Middle Ages to 19th century
The first translation of the whole Bible into Catalan was produced between by the Catholic Church, between 1287 and 1290. It was entrusted to Jaume de Montjuich by Alfons II of Aragon. Remains of this version can be found in Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale). Also, in the same French library, we can find another translation into Catalan, which Jaume II of Aragon received on November 23rd, 1319.[citation needed]
In the early fifteenth century appeared another whole Bible translation by Bonifaci Ferrer. In 1490 a psalter by Joan Roís de Corella came to light in Venice. The Catalan Bible by Bonifaci Ferrer was printed before any Bible was printed in English or Spanish, in 1478.[citation needed]
The prohibition, in Spain and other Catholic countries, of vernacular translations, along with the decline of the Catalan language until its renaissance in the nineteenth century, explain why there were no translations into Catalan from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century.
In 1832 a Catalan exiled in London, J.M. Prat Colom, sponsored by the British and Foreign Bible Society, translated the New Testament (Lo Nou Testament de nostre Senyor Jesu-Christ), which was published afterwards in Barcelona (1836) and Madrid (1888).[citation needed]
20th century to present
In the twentieth century many new translations flourished, both Catholic and Protestant.
Bible translations by language:
Catholic translations
1948 Bíblia de Cambó, by Fundació Bíblica Catalana; started in 1927
1968 Bíblia de Cambó, 2nd Edition: a new translation, reprinted some times
1970 Bíblia dels Monjos de Montserrat: by the Monks of Montserrat, started in 1926. Other editions based on it have been published, with some textual variations[citation needed]
Protestant translations
1988 Nou Testament: the New Testament, by the Institució Bíblica Evangèlica de Catalunya, with the help of the International Bible Society
2000 Bíblia Evangèlica Catalana (BEC); also La Bíblia del 2000: by Pau Sais and Samuel Sais of the Institució Bíblica Evangèlica de Catalunya
Ecumenical translation
For the Ecumenical translation, Catholic and Protestant translators worked together. However, there are two editions: a Catholic edition with the deuterocanonical books and a Protestant edition without.
1993 Bíblia Catalana Interconfessional (BCI), by Associació Bíblica de Catalunya, Editorial Claret, and Societats Bíbliques Unides.
The first translation of the whole Bible into Catalan was produced between by the Catholic Church, between 1287 and 1290. It was entrusted to Jaume de Montjuich by Alfons II of Aragon. Remains of this version can be found in Paris (Bibliothèque Nationale). Also, in the same French library, we can find another translation into Catalan, which Jaume II of Aragon received on November 23rd, 1319.[citation needed]
In the early fifteenth century appeared another whole Bible translation by Bonifaci Ferrer. In 1490 a psalter by Joan Roís de Corella came to light in Venice. The Catalan Bible by Bonifaci Ferrer was printed before any Bible was printed in English or Spanish, in 1478.[citation needed]
The prohibition, in Spain and other Catholic countries, of vernacular translations, along with the decline of the Catalan language until its renaissance in the nineteenth century, explain why there were no translations into Catalan from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century.
In 1832 a Catalan exiled in London, J.M. Prat Colom, sponsored by the British and Foreign Bible Society, translated the New Testament (Lo Nou Testament de nostre Senyor Jesu-Christ), which was published afterwards in Barcelona (1836) and Madrid (1888).[citation needed]
20th century to present
In the twentieth century many new translations flourished, both Catholic and Protestant.
Bible translations by language:
Catholic translations
1948 Bíblia de Cambó, by Fundació Bíblica Catalana; started in 1927
1968 Bíblia de Cambó, 2nd Edition: a new translation, reprinted some times
1970 Bíblia dels Monjos de Montserrat: by the Monks of Montserrat, started in 1926. Other editions based on it have been published, with some textual variations[citation needed]
Protestant translations
1988 Nou Testament: the New Testament, by the Institució Bíblica Evangèlica de Catalunya, with the help of the International Bible Society
2000 Bíblia Evangèlica Catalana (BEC); also La Bíblia del 2000: by Pau Sais and Samuel Sais of the Institució Bíblica Evangèlica de Catalunya
Ecumenical translation
For the Ecumenical translation, Catholic and Protestant translators worked together. However, there are two editions: a Catholic edition with the deuterocanonical books and a Protestant edition without.
1993 Bíblia Catalana Interconfessional (BCI), by Associació Bíblica de Catalunya, Editorial Claret, and Societats Bíbliques Unides.
Afrikaans
The Bible was translated into Afrikaans in 1933, revised in 1953 by the Bybelgenootskap van Suid Afrika, a South African Bible society. There is also a 1983 translation.
Translation
Genesis 1:1-3
1953
In die begin het God die hemel en die aarde geskape. En die aarde was woes en leeg, en duisternis was op die wêreldvloed, en die Gees van God het gesweef op die waters. En God het gesê: Laat daar lig wees! En daar was lig.
The Bible was translated into Afrikaans in 1933, revised in 1953 by the Bybelgenootskap van Suid Afrika, a South African Bible society. There is also a 1983 translation.
Translation
Genesis 1:1-3
1953
In die begin het God die hemel en die aarde geskape. En die aarde was woes en leeg, en duisternis was op die wêreldvloed, en die Gees van God het gesweef op die waters. En God het gesê: Laat daar lig wees! En daar was lig.
Apache
Missionary Crusader, Lubbock, Texas published an Apache language translation of John, James, and 1 John in 1958.
After translating the Navajo Bible, Faye Edgerton learned Apache, and together with Faith Hill, and the Apache's Celena Perry, Britton Goods, Johnson Ethelbah, and Happy Moses, translated the New Testament into the Western Apache language. The Apache New Testament was completed, and presented to President Johnson in 1966.
Arabic
Jewish
In the 10th century AD Saadia Gaon wrote a Tafsir, an Arabic translation of the Tanakh with a lengthy commentary. These were written in Hebrew characters (Judeo-Arabic). Much of the commentary is lost, but the translation has survived intact, and even served as part of the liturgy of Yemenite Jews, who read the Torah in the synagogue with each Hebrew verse translated twice: First to the Aramaic targum, and second to Saadia's Tafsir.
Christian
In 1671 the Catholic Church published the whole Bible at Rome. The translation was done under the direction of Sergius Risi, the Catholic Archbishop of Damascus. Francis Britius aided the translation.
The most popular translation is the Van Dyck Version, funded by the Syrian Mission and the American Bible Society. The project was the brainchild of Eli Smith, and started around 1847, centred in Beirut. After Eli Smith's death it was completed under the direction of Cornelius Van Allen Van Dyck. Others involved included Nasif al Yaziji and Boutros al Bustani. The New Testament was completed on March 9, 1860, followed by the Tanach on March 10, 1865. About 10 million copies of this version have been distributed since 1865. It has been accepted by the Coptic Church and the Protestant churches. This translation was based mostly on the same Textus Receptus as the King James Version of the Bible, and follows a more literal style of translation. Most printings of the Van Dyck version use the same basic printing plates which have been employed for years (possibly the same plates that were made when the translation was first adopted; maybe somebody can verify that fact). These plates employ the "stacking" version of writing Arabic, in which, for example, letters that precede other specified letters, such as "Jeem," are written vertical to rather than horizontal to that letter. This style of Arabic can be hard to read at times, especially for non-native students of Arabic. More recently, newer printings of the Van Dyck have been made which employ a more common, straightforward Arabic font.
While most of the Arabic in the Van Dyck version is pretty standard, there is some terminology in it that Muslim or other non-Christian readers may not understand (e.g. "As-hah", the word for a chapter of the Bible; "tajdif", the word for blasphemy.) It should also be noted that an Arab Muslim reading the Bible in Arabic (especially if he is reading the New Testament) will find the rather straightforward style quite different from the more cryptic tone that he is used to in the Qur'an (this is more or less true of all Arabic translations of the Bible). Also of note is the fact that Qur'anic/Islamic terminology was not very much used in this version of the Bible (as it is in most versions of the Bible).
In 1973 the International Bible Society began to work on a new translation, this project was named the Arabic Life Application Bible. The Injil (New Testament) was released in 1982, and the whole Bible was completed in 1988.
In 1992 the Bible Society, released Today's Arabic Version, a Dynamic equivalence translation designed to be as easy to understand as possible. It is the Arabic equivalent of the English Good News Translation.
Belarusian
The first translation into Belarusian was by Francysk Skaryna. He printed his first book entitled The Psalter, in the Old Belarusian language on August 6, 1517 in Prague. He continued his printing work in Vilnius. The culmination of his life's work was a printing of the Bible in Old Belarusian. From 1517 to 1519 he printed 23 books of the Bible. Skaryna laid the foundations of the Belarusian literary language. Belarusian bible was the first translation in an Eastern Slavic language and one of the first among European languages.
In 2000 a translation from an Old-Slavic Bible was executed by well known Byelorussian slavist and translator Vasiliy Sergeevich Semukha, with the help of Metropolitan of Byelorussian Authokefal Orthodox Church Nickolaj and missionary of Global Missionary Ministries George Rapetsky (Canada).
Czech
The first translation of the whole Bible into Czech, based on the Latin Vulgate, was done in 1360. The Bible is called the "Bible of Dresden". This manuscript was lost during World War I. Many other translations followed this Bible of Dresden, and from the linguistic point of view they can be divided in four different redactions. The last one was finally printed.
The first printed Czech New Testament is the "New Testament of Dlabač", printed in 1487. The first printed complete Bible is the "Bible of Prague" from 1488. Another Czech Bible printed before the year 1501 is the "Bible of Kutná Hora", printed in 1489. All these texts were translated from the Vulgate.
The first translation from the original languages into Czech was the Bible of Kralice, first published in years 1579–1593. The translation was done by the Unity of the Brethren. The third edition from 1613 is considered classical and is one of the most used Czech Bible translations.
Dakota
The Dakota Bible translation was started with Thomas E. Williamson and a half-breed trader, Mr. Renville, who had taken an interest in Williamson's work. After Williamson had modified the Latin alphabet to "work" for Dakota, he spent day after day for two or three winters in Renville's warehouse, reading verse by verse from his French Bible. Mr. Renville would then give the Dakota, and Williamson would write it down. They finished Mark and John this way. In 1837 Williamson was joined by Stephen Riggs, and both of them learned Dakota, and then compared the tentative translation with the original Greek.
In 1843 they offered a corrected gospel to the American Bible Society to be printed. It took nearly 40 years before the full Bible was translated. Williamson never lived to see it finished, as he died in 1879. Their work was revised by Williamson's son, the Rev. John Williamson.
Missionary Crusader, Lubbock, Texas published an Apache language translation of John, James, and 1 John in 1958.
After translating the Navajo Bible, Faye Edgerton learned Apache, and together with Faith Hill, and the Apache's Celena Perry, Britton Goods, Johnson Ethelbah, and Happy Moses, translated the New Testament into the Western Apache language. The Apache New Testament was completed, and presented to President Johnson in 1966.
Arabic
Jewish
In the 10th century AD Saadia Gaon wrote a Tafsir, an Arabic translation of the Tanakh with a lengthy commentary. These were written in Hebrew characters (Judeo-Arabic). Much of the commentary is lost, but the translation has survived intact, and even served as part of the liturgy of Yemenite Jews, who read the Torah in the synagogue with each Hebrew verse translated twice: First to the Aramaic targum, and second to Saadia's Tafsir.
Christian
In 1671 the Catholic Church published the whole Bible at Rome. The translation was done under the direction of Sergius Risi, the Catholic Archbishop of Damascus. Francis Britius aided the translation.
The most popular translation is the Van Dyck Version, funded by the Syrian Mission and the American Bible Society. The project was the brainchild of Eli Smith, and started around 1847, centred in Beirut. After Eli Smith's death it was completed under the direction of Cornelius Van Allen Van Dyck. Others involved included Nasif al Yaziji and Boutros al Bustani. The New Testament was completed on March 9, 1860, followed by the Tanach on March 10, 1865. About 10 million copies of this version have been distributed since 1865. It has been accepted by the Coptic Church and the Protestant churches. This translation was based mostly on the same Textus Receptus as the King James Version of the Bible, and follows a more literal style of translation. Most printings of the Van Dyck version use the same basic printing plates which have been employed for years (possibly the same plates that were made when the translation was first adopted; maybe somebody can verify that fact). These plates employ the "stacking" version of writing Arabic, in which, for example, letters that precede other specified letters, such as "Jeem," are written vertical to rather than horizontal to that letter. This style of Arabic can be hard to read at times, especially for non-native students of Arabic. More recently, newer printings of the Van Dyck have been made which employ a more common, straightforward Arabic font.
While most of the Arabic in the Van Dyck version is pretty standard, there is some terminology in it that Muslim or other non-Christian readers may not understand (e.g. "As-hah", the word for a chapter of the Bible; "tajdif", the word for blasphemy.) It should also be noted that an Arab Muslim reading the Bible in Arabic (especially if he is reading the New Testament) will find the rather straightforward style quite different from the more cryptic tone that he is used to in the Qur'an (this is more or less true of all Arabic translations of the Bible). Also of note is the fact that Qur'anic/Islamic terminology was not very much used in this version of the Bible (as it is in most versions of the Bible).
In 1973 the International Bible Society began to work on a new translation, this project was named the Arabic Life Application Bible. The Injil (New Testament) was released in 1982, and the whole Bible was completed in 1988.
In 1992 the Bible Society, released Today's Arabic Version, a Dynamic equivalence translation designed to be as easy to understand as possible. It is the Arabic equivalent of the English Good News Translation.
Belarusian
The first translation into Belarusian was by Francysk Skaryna. He printed his first book entitled The Psalter, in the Old Belarusian language on August 6, 1517 in Prague. He continued his printing work in Vilnius. The culmination of his life's work was a printing of the Bible in Old Belarusian. From 1517 to 1519 he printed 23 books of the Bible. Skaryna laid the foundations of the Belarusian literary language. Belarusian bible was the first translation in an Eastern Slavic language and one of the first among European languages.
In 2000 a translation from an Old-Slavic Bible was executed by well known Byelorussian slavist and translator Vasiliy Sergeevich Semukha, with the help of Metropolitan of Byelorussian Authokefal Orthodox Church Nickolaj and missionary of Global Missionary Ministries George Rapetsky (Canada).
Czech
The first translation of the whole Bible into Czech, based on the Latin Vulgate, was done in 1360. The Bible is called the "Bible of Dresden". This manuscript was lost during World War I. Many other translations followed this Bible of Dresden, and from the linguistic point of view they can be divided in four different redactions. The last one was finally printed.
The first printed Czech New Testament is the "New Testament of Dlabač", printed in 1487. The first printed complete Bible is the "Bible of Prague" from 1488. Another Czech Bible printed before the year 1501 is the "Bible of Kutná Hora", printed in 1489. All these texts were translated from the Vulgate.
The first translation from the original languages into Czech was the Bible of Kralice, first published in years 1579–1593. The translation was done by the Unity of the Brethren. The third edition from 1613 is considered classical and is one of the most used Czech Bible translations.
Dakota
The Dakota Bible translation was started with Thomas E. Williamson and a half-breed trader, Mr. Renville, who had taken an interest in Williamson's work. After Williamson had modified the Latin alphabet to "work" for Dakota, he spent day after day for two or three winters in Renville's warehouse, reading verse by verse from his French Bible. Mr. Renville would then give the Dakota, and Williamson would write it down. They finished Mark and John this way. In 1837 Williamson was joined by Stephen Riggs, and both of them learned Dakota, and then compared the tentative translation with the original Greek.
In 1843 they offered a corrected gospel to the American Bible Society to be printed. It took nearly 40 years before the full Bible was translated. Williamson never lived to see it finished, as he died in 1879. Their work was revised by Williamson's son, the Rev. John Williamson.
Dutch
The first translation into Dutch directly from Greek and Hebrew sources was the Statenvertaling. It was ordered by the States-General at the Synod of Dordrecht in 1618/19, and first published in 1637. It soon became the generally accepted translation for Reformed churches in the Netherlands and remained so well into the 20th century. It was supplanted to a large extent in 1951 by the Nederlands Bijbelgenootschap (NBG) translation, which still uses relatively old-fashioned language.
Modern language translations are Groot Nieuws Bijbel (GNB), International Bible Society's Het Boek, and the Catholic Willibrordvertaling. In 2004, the Nieuwe Bijbelvertaling (NBV) translation appeared, which was produced by an ecumenical translation team, and is intended as an all-purpose translation for pulpit and home use; however, there has been much criticism on its accuracy.[citation needed]
Around the same time, there has also been much work on very literal, idiolect translations, such as the Naarden translation of 2004, Albert Koster's translation of the Old Testament, a work in progress since 1991, and the Torah translation of the Societas Hebraica Amstelodamensis.
The first translation into Dutch directly from Greek and Hebrew sources was the Statenvertaling. It was ordered by the States-General at the Synod of Dordrecht in 1618/19, and first published in 1637. It soon became the generally accepted translation for Reformed churches in the Netherlands and remained so well into the 20th century. It was supplanted to a large extent in 1951 by the Nederlands Bijbelgenootschap (NBG) translation, which still uses relatively old-fashioned language.
Modern language translations are Groot Nieuws Bijbel (GNB), International Bible Society's Het Boek, and the Catholic Willibrordvertaling. In 2004, the Nieuwe Bijbelvertaling (NBV) translation appeared, which was produced by an ecumenical translation team, and is intended as an all-purpose translation for pulpit and home use; however, there has been much criticism on its accuracy.[citation needed]
Around the same time, there has also been much work on very literal, idiolect translations, such as the Naarden translation of 2004, Albert Koster's translation of the Old Testament, a work in progress since 1991, and the Torah translation of the Societas Hebraica Amstelodamensis.
English translations of the Bible:
The efforts of translating the Bible from its original languages into over 2,000 others have spanned more than two millennia. Partial translations of the Bible into languages of the English people can be traced back to the end of the 7th century, translations into Old English and Middle English as well as the language we know today. Over 450 versions have been created over time. The following paragraphs describe the history of these efforts, focusing on the translation of the Bible into English.
Old English translations.
Old English translations.
