the text of the New Testa
ment in the 1560 Bible shows many evidences
that Whittingham's work underwent careful and
thorough revision at the hands of those associated
with him in the larger work of the Bible.
No competent reader can spend an hour or two Success of
r 1 • r r ^ n *. the Geneva
in careful examination of a copy of the first Bible.
edition of the Geneva Bible without coming to
the conviction that it thoroughly deserved the
enormous success which it finally achieved. It
was the first Bible printed in Roman type, and
133

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
it was a convenient, handy size. It embodied the
best Biblical scholarship of the time, and was
in this respect a considerable advance upon all
previous editions. The basis is undeniably
Tindale's version and the Great Bible, but it
abounds in evidences of Hebrew scholarship.
After Archbishop Parker's death, and after
editions had been printed abroad in 1568, 1569,
and 1570, it ran through considerably over 150
editions, and continued to be printed until the
middle of the seventeenth century. It was to the
men who fought and conquered in the struggle
with Charles I. what the Tindale Testaments were
to the reformers of Henry VIII.'s day.

134

Chapter IX
THE BISHOPS' BIBLE
WHEN in 1537 Cranmer sent a copy of
Matthew's Bible to Cromwell, with the
desire that he would get Henry VIII. to license
it until the bishop should send forth a better,
he expressed the view that this would not be until
' a day after doomsday.' However, about thirty
years after the date of Cranmer's letter the bishops
did produce a version, although it was by no means
a better version than the 1537, but in a host of
important respects vastly inferior.
Some of the men concerned in the Geneva Bible
had strong leanings towards Nonconformity, the
general drift of many of the notes which it con
tained was against prelacy, and it addressed even
Elizabeth herself, in the dedicatory address, in a
way that can hardly have been palatable to that
self-contained and haughty lady. Two Bibles
occupied the field, Cranmer's, which was the
authorised version for use in public worship, so
far as any edition could claim to be this, and the
135

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Geneva, which was rapidly becoming the house
hold book for family and private use.
Bisko s' Parker, consecrated Archbishop of Canterbury
Bible. in 1558, set on foot a scheme for the production of
a new Bible. His plan was to parcel the work out
among the various bishops, retaining in his own
hands, seemingly, the general oversight and the
final revision of the whole.
The rules laid down were : —

1 To follow the common English translation
(Cranmer's) used in the churches, and not to recede
from it but where it varieth manifestly from the Hebrew
or Greek original.
2 To follow the text of Pagninus and Sebastian
Minister. 3 To make no bitter notes upon any text, or yet
to set down any determination in places of con
troversy. 4 To mark ' places not edifying,' so that the reader
may eschew them in his public reading.
5 That all such words as sound in the old translation
to any offence of lightness or obscenity be expressed
with more convenient terms and phrases.
From a list of the revisers still preserved in the
State Paper Office it appears that Archbishop
Parker himself undertook Genesis, Exodus,
Matthew, Mark, and all the Pauline epistles ex
cept Romans and 1 Corinthians. But the initials
printed at the close of sections of the translation
do not agree with this list. For example, at the
136

THE BISHOPS' BIBLE
end of the Pentateuch are the initials W.E., which
stand for William Alley, Bishop of Exeter.
Among those engaged in the work were Grindal,
Bishop of London (Minor Prophets) ; Sandys,
Bishop of Worcester (i Kings to 2 Chronicles) ;
Cox, Bishop of Ely (Gospels and Acts) ; and about
a dozen others. On October 5, 1568, a complete
copy of the book was presented by the archbishop
to Queen Elizabeth.
In appearance the Bible was a sumptuous
volume. It is, with the sole exception of the
A.V. folios, the largest Bible printed, and it
contains nearly 150 wood engravings. As might
be expected, courtly influence is very evident. On
the first title, which contains in a border the simple
words, ' The Holy Bible containing the Old
Testament and the New,' is a large portrait of
Elizabeth herself, and below this, in Latin,
Romans i. 16. The second title, prefixed to the
Book of Joshua, exhibits a portrait of the Earl
of Leicester. At the beginning of the first Psalm,
and forming a very handsome initial letter B, is
a fine portrait, generally assumed to be that of
Lord Burleigh.
Prefixed to the text are no less than twenty-four
folio leaves, containing a sum of the whole of
Scripture, a genealogy of Christ, tables of lessons,
Psalms, how to find Easter, etc., an almanack and
calendar, Cranmer's prologue, and a new one
by Parker, a chronological table and a table of
contents. 137

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Parker's prologue, which occupies five closely
printed folio pages, consists of an interesting and
forcible application of the passage, ' Search the
Scriptures.' In the course of it he gives his account
of the genesis of the new translation : —
' For that the copies thereof (of the Great Bible) be
so wasted that very many churches do want their con
venient Bibles, it was thought good to some well-
disposed men to recognise the same Bible again into
this form as it is now come out, with some further
diligence in the printing, and with some more light
added, partly in the translation and partly in the order
of the text, not as condemning the former translation,
which was followed mostly of any other translation,
excepting the original text from which as little variance
was made as was thought meet to such as took pains
therein : desiring thee, good reader, if aught be escaped,
either by such as had the expending of the books, or by
the oversight of the printer, to correct the same in the
spirit of charity, calling to remembrance what diversity
hath been seen in men's judgments in the translation of
these books before these days, though all directed their
labours to the glory of God, to the edification of the
Church, to the comfort of their Christian brethren, and
always as God did further open unto them, so ever more
desirous they were to reform their former human over
sights, rather than in a stubborn wilfulness to resist the
gift of the Holy Ghost, who from time to time is resident
as that Heavenly Teacher and Leader into all truth, by
whose direction the Church is ruled and governed.'
It is noteworthy that there is no dedicatory note
or address to this Bible. 138

THE BISHOPS' BIBLE
In 1 57 1 Convocation ordered that 'every arch
bishop and bishop should have at his house a copy
of the Holy Bible of the largest volume as lately
printed at London, and that it should be placed in
the hall or large dining-room, that it might be
useful to servants or to strangers.' Each cathedral
and, as far as it could conveniently be done, each
church was to have a copy.
Notwithstanding the high episcopal sanction
and supervision with which this Bible was
favoured, it is the most unsatisfactory and use
less of all the old translations. In 1569 an edition
in quarto was issued, which corrected a large
number of the blunders and misprints of the 1568
edition. In 1572 the second folio edition appeared.
Curiously enough, in this all the corrections made
in 1569 in the Old Testament are ignored, and it
returns to the 1568 text, but in the New Testa
ment there are many signs of careful revision.
During the last quarter of the sixteenth century
the Bishops' Bible was very frequently reprinted,
and the 1602 folio edition served as the basis
for James the First's revision.
The most interesting point about the 1568 Bible The >
was that it gave a new version of the Psalms. The Yer!Uon, of
=¦ the Psalms.
Old Testament is practically a revision of the
Great Bible ; and of the new rendering from the
Hebrew which it contains Dr. Westcott says, ' as a
general rule they appear to be arbitrary and at
variance with the exact sense of the Hebrew
text.' 139

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
But this edition further affords a striking
evidence of the power of custom and familiarity
in religious matters. Coverdale's version of the
Psalms had in the course of thirty-three years
become familiar to the eye and the ear of the
nation. Parker, however, did not like to give up
without a struggle his new version of the Psalms.
And so in 1572 a compromise was attempted, and
the folio Bible of that year is remarkable because
it prints the old and the new psalter in parallel
columns, one in black letter and one in Roman.
The folio editions of the Bishops' Bible, like
the Geneva, had explanatory side-notes. Those in
the former, though plentiful, are nothing like so
numerous as in the latter. They are also ' shorter
and more epigrammatic, and deal more frequently
with the interpretation than with the application
of the text.' Here are a few specimens : —
Gen. 1. 2. — To embalm. — This was to the godly then
an outward token of incorruption, but to the ignorant a
vain ceremony.
Psalms xiv. 9. — Ophir is thought to be the island in
the west coast of late found by Christopher Colombo :
from whence at this day is brought most fine gold.
Luke iv. 6. — Satan betrayeth himself, showing his
bold sacrilege, usurping the empire of the earth.
Phil. ii. 12. — Our health hangeth not on our works,
and yet are they said to work-out their health who do
run in the race of justice. For, although we be saved
freely in Christ by faith, yet must we walk by the way of
justice unto our health.' 140

Chapter X
THE FIRST ROMAN CATHOLIC
ENGLISH BIBLE
THE first version of the New Testament
published in English by Roman Catholic
scholars was issued at Rheims in 1582, fourteen
years after the publication of the Bishops' Bible.
The title-page is a somewhat formidable document,
and runs as follows : —
' The New Testament of Jesus Christ, translated faith
fully into English out of the authentical Latin, according
to the best corrected copies of the same, diligently
conferred with the Greeke and other editions in divers
languages : with arguments of bookes and chapters,
annotations, and other necessary helps, for the better
understanding of the text, and specially for the dis-
coverie of the corruptions of divers late translations,
and for cleering the controversies in religion of these
daies : In the English College of Rhemes.'
Then follows the
' Preface to the Reader treating of these three points :
of the translation of the Holy Scriptures into the vulgar
141

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
tongues, and namely into English : of the causes why
this New Testament is translated according to the
ancient vulgar Latin text, and of the manner of
translating the same.'

The^Rhemes Made by Roman Catholics for the express
purpose of combating the influence of the various
Protestant English Bibles, this translation naturally
takes high Romanist ground. And yet com
paratively little fault can be found with the
translation on doctrinal grounds. The style, on
the other hand, and the choice of words are open
to very serious criticism. In fact, it is hardly too
much to say that many passages are barely in
telligible to the ordinary reader. But the prefaces
and marginal notes and the annotations with
which every chapter is furnished are saturated
with Romanist doctrine, and abound in all the
characteristic false teaching against which the
Reformers contended, and which the English
Bible overthrew.
The Rhemes Testament sprang out of the great
effort made, chiefly under the inspiration and
guidance of Cardinal Allen, in Elizabeth's reign,
to win England back to the fold of Rome. The
translation, which, being from the old Latin, is
only a secondary version, is due chiefly to the
labours of Gregory Martin, once a Fellow of
St. John's College, Oxford. Allen himself, Dr.
Bristow, and Dr. J. Reynolds, are said to have
assisted him ; and the copious notes are ascribed
142

ROMAN CATHOLIC ENGLISH BIBLE
to Dr. Bristow. But there is no certain informa
tion as to the exact number of scholars employed,
and the share of work done by each.
The most remarkable feature of this translation
is a very literal transference into the text of the
very words and phrases of the Latin —
'which may seem to the vulgar reader and to common
English ears not yet acquainted therewith rudeness
or ignorance ; but to the discreet reader that deeply
weigheth and considereth the importance of sacred
words and speeches, and how easily the voluntary trans
lator may miss the true sense of the Holy Ghost, we
doubt not but our consideration and doing therein shall
seem reasonable and necessary ; yea, and that all sorts
of Catholic readers will in short time think that
familiar which at the first may seem strange, and will
esteem it more when they shall otherwise be taught
to understand it than if it were the common known
English.' However this may be, even on the ground of the specimen
purity of the English language, it is a fortunate Translation.
thing that the Rhemes Testament never became
popular. Otherwise, we should read, as this
Testament does : —
' From that time Jesus began to preach and to say,
Doe penance, for the kingdom of God is at hand.'
' Blessed are they that hunger and thirst after justice ¦
for they shall have their fill.'
' The first treatise I made of all things, O Theophilus,
which Jesus began to do and to teach until the day
143

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
wherein giving commandment by the Holy Ghost to the
apostles whom He chose He was assumpted.'
' And coming, He evangelized peace to you that were
far off, and peace to them that were nigh. For by Him
we have access both in one spirit to the Father. Now
then you are not strangers and foreigners ; but you
are citizens of the saints, and the domesticals of God.'
' To me, the least of all the saints, is given this grace
among the Gentiles to evangelize the unsearchable
riches of Christ, and to illuminate all men what is the
dispensation of the sacrament hidden from the worlds in
God who created all things ; that the manifold wisdom
of God may be notified to the princes and potestats
in the celestials by the Church according to the prefini-
tion of the worlds which He made in Christ Jesus our
Lord.' These are but a few samples of the extra
ordinary use of words found in this version.
There are many traces in the A.V. which show
that King James's translators studied the Rhemes
New Testament very carefully, and had it con
stantly before them. But, fortunately, they trans
ferred very few of its most characteristic words and
phrases.
The The main object of the work was polemical. It
Marginal , , . . , ,
Notes. abounds in marginal notes and annotations, all
intended either to confute ' Heretikes ' or to
confirm the teaching and practices of the Roman
Catholic Church. A good notion of the kind of
influence the book was intended to exert may
be gained from a study of the notes attached to
the Acts of the Apostles. 144

ROMAN CATHOLIC ENGLISH BIBLE
Upon Acts i. 14, ' Marie, the mother of Jesus,'
there is a very long controversial note, which collects
some absurd traditions — for example this : —
' They buried her sacred body in Gethsemane, but for
St. Thomas's sake, who desired to see and reverence
it, they opened the sepulchre the third day, and finding
it void of the holy body, but exceedingly fragrant,
they returned, assuredly deeming that her body was
assumpted into heaven, as the Church of God holdeth,
being most agreeable to the singular privilege of the
mother of God, and therefore celebrateth most solemnly
the day of her assumption.'
Having thus asserted an utterly absurd fancy,
the note proceeds : —
'But neither these holy fathers (viz., Denys and
Damasenus and^ Athanasius, who are said to assert
the above nonsense), nor the Church's tradition and
testimony, to bear any sway nowadays with the Pro
testants, that have abolished this her greatest feast of
her Assumption, who of reason should at the least
celebrate it as the day of her death, as they do of
other Saints.'
And much more of the same kind.
On Acts iii. 1, 'the ninth hour of prayer,' they
write : —
' This maketh for distinction of canonical hours, and
diversity of appointed times to pray.'
On iii. 21, 'Whom heaven truly must receive
145 K

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
until the times of the restitution of all things,'
they write :— r
' Some Heretikes foully corrupt this place, thus who
must be contained in heaven of purpose (as they protest)
to hold Christ in heaven from the Blessed Sacrament.
Beza. As though His presence there drew Him out
of heaven.'
On vii. 58, 'they stoned him,' the note is: —
' Read a marvellous narration in St. Augustine of one
stone, that hitting the martyr on the elbow rebounded
back to a faithful man that stood near, who keeping and
carrying it with him, was by revelation warned to leave it
at Ancona in Italy : whereupon a church or memory of
St. Stephen was there erected, and many miracles done
after the said martyr's body was found out, and not
before.' On viii. 27, ' was come to Jerusalem to adore,'
they write : —
' Note that this Ethiopian came to Jerusalem to adore,
that is, on pilgrimage, whereby we may learn that it
is an acceptable act of religion to go from home to
places of greater devotion and sanctification.'
And upon verse 31, ' How can I unless some
man shew me ? ' they note : —
'The Scriptures are so written that they cannot
be understood without an interpreter, as easy as our
Protestants make them.' 146

ROMAN CATHOLIC ENGLISH BIBLE
On viii. 38, .' He baptized him,' in his rough-
and-ready way they seek to establish Romish
custom : —

' When the Heretikes of this time find mention made
in Scripture of any sacrament ministered by the apostles
or other in the Primitive Church, they imagine no more
was done than there is expressly told, nor scarcely believe
so much. As if imposition of hands in the Sacrament
of Confirmation be only expressed, they think there was
no chrism nor other work or word used. So they think
no more ceremony was used in the baptizing of this
noble man than here is mentioned. Whereupon St.
Augustine hath these memorable words, " In that he
saith Philip baptized him, he would have it understood
that all things were done which, though in the Scripture,
for brevity sake, they are not mentioned, yet by order of
tradition we know were to be done.'"

Another instance of the same kind is xiii. 2,
' As they were ministering,' which is thus
annotated : —

' If we should, as our adversaries do, boldly turn what
texts we list, and flee from one language to another
for the advantage of our cause, we might have translated
for ministering, sacrificing, for so the Greek doth signify,
and so Erasmus translated. Yea, we might have trans
lated saying mass, for so they did ; and the Greek fathers
hereof had their name Liturgy, which Erasmus translated
mass. But we keep our text, as the translators of the
Scriptures should do most religiously.'
147

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
One more example will suffice. On xx. 29,
' ravening wolves,' this gloss occurs : —
' The governors of the Church are foretold of the
great danger that should fall to the people by wolves,
that is to say, by Heretikes, whose cruelty toward the
Catholics is noted by this term. They be known by
forsaking the unity of the Church, whereof they were
before, by going out and drawing many disciples after
them, and by their perverse doctrine. Such wolves
came afterward, indeed, in divers ages, Arius, Mace-
donius, Nestorius, Eutyches, Luther, Calvin, — great
blood-sucking wolves — and wasters of the flock of
Christ.' The above illustrations are a fair sample of what
Roman Catholic controversialists of the sixteenth
century were capable. Truth and error are mixed
up in the most dangerous way. At the end of the
Acts in a minute and circumstantial but altogether
baseless account of how and when the apostles
met together and formulated what is called ' The
Apostles' Creed,' although there is not a shred of
evidence extant to the effect that the apostles ever
heard of the creed. Ridiculous stories, such as the
miracle-working power of filings from the chains
of St. Paul, abound. The most bitter and per
sistent attacks are made upon the Reformers.
The practices of the Church of Rome are bolstered
up, not by Scripture, but chiefly by quotations from
the Fathers, similar in kind to those we have given
above. Any one who wishes to understand clearly
148

ROMAN CATHOLIC ENGLISH BIBLE
how it was that the Reformation of the sixteenth
century conquered all the power of Rome would
do well to compare carefully the Geneva New
Testament and the Rhemes. In the former,
common-sense, sound scholarship, freedom from
superstition, and vigorous English are admirably
combined ; in the latter, bad English, bondage
to ecclesiastical tradition and superstition, and a
fierce polemic, which is in itself a confession of
defeat, show that the work is the production of
men who have lost their fitness to rule the faith or
guide the lives of men.
Twenty-seven years passed away after the publi- The Douay
cation of the Rhemes Testament before the Roman ment.
Catholics completed their version of the Bible by
the issue of the Old Testament portion. Upon
the title-page stands the imprint : — ¦
' Printed at Doway by Lawrence Kellam, at the sign
of the Holy Lamb, m.dc.ix.'
The long delay is thus accounted for in the
preface : —
' As for the impediments which hitherto have hindered
this work ; they all proceeded (as many do know) from
one general cause: our poor estate in banishment.'
The main reason for the version is thus stated : —
' Now since Luther and his followers have pretended
that the Catholic Roman faith and doctrine should
149