Main article: Old English Bible translations
Although John Wycliff is often credited with the first translation of the Bible into English, there were, in fact, many translations of large parts of the Bible centuries before Wycliff's work. Toward the end of the seventh century, the Venerable Bede began a translation of Scripture into Old English (also called Anglo-Saxon). Aldhelm (AD 640–709), likewise, translated the complete Book of Psalms and large portions of other scriptures into Old English. In the 11th century, Abbot Ælfric translated much of the Old Testament into Old English.
For seven or eight centuries, it was the Latin Vulgate that held sway as the common version nearest to the tongue of the people. Latin had become the accepted tongue of the Roman Catholic Church, and there was little general acquaintance with the Bible except among the educated. During that time, there was little room for a further translation. While the illiterate majority of the people had little desire for access to the Bible, the educated minority would have been averse to so great and revolutionary a change.
These centuries added to the conviction of many that the Bible ought not to become too common, that it should not be read by everybody, and that it required a certain amount of learning to make it safe reading. They came to feel that it is as important to have an authoritative interpretation of the Bible as to have the Bible itself. When the movement began to make it speak the new English tongue, it provoked the most violent opposition. Latin had been good enough for a millennium; why cheapen the Bible by a translation? There had grown up a feeling that Jerome himself had been inspired. He had been canonised, and half the references to him in that time speak of him as the inspired translator.
Criticism of his version was counted as impious and profane as criticisms of the original text could possibly have been. It is one of the ironies of history that the version for which Jerome had to fight, and which was counted a piece of impiety itself, actually became the ground on which men stood when they fought against another version, counting anything else but this very version an impious intrusion.
How early the movement for an English Bible began, it is impossible now to say. Yet the fact is that until the last quarter of the 14th century, there was no complete prose version of the Bible in the English language. However, there were vernacular translations of parts of the Bible in England previously, in both Anglo-Saxon and Norman French.
Middle English translations:
Main article: Middle English Bible translations
Middle English Bible translations (1066–1500) covers the age of Middle English – it was not a fertile time for Bible translations but saw the first major translation, Wyclif's Bible, from John Wyclif. The period of Middle English begins with the Norman conquest and ends about 1500.
Early Modern English translations
Main article: Early Modern English Bible translations
Early Modern English Bible translations are those translations of the Bible which were made between about 1500 and 1800, the period of Early Modern English. This was the first major period of Bible translation into the English language. It began with the dramatic introduction of the Tyndale Bible and included the landmark King James Version (1611) and Douai Bibles. It included the first "authorised version", known as the Great Bible (1539); the Geneva Bible (1560), notable for being the first Bible divided into verses, and the Bishop's Bible (1568), which was an attempt by Elizabeth I to create a new authorised version.
Modern translations
Main articles: Modern English Bible translations and Jewish English Bible translations
Much like early English Bibles, which were based on Greek texts or Latin translations, modern English translations of the Bible are based on the best-available original texts of the time. The translators put much scholarly effort into cross-checking the various sources such as the Pentateuch, Septuagint, Textus Receptus, and Masoretic Text. Relatively recent discoveries such as the Dead Sea scrolls provide additional reference information. There is some controversy over which texts should be used as a basis for translation, as some of the alternate sources do not include verses which are found in the Textus Receptus. Some say the alternate sources were poorly representative of the texts used in their time, whereas others claim the Textus Receptus includes passages that were added to the alternate texts improperly. These controversial passages are generally not the basis for disputed issues of doctrine, but tend to be additional stories or snippets of phrases. The majority of modern English translations, such as the New International Version, contain extensive text notes indicating where differences occur in original sources.
Modern English translations can be broken down into Christian, Critical and Jewish sections.
Although John Wycliff is often credited with the first translation of the Bible into English, there were, in fact, many translations of large parts of the Bible centuries before Wycliff's work. Toward the end of the seventh century, the Venerable Bede began a translation of Scripture into Old English (also called Anglo-Saxon). Aldhelm (AD 640–709), likewise, translated the complete Book of Psalms and large portions of other scriptures into Old English. In the 11th century, Abbot Ælfric translated much of the Old Testament into Old English.
For seven or eight centuries, it was the Latin Vulgate that held sway as the common version nearest to the tongue of the people. Latin had become the accepted tongue of the Roman Catholic Church, and there was little general acquaintance with the Bible except among the educated. During that time, there was little room for a further translation. While the illiterate majority of the people had little desire for access to the Bible, the educated minority would have been averse to so great and revolutionary a change.
These centuries added to the conviction of many that the Bible ought not to become too common, that it should not be read by everybody, and that it required a certain amount of learning to make it safe reading. They came to feel that it is as important to have an authoritative interpretation of the Bible as to have the Bible itself. When the movement began to make it speak the new English tongue, it provoked the most violent opposition. Latin had been good enough for a millennium; why cheapen the Bible by a translation? There had grown up a feeling that Jerome himself had been inspired. He had been canonised, and half the references to him in that time speak of him as the inspired translator.
Criticism of his version was counted as impious and profane as criticisms of the original text could possibly have been. It is one of the ironies of history that the version for which Jerome had to fight, and which was counted a piece of impiety itself, actually became the ground on which men stood when they fought against another version, counting anything else but this very version an impious intrusion.
How early the movement for an English Bible began, it is impossible now to say. Yet the fact is that until the last quarter of the 14th century, there was no complete prose version of the Bible in the English language. However, there were vernacular translations of parts of the Bible in England previously, in both Anglo-Saxon and Norman French.
Middle English translations:
Main article: Middle English Bible translations
Middle English Bible translations (1066–1500) covers the age of Middle English – it was not a fertile time for Bible translations but saw the first major translation, Wyclif's Bible, from John Wyclif. The period of Middle English begins with the Norman conquest and ends about 1500.
Early Modern English translations
Main article: Early Modern English Bible translations
Early Modern English Bible translations are those translations of the Bible which were made between about 1500 and 1800, the period of Early Modern English. This was the first major period of Bible translation into the English language. It began with the dramatic introduction of the Tyndale Bible and included the landmark King James Version (1611) and Douai Bibles. It included the first "authorised version", known as the Great Bible (1539); the Geneva Bible (1560), notable for being the first Bible divided into verses, and the Bishop's Bible (1568), which was an attempt by Elizabeth I to create a new authorised version.
Modern translations
Main articles: Modern English Bible translations and Jewish English Bible translations
Much like early English Bibles, which were based on Greek texts or Latin translations, modern English translations of the Bible are based on the best-available original texts of the time. The translators put much scholarly effort into cross-checking the various sources such as the Pentateuch, Septuagint, Textus Receptus, and Masoretic Text. Relatively recent discoveries such as the Dead Sea scrolls provide additional reference information. There is some controversy over which texts should be used as a basis for translation, as some of the alternate sources do not include verses which are found in the Textus Receptus. Some say the alternate sources were poorly representative of the texts used in their time, whereas others claim the Textus Receptus includes passages that were added to the alternate texts improperly. These controversial passages are generally not the basis for disputed issues of doctrine, but tend to be additional stories or snippets of phrases. The majority of modern English translations, such as the New International Version, contain extensive text notes indicating where differences occur in original sources.
Modern English translations can be broken down into Christian, Critical and Jewish sections.
Christian translations
There are over 50 complete modern English Christian translations and many more partial translations. See main article: Modern English Bible translations.
Critical translations
Although most translations of the Bible have been authorised or made by religious people for religious use, historians and philologists have studied the Bible as a historical and literary text and have presented secular translations.
The best known is the Anchor Bible; each book is translated by a different scholar, with extensive critical commentary.
Jewish translations
Main article: Jewish English Bible translations
Jewish English Bible translations are modern English Bible translations that include the books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) according to the masoretic text, and according to the traditional division and order of Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim.
Jewish translations often also reflect traditional Jewish interpretations of the Bible, as opposed to the Christian understanding that is often reflected in non-Jewish translations. For example, Jewish translations translate עלמה ‘almâh in Isa 7:14 as young woman, while many Christian translations render the word as virgin.
While modern biblical scholarship is similar for both Christians and Jews, there are distinctive features of Jewish translations, even those created by academic scholars. These include (besides the avoidance of Christological interpretations) adherence to the Masoretic Text (at least in the main body of the text, as in the new JPS translation) and greater use of classical Jewish exegesis. Some translations prefer names transliterated from the Hebrew, though the majority of Jewish translations use the Anglicized forms of biblical names.
The first English Jewish translation of the Bible was by Isaac Leeser in the nineteenth century.
The Jewish Publication Society produced two of the most popular Jewish translations, namely the JPS The Holy Scriptures of 1917 and the NJPS Tanakh (first printed in a single volume in 1985).
Since the 1980s there have been multiple efforts among Orthodox publishers to produce translations that are not only Jewish, but also adhere to Orthodox norms. Among these are The Living Torah and Nach by Aryeh Kaplan and others, and the Artscroll Tanakh.
Old English translations:
There are over 50 complete modern English Christian translations and many more partial translations. See main article: Modern English Bible translations.
Critical translations
Although most translations of the Bible have been authorised or made by religious people for religious use, historians and philologists have studied the Bible as a historical and literary text and have presented secular translations.
The best known is the Anchor Bible; each book is translated by a different scholar, with extensive critical commentary.
Jewish translations
Main article: Jewish English Bible translations
Jewish English Bible translations are modern English Bible translations that include the books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) according to the masoretic text, and according to the traditional division and order of Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim.
Jewish translations often also reflect traditional Jewish interpretations of the Bible, as opposed to the Christian understanding that is often reflected in non-Jewish translations. For example, Jewish translations translate עלמה ‘almâh in Isa 7:14 as young woman, while many Christian translations render the word as virgin.
While modern biblical scholarship is similar for both Christians and Jews, there are distinctive features of Jewish translations, even those created by academic scholars. These include (besides the avoidance of Christological interpretations) adherence to the Masoretic Text (at least in the main body of the text, as in the new JPS translation) and greater use of classical Jewish exegesis. Some translations prefer names transliterated from the Hebrew, though the majority of Jewish translations use the Anglicized forms of biblical names.
The first English Jewish translation of the Bible was by Isaac Leeser in the nineteenth century.
The Jewish Publication Society produced two of the most popular Jewish translations, namely the JPS The Holy Scriptures of 1917 and the NJPS Tanakh (first printed in a single volume in 1985).
Since the 1980s there have been multiple efforts among Orthodox publishers to produce translations that are not only Jewish, but also adhere to Orthodox norms. Among these are The Living Torah and Nach by Aryeh Kaplan and others, and the Artscroll Tanakh.
Old English translations:
Main article: Old English Bible translations
Although John Wycliff is often credited with the first translation of the Bible into English, there were, in fact, many translations of large parts of the Bible centuries before Wycliff's work. Toward the end of the seventh century, the Venerable Bede began a translation of Scripture into Old English (also called Anglo-Saxon). Aldhelm (AD 640–709), likewise, translated the complete Book of Psalms and large portions of other scriptures into Old English. In the 11th century, Abbot Ælfric translated much of the Old Testament into Old English.
For seven or eight centuries, it was the Latin Vulgate that held sway as the common version nearest to the tongue of the people. Latin had become the accepted tongue of the Roman Catholic Church, and there was little general acquaintance with the Bible except among the educated. During that time, there was little room for a further translation. While the illiterate majority of the people had little desire for access to the Bible, the educated minority would have been averse to so great and revolutionary a change.
These centuries added to the conviction of many that the Bible ought not to become too common, that it should not be read by everybody, and that it required a certain amount of learning to make it safe reading. They came to feel that it is as important to have an authoritative interpretation of the Bible as to have the Bible itself. When the movement began to make it speak the new English tongue, it provoked the most violent opposition. Latin had been good enough for a millennium; why cheapen the Bible by a translation? There had grown up a feeling that Jerome himself had been inspired. He had been canonised, and half the references to him in that time speak of him as the inspired translator.
Criticism of his version was counted as impious and profane as criticisms of the original text could possibly have been. It is one of the ironies of history that the version for which Jerome had to fight, and which was counted a piece of impiety itself, actually became the ground on which men stood when they fought against another version, counting anything else but this very version an impious intrusion.
How early the movement for an English Bible began, it is impossible now to say. Yet the fact is that until the last quarter of the 14th century, there was no complete prose version of the Bible in the English language. However, there were vernacular translations of parts of the Bible in England previously, in both Anglo-Saxon and Norman French.
Middle English translations
Main article: Middle English Bible translations
Middle English Bible translations (1066–1500) covers the age of Middle English – it was not a fertile time for Bible translations but saw the first major translation, Wyclif's Bible, from John Wyclif. The period of Middle English begins with the Norman conquest and ends about 1500.
Early Modern English translations
Main article: Early Modern English Bible translations
Early Modern English Bible translations are those translations of the Bible which were made between about 1500 and 1800, the period of Early Modern English. This was the first major period of Bible translation into the English language. It began with the dramatic introduction of the Tyndale Bible and included the landmark King James Version (1611) and Douai Bibles. It included the first "authorised version", known as the Great Bible (1539); the Geneva Bible (1560), notable for being the first Bible divided into verses, and the Bishop's Bible (1568), which was an attempt by Elizabeth I to create a new authorised version.
Modern translations
Main articles: Modern English Bible translations and Jewish English Bible translations
Much like early English Bibles, which were based on Greek texts or Latin translations, modern English translations of the Bible are based on the best-available original texts of the time. The translators put much scholarly effort into cross-checking the various sources such as the Pentateuch, Septuagint, Textus Receptus, and Masoretic Text. Relatively recent discoveries such as the Dead Sea scrolls provide additional reference information. There is some controversy over which texts should be used as a basis for translation, as some of the alternate sources do not include verses which are found in the Textus Receptus. Some say the alternate sources were poorly representative of the texts used in their time, whereas others claim the Textus Receptus includes passages that were added to the alternate texts improperly. These controversial passages are generally not the basis for disputed issues of doctrine, but tend to be additional stories or snippets of phrases. The majority of modern English translations, such as the New International Version, contain extensive text notes indicating where differences occur in original sources.
Modern English translations can be broken down into Christian, Critical and Jewish sections.
What are the major Bible translations?Why Study the Bible?
Bible study is fascinating. You may doubt that if your past approach has been to start with Genesis and read straight through. Chances are you made it to Leviticus and gave up. Let's face it. The Bible is not always easy reading. It requires attention and effort, and it may even require a little help. When Philip encountered an Ethiopian who was reading the scriptures, he asked him, "Do you understand what you are reading?" The Ethiopian looked up from the book of Isaiah and answered," How can I, except some man should guide me?" (Acts 8:31).
The Bible is not one book, but many. And they are ancient books, written in strange tongues with the truth expressed in many complex ways. The Bible has a surface simplicity that reaches out to the mind of a child with remarkable clarity and purity. Yet it also has a depth and subtlety that have baffled philosophers down through the ages.
The books of the Bible seem unrelated in many ways, and yet a pattern is deliberately interwoven, sometimes hidden, sometimes obvious. Solomon wrote: "It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honor of kings to search out a matter" (Proverbs 25:2). God has not laid out the truth in stark clarity for all men to see. The truth will come, but it may come slowly. It may come with considerable effort. Sometimes we need a guide, yet the individual must search out the answers for himself.
Your Bible
People often ask us for our recommendation on Bibles and Bible study aids. While this is largely a matter of personal preference and needs, we can make some general observations.
Obviously, your most important acquisition for Bible study is the Bible itself. If you already own a Bible, your initial decision is made for you. Chances are that your Bible is a King James Version, but many people find that hard reading. They want to know which translation is best, easiest to read, most accurate, or most literal. Unfortunately, no one translation fits all these descriptions.
If you are going out to buy a Bible, be it your first, second, or third, what do you look for? An excellent article appeared in Christianity Today (April 22, 1983) entitled "Bible Translations: A Guide Through the Forest," by Leslie Keylock. The author includes a thorough summary of several popular translations. You may wish to stop by your local library and read this issue of the magazine before you invest in another translation, but we will include a few of our own observations for what they are worth.
King James Version (1611, KJV)
Many biblical quotations you will read are from the KJV. Many mature Christians have used the King James Bible for so long and are so familiar with it, that they just hate to change. The main argument for keeping it is that some of the best concordances are based on the King James Version. Unfortunately, the language has changed so much since 1611 that the old Bible simply does not mean what it used to mean.
Keylock suggests that one reason we keep using the old KJV is that we love its style. According to the King James Bible, Jesus told His disciples, "Let not your hearts be troubled." The Good News Bible tells the disciples, "Do not be worried and upset" (John 14:1). The KJV has a beauty of style that is rarely matched.
Revised Standard Version (1952, RSV)
The Revised Standard Version retains much of the beauty of the King James Version while getting rid of many archaic expressions. Unfortunately, the Revised Standard Version has now had more than forty years to become archaic itself. The RSV was especially noted for its scholarship, but we have discovered so much about the Bible since 1952 that even the RSV is out of date. So, the Revised Standard Version Bible committee has released a New Revised Standard Version (1989, NRSV). Naturally, this reflects the progress of scholarship in the intervening years.
New American Standard Bible (1963, NASV)
According to Keylock, "The most literal, word-for-word translation on the market today . . . is the New American Standard Bible." Some authorities consider the NASV choppy and hard to read. But for those who have no background in the biblical languages, it serves as an interesting counterbalance to some of the more modern free translations or paraphrases (as the Living Bible). However, even this literal translation slips up in places. In Mark 7:19, for example, the words "Thus He declared" are gratuitously added. They are in no ancient Greek manuscript.
The Jerusalem Bible (1966, JB)
The Jerusalem Bible and the New American Bible have replaced all earlier Bible translations among Catholic readers. Many scholars consider them good translations except for some Catholic idiosyncracies and some rather opinionated notes.
New English Bible (1970, NEB)
The New English Bible, the first British Bible to break completely with the King James tradition is remarkable in that it is a work intended to be both accurate and literary. It is one of the few modern translations which has attempted to maintain the literary standards of the King James and Revised Standard Versions.
Some scholars charge that the NEB translators did too much rearranging of the text. Nevertheless, it makes good reading.