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
be contrary to God's written word, and that the
Scriptures were not suffered in the vulgar languages,
lest the people should see the truth, and withal these
new masters corruptly turning the Scriptures into divers
tongues, as might best serve their own opinions : against
this false suggestion and practice Catholic pastors have,
for one especial remedy, set forth true and sincere trans
lations in most languages of the Latin Church.'
They go on to state that they translate from the
Latin rather than the Hebrew or Greek text
because —
' both the Hebrew and Greek editions are foully
corrupted by Jews and Heretics, since the Latin was
truly translated out of them while they were more pure.'
The habit of not translating many Latin terms
is thus defended : —
' English not having a name or a sufficient term, we
either keep the word as we find it, or only turn it to our
English termination, because it would otherwise require
many words in English to signify one word of another
tongue . . . the sense whereof indeed is soon learned,
as if they were turned so near as is possible into English.
Why then may we not say Pasch, Azimes, Breads oj
Proposition, Holocaust, and the like ? rather than as
Protestants translate them : Passover, The Feast of
Sweetbreads, Shewbreads, Burnt Offerings, etc'
The plan and method are similar to those
followed in the Rhemes New Testament. Argu
ments are prefixed to the books, there are
150

ROMAN CATHOLIC ENGLISH BIBLE
numerous marginal notes, and at the end of
many chapters there are annotations upon points
of special importance. The whole book is as
uncompromisingly Romanist as the New Testa
ment, although there are many signs that the
later translators of the latter volume did not
feel quite so certain of Rome's ultimate triumph.
The Pentateuch and the Historical books are specimens
fairly well translated, but the Psalms and Pro- Translation.
phetical books are very inferior work. As an
example of the former, we may take i Samuel
xvi. 4-7 : —
' Samuel therefore did as our Lord spake to him.
And he came into Bethlehem, and the ancients of
the city marvelled, meeting him, and they said, Is
thy entrance peaceable ? And he said, Peaceable :
I am come to immolate unto our Lord, be ye sanctified,
and come with me, that I may immolate ! He therefore
sanctified Isai and his sons, and called them to the
sacrifice. And when they were entered in he saw Eliab,
and said : Is there before our Lord his Christ ? And
our Lord said to Samuel : Respect not his countenance,
nor the tallness of his stature : because I have rejected
him, neither do I judge according to the look of man :
for man seeth those things which appear, but our Lord
beholdeth the heart.'
The marginal note upon 1 Samuel xvi. 16, 'a The Notes.
man skilful to play on the harp,' runs : —
' Naturally (as these men truly judge) music helpeth
some ill-disposition of humours, and draweth also the
151

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
mind from so vehement apprehension of afflictions : but
here it seemeth more probable that God supernaturally
relieved Saul by David's playing on the harp, together
with his sincere devotion, for more manifest condemna
tion of the one and justification of the other ' ;
and that upon i Sam. xvii. 4, Goliath : —
'This bold and impudent challenger signifieth the
devil, or any arch heretic that provoketh the Church
of God, but is overcome by the humble of heart and
confident in God, and slain with his own weapon.'
The very considerable difficulty in 1 Sam. xvii.
55, of Saul's not knowing David, is met by the
note :¦ —
' Saul knew not David, being perhaps in a shepherd's
habit, though he had not long before served and pleased
him well.'
The Psalter. The Psalter is the least satisfactory part of this
version — a result due, in the first place, to the
faulty character of the text in the Latin Bible,
which was a very indifferent translation of the
Septuagint. This means that it was the English
translation of a Latin translation of a Greek
version of the original Hebrew. Such a history
could hardly give satisfactory results. We have
in an earlier chapter quoted Psalm xxiii.1 Take
as further illustrations, first, Psalm viii. 1-6 : —
1 See page 78.
152

ROMAN CATHOLIC ENGLISH BIBLE
' 0 Lord, our Lord, how marvellous is Thy name in
the whole earth ! Because Thy magnificence is elevated
above the heavens. Out of the mouth of infants and
sucklings Thou hast perfected praise because of Thine
enemies, that Thou mayest destroy the enemy and the
revenger. Because I shall see Thy heavens, the work
of Thy fingers : the moon and the stars which Thou hast
founded. What is man that Thou art mindful of him ?
Or the son of man that Thou visitest him ? Thou hast
minished him a little less than angels : with glory and
honour Thou hast crowned him.'
The heading of the Psalm runs, ' Unto the end
for presses, the Psalm of David,' and upon the
word ' presses ' there is the following remarkable
annotation : —
'Most Hebrew doctors say the word Gittith may
either signify the place where this Psalm was made,
or the musical instrument on which it was sung. But
most Christian doctors expound it literally of Christ's
Passion, who was stretched on the cross, and all His
sacred blood pressed and drawn out of His body.
Which metaphor Isaias also useth, demanding of
Christ : Why is Thy clothing red, and Thy garments
as theirs that tread in the vine press ? and answereth
in Christ's person : I have trodden the press alone.'
Our second example is Psalm lxxxvii., headed,
' To the Children of Core, a Psalm of Canticle ' : —
' The foundations thereof in the holy mountains : our
Lord loveth the gates of Sion above all the tabernacles
153

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
of Jacob. Glorious things are said of thee, 0 city of
God ! I will be mindful of Raab and Babylon knowing
me. Behold the foreigners, and Tyre, and the people
of the Ethiopians, these were there. Shall it not be
said of Sion, Man and man is born in her, and the
Highest himself founded her? Our Lord will declare
in scriptures of people and of princes : of those that
have been in her. The habitation in thee is, as it were,
of all rejoicing.'
One example from the prophets — Isaiah liii. 3-5
— must suffice : —
' Despised and most abject of men, a man of sorrows
and knowing infirmity : and his look, as it were, hid and
despised, whereupon neither have we esteemed him.
He surely hath borne our infirmities, and our sorrows
he hath carried : and we have thought him, as it were,
a leper, and stricken of God and humbled. But he was
wounded for our iniquities, he was broken for our sins :
the discipline of our peace was upon Him, and with the
waile of his stripe we are healed.'
Looked at from the point of view of what an
English Bible should be, this is undoubtedly the
worst of all the early translations. It would,
however, be a great mistake to suppose that its
merits are few and small. There is a very great
deal of sound scholarship in the work, and its
influence upon the Authorised Version was by
no means inconsiderable. Following the Latin
text, it could not but be very far in many
important respects from the true text. But
154

ROMAN CATHOLIC ENGLISH BIBLE
where the Latin could be of no service, and
where there was scope for exact Greek scholar
ship — for example, in the translation of the
Greek article — this version stands high. It has
also enriched the English language with many
words that might not otherwise have found a
place — such, for instance, as ' acquisition,' ' victim,'
' gratis,' ' allegory,' ' advent,' ' resuscitate,' ' expec
tation.' ' Nothing,' writes Dr. Moulton, ' is easier than to
"accumulate instances of the eccentricity of this version,
of its obscure and inflated renderings ; but only minute
study can do justice to its faithfulness, and to the care
with which the translators executed their work. Every
other English version is to be preferred to this, if it
must be taken as a whole; no other English version will
prove more instructive to the student who will take the
pains to separate what is good and useful from what is
ill-advised and wrong.'

155

Chapter XI
THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
THE version of the English Bible which
was gradually to acquire the title of
' Authorised,' because of its intrinsic merits, and
not by virtue of any ecclesiastical or legislative
action, was published in 161 1. It gradually
won its way to supremacy over all other versions,
and remained unchallenged by any rival until
the year 1881, when the Revised New Testament
was issued. Thus for two hundred and seventy
years King James's Bible held the field. In the
opinion of large numbers it yet holds the field,
although in the writer's view, the Revised Version,
from its greater accuracy, and because translated
from a better original text, will ultimately win the
day. Jerome's new Latin Version, the Vulgate,
was at its first appearance assailed with all kinds
of angry criticism, and much unfair abuse. But it
was a better version than any of its predecessors,
and hence vanquished them all, and became for
more than one thousand years the recognised
Bible of Western Christendom. 156

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
Throughout Elizabeth's reign there were two
rival English Bibles ; the one, the Bishops',
supported by the Church and Parliament, and
placed by authority in the churches of the
realm ; the other, done at Geneva, but issued in
popular form and widely used, not only by the
people, but even by the clergy. The relative
popularity of the two may be seen from the fact
that, of the Bishops' Bible, there were published
twenty editions — thirteen folio, six quarto, and
one octavo. Of the Geneva, there were con
siderably over a hundred editions, and of these
only eighteen were folio.
Soon after Tames I. ascended the throne, the Origin of the
J Authorised
differences between the Puritan and High Church version.
parties grew greater and more active, instead of
less. A conference between leading men of both
sections was proposed, and the king, possessed of
a curious mixture of learning and vanity, flattered
himself with the belief that he would be able to
confute the Puritans. The conference assembled
at Hampton Court in January, 1604, the Puritan
leader being Dr. Reynolds, President of Corpus
Christi College, Oxford. On the second day of
the conference he

' moved His Majesty that there might be a new
translation of the Bible, because those which were
allowed in the reign of Henry VIII. and Edward VI.
were corrupt and not answerable to the truth of the
original.' 157

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
The examples he gave were not by any means
the strongest that might have been chosen, and
there was some force in the Bishop of London's
rejoinder, ' If every man's humour should be followed there
would be no end of translating.'
But the king took up the suggestion, and
' wished that some special pains should be taken in that
behalf for one uniform translation (professing that he
could never yet see a Bible well translated in English,
but the worst of all his Majesty thought the Geneva
to be), and this to be done by the best learned in
both the Universities ; after them to be reviewed by
the bishops and the chief learned of the Church ; from
them to be presented to the Privy Council ; and lastly,
to be ratified by his royal authority. . . . He gave this
caveat (upon a word cast out by my Lord of London)
that no marginal notes should be added, having found
in them, which are annexed to the Geneva translation,
some notes very partial, untrue, seditious, and savouring
too much of dangerous and traitorous conceits.'
King James took up the idea of a new trans
lation warmly, and the accomplishment was in all
probability largely the result of his efforts. No
notice was taken of the project in a meeting of
Convocation, which followed closely upon the
Hampton Court Conference. A letter still extant
from James to the Bishop of London, dated
July 22, 1604, states that he has chosen fifty-four
158

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
translators to meet in various companies at
Westminster, Oxford, and Cambridge, under the
presidency of the Dean of Westminster, and the
two university Hebrew professors.
'Furthermore,' he writes, 'we require you to move all
our bishops to inform themselves of all such learned
men within their several dioceses, as, having especial
skill in the Hebrew and Greek tongues, have taken
pains in their private studies of the Scriptures for the
clearing of any obscurities either in the Hebrew or
in the Greek, or touching any difficulties or mistakings
in the former English translation, which we have now
commanded to be thoroughly viewed and amended, and
thereupon to write unto them, earnestly charging them
and signifying our pleasure therein that they send such
their observations.'
The bishops and chapters were to contribute TheRevisers
r r of 1611.
the expenses of the work ; but as this was left
a voluntary act, it is, perhaps, not surprising to
hear that nothing was given, and that the trans
lators received nothing save free entertainment
in the colleges ; those who completed the. revision
in London were paid. This and a great many
other details are obscure, and in regard to many
matters upon which we should be glad to have
information, we are left quite in the dark. Thus,
although the work was decided upon and arranged
for in 1604, it was 1607 before the translators
began their task. On the list of translators only
forty-seven instead of fifty-four names appear.
TS9

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Genesis to 2 Kings inclusive was allotted to
a company of ten meeting at Westminster, and
presided over by the Dean, Dr. Andrews. I
Chronicles to Ecclesiastes fell to the Cambridge
company of eight, with Mr. Lively, Hebrew
Professor, as president. Isaiah to Malachi was
given to a company meeting at Oxford, presided
over by Dr. Harding, Professor of Hebrew, and
including Dr. Reynolds, of Corpus Christi College,
the Puritan leader. The Apocrypha was trans
lated by another Cambridge seven, with Dr.
Duport in the chair. The Gospels, Acts, and
Apocalypse at Oxford, by eight scholars, led by
Dr. Ravis, Dean of Christ Church. And the
Epistles by a second Westminster company,
seven in all, with Dr. Barlow, Dean of Chester,
presiding. Mr. Lively died in 1605, and Dr.
Reynolds, out of whose suggestion the great
undertaking sprang, died in 1607.
The General There seems to be evidence, apart from the
followed. Authorised Version itself, that many, if not all,
of these revisers were able and well-equipped
scholars. A body of no less than fourteen rules
was drawn up for their guidance ; but they do
not appear to have felt fettered by it, or compelled
even to obey it very implicitly.
Rule 14 runs : —
'These translations are to be used when they agree
better with the text than the Bishops' Bible ; Tindale's,
Matthew's, Coverdale's, Whitchurch's, Geneva.'
160

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
No mention is made here of the Rhemes and
Douay, which exerted considerable influence.
But the rule keeps before us a fact ever to be
borne in mind, that while in many respects to
William Tindale belongs the highest honour in
connection with the English Bible, as we now
have it, that Bible is the result of the labours
of scholars belonging to different churches, trained
in different schools, looking at truth from different
standpoints, but all actuated by the one common
desire of expressing in the vernacular, to the very
best of their ability, the exact statements of God's
Holy Word.
Rule 6 runs : —
' No marginal notes at all to be affixed, but only for
the explanation of the Hebrew or Greek words which
cannot, without some circumlocution, so briefly and
fitly be expressed in the text.'
Useful as many of the notes undoubtedly were —
and still are to the student, as they appear in
Tindale, Matthew, the Geneva, and the Bishops'
Bible — few will now question the wisdom of a
rule removing altogether expressions of opinion
upon controverted points and ecclesiastical
practices from the pages of the Bible.
Rule 9 : —
' As any one company hath despatched any one book
they shall send it to the rest to be considered of
seriously and judiciously, for his Majesty is very careful
upon this point ' —
161 L

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
seems never to have been followed. Like other
matters of high importance in the seventeenth
century, even the fact that the King was 'very
careful ' upon the point was not sufficient to
ensure its performance.
The most unfortunate of the whole fourteen
rules were numbers 3 and 5, which run —
' The old ecclesiastical words to be kept, viz., the
word church not to be translated congregation, etc'
fThe division of chapters to be altered either not
at all, or as little as may be, if necessity. so require.'
By the latter rule the mischievous practice of
mutilating the sense of Scripture, dividing it up,
and thus rendering it difficult to follow the
narrative or argument by chapters and verses,
was perpetuated for nearly three centuries.
The first draft translation was completed to
wards the end, probably, of 1609. Nine months
were occupied with a final revision in London
by six revisers, two from each centre — West
minster, Oxford, and Cambridge. Dr. Smith
and Bishop Bilson saw the volume through the
press, and Robert Barker printed it. It is
singular that of so important an undertaking as
the preparation of the Authorised Version we
have no authentic contemporary history and
documents. None of the copies of the Bible
that were revised and altered appear to have
survived, or if they have, to have been identified ;
162

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
no MSS. are known that can be clearly identified
as the revisers' work, and we are indebted for
what we do know of the matter to some scanty
and slight contemporary references.
There are practically three first issues of Description
r J of the 1611
the A. V, known as the He Bible, the She Bible.
Bible, and the 1613-1611 edition, that is, the
Old Testament title-page bearing the date 161 3,
the New Testament 161 1. All three are fine,
handsome folios, printed in a bold, black letter.
Although the author's view is that Mr. Fry's
arguments for the absolute priority of the He
Bible are not conclusive, yet as all three editions
are alike in the chief bibliographical details, a
copy of that issue shall be described as typical.
The page of type is in double columns, and is
enclosed in rules, and, measuring to the outside
of the rules, is 14J inches long by 9 inches
wide. Copies possessing that amount of margin
which entitles them to be considered 'fine and
large' measure at least \6\ by \o\ inches. It
is printed on thick paper, contains 750 leaves, or
1,500 pages, and is over 3 inches in thickness,
excluding the covers. Some copies possess a
very handsome engraved title-page, others a wood
block title, used also in the 1602 Bishops' Bible.
The letterpress of the title runs, ' The Holy Bible,
conteyning the Old Testament and the New :
Newly Translated out of the originall Tongues :
and with the former Translations diligently com
pared and revised, by his Majestie's speciall
163

THE WOOD-BLOCK TITLE-PAGE TO THE AUTHORISED
VERSION, l6ll.
(Size of original block 14 by 8| inches.)

I64

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
Commandement. Appointed to be read in
churches. Imprinted at London by Robert
Barker, Printer to the King's most Excellent
Majestic Anno Dom. 1611.' Then follows the
Dedication to James I., three pages; 'The
Translators to the Reader,' eleven pages ; Kalen-
dar, twelve pages ; Almanack for xxxix. yeares,
etc., two pages ; Table of Proper Lessons, etc.,
five pages ; and ' The Names and Order of all
the Books,' one page. Thirty-six pages, or eighteen
leaves, in all. Many copies contain a handsome
engraved double-page map of Canaan, with an
alphabetical table of all the places mentioned
upon the back. The reign of James I. was
the golden age of monopolists, and the A.V.
affords a conspicuous illustration in point. To
a certain John Speed the king sold the right
of inserting into every copy of every edition
of the A.V. a copy of his 'Genealogies of
Holy Scripture,' Speed, of course, receiving pay
ment for every copy thus enriched. In the
author's copy of the 161 1 Bible this document,
covering thirty-six pages, or eighteen leaves, comes
between the map and Genesis. There are no
woodcuts in the text and no other maps or
illustrations. There are many very fine initials.
The New Testament has a separate title in
the same wood-block as the first, and the book
ends with the word FlNIS printed at the
bottom of the page, one full of type, containing
Revelation xxii. 165