Living Bible (1971, LB)
As Keylock points out, the Living Bible is not really a translation. It was an attempt made by one man to put the Bible in a language his children could understand. It is easily the most readable contemporary interpretation of the Bible. The reader should not approach the Living Bible expecting to find scholarship, however, as its author knows neither Hebrew nor Greek. Others have suggested that it is no more readable than the New International Version and that the author's doctrinal views are visible in both the translations and the footnotes.
In spite of all this, it does read well and is extremely powerful--particularly in the Old Testament prophets. But one does need a counterbalance--perhaps the New American Standard Bible.
Good News Bible (1976, GNB)
Newsweek magazine said the Good News Bible was "useful for new readers, but short on poetry and majesty." It is translated by Southern Baptist Robert Bratcher and is what Keylock calls a "dynamic equivalence" translation. By that he means that the translators did not attempt to make a literal translation. First they ask what the biblical text really means and then they try to find the equivalent meaning in contemporary English. One has to wonder, however, whether "Happy are those whose greatest desire is to do what God requires" is any better than "Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness."
New International Version (1979, NIV)
Keylock concludes that the New International Version is "rapidly developing into the closest thing to a standard Bible among evangelical Bible-reading people in America." Many scholars feel that the NIV is a balanced translation. It stays close to the Hebrew and Greek text without becoming stilted as the NASB. Still, the NIV is another dynamic equivalence translation, and much depends on what the translator thought the author meant. This creates some theological problems, especially in the translator's interpretation of Paul.
New King James Version (1982, NKJV)
As its title suggests, the NKJV stays very close to the King James Bible simply replacing archaic words and phrases with more contemporary expressions. The purpose of the NKJV is to "maintain that lyrical quality which is so highly regarded in the Authorized Version." Scholars generally agree that they accomplished that, but wonder if the translation went far enough in making necessary revisions.
Reader's Digest Bible (1982, RDV)
The Reader's Digest Bible is simply a condensation of the Revised Standard Version by about 40 percent. Keylock points out that the strongest criticism has been to the introductions to some of the books, which adopt critical views of the Bible. It is really not a useful translation even for an amateur who is settling in for a serious study of the Bible.
Which One Is for You?
As you can see, you have a variety of choices when you go out to purchase a new Bible. If you do not own one at all, and you are only going to buy one Bible, your choice should probably be between the New Revised Standard Version, the New American Standard Bible, or the New King James Version. After that it depends upon what you are looking for. If you want easy readability, the Living Bible is hard to beat. If you want a more literal translation, perhaps the New American Standard Bible is for you.
Whatever you choose, keep in mind that the truth of God can even survive bad translation. But you still should not carelessly accept one version of a controversial scripture.
One other point if you are buying a new Bible. The version you will use the most, carry to church, read in bed, make notes in, etc., should be of good enough quality to last a lifetime. Look for one with wide margins so you can make notes in it. After a few years, a personally marked and annotated Bible will be one of your most cherished possessions. Your other translations can be more economically bound.
Bible Study Helps
Frequently, we receive letters asking where a given scripture, sentence, or phrase is to be found in the Bible. "I know it is in there somewhere," they complain. "I just cannot find it." Well, they could if they had a concordance.
A complete or exhaustive concordance simply takes every place in the Bible a given word is mentioned and lists it in the phrase in which it is found. If you have heard, for example, that the phrase "Every tub will sit on its own bottom" is in the Bible, all you have to do is look in your concordance under "tub" and learn that it is not there after all.
When you go to buy a concordance, you will find quickly why so many continue to use the King James Version. Most concordances are compiled from the King James Version of the Bible.
The two most popular concordances are Cruden's Complete Concordance and Strong's Exhaustive Concordance. Cruden's Concordance is smaller, cheaper, and handier to use. Strong's Concordance is a huge volume, but it also includes a cross-reference to the Greek and Hebrew words used in the Bible.
If you would rather have a subject index instead of the key word index of the concordance, Nave's Topical Bible should fill the bill nicely.
At least as important as a concordance is a Bible handbook. The beginning student can easily get lost. A Bible handbook gives you valuable background information plus the story flow of each book of the Bible. One of the most economical and easy to use is Halley's Bible Handbook, although others may serve just as well.
People also ask about commentaries, but I must caution that they are expensive and of marginal value for most students of the Bible. For years I got by nicely with the Critical & Experimental Commentary and Clarke's Commentary of the Bible. If I could only keep one of them, I would keep the Critical & Experimental. If you can find a secondhand copy of it, at a good price, it is not a bad investment. But you should realize that both these commentaries are sadly out of date. You will find more useful the Expositor's Bible Commentary published by Zondervan Press. It is much more up to date, easy to use, and contains much valuable information--but it is expensive.
I cannot speak for everyone, but I do not consult my commentaries as often as I do my International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. After the fundamentals of two or three versions of the Bible, a concordance and a Bible handbook, I have no Bible study aid more helpful than my Bible encyclopedia. Shop carefully. You might find an old set at a bargain. There is a new version on the market now which has replaced the old one and knocked its prices down. Nevertheless, the old one is still of considerable value. Far down the list of useful books would be an atlas of the Bible and a dictionary of the Bible. I have both but consult them less often.
Marking your Bible
Systematic marking of the Bible can be effective in three major ways:
It focuses attention on the scriptures at the time of marking.
It brings your eye back to the scripture easily and quickly in future study.
It makes key scriptures easier to find later.
Some are reluctant to mark books (especially the Bible), but underlined scriptures, good marginal notes and chain-referenced scriptures may be useful for years to come.
We recommend a Bible with good paper, a little room in the margins, a couple of colored pencils for underlining and a fine-point pen for marginal notes. Beyond these suggested items, all you need is time and a quiet place to get acquainted with the Word of God.
Before you begin, be aware of one thing. If you enter on a careful, reverent and persevering study of the Bible, your life will never be the same. You will come to a knowledge of truth you will be unable to ignore. If you will take a few minutes before and after your study to pray about the things you are learning, you will make a start in building a deeper relationship with your God and Savior.
To do the lesson below, first read the indicated passages in your Bible, taking care to notice the context of the passage. You may want to read as much as a chapter before and after some references to be sure you have a feeling for the passage. Take your time and mark what you perceive to be important. This lesson will introduce you to a new way of studying your Bible. While containing valuable knowledge, it is designed to introduce you to the method.
The Bible Can Change Your Life
By what standard is a man to live his life? (Deuteronomy 8:1-3, Matthew 4:1-4).
If a person's life has gone bad, and he wants to turn it around, what can he do? (Psalms 119:9-16).
What did King David see as his primary source of understanding, his source of light? (Psalms 119:97-130).
What is the source of our freedom? (John 8:32).
What is Truth? (John 17:14-17)
Spreading the WordRead Acts 8:1-40
Why did God allow persecution to come upon the early church?
Was the "preaching of the Word" limited to the apostles only?
Does the physical act of baptism necessarily show conversion?
Why did God deliberately send Philip to this area only to reach one man?
Is it sometimes necessary to have a guide in the study of the Bible?
What was the focus of Philip's "Bible study" with the Ethiopian Eunuch?
What indications do you find of the requirements for and the mode of baptism?
Perhaps the most important instruction Christ left His disciples is the Great Commission: "Go you therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the world" (Matthew 28:19, 20).
Unfortunately, long after Christ's ascension and long after the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, the church had essentially not "gone" anywhere. Three thousand people had been baptized in one day because of Peter's first inspired sermon. The success of the church in Jerusalem continued, and it just may not have occurred to the apostles and elders that there was any urgency about going to the rest of the world.
This may point out the danger that one might allow his religion to become only a personal pleasure leading to neglect of his responsibility to other people. It is worth asking why the church had made so little progress in going to the world by the time of the eighth chapter of Acts. It may be that God used persecution to move the people out into the world. Then each could become a light in various nations and communities, so that still more people might come to know the gospel of Jesus Christ (Acts 8:1-4).
It is also interesting that when the persecution arose everyone was scattered from Jerusalem except the apostles (Acts 8:1). Luke then tells us that those whom they scattered were the ones that went everywhere preaching the word (verse 4). Any suggestion that only the apostles could have been preaching the gospel is false, according to this scripture. Indeed, we find in verse five that Philip, who had previously been ordained as deacon, is preaching the gospel throughout Samaria.
The section in the chapter about Simon Magus (Acts 8:9-24) is particularly interesting as we find this infamous sorcerer believes the truth and is baptized (verse 13). Yet later we find Peter saying to him, "You have neither part nor lot in this matter: for your heart is not right in the sight of God" (verse 21). Note well that mere belief and the act of baptism do not necessarily guarantee that a person is a converted Christian.
We include the eighth chapter of Acts in this lesson primarily because of the narrative concerning Philip and the Ethiopian eunuch. In the first place it is a rare occurrence for an angel to appear to an evangelist, and this is of additional interest because Philip is sent, apparently on foot, a distance of at least 50 miles to intercept one man en route from Jerusalem to Africa. Why would God have done this? If we see this as an effort to reach one man who could be influential in carrying the gospel to others in northern Africa then the incident makes sense. If only those who are ordained can preach the gospel to others, then it seems a little strange that this trip would have been made merely to reach one man.
Note that a man may not necessarily come to a complete understanding of God's will without some kind of guidance or help from others who understand and know the Scriptures (Acts 8:30, 31). In this case, of course, this man lacked the knowledge of Jesus Christ to combine with the knowledge of the prophet Isaiah to come to an understanding of the truth. Notice also that the focus of Philip's message is Jesus. "Then Philip opened his mouth and began at the same scripture and preached unto him Jesus" (verse 35). All that Philip mentions here regarding the requirements for baptism is a total wholehearted belief (verse 37). It will become evident from other scriptures, however, that encompassed in the belief is the idea of repentance of sins and an acknowledgment of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ.
PreparationRead I Peter 3:15
Does it seem that God intends His people to be witnesses?
Is preparation necessary?
If so, why?
It is important to understand that it is God's intent that all Christians be involved in the promulgation of the gospel and that diligent preparation and study are necessary to be able to give "an answer to him that asketh thee a reason of the hope that is within you in meekness and fear." When you think about it, what hope did one man have of spreading the gospel far and wide? Without mass media, the only way of seeding the world with the gospel was if everyone got involved.
A Special Message to TimothyRead II Timothy 2 and 3
Do you see any indication here of the extent of involvement Paul expected of men in the church?
Are there any pitfalls to be avoided in the study and discussion of Scripture?
Why does Paul equate "study" with being a workman?
What is the first line of defense against the perilous "last days" of which Paul wrote?
Who were Jannes and Jambres, and how do they fit into this account? (Exodus 7:11).
Are we likely to have less trouble with those who would attempt to disrupt the church as we approach the end time?
What would Timothy have considered "the Holy Scriptures" when he was a child?
What does Paul mean by "all scripture"?
What is the role of the Scriptures in the life of the man of God?
When Timothy was a child, not one word of the New Testament had been written--It is easy to forget. When we speak of the Scriptures, or "Holy Writ," we are talking about the whole Bible, but not so with Paul and Timothy. For them, the "Holy Scriptures" were strictly the Old Testament. Far from having no use for the Old Testament, Paul and other New Testament writers appeal to it as their fundamental authority. Philip preached Christ from it, and Paul told Timothy that it could make a man "wise unto salvation."
Why Parables?Read Matthew 13:1-23
Why did Jesus speak to the multitudes in parables?
Is the truth always easy to see and understand?
Whose fault was it that the multitudes did not understand?
Will all men understand the gospel to the same degree?
Will some people not understand the gospel at all?
Did the Old Testament prophets fully understand all that God was revealing to them?
It is sobering to read Jesus' response to His disciples' question, "Why speak you unto them in parables?" (verse 11). It is one thing to acknowledge that the things concerning the kingdom of God are "mysteries." It is another thing altogether to face the fact that these mysteries are revealed to one man and concealed from another. True, Jesus goes on to explain that "This people's heart is waxed gross . . . " making it clear that they had closed their own eyes. But His parables did not reach them. Even His disciples had to have explanations of them from time to time, and they were the ones to whom the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven were revealed.
It is also sobering to realize that many prophets and righteous men had desired to know things that Christ was revealing and had never been privileged to know them (verse 17). It should be especially sobering to anyone who has supposed that he is somehow more righteous than others because he somehow understands the plan of God. The truth is that there are times in which God chooses to reveal different truths to different people, and sometimes it is the sinner who will respond to the revelation of God while the "righteous" feel they do not need it.
Understanding and Spiritual MaturityRead Isaiah 28:1-13
What is the possible symbolism of an excess of wine or strong drink in this chapter? (Isaiah 29:9,10, Revelation 14:8).
Is there an indication here of a progression of understanding?
Will it be necessary to search out related ideas and put them together to get a complete picture?
Does it appear that God has deliberately obscured the truth where some men are concerned?
Why would He do so? (Compare Romans 11:32-36).
The symbolism of drunkenness in this context goes well beyond the literal meaning involving alcoholic spirits and the error that man gets into because of a stupefied brain. It includes the idea of a "spirit of error" or false doctrine that had infected most of Israel. The passage also implies that only a few are liberated from that spirit of error, as the prophet cries: "Whom shall He teach knowledge?" He goes on to show that some spiritual maturity is necessary to progress in the understanding of God (verse 9). All the truth is not found in a simple statement in one place in the Bible. It is necessary to lay one precept on top of another precept to gain a complete understanding. We must take a line from one place and add it to a line from another place to produce a meaningful concept.
One of the most remarkable truths revealed to man is that God Almighty in heaven has blinded some of mankind so that He need not hold them guilty for what they have done (Romans 11:32-36).
False Prophets Read Deuteronomy 13:1-5
Is it possible to be misled by a prophet?
Are miracles and signs of any value in determining the validity of a prophet's message?
Why would God allow a deceiver to perform a sign or wonder?
What is the false prophet's goal or purpose?
It is quite disturbing to face the idea of "false prophet," perhaps because facing it implies a responsibility for the servant of God to observe, discern and decide. It is so tempting to look for simple formulas to do that for us, but they do not exist.
Perhaps the most important idea from this passage is that men, any men, may lead us astray. The next most important idea is that miracles and signs are not the criteria for determining who is a servant of God.
Who Are the Servants of God?Read Isaiah 8:19, 20
What is a criterion for determining who is a servant of God?
The one dependable standard of comparison for a prophet, dreamer, minister or apostle is simply the law of God and the testimony of His servants. Some hold as a doctrine that God does not reveal everything at once, but progressively reveals more and more truth down through the ages. This is, of course, true. But how can you know if a given "revelation" is from God or if it only arises from the wanderings of some human mind? One part of the answer is simple enough. Subsequent revelation cannot negate previous revelation. If a so- called "new truth" disagrees with old truths that have been thoroughly substantiated and absolutely proven, we cannot accept this "new truth." Any self-styled prophet must agree with the Scriptures or be rejected, as the following section illustrates.
Who Gets the Gospel?Read Acts 15:1-41
What is the primary issue in this controversy?
Was there automatic agreement among the leaders of the church?
How would you describe the method for arriving at an understanding in this case?
Briefly describe the role of each of the apostles in this discussion.
Who makes the "decision" in this dispute?
Was it necessary to appeal to Scripture for a ratification of the acts and events described?
Was it necessary that the decisions "please" anyone other than James?
Just how serious could a disagreement among the apostles become?
Was any punitive action taken as a result of disagreement?
Were there any "prophets" present at this meeting?
By comparing this chapter with the first two chapters of Galatians, we can conclude that the primary question was whether the gospel might continue to be preached to Gentiles (Galatians 2:5) or whether it could only go to the circumcised. Paul, Peter and others appeal to events. They point out what God had done through them respectively. But James recognizes an important truth; the Scriptures had to agree (Acts 15:15). Otherwise, they only had circumstantial and inconclusive evidence. James aptly points out that the Pharisees' exclusive approach was untenable in the light of Scripture. God had said that the Gentiles (by definition, uncircumcised) might receive the gospel in the latter days.
In summary, the Scriptures must test any minister, apostle or prophet.
It is also worth noting in verse nineteen that the Greek word for "sentence" in the King James Version is translated "judgment" in the Revised Standard Version. The latter translation is probably more accurate.
Regarding the above questions, reviewing Matthew 20:20-29 would be instructive at this point.
Did some of the disciples have a traditional "authoritarian" view of church structure?
How would you describe Christ's reaction to the Gentile idea of dominance and rule of one man over another?
Was any apostle to "exercise dominion" over the others?
Search the ScripturesRead Acts 17:1-11
What was Paul's source material for his presentation?
What was the central thrust of his message?
What technique did the Bereans use to test Paul's message?
Just what did the writers mean by "the Scriptures"?
Is there ever a time when the servant of God is justified in ceasing to search the Scriptures to test a preacher and his message? (I Thessalonians 5:21).
Merely because we have found a preacher to be right on many occasions does not mean he will stay right. No man is infallible, and constant vigilance is a continual responsibility for the Christian. This is not to infer that suspicion is called for, but we need to keep men in proper perspective. Only God is infallible.
Whole Armor of GodRead Ephesians 6:10-18
Who is the real enemy? Is it another human being?
How many items of the armor of God relate to the study of the Word of God?
Jesus spoke of a time when false Christs and false prophets would arise and show such great signs and wonders that "if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect" (Matthew 24:24). Of course, the person who is deceived does not realize that he is deceived. As the wise man wrote, "Every way of a man is right in his own eyes." Therefore, our own conviction that we are right proves absolutely nothing. It can be a little scary when we think about it, but there is a strong defense available to every Christian.
Be aware right from the start that the enemy in this battle is not another human being, but the spiritual powers of darkness--i.e., Satan the devil. Perhaps the most powerful weapon at our disposal in this battle is the Word of God. Four items included in the armor of God have to do directly with the study of the Bible. The first mentioned is truth. Jesus said in His prayer for His disciples, "Sanctify them through your truth: your Word is truth" (John 17:17). Next He mentions the "preparation of the gospel of peace" which involves the careful study of the gospel so that any Christian can explain it to the seeker after God. He then mentions the shield of faith, and Paul tells us: "So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God" (Romans 10:17). Finally the Scripture tells us to pick up as our chief weapon "the sword of the spirit, which is the Word of God" (Ephesians 6:17).
The man who is determined to do as the Bereans, searching the Scriptures daily, comparing what he is told with what God says, will be a hard man to deceive. "The Word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart" (Hebrews 4:12).
A final word: We hope you will continue to study and that you will come to love the Holy Scriptures as we do. May God bless you in your meditation, your study and your prayer.
More About the Histories :
History of the Douay Version
King James Bible Version
English Bible History - with links to historic bibles .
King James Bible Version
English Bible History - with links to historic bibles .
[edit] Jewish translations
Main article: Jewish English Bible translations
Jewish English Bible translations are modern English Bible translations that include the books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) according to the masoretic text, and according to the traditional division and order of Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim.
Jewish translations often also reflect traditional Jewish interpretations of the Bible, as opposed to the Christian understanding that is often reflected in non-Jewish translations. For example, Jewish translations translate עלמה ‘almâh in Isa 7:14 as young woman, while many Christian translations render the word as virgin.
While modern biblical scholarship is similar for both Christians and Jews, there are distinctive features of Jewish translations, even those created by academic scholars. These include (besides the avoidance of Christological interpretations) adherence to the Masoretic Text (at least in the main body of the text, as in the new JPS translation) and greater use of classical Jewish exegesis. Some translations prefer names transliterated from the Hebrew, though the majority of Jewish translations use the Anglicized forms of biblical names.
The first English Jewish translation of the Bible was by Isaac Leeser in the nineteenth century.
The Jewish Publication Society produced two of the most popular Jewish translations, namely the JPS The Holy Scriptures of 1917 and the NJPS Tanakh (first printed in a single volume in 1985).
Since the 1980s there have been multiple efforts among Orthodox publishers to produce translations that are not only Jewish, but also adhere to Orthodox norms. Among these are The Living Torah and Nach by Aryeh Kaplan and others, and the Artscroll Tanakh.
Main article: Jewish English Bible translations
Jewish English Bible translations are modern English Bible translations that include the books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) according to the masoretic text, and according to the traditional division and order of Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim.
Jewish translations often also reflect traditional Jewish interpretations of the Bible, as opposed to the Christian understanding that is often reflected in non-Jewish translations. For example, Jewish translations translate עלמה ‘almâh in Isa 7:14 as young woman, while many Christian translations render the word as virgin.
While modern biblical scholarship is similar for both Christians and Jews, there are distinctive features of Jewish translations, even those created by academic scholars. These include (besides the avoidance of Christological interpretations) adherence to the Masoretic Text (at least in the main body of the text, as in the new JPS translation) and greater use of classical Jewish exegesis. Some translations prefer names transliterated from the Hebrew, though the majority of Jewish translations use the Anglicized forms of biblical names.
The first English Jewish translation of the Bible was by Isaac Leeser in the nineteenth century.
The Jewish Publication Society produced two of the most popular Jewish translations, namely the JPS The Holy Scriptures of 1917 and the NJPS Tanakh (first printed in a single volume in 1985).
Since the 1980s there have been multiple efforts among Orthodox publishers to produce translations that are not only Jewish, but also adhere to Orthodox norms. Among these are The Living Torah and Nach by Aryeh Kaplan and others, and the Artscroll Tanakh.
English Bible History
The fascinating story of how we got the Bible in its present form actually starts thousands of years ago, as briefly outlined in our Timeline of Bible Translation History. As a background study, we recommend that you first review our discussion of the Pre-Reformation History of the Bible from 1,400 B.C. to 1,400 A.D., which covers the transmission of the scripture through the original languages of Hebrew and Greek, and the 1,000 years of the Dark & Middle Ages when the Word was trapped in only Latin. Our starting point in this discussion of Bible history, however, is the advent of the scripture in the English language with the “Morning Star of the Reformation”, John Wycliffe.
John Wycliffe
The first hand-written English language Bible manuscripts were produced in the 1380's AD by John Wycliffe, an Oxford professor, scholar, and theologian. Wycliffe, (also spelled “Wycliff” & “Wyclif”), was well-known throughout Europe for his opposition to the teaching of the organized Church, which he believed to be contrary to the Bible. With the help of his followers, called the Lollards, and his assistant Purvey, and many other faithful scribes, Wycliffe produced dozens of English language manuscript copies of the scriptures. They were translated out of the Latin Vulgate, which was the only source text available to Wycliffe. The Pope was so infuriated by his teachings and his translation of the Bible into English, that 44 years after Wycliffe had died, he ordered the bones to be dug-up, crushed, and scattered in the river!
John Hus
One of Wycliffe’s followers, John Hus, actively promoted Wycliffe’s ideas: that people should be permitted to read the Bible in their own language, and they should oppose the tyranny of the Roman church that threatened anyone possessing a non-Latin Bible with execution. Hus was burned at the stake in 1415, with Wycliffe’s manuscript Bibles used as kindling for the fire. The last words of John Hus were that, “in 100 years, God will raise up a man whose calls for reform cannot be suppressed.” Almost exactly 100 years later, in 1517, Martin Luther nailed his famous 95 Theses of Contention (a list of 95 issues of heretical theology and crimes of the Roman Catholic Church) into the church door at Wittenberg. The prophecy of Hus had come true! Martin Luther went on to be the first person to translate and publish the Bible in the commonly-spoken dialect of the German people; a translation more appealing than previous German Biblical translations. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs records that in that same year, 1517, seven people were burned at the stake by the Roman Catholic Church for the crime of teaching their children to say the Lord’s Prayer in English rather than Latin.
Johann Gutenberg
Johann Gutenberg invented the printing press in the 1450's, and the first book to ever be printed was a Latin language Bible, printed in Mainz, Germany. Gutenberg’s Bibles were surprisingly beautiful, as each leaf Gutenberg printed was later colorfully hand-illuminated. Born as “Johann Gensfleisch” (John Gooseflesh), he preferred to be known as “Johann Gutenberg” (John Beautiful Mountain). Ironically, though he had created what many believe to be the most important invention in history, Gutenberg was a victim of unscrupulous business associates who took control of his business and left him in poverty. Nevertheless, the invention of the movable-type printing press meant that Bibles and books could finally be effectively produced in large quantities in a short period of time. This was essential to the success of the Reformation.
Thomas Linacre
In the 1490’s another Oxford professor, and the personal physician to King Henry the 7th and 8th, Thomas Linacre, decided to learn Greek. After reading the Gospels in Greek, and comparing it to the Latin Vulgate, he wrote in his diary, “Either this (the original Greek) is not the Gospel… or we are not Christians.” The Latin had become so corrupt that it no longer even preserved the message of the Gospel… yet the Church still threatened to kill anyone who read the scripture in any language other than Latin… though Latin was not an original language of the scriptures.
John Colet
In 1496, John Colet, another Oxford professor and the son of the Mayor of London, started reading the New Testament in Greek and translating it into English for his students at Oxford, and later for the public at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London. The people were so hungry to hear the Word of God in a language they could understand, that within six months there were 20,000 people packed in the church and at least that many outside trying to get in! (Sadly, while the enormous and beautiful Saint Paul’s Cathedral remains the main church in London today, as of 2003, typical Sunday morning worship attendance is only around 200 people… and most of them are tourists). Fortunately for Colet, he was a powerful man with friends in high places, so he amazingly managed to avoid execution.
Erasmus
In considering the experiences of Linacre and Colet, the great scholar Erasmus was so moved to correct the corrupt Latin Vulgate, that in 1516, with the help of printer John Froben, he published a Greek-Latin Parallel New Testament. The Latin part was not the corrupt Vulgate, but his own fresh rendering of the text from the more accurate and reliable Greek, which he had managed to collate from a half-dozen partial old Greek New Testament manuscripts he had acquired. This milestone was the first non-Latin Vulgate text of the scripture to be produced in a millennium… and the first ever to come off a printing press. The 1516 Greek-Latin New Testament of Erasmus further focused attention on just how corrupt and inaccurate the Latin Vulgate had become, and how important it was to go back and use the original Greek (New Testament) and original Hebrew (Old Testament) languages to maintain accuracy… and to translate them faithfully into the languages of the common people, whether that be English, German, or any other tongue. No sympathy for this “illegal activity” was to be found from Rome… even as the words of Pope Leo X's declaration that "the fable of Christ was quite profitable to him" continued through the years to infuriate the people of God.
William Tyndale
William Tyndale was the Captain of the Army of Reformers, and was their spiritual leader. Tyndale holds the distinction of being the first man to ever print the New Testament in the English language. Tyndale was a true scholar and a genius, so fluent in eight languages that it was said one would think any one of them to be his native tongue. He is frequently referred to as the “Architect of the English Language”, (even more so than William Shakespeare) as so many of the phrases Tyndale coined are still in our language today.
Martin Luther
Martin Luther had a small head-start on Tyndale, as Luther declared his intolerance for the Roman Church’s corruption on Halloween in 1517, by nailing his 95 Theses of Contention to the Wittenberg Church door. Luther, who would be exiled in the months following the Diet of Worms Council in 1521 that was designed to martyr him, would translate the New Testament into German for the first time from the 1516 Greek-Latin New Testament of Erasmus, and publish it in September of 1522. Luther also published a German Pentateuch in 1523, and another edition of the German New Testament in 1529. In the 1530’s he would go on to publish the entire Bible in German.
William Tyndale wanted to use the same 1516 Erasmus text as a source to translate and print the New Testament in English for the first time in history. Tyndale showed up on Luther's doorstep in Germany in 1525, and by year's end had translated the New Testament into English. Tyndale had been forced to flee England, because of the wide-spread rumor that his English New Testament project was underway, causing inquisitors and bounty hunters to be constantly on Tyndale's trail to arrest him and prevent his project. God foiled their plans, and in 1525-1526 the Tyndale New Testament became the first printed edition of the scripture in the English language. Subsequent printings of the Tyndale New Testament in the 1530's were often elaborately illustrated.
They were burned as soon as the Bishop could confiscate them, but copies trickled through and actually ended up in the bedroom of King Henry VIII. The more the King and Bishop resisted its distribution, the more fascinated the public at large became. The church declared it contained thousands of errors as they torched hundreds of New Testaments confiscated by the clergy, while in fact, they burned them because they could find no errors at all. One risked death by burning if caught in mere possession of Tyndale's forbidden books.
Having God's Word available to the public in the language of the common man, English, would have meant disaster to the church. No longer would they control access to the scriptures. If people were able to read the Bible in their own tongue, the church's income and power would crumble. They could not possibly continue to get away with selling indulgences (the forgiveness of sins) or selling the release of loved ones from a church-manufactured "Purgatory". People would begin to challenge the church's authority if the church were exposed as frauds and thieves. The contradictions between what God's Word said, and what the priests taught, would open the public's eyes and the truth would set them free from the grip of fear that the institutional church held. Salvation through faith, not works or donations, would be understood. The need for priests would vanish through the priesthood of all believers. The veneration of church-canonized Saints and Mary would be called into question. The availability of the scriptures in English was the biggest threat imaginable to the wicked church. Neither side would give up without a fight.
Today, there are only two known copies left of Tyndale’s 1525-26 First Edition. Any copies printed prior to 1570 are extremely valuable. Tyndale's flight was an inspiration to freedom-loving Englishmen who drew courage from the 11 years that he was hunted. Books and Bibles flowed into England in bales of cotton and sacks of flour. Ironically, Tyndale’s biggest customer was the King’s men, who would buy up every copy available to burn them… and Tyndale used their money to print even more! In the end, Tyndale was caught: betrayed by an Englishman that he had befriended. Tyndale was incarcerated for 500 days before he was strangled and burned at the stake in 1536. Tyndale’s last words were, "Oh Lord, open the King of England’s eyes". This prayer would be answered just three years later in 1539, when King Henry VIII finally allowed, and even funded, the printing of an English Bible known as the “Great Bible”. But before that could happen…
Myles Coverdale
Myles Coverdale and John “Thomas Matthew” Rogers had remained loyal disciples the last six years of Tyndale's life, and they carried the English Bible project forward and even accelerated it. Coverdale finished translating the Old Testament, and in 1535 he printed the first complete Bible in the English language, making use of Luther's German text and the Latin as sources. Thus, the first complete English Bible was printed on October 4, 1535, and is known as the Coverdale Bible.
John Rogers
John Rogers went on to print the second complete English Bible in 1537. It was, however, the first English Bible translated from the original Biblical languages of Hebrew & Greek. He printed it under the pseudonym "Thomas Matthew", (an assumed name that had actually been used by Tyndale at one time) as a considerable part of this Bible was the translation of Tyndale, whose writings had been condemned by the English authorities. It is a composite made up of Tyndale's Pentateuch and New Testament (1534-1535 edition) and Coverdale's Bible and some of Roger's own translation of the text. It remains known most commonly as the Matthew-Tyndale Bible. It went through a nearly identical second-edition printing in 1549.
Thomas Cranmer
In 1539, Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, hired Myles Coverdale at the bequest of King Henry VIII to publish the "Great Bible". It became the first English Bible authorized for public use, as it was distributed to every church, chained to the pulpit, and a reader was even provided so that the illiterate could hear the Word of God in plain English. It would seem that William Tyndale's last wish had been granted...just three years after his martyrdom. Cranmer's Bible, published by Coverdale, was known as the Great Bible due to its great size: a large pulpit folio measuring over 14 inches tall. Seven editions of this version were printed between April of 1539 and December of 1541.
King Henry VIII
It was not that King Henry VIII had a change of conscience regarding publishing the Bible in English. His motives were more sinister… but the Lord sometimes uses the evil intentions of men to bring about His glory. King Henry VIII had in fact, requested that the Pope permit him to divorce his wife and marry his mistress. The Pope refused. King Henry responded by marrying his mistress anyway, (later having two of his many wives executed), and thumbing his nose at the Pope by renouncing Roman Catholicism, taking England out from under Rome’s religious control, and declaring himself as the reigning head of State to also be the new head of the Church. This new branch of the Christian Church, neither Roman Catholic nor truly Protestant, became known as the Anglican Church or the Church of England. King Henry acted essentially as its “Pope”. His first act was to further defy the wishes of Rome by funding the printing of the scriptures in English… the first legal English Bible… just for spite.
Queen Mary
The ebb and flow of freedom continued through the 1540's...and into the 1550's. After King Henry VIII, King Edward VI took the throne, and after his death, the reign of Queen “Bloody” Mary was the next obstacle to the printing of the Bible in English. She was possessed in her quest to return England to the Roman Church. In 1555, John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers and Thomas Cranmer were both burned at the stake. Mary went on to burn reformers at the stake by the hundreds for the "crime" of being a Protestant. This era was known as the Marian Exile, and the refugees fled from England with little hope of ever seeing their home or friends again.
John Foxe
In the 1550's, the Church at Geneva, Switzerland, was very sympathetic to the reformer refugees and was one of only a few safe havens for a desperate people. Many of them met in Geneva, led by Myles Coverdale and John Foxe (publisher of the famous Foxe's Book of Martyrs, which is to this day the only exhaustive reference work on the persecution and martyrdom of Early Christians and Protestants from the first century up to the mid-16th century), as well as Thomas Sampson and William Whittingham. There, with the protection of the great theologian John Calvin (author of the most famous theological book ever published, Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion)and John Knox, the great Reformer of the Scottish Church, the Church of Geneva determined to produce a Bible that would educate their families while they continued in exile.
John Calvin
The New Testament was completed in 1557, and the complete Bible was first published in 1560. It became known as the Geneva Bible. Due to a passage in Genesis describing the clothing that God fashioned for Adam and Eve upon expulsion from the Garden of Eden as "Breeches" (an antiquated form of "Britches"), some people referred to the Geneva Bible as the Breeches Bible.
John Knox
The Geneva Bible was the first Bible to add numbered verses to the chapters, so that referencing specific passages would be easier. Every chapter was also accompanied by extensive marginal notes and references so thorough and complete that the Geneva Bible is also considered the first English "Study Bible". William Shakespeare quotes hundreds of times in his plays from the Geneva translation of the Bible. The Geneva Bible became the Bible of choice for over 100 years of English speaking Christians. Between 1560 and 1644 at least 144 editions of this Bible were published. Examination of the 1611 King James Bible shows clearly that its translators were influenced much more by the Geneva Bible, than by any other source. The Geneva Bible itself retains over 90% of William Tyndale's original English translation. The Geneva in fact, remained more popular than the King James Version until decades after its original release in 1611! The Geneva holds the honor of being the first Bible taken to America, and the Bible of the Puritans and Pilgrims. It is truly the “Bible of the Protestant Reformation.” Strangely, the famous Geneva Bible has been out-of-print since 1644, so the only way to obtain one is to either purchase an original printing of the Geneva Bible, or a less costly facsimile reproduction of the original 1560 Geneva Bible.
With the end of Queen Mary's bloody reign, the reformers could safely return to England. The Anglican Church, now under Queen Elizabeth I, reluctantly tolerated the printing and distribution of Geneva version Bibles in England. The marginal notes, which were vehemently against the institutional Church of the day, did not rest well with the rulers of the day. Another version, one with a less inflammatory tone was desired, and the copies of the Great Bible were getting to be decades old. In 1568, a revision of the Great Bible known as the Bishop's Bible was introduced. Despite 19 editions being printed between 1568 and 1606, this Bible, referred to as the “rough draft of the King James Version”, never gained much of a foothold of popularity among the people. The Geneva may have simply been too much to compete with.
By the 1580's, the Roman Catholic Church saw that it had lost the battle to suppress the will of God: that His Holy Word be available in the English language. In 1582, the Church of Rome surrendered their fight for "Latin only" and decided that if the Bible was to be available in English, they would at least have an official Roman Catholic English translation. And so, using the corrupt and inaccurate Latin Vulgate as the only source text, they went on to publish an English Bible with all the distortions and corruptions that Erasmus had revealed and warned of 75 years earlier. Because it was translated at the Roman Catholic College in the city of Rheims, it was known as the Rheims New Testament (also spelled Rhemes). The Douay Old Testament was translated by the Church of Rome in 1609 at the College in the city of Douay (also spelled Doway & Douai). The combined product is commonly referred to as the "Doway/Rheims" Version. In 1589, Dr. William Fulke of Cambridge published the "Fulke's Refutation", in which he printed in parallel columns the Bishops Version along side the Rheims Version, attempting to show the error and distortion of the Roman Church's corrupt compromise of an English version of the Bible.