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
There are many bibliographical puzzles con
nected with this Bible. The separate and distinct
issues of the first edition are so exactly alike in
appearance, and the words on the page are
arranged so similarly, that many leaves of one
may be and have been exchanged for the other.
From the fact that in Ruth iii. 15, one edition
reads ' and he went into the city,' while the other
reads ' she went into the city,' the two editions
are known as the He and She Bibles. Careful
scrutiny shows that they were set up in type
independently, and that the He Bibles have one
set of errors, and the She Bibles quite another.
It is supposed that in order to meet the demand
two independent printers were employed, or else
that Barker got some one to help him, who
followed a standard copy different from his own.
It is generally supposed that the He Bible is the
real first edition, though no less an authority than
Mr. Scrivener pronounced for the She Bible:
Other folio editions followed in 1613, 1617, 1634,
and 1640. The 161 3 edition is in smaller type,
and is hence easily recognised. The other
editions resemble one another very closely. The
first octavo and quarto editions were published in
1612, and from that date onwards the book was
reprinted steadily, although it was twenty-five
years before it finally vanquished the Geneva.
Another peculiarity is the title-page. Some
copies have a handsome steel plate, and some a
fine woodcut title. Here the fact seems to be that
166

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
the plate was intended for all, but was not ready
in time, and hence is often missing in genuine first
editions. No copy ought to possess both.
The revisers prefixed to their work two state- The
r Translators
ments. The first, the dedication to King James, to the
is, unfortunately, still allowed to be printed. The
second is the revisers' own account of their work,
called ' The Translators to the Reader,' attributed
to Dr. Miles Smith, who afterwards became Bishop
of Gloucester. This, most unhappily, long ago
ceased to form part of the ordinary editions, and
has probably never been read by one in a hundred
thousand readers of the Bible ; and yet it is
a most valuable and suggestive document. It
begins with an admission that anything new,
especially in religion, ' is sure to be misconstrued,
and in danger to be condemned.' It then pays
a tribute, probably well deserved, to King James's
interest in the work and desire for its completion.
It next pays a long and beautifully expressed
tribute to the unapproachable excellency of Holy
Scripture. ' It is not only an armour, but also a whole armoury
of weapons, both offensive and defensive ; whereby we
may save ourselves and put the enemy to flight. It
is not an herb, but a tree, or rather a whole paradise
of trees of life, which bring forth fruit every month, and
the fruit thereof is for meat, and the leaves for medicine.
... In a word, it is a panary of wholesome food
against fenowed (mouldy) traditions ; a physician's shop
(as St. Basil calleth it) of preservatives against poisoned
167

THE ENGRAVED TITLE-PAGE TO THE AUTHORISED
VERSION, l6ll.
(Size of original plate I3§ by 8g inches.)

168

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
heresies ; a pandect of profitable laws against rebellious
spirits ; a treasury of most costly jewels against beggarly
rudiments ; finally, a fountain of most pure water
springing up into everlasting life.'

But the Word of God must be in a language
men can understand before it can be useful, and
hence the need for translation.
' Translation it is that openeth the window, to let
in the light; that breaketh the shell, that we may eat
the kernel ; that putteth aside the curtain, that we may
look into the most holy place ; that removeth the cover
of the well, that we may come by the water; even as
Jacob rolled away the stone from the mouth of the
well, by which means the flocks of Laban were watered.
Indeed, without translation into the vulgar tongue, the
unlearned are but like children at Jacob's well (which
was deep) without a bucket or something to draw with ;
or as that person mentioned by Esay (Isaiah xxix. ii),
to whom when a sealed book was delivered with this
motion, " Read this, I pray thee," he was fain to make
this answer, " I cannot, for it is sealed." '
After a somewhat lengthy but most interesting
sketch of ancient versions, and an assault upon
the Romish Church for its unwillingness to
sanction the reading of the Bible, Dr. Smith
deals with those who held that there was no
need for a new English version, and that the
undertaking cast a slight upon the earlier English
Bibles, and states : — 169

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
'We are so far off from condemning any of their
labours that travailed before us in this kind, either in
this land or beyond sea, either in King Henry's time, or
King Edward's (if there were any translation, or correc
tion of a translation, in his time), or Queen Elizabeth's
of ever-renowned memory, that we acknowledge them
to have been raised up of God for the building and
furnishing of His Church, and that they deserve to be
had of us and of posterity in everlasting remembrance.'
The object of the revisers is finally thus stated : —
' Truly, good Christian reader, we never thought from
the beginning that we should need to make a new trans
lation, nor yet to make of a bad one a good one, . . .
but to make a good one better, or out of many good
ones one principal good one, not justly to be excepted
against; that hath been our endeavour, that our work.
To that purpose were many chosen, that were greater in
other men's eyes than in their own, and that sought the
truth rather than their own praise.'
These learned men — ' not too many, lest one
should trouble another ; and yet many, lest many
things might haply escape them ' — assembled,
relying upon God's help, with the Hebrew and
the Greek texts before them.
' Neither did we run over the work with that posting
haste that the Septuagint did, if that be true which is
reported of them, that they finished it in 72 days.
. . . The work . . . hath cost the workmen, as light
as it seemeth, the pains of twice seven times seventy-
two days and more : matters of such weight and con-
170

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
sequence are to be speeded with maturity : for in a
business of moment a man feareth not the blame of
convenient slackness. . . . Neither did we disdain to
revise that which we had done, and to bring back to the
anvil that which we had hammered : but having and
using as great helps as were needful, and fearing no
reproach for slowness, nor coveting praise for expedition,
we have at length, through the good hand of the Lord
upon us, brought the work to that pass that you see.'
After a defence of the insertion of explanatory
notes and of the practice of translating the same
Hebrew and Greek word by two or more English
words — a most unfortunate practice — the preface
closes with a fervent appeal to the reader.
' It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living
God ; but a blessed thing it is, and will bring us into
everlasting blessedness in the end, when God speaketh
unto us, to hearken ; when He setteth His word before
us, to read it ; when He stretcheth out His hand and
calleth, to answer, " Here am I, here we are to do Thy
will, O God." '
Turning now to the work itself, it has been esti- „
° . Examples
mated that the number of new words introduced by Jhe ?8™
the A.V. is not more than four in a hundred. The
Genevan version throughout, and the Rhemes
version in the New Testament, were much more
closely followed than the Great Bible or the
Bishops'. The simplest way of illustrating this
statement without going into minute details, and
at the same time showing how largely all subse-
171

Revision.

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
quent versions were indebted to Tindale, is to
print three passages side by side as they stand in
the most important of the earlier versions, quoting
Tindale from Matthew's Bible.
These passages have been chosen, not on account
of any special difficulties which they present, but
simply because they are among the most familiar
of all Bible words. Each reader can examine and
compare the different renderings, and by this com
parison be enabled to comprehend better the way
in which many different minds have contributed
towards the production of the A.V.

I.— Genesis xxxvii. 3-6.

Matthew's. 1537.
And Israel loved Joseph
more than all his children,
because he begat him in
his old age, and he made
him a coat of many colours.
When his brethren saw
that their father loved him
more than all his brethren,
they hated him, and
could not speak one kind
word unto him. More
over, Joseph dreamed a
dream, and told it his
brethren, wherefore they
hated him yet the more.
And he said unto them,
Hear, I pray you, this
dream which I have
dreamed.

Geneva. 1560.
Now Israel loved Joseph
more than all his sons,
because he begat him in
his old age, and he made
him a coat of many colours.
So when his brethren saw
that their father loved him
more than all his brethren,
then they hated him, and
could not speak peaceably
unto him. And Joseph
dreamed a dream, and
told his brethren, who
hated him so much the
more. For he said unto
them, Hear, I pray you,
this dream which I have
dreamed.

172

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611

Bishops'. 1568.
And Israel loved Joseph
more than all his children,
because he begat him in
his old age ; and he made
him a coat of many colours.
And when his brethren saw
that their father loved him
more than all his breth
ren, they hated him, and
could not speak peace
ably unto him. Moreover,
when Joseph had dreamed
a dream, he told it to his
brethren, which hated him
yet the more. And he
said unto them, Hear, I
pray you, this dream which
I have dreamed.

A.V. 1611.
Now Israel loved Joseph
more than all his children,
because he was the son of
his old age; and he made
him a coat of many colours.
And when his brethren saw
that their father loved him
more than all his brethren,
they hated him, and could
not speak peaceably unto
him. And Joseph dreamed
a dream, and he told it his
brethren : and they hated
him yet the more. And
he said unto them, Hear,
I pray you, this dream
which I have dreamed.

II. — Psalm xxiii. 1-4.

Matthew's. 1537.
The Lord is my Shep
herd ; I can want nothing.
He feedeth me in a green
pasture, and leadeth me to
a fresh water. He quick-
eneth my soul, and bring
eth me forth in the way
of righteousness for his
name's sake. Though I
should walk now in the
valley of the shadow of
death, yet I fear no evil,
for thou art with me; thy
staff and thy sheep-hook
comfort me.

A.V. 1611.
The Lord is my shep
herd ; I shall not want.
He maketh me to lie
down in green pastures ;
he leadeth me beside the
still waters. He restoreth
my soul : he leadeth me
in the paths of righteous
ness for his name's sake.
Yea, though I walk through
the valley of the shadow of
death, I will fear no evil :
for thou art with me ; thy
rod and thy staff they
comfort me.