King James I
With the death of Queen Elizabeth I, Prince James VI of Scotland became King James I of England. The Protestant clergy approached the new King in 1604 and announced their desire for a new translation to replace the Bishop's Bible first printed in 1568. They knew that the Geneva Version had won the hearts of the people because of its excellent scholarship, accuracy, and exhaustive commentary. However, they did not want the controversial marginal notes (proclaiming the Pope an Anti-Christ, etc.) Essentially, the leaders of the church desired a Bible for the people, with scriptural references only for word clarification or cross-references.
This "translation to end all translations" (for a while at least) was the result of the combined effort of about fifty scholars. They took into consideration: The Tyndale New Testament, The Coverdale Bible, The Matthews Bible, The Great Bible, The Geneva Bible, and even the Rheims New Testament. The great revision of the Bishop's Bible had begun. From 1605 to 1606 the scholars engaged in private research. From 1607 to 1609 the work was assembled. In 1610 the work went to press, and in 1611 the first of the huge (16 inch tall) pulpit folios known today as "The 1611 King James Bible" came off the printing press. A typographical discrepancy in Ruth 3:15 rendered a pronoun "He" instead of "She" in that verse in some printings. This caused some of the 1611 First Editions to be known by collectors as "He" Bibles, and others as "She" Bibles. Starting just one year after the huge 1611 pulpit-size King James Bibles were printed and chained to every church pulpit in England; printing then began on the earliest normal-size printings of the King James Bible. These were produced so individuals could have their own personal copy of the Bible.
John Bunyan
The Anglican Church’s King James Bible took decades to overcome the more popular Protestant Church’s Geneva Bible. One of the greatest ironies of history, is that many Protestant Christian churches today embrace the King James Bible exclusively as the “only” legitimate English language translation… yet it is not even a Protestant translation! It was printed to compete with the Protestant Geneva Bible, by authorities who throughout most of history were hostile to Protestants… and killed them. While many Protestants are quick to assign the full blame of persecution to the Roman Catholic Church, it should be noted that even after England broke from Roman Catholicism in the 1500’s, the Church of England (The Anglican Church) continued to persecute Protestants throughout the 1600’s. One famous example of this is John Bunyan, who while in prison for the crime of preaching the Gospel, wrote one of Christian history’s greatest books, Pilgrim’s Progress. Throughout the 1600’s, as the Puritans and the Pilgrims fled the religious persecution of England to cross the Atlantic and start a new free nation in America, they took with them their precious Geneva Bible, and rejected the King’s Bible. America was founded upon the Geneva Bible, not the King James Bible.
Protestants today are largely unaware of their own history, and unaware of the Geneva Bible (which is textually 95% the same as the King James Version, but 50 years older than the King James Version, and not influenced by the Roman Catholic Rheims New Testament that the King James translators admittedly took into consideration). Nevertheless, the King James Bible turned out to be an excellent and accurate translation, and it became the most printed book in the history of the world, and the only book with one billion copies in print. In fact, for over 250 years...until the appearance of the English Revised Version of 1881-1885...the King James Version reigned without much of a rival. One little-known fact, is that for the past 200 years, all King James Bibles published in America are actually the 1769 Baskerville spelling and wording revision of the 1611. The original “1611” preface is deceivingly included by the publishers, and no mention of the fact that it is really the 1769 version is to be found, because that might hurt sales. The only way to obtain a true, unaltered, 1611 version is to either purchase an original pre-1769 printing of the King James Bible, or a less costly facsimile reproduction of the original 1611 King James Bible.
John Eliot
Although the first Bible printed in America was done in the native Algonquin Indian Language by John Eliot in 1663; the first English language Bible to be printed in America by Robert Aitken in 1782 was a King James Version. Robert Aitken’s 1782 Bible was also the only Bible ever authorized by the United States Congress. He was commended by President George Washington for providing Americans with Bibles during the embargo of imported English goods due to the Revolutionary War. In 1808, Robert’s daughter, Jane Aitken, would become the first woman to ever print a Bible… and to do so in America, of course. In 1791, Isaac Collins vastly improved upon the quality and size of the typesetting of American Bibles and produced the first "Family Bible" printed in America... also a King James Version. Also in 1791, Isaiah Thomas published the first Illustrated Bible printed in America...in the King James Version. For more information on the earliest Bibles printed in America from the 1600’s through the early 1800’s, you may wish to review our more detailed discussion of The Bibles of Colonial America.
Noah Webster
While Noah Webster, just a few years after producing his famous Dictionary of the English Language, would produce his own modern translation of the English Bible in 1833; the public remained too loyal to the King James Version for Webster’s version to have much impact. It was not really until the 1880’s that England’s own planned replacement for their King James Bible, the English Revised Version(E.R.V.) would become the first English language Bible to gain popular acceptance as a post-King James Version modern-English Bible. The widespread popularity of this modern-English translation brought with it another curious characteristic: the absence of the 14 Apocryphal books.
Up until the 1880’s every Protestant Bible (not just Catholic Bibles) had 80 books, not 66! The inter-testamental books written hundreds of years before Christ called “The Apocrypha” were part of virtually every printing of the Tyndale-Matthews Bible, the Great Bible, the Bishops Bible, the Protestant Geneva Bible, and the King James Bible until their removal in the 1880’s! The original 1611 King James contained the Apocrypha, and King James threatened anyone who dared to print the Bible without the Apocrypha with heavy fines and a year in jail. Only for the last 120 years has the Protestant Church rejected these books, and removed them from their Bibles. This has left most modern-day Christians believing the popular myth that there is something “Roman Catholic” about the Apocrypha. There is, however, no truth in that myth, and no widely-accepted reason for the removal of the Apocrypha in the 1880’s has ever been officially issued by a mainline Protestant denomination.
The Americans responded to England’s E.R.V. Bible by publishing the nearly-identical American Standard Version (A.S.V.) in 1901. It was also widely-accepted and embraced by churches throughout America for many decades as the leading modern-English version of the Bible. In the 1971, it was again revised and called New American Standard Version Bible (often referred to as the N.A.S.V. or N.A.S.B. or N.A.S.). This New American Standard Bible is considered by nearly all evangelical Christian scholars and translators today, to be the most accurate, word-for-word translation of the original Greek and Hebrew scriptures into the modern English language that has ever been produced. It remains the most popular version among theologians, professors, scholars, and seminary students today. Some, however, have taken issue with it because it is so direct and literal a translation (focused on accuracy), that it does not flow as easily in conversational English.
For this reason, in 1973, the New International Version (N.I.V.) was produced, which was offered as a “dynamic equivalent” translation into modern English. The N.I.V. was designed not for “word-for-word” accuracy, but rather, for “phrase-for-phrase” accuracy, and ease of reading even at a Junior High-School reading level. It was meant to appeal to a broader (and in some instances less-educated) cross-section of the general public. Critics of the N.I.V. often jokingly refer to it as the “Nearly Inspired Version”, but that has not stopped it from becoming the best-selling modern-English translation of the Bible ever published.
In 1982, Thomas Nelson Publishers produced what they called the “New King James Version”. Their original intent was to keep the basic wording of the King James to appeal to King James Version loyalists, while only changing the most obscure words and the Elizabethan “thee, thy, thou” pronouns. This was an interesting marketing ploy, however, upon discovering that this was not enough of a change for them to be able to legally copyright the result, they had to make more significant revisions, which defeated their purpose in the first place. It was never taken seriously by scholars, but it has enjoyed some degree of public acceptance, simply because of its clever “New King James Version” marketing name.
In 2002, a major attempt was made to bridge the gap between the simple readability of the N.I.V., and the extremely precise accuracy of the N.A.S.B. This translation is called the English Standard Version (E.S.V.) and is rapidly gaining popularity for its readability and accuracy. The 21st Century will certainly continue to bring new translations of God’s Word in the modern English language.
As Christians, we must be very careful to make intelligent and informed decisions about what translations of the Bible we choose to read. On the liberal extreme, we have people who would give us heretical new translations that attempt to change God’s Word to make it politically correct. One example of this, which has made headlines recently is the Today’s New International Version (T.N.I.V.) which seeks to remove all gender-specific references in the Bible whenever possible! Not all new translations are good… and some are very bad.
But equally dangerous, is the other extreme… of blindly rejecting ANY English translation that was produced in the four centuries that have come after the 1611 King James. We must remember that the main purpose of the Protestant Reformation was to get the Bible out of the chains of being trapped in an ancient language that few could understand, and into the modern, spoken, conversational language of the present day. William Tyndale fought and died for the right to print the Bible in the common, spoken, modern English tongue of his day… as he boldly told one official who criticized his efforts, “If God spare my life, I will see to it that the boy who drives the plowshare knows more of the scripture than you, Sir!”
Will we now go backwards, and seek to imprison God’s Word once again exclusively in ancient translations? Clearly it is not God’s will that we over-react to SOME of the bad modern translations, by rejecting ALL new translations and “throwing the baby out with the bathwater”. The Word of God is unchanging from generation to generation, but language is a dynamic and ever-changing form of communication. We therefore have a responsibility before God as Christians to make sure that each generation has a modern translation that they can easily understand, yet that does not sacrifice accuracy in any way. Let’s be ever mindful that we are not called to worship the Bible. That is called idolatry. We are called to worship the God who gave us the Bible, and who preserved it through the centuries of people who sought to destroy it.
We are also called to preserve the ancient, original English translations of the Bible… and that is what we do here at WWW.GREATSITE.COM
Consider the following textual comparison of the earliest English translations of John 3:16, as shown in the English Hexapla Parallel New Testament:
1st Ed. King James (1611): "For God so loued the world, that he gaue his only begotten Sonne: that whosoeuer beleeueth in him, should not perish, but haue euerlasting life."
Rheims (1582): "For so God loued the vvorld, that he gaue his only-begotten sonne: that euery one that beleeueth in him, perish not, but may haue life euerlasting"
Geneva (1560): "For God so loueth the world, that he hath geuen his only begotten Sonne: that none that beleue in him, should peryshe, but haue euerlasting lyfe."
Great Bible (1539): "For God so loued the worlde, that he gaue his only begotten sonne, that whosoeuer beleueth in him, shulde not perisshe, but haue euerlasting lyfe."
Tyndale (1534): "For God so loveth the worlde, that he hath geven his only sonne, that none that beleve in him, shuld perisshe: but shuld have everlastinge lyfe."
Wycliff (1380): "for god loued so the world; that he gaf his oon bigetun sone, that eche man that bileueth in him perisch not: but haue euerlastynge liif,"
Anglo-Saxon Proto-English Manuscripts (995 AD): “God lufode middan-eard swa, dat he seade his an-cennedan sunu, dat nan ne forweorde de on hine gely ac habbe dat ece lif."
Timeline of Bible Translation History
1,400 BC: The first written Word of God: The Ten Commandments delivered to Moses.
500 BC: Completion of All Original Hebrew Manuscripts which make up The 39 Books of the Old Testament.
200 BC: Completion of the Septuagint Greek Manuscripts which contain The 39 Old Testament Books AND 14 Apocrypha Books.
1st Century AD: Completion of All Original Greek Manuscripts which make up The 27 Books of the New Testament.
315 AD: Athenasius, the Bishop of Alexandria, identifies the 27 books of the New Testament which are today recognized as the canon of scripture.
382 AD: Jerome's Latin Vulgate Manuscripts Produced which contain All 80 Books (39 Old Test. + 14 Apocrypha + 27 New Test).
500 AD: Scriptures have been Translated into Over 500 Languages.
600 AD: LATIN was the Only Language Allowed for Scripture.
995 AD: Anglo-Saxon (Early Roots of English Language) Translations of The New Testament Produced.
1384 AD: Wycliffe is the First Person to Produce a (Hand-Written) manuscript Copy of the Complete Bible; All 80 Books.
1455 AD: Gutenberg Invents the Printing Press; Books May Now be mass-Produced Instead of Individually Hand-Written. The First Book Ever Printed is Gutenberg's Bible in Latin.
1516 AD: Erasmus Produces a Greek/Latin Parallel New Testament.
1522 AD: Martin Luther's German New Testament.
1526 AD: William Tyndale's New Testament; The First New Testament printed in the English Language.
1535 AD: Myles Coverdale's Bible; The First Complete Bible printed in the English Language (80 Books: O.T. & N.T. & Apocrypha).
1537 AD: Tyndale-Matthews Bible; The Second Complete Bible printed in English. Done by John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers (80 Books).
1539 AD: The "Great Bible" Printed; The First English Language Bible Authorized for Public Use (80 Books).
1560 AD: The Geneva Bible Printed; The First English Language Bible to add Numbered Verses to Each Chapter (80 Books).
1568 AD: The Bishops Bible Printed; The Bible of which the King James was a Revision (80 Books).
1609 AD: The Douay Old Testament is added to the Rheims New Testament (of 1582) Making the First Complete English Catholic Bible; Translated from the Latin Vulgate (80 Books).
1611 AD: The King James Bible Printed; Originally with All 80 Books. The Apocrypha was Officially Removed in 1885 Leaving Only 66 Books.
1782 AD: Robert Aitken's Bible; The First English Language Bible (KJV) Printed in America.
1791 AD: Isaac Collins and Isaiah Thomas Respectively Produce the First Family Bible and First Illustrated Bible Printed in America. Both were King James Versions, with All 80 Books.
1808 AD: Jane Aitken's Bible (Daughter of Robert Aitken); The First Bible to be Printed by a Woman.
1833 AD: Noah Webster's Bible; After Producing his Famous Dictionary, Webster Printed his Own Revision of the King James Bible.
1841 AD: English Hexapla New Testament; an Early Textual Comparison showing the Greek and 6 Famous English Translations in Parallel Columns.
1846 AD: The Illuminated Bible; The Most Lavishly Illustrated Bible printed in America. A King James Version, with All 80 Books.
1885 AD: The "English Revised Version" Bible; The First Major English Revision of the KJV.
1901 AD: The "American Standard Version"; The First Major American Revision of the KJV.
1971 AD: The "New American Standard Bible" (NASB) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Word for Word English Translation" of the Bible.
1973 AD: The "New International Version" (NIV) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Phrase for Phrase English Translation" of the Bible.
1982 AD: The "New King James Version" (NKJV) is Published as a "Modern English Version Maintaining the Original Style of the King James."
2002 AD: The English Standard Version (ESV) is Published as a translation to bridge the gap between the accuracy of the NASB and the readability of the NIV.
History of the Bible: How The Bible Came To Usby Wesley Ringer
Introduction
Why should we have some understanding of how the Bible came to us? Young children often think that milk comes in cartons from the grocery store. As they grow up they learn that milk comes from cows on the farm. Likewise many Christians have become so used to having Bibles that they have bought at a book store that they have almost no knowledge of where the present English translations of the Bible came from.
Understanding how the Bible came to us gives us a confident foundation for our faith in the reliability the Bible. Evidence presented in a criminal case must be shown to have been protected by a proper chain of custody from being tampered with.
We will be able to answer to critics when they claim that the New Testament contains 200,000 errors.
We will have some understanding of why the newer translations such as the NIV and NASV differ from the King James Versions at various points.
Important terms to remember:
Skeptics often claim that the Bible has been changed. However, it is important to define the terms that apply to the source of our English Bible.
Autographs: The original texts were written either by the author's own hand or by a scribe under their personal supervision.
Manuscripts: Until Gutenberg first printed the Latin Bible in 1456, all Bibles were hand copied onto papyrus, parchment, and paper.
Translations: When the Bible is translated into a different language it is usually translated from the original Hebrew and Greek. However some translations in the past were derived from an earlier translation. For example the first English translation by John Wycliffe in 1380 was prepared from the Latin Vulgate.
Old Testament
The Bible comes from two main sources - Old and New Testaments - written in different languages. The Old Testament was written primarily in Hebrew, with some books written in Aramaic. The following are brief snap shots of the beginning and ending of the Old Testament and the reasons for the first two translations of the Old Testament from Hebrew into Aramaic and Greek
1875 B.C. Abraham was called by God to the land of Canaan.
1450 B.C. The exodus of the Children of Israel from Egypt.
Autographs
There are no known autographs of any books of the Old Testament. Below is a list of the languages in which the Old Testament books were written.
1450-1400 B.C. The traditional date for Moses' writing of Genesis-Deuteronomy written in Hebrew.
586 B.C. Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar. The Jews were taken into captivity to Babylon. They remained in Babylon under the Medo-Persian Empire and there began to speak Aramaic.
555-545 B.C. The Book of Daniel Chapters. 2:4 to 7:28 were written in Aramaic.
425 B.C. Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, was written in Hebrew.
400 B.C. Ezra Chapters. 4:8 to 6:18; and 7:12-26 were written in Aramaic.
Manuscripts
The following is a list of the oldest Hebrew manuscripts of the Old Testament that are still in existence.
The Dead Sea Scrolls: date from 200 B.C. - 70 A.D. and contain the entire book of Isaiah and portions of every other Old Testament book but Esther.
Geniza Fragments: portions the Old Testament in Hebrew and Aramaic, discovered in 1947 in an old synagogue in Cairo, Egypt, which date from about 400 A.D.
Ben Asher Manuscripts: five or six generations of this family made copies of the Old Testament using the Masoretic Hebrew text, from 700-950 A.D. The following are examples of the Hebrew Masoretic text-type.
Aleppo Codex: contains the complete Old Testament and is dated around 950 A.D. Unfortunately over one quarter of this Codex was destroyed in anti-Jewish riots in 1947.
Codex Leningradensis: The complete Old Testament in Hebrew copied by the last member of the Ben Asher family in A.D. 1008.
Translations
The Old Testament was translated very early into Aramaic and Greek.
400 B.C. The Old Testament began to be translated into Aramaic. This translation is called the Aramaic Targums. This translation helped the Jewish people, who began to speak Aramaic from the time of their captivity in Babylon, to understand the Old Testament in the language that they commonly spoke. In the first century Palestine of Jesus' day, Aramaic was still the commonly spoken language. For example maranatha: "Our Lord has come," 1 Corinthians 16:22 is an example of an Aramaic word that is used in the New Testament.
250 B.C. The Old Testament was translated into Greek. This translation is known as the Septuagint. It is sometimes designated "LXX" (which is Roman numeral for "70") because it was believed that 70 to 72 translators worked to translate the Hebrew Old Testament in Greek. The Septuagint was often used by New Testament writers when they quoted from the Old Testament. The LXX was translation of the Old Testament that was used by the early Church.1. The following is a list of the oldest Greek LXX translations of the Old Testament that are still in existence.
Chester Beatty Papyri: Contains nine Old Testament Books in the Greek Septuagint and dates between 100-400 A.D.
Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus each contain almost the entire Old Testament of the Greek Septuagint and they both date around 350 A.D.
The New Testament
Autographs
45- 95 A.D. The New Testament was written in Greek. The Pauline Epistles, the Gospel of Mark, the Gospel of Luke, and the book of Acts are all dated from 45-63 A.D. The Gospel of John and the Revelation may have been written as late as 95 A.D.
Manuscripts
There are over 5,600 early Greek Manuscripts of the New Testament that are still in existence. The oldest manuscripts were written on papyrus and the later manuscripts were written on leather called parchment.
125 A.D. The New Testament manuscript which dates most closely to the original autograph was copied around 125 A.D, within 35 years of the original. It is designated "p 52" and contains a small portion of John 18. (The "p" stands for papyrus.)
200 A.D. Bodmer p 66 a papyrus manuscript which contains a large part of the Gospel of John.
200 A.D. Chester Beatty Biblical papyrus p 46 contains the Pauline Epistles and Hebrews.
225 A.D. Bodmer Papyrus p 75 contains the Gospels of Luke and John.
250-300 A.D. Chester Beatty Biblical papyrus p 45 contains portions of the four Gospels and Acts.
350 A.D. Codex Sinaiticus contains the entire New Testament and almost the entire Old Testament in Greek. It was discovered by a German scholar Tisendorf in 1856 at an Orthodox monastery at Mt. Sinai.
350 A.D. Codex Vaticanus: {B} is an almost complete New Testament. It was cataloged as being in the Vatican Library since 1475.
Translations
Early translations of the New Testament can give important insight into the underlying Greek manuscripts from which they were translated from.
180 A.D. Early translations of the New Testament from Greek into Latin, Syriac, and Coptic versions began about 180 A.D.
195 A.D. The name of the first translation of the Old and New Testaments into Latin was termed Old Latin, both Testaments having been translated from the Greek. Parts of the Old Latin were found in quotes by the church father Tertullian, who lived around 160-220 A.D. in north Africa and wrote treatises on theology.
300 A.D. The Old Syriac was a translation of the New Testament from the Greek into Syriac.
300 A.D. The Coptic Versions: Coptic was spoken in four dialects in Egypt. The Bible was translated into each of these four dialects.
380 A.D. The Latin Vulgate was translated by St. Jerome. He translated into Latin the Old Testament from the Hebrew and the New Testament from Greek. The Latin Vulgate became the Bible of the Western Church until the Protestant Reformation in the 1500's. It continues to be the authoritative translation of the Roman Catholic Church to this day. The Protestant Reformation saw an increase in translations of the Bible into the common languages of the people.
Other early translations of the Bible were in Armenian, Georgian, and Ethiopic, Slavic, and Gothic.
1380 A.D. The first English translation of the Bible was by John Wycliffe. He translated the Bible into English from the Latin Vulgate. This was a translation from a translation and not a translation from the original Hebrew and Greek. Wycliffe was forced to translate from the Latin Vulgate because he did not know Hebrew or Greek.
The Advent of Printing
Printing greatly aided the transmission of the biblical texts.
1456 A.D. Gutenberg produced the first printed Bible in Latin. Printing revolutionized the way books were made. From now on books could be published in great numbers and at a lower cost.
1514 A.D. The Greek New Testament was printed for the first time by Erasmus. He based his Greek New Testament from only five Greek manuscripts, the oldest of which dated only as far back as the twelfth century. With minor revisions, Erasmus' Greek New Testament came to be known as the Textus Receptus or the "received texts."
1522 A. D. Polyglot Bible was published. The Old Testament was in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin and the New Testament in Latin and Greek. Erasmus used the Polyglot to revise later editions of his New Testament. Tyndale made use of the Polyglot in his translation on the Old Testament into English which he did not complete because he was martyred in 1534.
1611 A.D. The King James Version into English from the original Hebrew and Greek. The King James translators of the New Testament used the Textus Receptus as the basis for their translations.
1968 A.D. The United Bible Societies 4th Edition of the Greek New Testament. This Greek New Testament made use of the oldest Greek manuscripts which date from 175 A.D. This was the Greek New Testament text from which the NASV and the NIV were translated.
1971 A.D. The New American Standard Version (NASV) was published. It makes use of the wealth of much older Hebrew and Greek manuscripts now available that weren't available at the time of the translation of the KJV. Its wording and sentence structure closely follow the Greek in more of a word for word style.
1983 A.D. The New International Version (NIV) was published. It also made use of the oldest manuscript evidence. It is more of a "thought-for-thought" translation and reads more easily than the NASV.
As an example of the contrast between word-for-word and thought-for-thought translations, notice below the translation of the Greek word "hagios-holy" NASV Hebrews 9:25. "...the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood not his own."NIV Hebrews 9:25. "...the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood that is not his own."
The NIV supplies "understood" information about the Day of Atonement, namely that the high priest's duties took place in the compartment of the temple known specifically as the Most Holy Place. Note that the NASV simply says "holy place" reflecting the more literal translation of "hagios."
The Integrity of the Manuscript Evidence
As with any ancient book transmitted through a number of handwritten manuscripts, the question naturally arises as to how confident can we be that we have anything resembling the autograph. Let us now look at what evidences we have for the integrity of the New Testament manuscripts. Let us look at the number of manuscripts and how close they date to the autographs of the Bible as compared with other ancient writings of similar age.
Tacitus, the Roman historian, wrote his Annals of Imperial Rome in about A.D. 116. Only one manuscript of his work remains. It was copied about 850 A.D.
Josephus, a Jewish historian, wrote The Jewish War shortly after 70 A.D. There are nine manuscripts in Greek which date from 1000-1200 A.D. and one Latin translation from around 400 A.D.
Homer's Iliad was written around 800 B.C. It was as important to ancient Greeks as the Bible was to the Hebrews. There are over 650 manuscripts remaining but they date from 200 to 300 A.D. which is over a thousand years after the Iliad was written.
The Old Testament autographs were written 1450 - 400 B. C.
The Dead Sea Scrolls date between 200 B.C. to 70 A. D and date within 300 years from when the last book of the Old Testament was written.
Two almost complete Greek LXX translations of the Old Testament date about 350 A. D.
The oldest complete Hebrew Old Testament dates about 950 A. D.
Genesis-Deuteronomy were written over 1200 years before the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Codex Vaticanus is an almost complete Greek translation of the Old Testament dating around 350 A.D. The Aleppo Codex is the oldest complete Old Testament manuscript in Hebrew and was copied around 950 A.D. The Dead Sea Scrolls date from within 200-300 years from the last book of the Old Testament. However since the five books of Moses were written about 1450- 1400 B.C. the Dead Sea Scrolls still come almost 1200 years after the first books of the Old Testament were written.
The New Testament autographs were written between 45-95 A. D.
There are 5,664 Greek manuscripts some dating as early as 125 A. D. and an complete New Testament that dates from 350 A. D.
8,000 to 10,000 Latin Vulgate manuscripts.
8,000 manuscripts in Ethiopic, Coptic, Slavic, Syriac, and Armenian.
In addition, the complete New Testament could be reproduced from the quotes that were made from it by the early church fathers in their letters and sermons.
Authorship and dating of the New Testament books
Skeptics and liberal Christian scholars both seek to date the New Testament books as late first century or early second century writings. They contend that these books were not written by eyewitnesses but rather by second or third hand sources. This allowed for the development of what they view as myths concerning Jesus. For example, they would deny that Jesus actually foretold the destruction of Jerusalem. Rather they would contend that later Christian writers "put these words into his mouth."
Many of the New Testament books claim to be written by eyewitnesses.
The Gospel of John claims to be written by the disciple of the Lord. Recent archeological research has confirmed both the existence of the Pool of Bethesda and that it had five porticoes as described in John 5:2. This correct reference to an incidental detail lends credibility to the claim that the Gospel of John was written by John who as an eyewitness knew Jerusalem before it was destroyed in 70 A. D.
Paul signed his epistles with his own hand. He was writing to churches who knew him. These churches were able to authenticate that these epistles had come from his hands (Galatians 6:11). Clement an associate of Paul's wrote to the Corinthian Church in 97 A. D. urging them to heed the epistle that Paul had sent them.
The following facts strongly suggest that both the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts were written prior to 65 A.D. This lends credibility to the author's (Luke) claim to be an eyewitness to Paul's missionary journeys. This would date Mark prior to 65 A.D. and the Pauline epistles between 49-63 A.D.
Acts records the beginning history of the church with persecutions and martyrdoms being mentioned repeatedly. Three men; Peter, Paul, and James the brother of Jesus all play leading roles throughout the book. They were all martyred by 67 A.D., but their martyrdoms are not recorded in Acts.
The church in Jerusalem played a central role in the Book of Acts, but the destruction of the city in 70 A.D. was not mentioned. The Jewish historian Josephus cited the siege and destruction of Jerusalem as befalling the Jews because of their unjust killing of James the brother of Jesus.
The Book of Acts ends with Paul in Rome under house arrest in 62 A.D. In 64 A.D., Nero blamed and persecuted the Christians for the fire that burned down the city of Rome. Paul himself was martyred by 65 A.D. in Rome. Again, neither the terrible persecution of the Christians in Rome nor Paul's martyrdom are mentioned.Conclusion: These books, Luke-Acts, were written while Luke was an eyewitness to many of the events, and had opportunity to research portions that he was not an eyewitness to.
The church fathers bear witness to even earlier New Testament manuscripts
The earliest manuscripts we have of major portions of the New Testament are p 45, p 46, p66, and p 75, and they date from 175-250 A. D. The early church fathers (97-180 A.D.) bear witness to even earlier New Testament manuscripts by quoting from all but one of the New Testament books. They are also in the position to authenticate those books, written by the apostles or their close associates, from later books such as the gospel of Thomas that claimed to have been written by the apostles, but were not.
Clement (30-100 A.D.) wrote an epistle to the Corinthian Church around 97 A.D. He reminded them to heed the epistle that Paul had written to them years before. Recall that Clement had labored with Paul (Philippians 4:3). He quoted from the following New Testament books: Luke, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Ephesians, Titus, 1 and 2 Peter, Hebrews, and James.
The apostolic fathers Ignatius (30-107 A.D.), Polycarp (65-155 A.D.), and Papias (70-155 A.D.) cite verses from every New Testament book except 2 and 3 John. They thereby authenticated nearly the entire New Testament. Both Ignatius and Polycarp were disciples of the apostle John.
Justin Martyr, (110-165 A.D.), cited verses from the following 13 books of the New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Galatians, 2 Thessalonians, Hebrews, 1 and 2 Peter, and Revelation.
Irenaeus, (120-202 A.D.), wrote a five volume work Against Heresies in which,
He quoted from every book of the New Testament but 3 John.
He quoted from the New Testament books over 1,200 times.
How was the New Testament canon determined?
The Early church had three criteria for determining what books were to be included or excluded from the Canon of the New Testament.
First, the books must have apostolic authority-- that is, they must have been written either by the apostles themselves, who were eyewitnesses to what they wrote about, or by associates of the apostles.
Second, there was the criterion of conformity to what was called the "rule of faith." In other words, was the document congruent with the basic Christian tradition that the church recognized as normative.
Third, there was the criterion of whether a document had enjoyed continuous acceptance and usage by the church at large.
The gospel of Thomas is not included in the Canon of the New Testament for the following reasons.
The gospel of Thomas fails the test of Apostolic authority. None of the early church fathers from Clement to Irenaeus ever quoted from the gospel of Thomas. This indicates that they either did not know of it or that they rejected it as spurious. In either case, the early church fathers fail to support the gospel of Thomas' claim to have been written by the apostle. It was believed to by written around 140 A.D. There is no evidence to support its purported claim to be written by the Apostle Thomas himself.
The gospel of Thomas fails to conform to the rule of faith. It purports to contain 114 "secret sayings" of Jesus. Some of these are very similar to the sayings of Jesus recorded in the Four Gospels. For example the gospel of Thomas quotes Jesus as saying, "A city built on a high hill cannot be hidden." This reads the same as Matthew's Gospel except that high is added. But Thomas claims that Jesus said, "Split wood; I am there. Lift up a stone, and you will find me there." That concept is pantheistic. Thomas ends with the following saying that denies women salvation unless they are some how changed into being a man. "Let Mary go away from us, because women are not worthy of life." Jesus is quoted as saying, "Lo, I shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit, resembling you males. For every woman who makes herself male will enter into the kingdom of heaven."
The gospel of Thomas fails the test of continuous usage and acceptance. The lack of manuscript evidence plus the failure of the early church fathers to quote from it or recognize it shows that it was not used or accepted in the early Church. Only two manuscripts are known of this "gospel." Until 1945 only a single fifth-century copy translation in Coptic had been found. Then in 1945 a Greek manuscript of the Gospel of Thomas was found at Nag Hammadi in Egypt. This compares very poorly to the thousands of manuscripts that authenticate the Four Gospels.
Textual Criticism: What Is It And Why It Is Necessary
Important terms:
Textual criticism is the method used to examine the vast number of manuscripts to determine the probably composition of the original autographs.
"Lower" Textual Criticism: the practice of studying the manuscripts of the Bible with the goal of reproducing the original text of the Bible from this vast wealth of manuscripts. This is a necessary task because there exists minor variations among the biblical manuscripts. So, unless one manuscript is arbitrarily chosen as a standard by which to judge all others, then one must employ textual criticism to compare all manuscripts to derive the reading which would most closely reflect the autographs.
"Higher" criticism: "The Jesus Seminar" is a group of liberal Christian higher critics who vote on which of the sayings of Christ they believe to have actually been spoken by Him. This is an example of "higher" criticism. It is highly subjective and is colored by the view points of various "higher" critics.
Textual Variants: Since all Greek manuscripts of the New Testament prior to Erasmus' first printed Greek New Testament were copied by hand scribal errors or variants could have crept into the texts.. When these Greek New Testament manuscripts are compared with each other we find evidence of scribal errors and places where the different manuscripts differ with one another.
Textual variants and the integrity of the New Testament text
Many scholars have spent a lifetime of study of the textual variants. The following is the conclusion of the importance of these variants as they relate to the integrity of the New Testament text.
There are over 200,000 variants in the New Testament alone. How do these variants effect our confidence that the New Testament has been faithfully handed down to us?
These 200,000 variants are not as large as they seem. Remember that every misspelled word or an omission of a single word in any of the 5,600 manuscript would count as a variant.
Johann Bengel 1687-1752 was very disturbed by the 30,000 variants that had recently been noted in Mill's edition of the Greek Testament. After extended study he came to the conclusion that the variant readings were fewer in number than might have been expected and that they did not shake any article of Christian doctrine.
Westcott and Hort, in the 1870's, state that the New Testament text remains over 98.3 percent pure no matter whether one uses the Textus Receptus or their own Greek text which was largely based on Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus.
James White, on p. 40 of his book The King James Only Controversy states: "The reality is that the amount of variation between the two most extremely different manuscripts of the New Testament would not fundamentally altar the message of the Scriptures! I make this statement (1) fully aware of the wide range of textual variants in the New Testament, and (2) painfully aware of the strong attacks upon those who have made similar statements in the past."
Scholars Norman Geisler and William Nix conclude, "The New Testament, then, has not only survived in more manuscripts that any other book from antiquity, but it has survived in a purer form than any other great book-a form that is 99.5 percent pure."
When textual critics look at all 5,600 Greek New Testament manuscripts they find that they can group these manuscripts into text-types or families with other similar manuscripts. There are four text-types.
Figure 1. Age differences between Alexandrian and Byzantine manuscripts.
The Alexandrian text-type, found in most papyri and in Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus all of which date prior to 350 A.D.
The Western text-type, found both in Greek manuscripts and in translations into other languages, especially Latin.
The Byzantine text-type, found in the vast majority of later Greek manuscripts. Over 90 percent of all 5,600 Greek New Testament manuscripts are of the Byzantine text-type. The Byzantine text-type is "fuller" or "longer" than other text-types, and this is taken as evidence of a later origin. The reason that we have so many manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type is because the Byzantine Empire remained Greek speaking and Orthodox Christian until Islamic Turks overran its capital, Constantinople, in 1453. Constantinople is now called Istanbul and is Turkey's largest city, although no longer its capital.
The Caesaarean text-type, disputed by some, found in p 45 and a few other manuscripts.
Why does the KJV differ from the NIV?
The reason the King James version differ from the NASV and the NIV in a number of readings is because it is translated from a different text-type than they are.
The King James Version was translated from Erasmus' printed Greek New Testament which made use of only five Greek manuscripts the oldest of which dated to the 1,100 A.D. These manuscripts were examples of the Byzantine text-type.
The NASV and the NIV make use of the United Bible Societies 4th Edition 1968 of the New Testament. This edition of the Greek New Testament relies more heavily on the Alexandrian text-type while making use of all 5,664 Greek manuscripts. The reasons that the NASV and NIV find the Alexandrian text-type more reliable are the following:
This text-type uses manuscripts date from 175-350 A.D. which includes most of the papyri, Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus.
The church fathers from 97-350 A.D. used this text-type when they quoted the New Testament.
The early translations of the New Testament used the Alexandrian text-type.
Examples that show why the KJV differs from the NIV and NASV in certain verses
In the following examples the King James Version differs from the NIV, and NASV. because it bases it's translation on the Byzantine text-type and the NIV and NASV base theirs on the Alexandrian text-type.
KJV 1 John 5:7-8 "For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and Holy Ghost: and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness in earth, the spirit, and the water, and the blood; and these three agree in one."NIV 1 John 5:7 "For there are three that testify: v. 8 the Spirit, the water and the blood: and the three are in agreement."