173

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE

III.— I COR. XIII. 4-

Matthew's. 1537.
Love suffereth long, and
is courteous. Love en
vieth not. Love doth not
frowardly, swelleth not,
dealeth not dishonestly,
seeketh not her own, is
not provoked to anger,
thinketh not evil, rejoiceth
not in iniquity, but rejoiceth
in the truth ; suffereth all
things, believeth all things,
hopeth all things, endureth
in all things. Though that
prophesying fail, other
tongues shall cease, or
knowledge vanish away,
yet love faileth never
away.

Geneva. 1560.
Love suffereth long: it
is bountiful : love envieth
not; love doth not boast
itself; it is not puffed up ;
it disdaineth not ; it seek
eth not her own things ;
it is not provoked to
anger; it thinketh not
evil : it rejoiceth not in
iniquity, but rejoiceth in
the truth. It suffereth
all things, it believeth all
things, it hopeth all things,
it endureth all things.
Love doth never fall away,
though that prophesyings
be abolished, or the tongues
cease, or knowledge vanish
away.

Bishops'. 1568.
Love suffereth
long, and is cour
teous ; love en
vieth not ; love
doth not fro
wardly, swelleth
not, dealeth not
dishonestly, seek
eth not her own,
is not provoked
to anger, thinketh
none evil,rejoiceth
not in iniquity,
but rejoiceth in
the truth ; suffer
eth all things ;
believeth all

Rhemes. 1582.
Charity is pa
tient, is benign ;
charity envieth
not, dealeth not
perversely ; is not
puffed up, is not
ambitious, seek
eth not her own,
is not provoked
to anger, thinketh
not evil ; rejoiceth
not upon iniquity,
but rejoiceth with
the truth ; suffer
eth all things,
believeth all
things, hopeth all
174

A.V. 161 1.
Charity suffer
eth long, and is
kind ; charity
envi eth not ;
charity vaunteth
not itself, is not
puffed up, doth
not behave itself
unseemly, seeketh
not her own, is not
easily provoked,
thinketh no evil ;
rejoiceth not in
iniquity, but re
joiceth in the
truth ; beareth all
things, believeth

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611

things ; hopeth
all things ; en
dureth all things.
Though that pro-
phesyings fa i 1,
other tongues
cease, or know
ledge vanish
away, yet love
fall eth n ev er
away.

things, beareth all
things. Charity
never faileth
away; whether
prophecies shall
be made void, or
tongues shall
cease, or know
ledge shall be
destroyed.

all things, hopeth
all things, e n -
dureth all things.
Charity never
faileth: but
whether there be
prophecies, they
shall fail; whether
there be tongues,
they shall cease;
whether there be
knowledge, it
shall vanish away.

It will be seen at once that the actual contribu
tion of the A.V. in the way of new renderings is
very small. In extract I. the well-known ' coat of
many colours ' is Tindale's, and has held its place
throughout. ' Could not speak peaceably unto
him,' the A.V. gets from the Geneva, while a good
instance of the improvement in expression on the
part of the A.V. is the replacing of the ' because
he begat him in his old age ' of the earlier versions
by the smoother expression ' because he was the
son of his old age.'
In extract III. another element of comparison
comes in, the Rhemes New Testament of 1582,
and a careful comparison shows that it exerted
considerable influence ; for example, in the ' is
kind ' of verse 4, and the whole structure of verse
8. At the same time, much of the A.V. here is
independent, e.g., ' vaunteth not itself,' ' doth not
behave itself unseemly,' ' is not easily provoked,'
' charity never faileth.' Here also the influence
of the Geneva Bible can be clearly seen, and it is
175

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
matter for regret that the A.V. did not go back to
that and the 1 537 rendering of ' love ' for ' charity.'
The 1611 It is probable that multitudes of the Bible
Bible never l
'Authorised.' readers of to-day think that either by some act of
James I. or of his Parliament, the revision finished
in 161 1 was duly constituted the Authorised
Version of the English nation. But there is no
evidence whatever that in any formal or authorita
tive way this Bible was ever constituted the official
version. Even the words ' Appointed to be read
in Churches,' which appear on the engraved 161 1
title-page, and upon some, but not all, of the early
wood-block titles, may not mean what the reader
of to-day usually understands by them. They
may refer rather to the fact that in the preliminary
pages there is a table showing first 'how the
Psalter is appointed to be read,' and then, ' the
order how the rest of Scripture is appointed to be
read.' That is, they may refer to the lessons to
be read in church ; and, to give the proper selec
tion, in all the folio editions of the 161 1 Bible a
Kalendar is given. The only authorisation of
which there is any record was the highest and
best — the admission on all hands of its many and
great excellences. Slowly but surely it won its
way. It, of course, received great assistance
towards winning general acceptance from the fact
that king and bishops and scholars of renown had
co-operated in producing it. But for twenty-five
years the Geneva Bible continued in use in many
churches. Yet, after having distanced this most
176

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
formidable competitor for popular favour, the 1611
Bible for more than two centuries remained the
unrivalled version of the Scriptures for all English-
speaking peoples.
One of the commonest misconceptions about the common
1 Miscon-
161 1 Bible is that it was throughout an entirely a ceptions,
new translation. The extracts from the translator's Authorised
Version.
own preface given above show how erroneous this
view is. They also say, in speaking of James the
First's desire for the new Bible, ' by this means
it cometh to pass that whatsover is sound already
(and all is sound for substance, in one or other of
our editions,1 and the worst of ours far better than
their authentic vulgar),2 the same will shine as
gold more brightly, being rubbed and polished ;
also, if anything be halting, or superfluous, or not
so agreeable to the original, the same may be cor
rected, and the truth set in place.' These words
clearly describe the task, not of men who set to
work to make ' a new translation,' but rather ' to
make a good one better.' Another very common
mistake is the impression that the A.V. had never
been revised until 1881. Or — another form of the
same error — to suppose that our ordinary Bibles
are exact reprints of the 161 1 text. How far this
notion is from the truth any one can soon satisfy
himself who will glance through Mr. Scrivener's
1 That is, the earlier Bibles, Matthew's, Great Bible,
Bishops', etc.
2 The reference is to the Rhemes N.T. (1582) and the
Douay O.T. (1609-10). 177 M

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
Introduction to the Cambridge Paragraph Bible.*
So far from this being the case, the extraordinary
fact is that of the first edition (1611) there are two
separate standard issues, differing from one another
in hundreds of minute matters. And in subse
quent and modern editions the departures from
the text of both are very numerous. ' Some of
these differences,' writes Mr. Scrivener, ' must be
imputed to oversight and negligence, from which
no work of man is entirely free ; but much the
greater part of them are deliberate changes intro
duced silently and without authority by men whose
very names are often unknown.' Very many of
these changes were decidedly for the better, and
not a few correct obvious faults in the early
editions. The list of them given in Appendix A,
in Mr. Scrivener's book, covers forty-seven pages.
They are for the most part corrections in minute
points, and but few of them seriously affect the
meaning of Scripture. A few of the most impor
tant in the Gospels, taken from Mr. Scrivener's
list, will illustrate and exhibit the character of this
quiet but effective revision. The dates in the
second column give the earliest known appearance
of exact alteration.
1 Mr. Scrivener has embodied this with much additional-
matter in his book, The Authorized Edition of the English
Bible (1611), its subsequent reprints and modem representa
tives.

I78

THE AUTHORISED VERSION, 1611
The 1611 Text. The A.V. of To-day.
Matth. xvi. 16. Thou art Thou art the Christ (1762).
Christ.
„ xxvi. 75. The words The word of Jesus (1762).
of Jesus.
,, xxvii. 22. Pilate said. Pilate said (1629).
Mark ii. 4. For press. For the press (1743).
„ v. 6. He came and He ran and worshipped
worshipped. (1638).
„ x. 18. There is no There is none good but
man good but one (1638).
one.
Luke i. 3. Understanding Understanding of all
of things. things (1629).
John xv. 20. The servant The servant is not greater
is not greater than his lord (1762).
than the Lord.
All the examples given in the above list, and, in
fact all the really important variations in our
present A.V. from the 161 1 text, are carefully
indicated in the margin of the Parallel Bible of
1885, A.V. and R.V.
In 161 2 the first octavo and the first quarto Notable
,. . , , , , . , .. , Editions
editions appeared, the latter being a very beautiful of the .
, , Authorised
book. Then edition followed edition in rapid version.
succession. In 1616 the first folio edition in
Roman type appeared, a finely printed book. In
1629 and 1638 editions appeared at Cambridge,
the former printed by Thomas and John Buck,
the latter by Thomas Buck and Roger Daniel,
both in folio. These are the first editions in which
any important revision work can be traced. In
1701, an edition in three volumes folio appeared
in London, notable as being the first containing
the marginal dates so familiar to us all. This
179

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
was edited by Bishop Lloyd, who took the dates
from Archbishop Ussher's Annates Veteris et Novi
Testamenti. The dates, though doubtless correct
in a large number of instances, are practically the
work of only one scholar, and are no part of James
the First's work. In 1762, Dr. Paris, of Trinity
College, Cambridge, and in 1769, Dr. Blayney,
Hertford College, Oxford, Regius Professor of
Hebrew, published editions in quarto and folio,
both very considerably revised, and Dr. Blayney
has left an interesting account of his share in the
work. This was the last serious attempt to
improve the A.V., whose results found any place
in the ordinary editions prior to 1881.