When Erasmus first printed the Greek New Testament in 1514 it did not contain the words "in heaven, the Father, the Word, and Holy Ghost: and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness in earth," because they were not found in any of the Greek manuscripts that Erasmus looked at.
These words were not quoted by any of the Greek church fathers. They most certainly would have been used by the church fathers in their 3rd and 4th century letters if found in the Greek manuscripts available to them.
These words are not found in any ancient versions of the New Testament. These include Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, Ethiopic, Arabic, Slavonic, nor in the Old Latin in its early form.
These words begin to appear in marginal notes in the Latin New Testament beginning in the fifth century. From the sixth century onward these words are found more and more frequently.
Erasmus finally agreed to put these words into new editions of his Greek New Testament if his critic's could find one Greek manuscript that contained these words. It appears that his critics manufactured manuscripts to include these words.
These additional words are found in only eight manuscripts as a variant reading written in the margin. Seven of these manuscripts date from the sixteenth century and one is a tenth century manuscript.
Erasmus' New Testament became the basis for the Greek New Testament, "Textus Receptus", which the King James translators used as the basis for their translation of the New Testament into English.
Mark 16 verses 9-20 are found in the King James Version. However, both the NASV and the NIV note that these verses are not found in the earliest manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark (see The Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20).
Neither Codex Sinaiticus nor Codex Vaticanus have Mark 16:9-20.
Mark 16:9-20 is also absent from some Old Latin, Syriac, Armenian, and Georgian manuscripts.
Clement of Alexandria and Origen show no knowledge of the existence of these verses.
4. The earliest church father to note the longer ending of Mark 16:9-20 was Irenaeus, around 180 A. D.
Luke 2:14 reads:
KJV: "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will toward men."NIV: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."
The Greek text from which these two versions are translated differ by only one letter. The NIV is translated from manuscripts that have an "s" on the end of the Greek word for good will. This reading is supported by the oldest Alexandrine text-types.
Bibliography
The following is a list of books that deal with the issue of how the Bible came to us. I have listed them from the easiest to most the complex.
Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ: A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998
White, James R. The King James Only Controversy: Can You Trust the Modern Translations? Minneapolis, Bethany House Publishers, 1995
Metzger, Bruce M. The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1992
Aland, Kurt and Barbara. The Text of The New Testament an Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism. Grand Rapids, Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995
Wurthwein, Ernst. The Text of The Old Testament: An Introduction to the Biblia Hebraica. Grand Rapids, Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995
Metzger, Bruce M. A Textual Commentary of the Greek New Testament. Stuttgart, United Bible Societies, 1995 .
The fascinating story of how we got the Bible in its present form actually starts thousands of years ago, as briefly outlined in our Timeline of Bible Translation History. As a background study, we recommend that you first review our discussion of the Pre-Reformation History of the Bible from 1,400 B.C. to 1,400 A.D., which covers the transmission of the scripture through the original languages of Hebrew and Greek, and the 1,000 years of the Dark & Middle Ages when the Word was trapped in only Latin. Our starting point in this discussion of Bible history, however, is the advent of the scripture in the English language with the “Morning Star of the Reformation”, John Wycliffe.
John Wycliffe
The first hand-written English language Bible manuscripts were produced in the 1380's AD by John Wycliffe, an Oxford professor, scholar, and theologian. Wycliffe, (also spelled “Wycliff” & “Wyclif”), was well-known throughout Europe for his opposition to the teaching of the organized Church, which he believed to be contrary to the Bible. With the help of his followers, called the Lollards, and his assistant Purvey, and many other faithful scribes, Wycliffe produced dozens of English language manuscript copies of the scriptures. They were translated out of the Latin Vulgate, which was the only source text available to Wycliffe. The Pope was so infuriated by his teachings and his translation of the Bible into English, that 44 years after Wycliffe had died, he ordered the bones to be dug-up, crushed, and scattered in the river!
John Hus
One of Wycliffe’s followers, John Hus, actively promoted Wycliffe’s ideas: that people should be permitted to read the Bible in their own language, and they should oppose the tyranny of the Roman church that threatened anyone possessing a non-Latin Bible with execution. Hus was burned at the stake in 1415, with Wycliffe’s manuscript Bibles used as kindling for the fire. The last words of John Hus were that, “in 100 years, God will raise up a man whose calls for reform cannot be suppressed.” Almost exactly 100 years later, in 1517, Martin Luther nailed his famous 95 Theses of Contention (a list of 95 issues of heretical theology and crimes of the Roman Catholic Church) into the church door at Wittenberg. The prophecy of Hus had come true! Martin Luther went on to be the first person to translate and publish the Bible in the commonly-spoken dialect of the German people; a translation more appealing than previous German Biblical translations. Foxe’s Book of Martyrs records that in that same year, 1517, seven people were burned at the stake by the Roman Catholic Church for the crime of teaching their children to say the Lord’s Prayer in English rather than Latin.
Johann Gutenberg
Johann Gutenberg invented the printing press in the 1450's, and the first book to ever be printed was a Latin language Bible, printed in Mainz, Germany. Gutenberg’s Bibles were surprisingly beautiful, as each leaf Gutenberg printed was later colorfully hand-illuminated. Born as “Johann Gensfleisch” (John Gooseflesh), he preferred to be known as “Johann Gutenberg” (John Beautiful Mountain). Ironically, though he had created what many believe to be the most important invention in history, Gutenberg was a victim of unscrupulous business associates who took control of his business and left him in poverty. Nevertheless, the invention of the movable-type printing press meant that Bibles and books could finally be effectively produced in large quantities in a short period of time. This was essential to the success of the Reformation.
Thomas Linacre
In the 1490’s another Oxford professor, and the personal physician to King Henry the 7th and 8th, Thomas Linacre, decided to learn Greek. After reading the Gospels in Greek, and comparing it to the Latin Vulgate, he wrote in his diary, “Either this (the original Greek) is not the Gospel… or we are not Christians.” The Latin had become so corrupt that it no longer even preserved the message of the Gospel… yet the Church still threatened to kill anyone who read the scripture in any language other than Latin… though Latin was not an original language of the scriptures.
John Colet
In 1496, John Colet, another Oxford professor and the son of the Mayor of London, started reading the New Testament in Greek and translating it into English for his students at Oxford, and later for the public at Saint Paul’s Cathedral in London. The people were so hungry to hear the Word of God in a language they could understand, that within six months there were 20,000 people packed in the church and at least that many outside trying to get in! (Sadly, while the enormous and beautiful Saint Paul’s Cathedral remains the main church in London today, as of 2003, typical Sunday morning worship attendance is only around 200 people… and most of them are tourists). Fortunately for Colet, he was a powerful man with friends in high places, so he amazingly managed to avoid execution.
Erasmus
In considering the experiences of Linacre and Colet, the great scholar Erasmus was so moved to correct the corrupt Latin Vulgate, that in 1516, with the help of printer John Froben, he published a Greek-Latin Parallel New Testament. The Latin part was not the corrupt Vulgate, but his own fresh rendering of the text from the more accurate and reliable Greek, which he had managed to collate from a half-dozen partial old Greek New Testament manuscripts he had acquired. This milestone was the first non-Latin Vulgate text of the scripture to be produced in a millennium… and the first ever to come off a printing press. The 1516 Greek-Latin New Testament of Erasmus further focused attention on just how corrupt and inaccurate the Latin Vulgate had become, and how important it was to go back and use the original Greek (New Testament) and original Hebrew (Old Testament) languages to maintain accuracy… and to translate them faithfully into the languages of the common people, whether that be English, German, or any other tongue. No sympathy for this “illegal activity” was to be found from Rome… even as the words of Pope Leo X's declaration that "the fable of Christ was quite profitable to him" continued through the years to infuriate the people of God.
William Tyndale
William Tyndale was the Captain of the Army of Reformers, and was their spiritual leader. Tyndale holds the distinction of being the first man to ever print the New Testament in the English language. Tyndale was a true scholar and a genius, so fluent in eight languages that it was said one would think any one of them to be his native tongue. He is frequently referred to as the “Architect of the English Language”, (even more so than William Shakespeare) as so many of the phrases Tyndale coined are still in our language today.
Martin Luther
Martin Luther had a small head-start on Tyndale, as Luther declared his intolerance for the Roman Church’s corruption on Halloween in 1517, by nailing his 95 Theses of Contention to the Wittenberg Church door. Luther, who would be exiled in the months following the Diet of Worms Council in 1521 that was designed to martyr him, would translate the New Testament into German for the first time from the 1516 Greek-Latin New Testament of Erasmus, and publish it in September of 1522. Luther also published a German Pentateuch in 1523, and another edition of the German New Testament in 1529. In the 1530’s he would go on to publish the entire Bible in German.
William Tyndale wanted to use the same 1516 Erasmus text as a source to translate and print the New Testament in English for the first time in history. Tyndale showed up on Luther's doorstep in Germany in 1525, and by year's end had translated the New Testament into English. Tyndale had been forced to flee England, because of the wide-spread rumor that his English New Testament project was underway, causing inquisitors and bounty hunters to be constantly on Tyndale's trail to arrest him and prevent his project. God foiled their plans, and in 1525-1526 the Tyndale New Testament became the first printed edition of the scripture in the English language. Subsequent printings of the Tyndale New Testament in the 1530's were often elaborately illustrated.
They were burned as soon as the Bishop could confiscate them, but copies trickled through and actually ended up in the bedroom of King Henry VIII. The more the King and Bishop resisted its distribution, the more fascinated the public at large became. The church declared it contained thousands of errors as they torched hundreds of New Testaments confiscated by the clergy, while in fact, they burned them because they could find no errors at all. One risked death by burning if caught in mere possession of Tyndale's forbidden books.
Having God's Word available to the public in the language of the common man, English, would have meant disaster to the church. No longer would they control access to the scriptures. If people were able to read the Bible in their own tongue, the church's income and power would crumble. They could not possibly continue to get away with selling indulgences (the forgiveness of sins) or selling the release of loved ones from a church-manufactured "Purgatory". People would begin to challenge the church's authority if the church were exposed as frauds and thieves. The contradictions between what God's Word said, and what the priests taught, would open the public's eyes and the truth would set them free from the grip of fear that the institutional church held. Salvation through faith, not works or donations, would be understood. The need for priests would vanish through the priesthood of all believers. The veneration of church-canonized Saints and Mary would be called into question. The availability of the scriptures in English was the biggest threat imaginable to the wicked church. Neither side would give up without a fight.
Today, there are only two known copies left of Tyndale’s 1525-26 First Edition. Any copies printed prior to 1570 are extremely valuable. Tyndale's flight was an inspiration to freedom-loving Englishmen who drew courage from the 11 years that he was hunted. Books and Bibles flowed into England in bales of cotton and sacks of flour. Ironically, Tyndale’s biggest customer was the King’s men, who would buy up every copy available to burn them… and Tyndale used their money to print even more! In the end, Tyndale was caught: betrayed by an Englishman that he had befriended. Tyndale was incarcerated for 500 days before he was strangled and burned at the stake in 1536. Tyndale’s last words were, "Oh Lord, open the King of England’s eyes". This prayer would be answered just three years later in 1539, when King Henry VIII finally allowed, and even funded, the printing of an English Bible known as the “Great Bible”. But before that could happen…
Myles Coverdale
Myles Coverdale and John “Thomas Matthew” Rogers had remained loyal disciples the last six years of Tyndale's life, and they carried the English Bible project forward and even accelerated it. Coverdale finished translating the Old Testament, and in 1535 he printed the first complete Bible in the English language, making use of Luther's German text and the Latin as sources. Thus, the first complete English Bible was printed on October 4, 1535, and is known as the Coverdale Bible.
John Rogers
John Rogers went on to print the second complete English Bible in 1537. It was, however, the first English Bible translated from the original Biblical languages of Hebrew & Greek. He printed it under the pseudonym "Thomas Matthew", (an assumed name that had actually been used by Tyndale at one time) as a considerable part of this Bible was the translation of Tyndale, whose writings had been condemned by the English authorities. It is a composite made up of Tyndale's Pentateuch and New Testament (1534-1535 edition) and Coverdale's Bible and some of Roger's own translation of the text. It remains known most commonly as the Matthew-Tyndale Bible. It went through a nearly identical second-edition printing in 1549.
Thomas Cranmer
In 1539, Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, hired Myles Coverdale at the bequest of King Henry VIII to publish the "Great Bible". It became the first English Bible authorized for public use, as it was distributed to every church, chained to the pulpit, and a reader was even provided so that the illiterate could hear the Word of God in plain English. It would seem that William Tyndale's last wish had been granted...just three years after his martyrdom. Cranmer's Bible, published by Coverdale, was known as the Great Bible due to its great size: a large pulpit folio measuring over 14 inches tall. Seven editions of this version were printed between April of 1539 and December of 1541.
King Henry VIII
It was not that King Henry VIII had a change of conscience regarding publishing the Bible in English. His motives were more sinister… but the Lord sometimes uses the evil intentions of men to bring about His glory. King Henry VIII had in fact, requested that the Pope permit him to divorce his wife and marry his mistress. The Pope refused. King Henry responded by marrying his mistress anyway, (later having two of his many wives executed), and thumbing his nose at the Pope by renouncing Roman Catholicism, taking England out from under Rome’s religious control, and declaring himself as the reigning head of State to also be the new head of the Church. This new branch of the Christian Church, neither Roman Catholic nor truly Protestant, became known as the Anglican Church or the Church of England. King Henry acted essentially as its “Pope”. His first act was to further defy the wishes of Rome by funding the printing of the scriptures in English… the first legal English Bible… just for spite.
Queen Mary
The ebb and flow of freedom continued through the 1540's...and into the 1550's. After King Henry VIII, King Edward VI took the throne, and after his death, the reign of Queen “Bloody” Mary was the next obstacle to the printing of the Bible in English. She was possessed in her quest to return England to the Roman Church. In 1555, John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers and Thomas Cranmer were both burned at the stake. Mary went on to burn reformers at the stake by the hundreds for the "crime" of being a Protestant. This era was known as the Marian Exile, and the refugees fled from England with little hope of ever seeing their home or friends again.
John Foxe
In the 1550's, the Church at Geneva, Switzerland, was very sympathetic to the reformer refugees and was one of only a few safe havens for a desperate people. Many of them met in Geneva, led by Myles Coverdale and John Foxe (publisher of the famous Foxe's Book of Martyrs, which is to this day the only exhaustive reference work on the persecution and martyrdom of Early Christians and Protestants from the first century up to the mid-16th century), as well as Thomas Sampson and William Whittingham. There, with the protection of the great theologian John Calvin (author of the most famous theological book ever published, Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion)and John Knox, the great Reformer of the Scottish Church, the Church of Geneva determined to produce a Bible that would educate their families while they continued in exile.
John Calvin
The New Testament was completed in 1557, and the complete Bible was first published in 1560. It became known as the Geneva Bible. Due to a passage in Genesis describing the clothing that God fashioned for Adam and Eve upon expulsion from the Garden of Eden as "Breeches" (an antiquated form of "Britches"), some people referred to the Geneva Bible as the Breeches Bible.
John Knox
The Geneva Bible was the first Bible to add numbered verses to the chapters, so that referencing specific passages would be easier. Every chapter was also accompanied by extensive marginal notes and references so thorough and complete that the Geneva Bible is also considered the first English "Study Bible". William Shakespeare quotes hundreds of times in his plays from the Geneva translation of the Bible. The Geneva Bible became the Bible of choice for over 100 years of English speaking Christians. Between 1560 and 1644 at least 144 editions of this Bible were published. Examination of the 1611 King James Bible shows clearly that its translators were influenced much more by the Geneva Bible, than by any other source. The Geneva Bible itself retains over 90% of William Tyndale's original English translation. The Geneva in fact, remained more popular than the King James Version until decades after its original release in 1611! The Geneva holds the honor of being the first Bible taken to America, and the Bible of the Puritans and Pilgrims. It is truly the “Bible of the Protestant Reformation.” Strangely, the famous Geneva Bible has been out-of-print since 1644, so the only way to obtain one is to either purchase an original printing of the Geneva Bible, or a less costly facsimile reproduction of the original 1560 Geneva Bible.
With the end of Queen Mary's bloody reign, the reformers could safely return to England. The Anglican Church, now under Queen Elizabeth I, reluctantly tolerated the printing and distribution of Geneva version Bibles in England. The marginal notes, which were vehemently against the institutional Church of the day, did not rest well with the rulers of the day. Another version, one with a less inflammatory tone was desired, and the copies of the Great Bible were getting to be decades old. In 1568, a revision of the Great Bible known as the Bishop's Bible was introduced. Despite 19 editions being printed between 1568 and 1606, this Bible, referred to as the “rough draft of the King James Version”, never gained much of a foothold of popularity among the people. The Geneva may have simply been too much to compete with.
By the 1580's, the Roman Catholic Church saw that it had lost the battle to suppress the will of God: that His Holy Word be available in the English language. In 1582, the Church of Rome surrendered their fight for "Latin only" and decided that if the Bible was to be available in English, they would at least have an official Roman Catholic English translation. And so, using the corrupt and inaccurate Latin Vulgate as the only source text, they went on to publish an English Bible with all the distortions and corruptions that Erasmus had revealed and warned of 75 years earlier. Because it was translated at the Roman Catholic College in the city of Rheims, it was known as the Rheims New Testament (also spelled Rhemes). The Douay Old Testament was translated by the Church of Rome in 1609 at the College in the city of Douay (also spelled Doway & Douai). The combined product is commonly referred to as the "Doway/Rheims" Version. In 1589, Dr. William Fulke of Cambridge published the "Fulke's Refutation", in which he printed in parallel columns the Bishops Version along side the Rheims Version, attempting to show the error and distortion of the Roman Church's corrupt compromise of an English version of the Bible.
King James I
With the death of Queen Elizabeth I, Prince James VI of Scotland became King James I of England. The Protestant clergy approached the new King in 1604 and announced their desire for a new translation to replace the Bishop's Bible first printed in 1568. They knew that the Geneva Version had won the hearts of the people because of its excellent scholarship, accuracy, and exhaustive commentary. However, they did not want the controversial marginal notes (proclaiming the Pope an Anti-Christ, etc.) Essentially, the leaders of the church desired a Bible for the people, with scriptural references only for word clarification or cross-references.