180

Chapter XII
THE REVISED VERSION, 1881-85

W

E have left only a limited space for the The Revised
r , _ • , t t • • , Veasion and
story of the Revised Version, mainly its Revisers.
because, being recent, the main details are familiar
to most readers. Yet, for the sake of complete
ness, it is needful to set apart a few pages to this last
great achievement of English Biblical scholarship.
During the first fifty or sixty years of the nineteenth
century the question of revising the Authorised
Version was discussed from time to time. Two
main reasons account for this. First, the advance
in the textual criticism of the Greek Testament,
due to the discovery and study of MSS.,' — especi
ally to the labours of such scholars as Griesbach,
Lachmann, Tischendorf, and Tregelles, had resulted
in the construction of a much more accurate Greek
text than the best available in the days of James
the First. This, together with the advance of
scholarship generally, led to the acknowledgment
of a considerable number of mistranslations in the
Authorised Version. As early as 1856 motions
on the subject were made in both the Lower
181

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
House of Convocation and also in the House of
Commons, but without any immediate effect.
Meanwhile discussion continued, and the convic
tion grew that the fit time for revision had come.
In February, 1870, the Convocation of Canter
bury resolved that it was desirable to undertake
a revision of the Authorised Version, and that
a body of its own members should under
take the work, with power to ' invite the co
operation of any eminent for scholarship, to
whatever nation or religious body they may
belong.' In May, 1870, Convocation resolved
that the committee appointed in February should
separate into two companies, one for the Old
Testament, the other for the New Testament.
The following general principles were also
adopted : —

1. To introduce as few alterations as possible into the
text of the A.V. consistently with faithfulness.
2. To limit, as far as possible, the expressions of such
alterations to the language of the A.V. and earlier
English versions.
3. That each company go twice over the portion to be
revised, once provisionally, the second time finally.
4. That the text to be adopted be that for which the
evidence is decidedly preponderating; and that when
the text so adopted differs from that from which the
A.V. was made, the alterations be indicated in the
margin. 5. To make or retain no change in the text on the
second final revision by each company, except tivo-thirds
182

THE REVISED VERSION, 1881-85
of those present approve of the same, but on the first
revision to decide by simple majorities,
Two Companies of American scholars were
organised, at the invitation of the Revisers, to
work in co-operation with them, and began their
labours in October, 1872. The Revised New
Testament was published in 1881 ; the Revised
Old Testament, and consequently the complete
Revised Bible, in 1885.
The chief changes effected in the Revised chief
Version of the New Testament — These are the Revised
I. Changes due to a better Greek Text. In total Testament.
these are very considerable, but they affect no
important doctrine. They comprise — (i.) Omis
sions. The chief of these are the Doxology in the
Lord's Prayer, Matt. vi. 13 ; the angel troubling
the water, John v. 3, 4 ; the baptismal confession
of the eunuch, Acts viii. 37 ; the omission of the
word ' blood ' in the phrase ' of one blood,' in
Acts xvii. 26 ; and the three heavenly witnesses,
1 John v. 7. (ii.) Important alterations of reading.
As examples of these we may instance Luke ii. 14,
' And on earth peace among men in whom he is
well pleased ' ; ' Let us have peace,' in Rom. v. 1 ;
and 1 Tim. iii. 16, ' He who was manifested in the
flesh.' 2. Improved translations. There are almost
numberless, and many of them give a new beauty
and force to the words and incidents of Scripture ;
for example, ' which strain out the gnat and swallow
183

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
the camel,' Matt, xxiii. 24; 'The Lord added to
them day by day those that were being saved'
Acts ii. 47 ; ' With but little persuasion thou
wouldest fain make me a Christian,' Acts xxvi. 28 ;
' Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable,'
2 Tim. iii. 16; 'Therefore we ought to give the
more earnest heed to the things that we have
heard, lest haply we drift away from them' Heb.
ii. 1.
Following the practice observed throughout this
book, we give side by side the same passage for
comparison in both A.V. and R.V. It was inevit
able that the Revised Version should disturb some
cherished associations and some loved familiar
rhythms. But it is hard to conceive how any one
can carefully study it without seeing what a flood
of new light it throws upon the meaning of God's
Word. The excellences of the version are seen
to greatest advantage in the Epistles. Take as
an example the verses upon which we happen to
open : —
Ephesians i. 7-14, A.V. Ephesians i. 7-14, R.V.
7. In whom we have In whom we have our
redemption through his redemption through his
blood, the forgiveness of blood, the forgiveness of
sins, according to the our trespasses, according to
riches of his grace ; the riches of his grace,
8. Wherein he hath which he made to abound
abounded toward us in toward us in all wisdom
all wisdom and prudence ; and prudence, having made
9. Having made known known unto us the mystery
unto us the mystery of his of his will, according to his
184

THE REVISED VERSION, 1881-85

will, according to his good
pleasure which he hath
purposed in himself:
10. That in the dispen
sation of the fulness of
times he might gather
together in one all things
in Christ, both which are
in heaven, and which are
on earth ; even in him :
n. In whom also we
have obtained an inheri
tance, being predestinated
according to the purpose
of him who worketh all
things after the counsel of
his own will :
12. That we should be
to the praise of his glory,
who first trusted in Christ.

good pleasure which he
purposed in him unto a
dispensation of the fulness
of the times, to sum up all
things in Christ, the things
in the heavens, and the
things upon the earth ; in
him, 7" say, in whom also
we were made a heritage,
having been foreordained
according to the purpose
of him who worketh all
things after the counsel of
his will ; to the end that
we should be unto the
praise of his glory, we
who had before hoped in
Christ.

The Old Testament Revisers followed the chiet
Massoretic Text closely, and very rarely departed Effected in
r . „, . , , , . , . the Revised
from it. Ihis renders the changes in their text oid
Testament.
much less noticeable than in the N.T. Light,
however, is thrown upon the O.T. text by the
LXX. and other early versions, and the Revisers
have not unfrequently put in the margin what is
probably the true reading. Examples of this occur
at Genesis iv. 8 ; xxxii. 28 ; Job xiii. 1 5 ; Isaiah
ix. 3. In this last example the Revisers read,
' Thou has multiplied the nation, thou hast in
creased their joy,' thus removing the seeming
contradiction of the A.V. In Isaiah lxiii. 9, they
put the probably true reading in the margin, ' In
185

THE PRINTED ENGLISH BIBLE
all their adversity he was no adversary.' In short,
there are many traces throughout the O.T. that the
needful two-thirds majority for important changes
of rendering was much less frequently attained
than in the NT. This renders the very careful
study of the marginal notes of the Revised O.T. a
necessity to any one who wishes to derive the
utmost benefit from it. In Job, for example, it is
hardly too much to say that the margin affords a
finer translation of the book than that which appears
in the text.
The Revisers have further bestowed great
benefit upon all Biblical scholars by the careful
way in which they have indicated the poetical
portions ; by their very judicious and helpful
treatment of the Psalter, especially in the way of
restraining alteration, indicating the five books, and
their treatment of the titles of the Psalms. As in
the New Testament the chief benefit is conferred
upon the student of the Epistles, so, if we had
to make a choice, we should say in the Old
Testament the chief benefit is conferred upon
the student of the Prophets. Of the manner
in which they have enabled the English reader to
grasp, in a way never possible before, the meaning
of the prophetical writers, a very long series of
illustrations could be given, but one must suffice.
Ex uno disce omnes. In Habakkuk i. 1 1 the A.V.
reads, ' Then shall his mind change, and he shall
pass over, and offend, imputing this his power unto
his god ' ; the R.V., ' Then shall he sweep by as a
186

THE REVISED VERSION, 1881-85
wind, and shall pass over (margin, or transgress)
and be guilty : even he whose might is his god.'
The latter gives a vivid picture of the haughty,
resistless Chaldean ; the former is practically
unintelligible. We have now passed in rapid review the cardinal
editions of portions, and of complete versions of
the English Printed Bible. We have been able to
sketch but the merest outline. The temptation to
fill in that outline has always been strong, but the
inexorable limits of space forbade. We trust that
enough has been said to put the careful reader in
possession of the leading points in one of the most
wonderful stories in the history of the English
nation. Since William Tindale died at Vilvorde,
in 1536, England has passed through many a time
of stress and storm. She successfully weathered
the Romanist reaction under both Henry VIII. and
Mary Tudor ; she defeated Spain in the day of
that kingdom's haughtiest might ; she broke the
power of irresponsible monarchy during the
Commonwealth ; and since that day she has led
the van among the nations of the world in the
struggle for and the achievement of civil and
religious liberty. In all these past conflicts the
English Bible has been the real strength of the
English nation. And amid the conflict of thought
and purpose and motive to-day the same sure
guide is in our midst, the same unerring counsellor
in that ' Word of the Lord that liveth and abideth
for ever.' 187

BIBLIOGRAPHY
First and foremost for all quotations consult the various
editions of the Bible themselves. Rare and valuable
as these are, nearly all of them are now accessible at the
British Museum and other great libraries. Nowhere else
does the maxim 'verify your references' apply with
greater force.
The best Histories are Westcott's History of the
English Bible, second edition, 1872 ; Eadie's The
English Bible, 2 vols., octavo, 1876 ; and Moulton's
The History of the English Bible, 1878. The first of
these is an admirable book. The second is correct in
the main, though inaccurate in some detailsr The third
is, perhaps, the best for those beginning the study. To
these, for all information respecting Tindale, must be
added William Tyndale, A Biography, by R. Demaus,
Second Edition, with facsimiles, revised by Richard
Lovett, M.A. (R.T.S.).
The following facsimile and reprint editions are very
useful : —
New Testament, Tyndale, 1525. Francis Fry, 1862.
The Prophet fonas, Tyndale. Francis Fry, 1863.
The First Printed English NT., W. Tyndale, 1525.
Edward Arber, 1871. 188

BIBLIOGRAPHY
William Tyndale's Five Books of Moses. Verbatim
Reprint of the edition of 1530, by Rev. J. I.
Mombert, D.D. (Bagster).
The English Hexapla (Bagster).
The Oxford Reprint of the A.V., 161 1, 1833.
The following may be mentioned as specially useful
for bibliographical and textual information. They are
all easily procurable : —
British Museum Catalogue of Printed Books — Bible,
Part I., 1892 (only part yet issued).
A Description of the Great Bible, 1539, and the Six
Editions of Cranmer's Bible ; also of the Editions in
large folio of the A. V., by Francis Fry, folio, 186.5.
A Bibliographical Description of the Editions of the NT.,
Tyndale's Version, 1525-1566. Francis Fry, quarto,
1878.
The Bibles in the Caxton Exhibition, by Henry Stevens,
1877. (Usually extremely accurate in all biblio
graphical details. On other points must be used
with care.)
The Authorized Edition of the English Bible, 161 1, by
F. H. A. Scrivener, M.A., D.C.L., 1884 (University
Press, Cambridge).
Anderson's The Annals of the English Bible, 2 vols.,
octavo, 1845 ; Lewis, History of 'the English Bible, 1818,
Cotton's Editions of the Bible, Oxford, 1855, and Rheims
and Douay, Oxford, 1855, contain much useful infor
mation, but are so unreliable that it is not safe to
accept their statements without verification.

189

INDEX

Allen, Cardinal, 142
Alley.iBishop, one of the translators
of the Bishops' Bible, 137
Andrews, Dr., Dean of Westminster,
one of the A.V. translators, 160
Answer to Sir Thomas More, Tindale's,
57
'Authorised' Version, 1611, the,
156-80
the history of its inception, 157-
59
the revisers, 159-60
general rules to be followed, 160-
62
description of the version, 163-76
never ' authorised,' 176
not an entirely new translation,
177
no exact reprints of the A.V.
now in common use, 177-79
notable editions of the A.V., 179-
80
Bainham, 84
Barlow, Dr., Dean of Chester, one
of the A.V. translators, 160
Barker, Robert, printer of the, A.V.,
162, 165, 166
Bible, the Great, 1539, 101-14
Bibliography, 188-89
Bilney, 83-4
Bilson, Bishop, and the A.V., 162
Bishops' Bible, 1568, the, 135-40
Bonner, Bishop, 102
' Breeches Bibie,' the, 130
Bristow, Dr., 142-43
Burleigh, Lord, 137
Buschius, 47
Calvin, John, 121, 148
Caxton, 12-13

Cochlaeus, John, 26-7 J
Coverdale, 71-81, 96-8
his translation of the whole Bible
published in 1535, 71-3
his personal history, 73
description of his Bible, 74-81, 84
reprints of Coverdale's Bible, 95—
6, 1 15-16
his parallel Latin-English N.T.
published in 1538, 96-8
an edition of his N.T. published in
1538, 98
editor of the Great Bible of 1539,
in
Cox, Bishop, one of the translators
of the Bishops' Bible, 137
Cranmer's Bible (so-called), 87, 88-
9, 105, 106, 108, no, 115, 135
Crom, Matthew, 98
Cromwell, Thomas, 73, 78, 85, 87,
88-9, 99, 101, 103, 105, 106, no,
135
Day, John, 100
Douay O.T., the, 79, 149-55
Duport, Dr., one of the A.V. trans
lators, 160
Edward VI., 1 14-15 ; editions of
the N.T. published during his
reign, 116, 157
Elizabeth, 119, 124, 126-28,135,137,
157
Erasmus, 19, 23, 24, 35, in, 112,
116, 147
FOXE, 17, 18, 74, 83, 118
Gardiner, Stephen, 118
Geneva Bible, 1560, the, 119-34,
135

190

INDEX

Geneva N.T., 1557, the, 121-23
Gilbey, Anthony, one of the editors
of the Geneva Bible, 120
Golden Legend, the, the first printed
English book in which any por
tion of Scripture appeared, 12-
14, 130
Grafton and Whitchurch, no
Gregory, Martin, one of the trans
lators of the Roman Catholic
Bible, 142
Grindal, Bishop, one of the trans
lators of the Bishops' Bible,
137
Hampton Court Conference, out
of which the A.V. proceeded,
157
Harding, Dr., Professor of Hebrew
at Oxford, one of the A.V.
translators, 160
He Bible, the, 163, 166
Henry VIII., 71, 74, 77, 87, 102-03,
105, 114, 157
Hollybush Testament, the, 98
James I., King, 157-58, 167, 177
Jonah, Book of, Tindale's transla
tion of, 87
Joye, George, his edition of the
N.T., 1534, 57, 66-8
Latimer, 72
Leicester, Earl of, 137
Lively, Professor of Hebrew at
Cambridge, one of the A.V.
translators, 160
Lloyd, Bishop, 180
Luther, 19, 23, 27, 34-5, 66, 77, 148,
149
Manual of a Christian Soldier, The,
19
Marler, Anthony, no
Mary Tudor, reign of, 115, 1 16-18
Matthew's Bible of 1537, 85-100
licensed bv Henry VIII., and
dedicated to him, 87, 88
who was Matthew ? 88
description of Matthew's Bible,
89-95
si revised edition of Matthews
Bible known as Taverner's
Bible, 1539, 98-100

Matthew's Bible, the basis of the
Great Bible of 1539, in
two editions of Matthew's Bible
published in 1549, 115
Martyrdom of Rogers, 117-18
Monmouth, Humfrey, 46
Moulton, Dr., 155
Miinster, Sebastian, his Hebrew-
Latin edition of the O.T. used
by Coverdale in preparing the
Great Bible of 1539, in, 136
Nicolson, 74, 95, 97
Obedience of a Christian Man, Tin-
dale's, 42, 57, 84
PAGNINUS, his Latin version of the
Scriptures consulted by Cover-
dale, 77, 136
Parable of the Wicked Mammon,
Tindale's, 34, 42, 57
Parker, Archbishop, 134, 136-40
Phillips, Henry, 82
Pole, Reginald, 117
Poyntz, Thomas, 82
Practice of Prelates, Tindale's, 57
Prologue to the Epistle to the Romans,
Tindale's, 41-2
Psalms, Prayer Book version of the,
taken from the Great Bible of
1539, 1 1 2-1 3
Purvey, 11
Quentel, Peter, 26 .
Ravis, Dr., Dean of Christ Church,
Oxford, one of the A.V. trans
lators. 160
Redman, Robert, 98
Regnault, Francis, 97
Revised Version, the, 1S1-87
chief changes, 183-87
Reynolds, Dr. J., 142
Reynolds, Dr., who suggested the
A. V., 157, 160
Rhemes N.T., the, 141-49
Rogers, John, the first victim of the
Marian persecution, and trans
lator of Matthew's Bible, 85,
87, 93, 94. 101, 1 17-18
Roman Catholic English Bible, 1582,
141-55
Roye, Tindale's amanuensis, 27, 34

191

INDEX

Sampson, Thomas, one of the
editors of the Geneva Bible,
1 20
Sandys, Bishop, one of the trans
lators of the Bishops' Bible,
137
Schoeffer, Peter, 71
She Bible, the, 163, 166
Smith, Dr., and the A.V., 162, 167-
71
Speed, John, 165
Taverner's Bible, 1539 ; reprinted
in several volumes, 1540 ; O.T.
reprinted 1551, 98-100
Tindale, William, 15-70, 81-4
his early life, 17-1S
at Little Sodbury, 18-24
in London, 24-6
Hamburg, 26
translation of N.T. completed, 26
printed in part at Cologne, 26-7
completion of printing at Worms
in 1525, 27-8
the translation burnt in St. Paul's
Churchyard, 28
examination of the translation by
author, 28-40
his life between 1525 and 1530
obscure, 41-2

Tindale, William, his translation of
the Pentateuch printed at Mar
burg in 1530, 42-55
his revised translation of the N.T.
published in 1534, 56-68
other editions of his N.T., 68-70
his martyrdom in 1536, 81-3
examples of his influence, 83-4
two editions of his N.T. pub
lished in 1538, 98
Tunstal, Bishop, 24-5, 28, 71
Ussher, Archbishop, 180
Vilvorde Castle, scene of Tindale's
martyrdom, 82-3
Vulgate, the, 10, 35, 77, 96, 105,
111-12, 156
WALSH, Sir JOHN, Tindale tutor to
his children, 18-24
Warham, Archbishop, 71
Westcott, Bishop, 39-40, 139
Whittingham, William, 120, 122-23,
133
Wolsey, 9, 21, 24, 27, 28, 71, 98
Wycliffe's translation of the Bible,
10—12
Zurich Bible, the, 77

DNWIX BROTHERS, LIMITED, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON.
192

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