This "translation to end all translations" (for a while at least) was the result of the combined effort of about fifty scholars. They took into consideration: The Tyndale New Testament, The Coverdale Bible, The Matthews Bible, The Great Bible, The Geneva Bible, and even the Rheims New Testament. The great revision of the Bishop's Bible had begun. From 1605 to 1606 the scholars engaged in private research. From 1607 to 1609 the work was assembled. In 1610 the work went to press, and in 1611 the first of the huge (16 inch tall) pulpit folios known today as "The 1611 King James Bible" came off the printing press. A typographical discrepancy in Ruth 3:15 rendered a pronoun "He" instead of "She" in that verse in some printings. This caused some of the 1611 First Editions to be known by collectors as "He" Bibles, and others as "She" Bibles. Starting just one year after the huge 1611 pulpit-size King James Bibles were printed and chained to every church pulpit in England; printing then began on the earliest normal-size printings of the King James Bible. These were produced so individuals could have their own personal copy of the Bible.
John Bunyan
The Anglican Church’s King James Bible took decades to overcome the more popular Protestant Church’s Geneva Bible. One of the greatest ironies of history, is that many Protestant Christian churches today embrace the King James Bible exclusively as the “only” legitimate English language translation… yet it is not even a Protestant translation! It was printed to compete with the Protestant Geneva Bible, by authorities who throughout most of history were hostile to Protestants… and killed them. While many Protestants are quick to assign the full blame of persecution to the Roman Catholic Church, it should be noted that even after England broke from Roman Catholicism in the 1500’s, the Church of England (The Anglican Church) continued to persecute Protestants throughout the 1600’s. One famous example of this is John Bunyan, who while in prison for the crime of preaching the Gospel, wrote one of Christian history’s greatest books, Pilgrim’s Progress. Throughout the 1600’s, as the Puritans and the Pilgrims fled the religious persecution of England to cross the Atlantic and start a new free nation in America, they took with them their precious Geneva Bible, and rejected the King’s Bible. America was founded upon the Geneva Bible, not the King James Bible.
Protestants today are largely unaware of their own history, and unaware of the Geneva Bible (which is textually 95% the same as the King James Version, but 50 years older than the King James Version, and not influenced by the Roman Catholic Rheims New Testament that the King James translators admittedly took into consideration). Nevertheless, the King James Bible turned out to be an excellent and accurate translation, and it became the most printed book in the history of the world, and the only book with one billion copies in print. In fact, for over 250 years...until the appearance of the English Revised Version of 1881-1885...the King James Version reigned without much of a rival. One little-known fact, is that for the past 200 years, all King James Bibles published in America are actually the 1769 Baskerville spelling and wording revision of the 1611. The original “1611” preface is deceivingly included by the publishers, and no mention of the fact that it is really the 1769 version is to be found, because that might hurt sales. The only way to obtain a true, unaltered, 1611 version is to either purchase an original pre-1769 printing of the King James Bible, or a less costly facsimile reproduction of the original 1611 King James Bible.
John Eliot
Although the first Bible printed in America was done in the native Algonquin Indian Language by John Eliot in 1663; the first English language Bible to be printed in America by Robert Aitken in 1782 was a King James Version. Robert Aitken’s 1782 Bible was also the only Bible ever authorized by the United States Congress. He was commended by President George Washington for providing Americans with Bibles during the embargo of imported English goods due to the Revolutionary War. In 1808, Robert’s daughter, Jane Aitken, would become the first woman to ever print a Bible… and to do so in America, of course. In 1791, Isaac Collins vastly improved upon the quality and size of the typesetting of American Bibles and produced the first "Family Bible" printed in America... also a King James Version. Also in 1791, Isaiah Thomas published the first Illustrated Bible printed in America...in the King James Version. For more information on the earliest Bibles printed in America from the 1600’s through the early 1800’s, you may wish to review our more detailed discussion of The Bibles of Colonial America.
Noah Webster
While Noah Webster, just a few years after producing his famous Dictionary of the English Language, would produce his own modern translation of the English Bible in 1833; the public remained too loyal to the King James Version for Webster’s version to have much impact. It was not really until the 1880’s that England’s own planned replacement for their King James Bible, the English Revised Version(E.R.V.) would become the first English language Bible to gain popular acceptance as a post-King James Version modern-English Bible. The widespread popularity of this modern-English translation brought with it another curious characteristic: the absence of the 14 Apocryphal books.
Up until the 1880’s every Protestant Bible (not just Catholic Bibles) had 80 books, not 66! The inter-testamental books written hundreds of years before Christ called “The Apocrypha” were part of virtually every printing of the Tyndale-Matthews Bible, the Great Bible, the Bishops Bible, the Protestant Geneva Bible, and the King James Bible until their removal in the 1880’s! The original 1611 King James contained the Apocrypha, and King James threatened anyone who dared to print the Bible without the Apocrypha with heavy fines and a year in jail. Only for the last 120 years has the Protestant Church rejected these books, and removed them from their Bibles. This has left most modern-day Christians believing the popular myth that there is something “Roman Catholic” about the Apocrypha. There is, however, no truth in that myth, and no widely-accepted reason for the removal of the Apocrypha in the 1880’s has ever been officially issued by a mainline Protestant denomination.
The Americans responded to England’s E.R.V. Bible by publishing the nearly-identical American Standard Version (A.S.V.) in 1901. It was also widely-accepted and embraced by churches throughout America for many decades as the leading modern-English version of the Bible. In the 1971, it was again revised and called New American Standard Version Bible (often referred to as the N.A.S.V. or N.A.S.B. or N.A.S.). This New American Standard Bible is considered by nearly all evangelical Christian scholars and translators today, to be the most accurate, word-for-word translation of the original Greek and Hebrew scriptures into the modern English language that has ever been produced. It remains the most popular version among theologians, professors, scholars, and seminary students today. Some, however, have taken issue with it because it is so direct and literal a translation (focused on accuracy), that it does not flow as easily in conversational English.
For this reason, in 1973, the New International Version (N.I.V.) was produced, which was offered as a “dynamic equivalent” translation into modern English. The N.I.V. was designed not for “word-for-word” accuracy, but rather, for “phrase-for-phrase” accuracy, and ease of reading even at a Junior High-School reading level. It was meant to appeal to a broader (and in some instances less-educated) cross-section of the general public. Critics of the N.I.V. often jokingly refer to it as the “Nearly Inspired Version”, but that has not stopped it from becoming the best-selling modern-English translation of the Bible ever published.
In 1982, Thomas Nelson Publishers produced what they called the “New King James Version”. Their original intent was to keep the basic wording of the King James to appeal to King James Version loyalists, while only changing the most obscure words and the Elizabethan “thee, thy, thou” pronouns. This was an interesting marketing ploy, however, upon discovering that this was not enough of a change for them to be able to legally copyright the result, they had to make more significant revisions, which defeated their purpose in the first place. It was never taken seriously by scholars, but it has enjoyed some degree of public acceptance, simply because of its clever “New King James Version” marketing name.
In 2002, a major attempt was made to bridge the gap between the simple readability of the N.I.V., and the extremely precise accuracy of the N.A.S.B. This translation is called the English Standard Version (E.S.V.) and is rapidly gaining popularity for its readability and accuracy. The 21st Century will certainly continue to bring new translations of God’s Word in the modern English language.
As Christians, we must be very careful to make intelligent and informed decisions about what translations of the Bible we choose to read. On the liberal extreme, we have people who would give us heretical new translations that attempt to change God’s Word to make it politically correct. One example of this, which has made headlines recently is the Today’s New International Version (T.N.I.V.) which seeks to remove all gender-specific references in the Bible whenever possible! Not all new translations are good… and some are very bad.
But equally dangerous, is the other extreme… of blindly rejecting ANY English translation that was produced in the four centuries that have come after the 1611 King James. We must remember that the main purpose of the Protestant Reformation was to get the Bible out of the chains of being trapped in an ancient language that few could understand, and into the modern, spoken, conversational language of the present day. William Tyndale fought and died for the right to print the Bible in the common, spoken, modern English tongue of his day… as he boldly told one official who criticized his efforts, “If God spare my life, I will see to it that the boy who drives the plowshare knows more of the scripture than you, Sir!”
Will we now go backwards, and seek to imprison God’s Word once again exclusively in ancient translations? Clearly it is not God’s will that we over-react to SOME of the bad modern translations, by rejecting ALL new translations and “throwing the baby out with the bathwater”. The Word of God is unchanging from generation to generation, but language is a dynamic and ever-changing form of communication. We therefore have a responsibility before God as Christians to make sure that each generation has a modern translation that they can easily understand, yet that does not sacrifice accuracy in any way. Let’s be ever mindful that we are not called to worship the Bible. That is called idolatry. We are called to worship the God who gave us the Bible, and who preserved it through the centuries of people who sought to destroy it.
We are also called to preserve the ancient, original English translations of the Bible… and that is what we do here at WWW.GREATSITE.COM
Consider the following textual comparison of the earliest English translations of John 3:16, as shown in the English Hexapla Parallel New Testament:
1st Ed. King James (1611): "For God so loued the world, that he gaue his only begotten Sonne: that whosoeuer beleeueth in him, should not perish, but haue euerlasting life."
Rheims (1582): "For so God loued the vvorld, that he gaue his only-begotten sonne: that euery one that beleeueth in him, perish not, but may haue life euerlasting"
Geneva (1560): "For God so loueth the world, that he hath geuen his only begotten Sonne: that none that beleue in him, should peryshe, but haue euerlasting lyfe."
Great Bible (1539): "For God so loued the worlde, that he gaue his only begotten sonne, that whosoeuer beleueth in him, shulde not perisshe, but haue euerlasting lyfe."
Tyndale (1534): "For God so loveth the worlde, that he hath geven his only sonne, that none that beleve in him, shuld perisshe: but shuld have everlastinge lyfe."
Wycliff (1380): "for god loued so the world; that he gaf his oon bigetun sone, that eche man that bileueth in him perisch not: but haue euerlastynge liif,"
Anglo-Saxon Proto-English Manuscripts (995 AD): “God lufode middan-eard swa, dat he seade his an-cennedan sunu, dat nan ne forweorde de on hine gely ac habbe dat ece lif."
Timeline of Bible Translation History
1,400 BC: The first written Word of God: The Ten Commandments delivered to Moses.
500 BC: Completion of All Original Hebrew Manuscripts which make up The 39 Books of the Old Testament.
200 BC: Completion of the Septuagint Greek Manuscripts which contain The 39 Old Testament Books AND 14 Apocrypha Books.
1st Century AD: Completion of All Original Greek Manuscripts which make up The 27 Books of the New Testament.
315 AD: Athenasius, the Bishop of Alexandria, identifies the 27 books of the New Testament which are today recognized as the canon of scripture.
382 AD: Jerome's Latin Vulgate Manuscripts Produced which contain All 80 Books (39 Old Test. + 14 Apocrypha + 27 New Test).
500 AD: Scriptures have been Translated into Over 500 Languages.
600 AD: LATIN was the Only Language Allowed for Scripture.
995 AD: Anglo-Saxon (Early Roots of English Language) Translations of The New Testament Produced.
1384 AD: Wycliffe is the First Person to Produce a (Hand-Written) manuscript Copy of the Complete Bible; All 80 Books.
1455 AD: Gutenberg Invents the Printing Press; Books May Now be mass-Produced Instead of Individually Hand-Written. The First Book Ever Printed is Gutenberg's Bible in Latin.
1516 AD: Erasmus Produces a Greek/Latin Parallel New Testament.
1522 AD: Martin Luther's German New Testament.
1526 AD: William Tyndale's New Testament; The First New Testament printed in the English Language.
1535 AD: Myles Coverdale's Bible; The First Complete Bible printed in the English Language (80 Books: O.T. & N.T. & Apocrypha).
1537 AD: Tyndale-Matthews Bible; The Second Complete Bible printed in English. Done by John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers (80 Books).
1539 AD: The "Great Bible" Printed; The First English Language Bible Authorized for Public Use (80 Books).
1560 AD: The Geneva Bible Printed; The First English Language Bible to add Numbered Verses to Each Chapter (80 Books).
1568 AD: The Bishops Bible Printed; The Bible of which the King James was a Revision (80 Books).
1609 AD: The Douay Old Testament is added to the Rheims New Testament (of 1582) Making the First Complete English Catholic Bible; Translated from the Latin Vulgate (80 Books).
1611 AD: The King James Bible Printed; Originally with All 80 Books. The Apocrypha was Officially Removed in 1885 Leaving Only 66 Books.
1782 AD: Robert Aitken's Bible; The First English Language Bible (KJV) Printed in America.
1791 AD: Isaac Collins and Isaiah Thomas Respectively Produce the First Family Bible and First Illustrated Bible Printed in America. Both were King James Versions, with All 80 Books.
1808 AD: Jane Aitken's Bible (Daughter of Robert Aitken); The First Bible to be Printed by a Woman.
1833 AD: Noah Webster's Bible; After Producing his Famous Dictionary, Webster Printed his Own Revision of the King James Bible.
1841 AD: English Hexapla New Testament; an Early Textual Comparison showing the Greek and 6 Famous English Translations in Parallel Columns.
1846 AD: The Illuminated Bible; The Most Lavishly Illustrated Bible printed in America. A King James Version, with All 80 Books.
1885 AD: The "English Revised Version" Bible; The First Major English Revision of the KJV.
1901 AD: The "American Standard Version"; The First Major American Revision of the KJV.
1971 AD: The "New American Standard Bible" (NASB) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Word for Word English Translation" of the Bible.
1973 AD: The "New International Version" (NIV) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Phrase for Phrase English Translation" of the Bible.
1982 AD: The "New King James Version" (NKJV) is Published as a "Modern English Version Maintaining the Original Style of the King James."
2002 AD: The English Standard Version (ESV) is Published as a translation to bridge the gap between the accuracy of the NASB and the readability of the NIV.
History of the Bible: How The Bible Came To Usby Wesley Ringer
Introduction
Why should we have some understanding of how the Bible came to us? Young children often think that milk comes in cartons from the grocery store. As they grow up they learn that milk comes from cows on the farm. Likewise many Christians have become so used to having Bibles that they have bought at a book store that they have almost no knowledge of where the present English translations of the Bible came from.
Understanding how the Bible came to us gives us a confident foundation for our faith in the reliability the Bible. Evidence presented in a criminal case must be shown to have been protected by a proper chain of custody from being tampered with.
We will be able to answer to critics when they claim that the New Testament contains 200,000 errors.
We will have some understanding of why the newer translations such as the NIV and NASV differ from the King James Versions at various points.
Important terms to remember:
Skeptics often claim that the Bible has been changed. However, it is important to define the terms that apply to the source of our English Bible.
Autographs: The original texts were written either by the author's own hand or by a scribe under their personal supervision.
Manuscripts: Until Gutenberg first printed the Latin Bible in 1456, all Bibles were hand copied onto papyrus, parchment, and paper.
Translations: When the Bible is translated into a different language it is usually translated from the original Hebrew and Greek. However some translations in the past were derived from an earlier translation. For example the first English translation by John Wycliffe in 1380 was prepared from the Latin Vulgate.
Old Testament
The Bible comes from two main sources - Old and New Testaments - written in different languages. The Old Testament was written primarily in Hebrew, with some books written in Aramaic. The following are brief snap shots of the beginning and ending of the Old Testament and the reasons for the first two translations of the Old Testament from Hebrew into Aramaic and Greek
1875 B.C. Abraham was called by God to the land of Canaan.
1450 B.C. The exodus of the Children of Israel from Egypt.
Autographs
There are no known autographs of any books of the Old Testament. Below is a list of the languages in which the Old Testament books were written.
1450-1400 B.C. The traditional date for Moses' writing of Genesis-Deuteronomy written in Hebrew.
586 B.C. Jerusalem was destroyed by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar. The Jews were taken into captivity to Babylon. They remained in Babylon under the Medo-Persian Empire and there began to speak Aramaic.
555-545 B.C. The Book of Daniel Chapters. 2:4 to 7:28 were written in Aramaic.
425 B.C. Malachi, the last book of the Old Testament, was written in Hebrew.
400 B.C. Ezra Chapters. 4:8 to 6:18; and 7:12-26 were written in Aramaic.
Manuscripts
The following is a list of the oldest Hebrew manuscripts of the Old Testament that are still in existence.
The Dead Sea Scrolls: date from 200 B.C. - 70 A.D. and contain the entire book of Isaiah and portions of every other Old Testament book but Esther.
Geniza Fragments: portions the Old Testament in Hebrew and Aramaic, discovered in 1947 in an old synagogue in Cairo, Egypt, which date from about 400 A.D.
Ben Asher Manuscripts: five or six generations of this family made copies of the Old Testament using the Masoretic Hebrew text, from 700-950 A.D. The following are examples of the Hebrew Masoretic text-type.
Aleppo Codex: contains the complete Old Testament and is dated around 950 A.D. Unfortunately over one quarter of this Codex was destroyed in anti-Jewish riots in 1947.
Codex Leningradensis: The complete Old Testament in Hebrew copied by the last member of the Ben Asher family in A.D. 1008.
Translations
The Old Testament was translated very early into Aramaic and Greek.
400 B.C. The Old Testament began to be translated into Aramaic. This translation is called the Aramaic Targums. This translation helped the Jewish people, who began to speak Aramaic from the time of their captivity in Babylon, to understand the Old Testament in the language that they commonly spoke. In the first century Palestine of Jesus' day, Aramaic was still the commonly spoken language. For example maranatha: "Our Lord has come," 1 Corinthians 16:22 is an example of an Aramaic word that is used in the New Testament.
250 B.C. The Old Testament was translated into Greek. This translation is known as the Septuagint. It is sometimes designated "LXX" (which is Roman numeral for "70") because it was believed that 70 to 72 translators worked to translate the Hebrew Old Testament in Greek. The Septuagint was often used by New Testament writers when they quoted from the Old Testament. The LXX was translation of the Old Testament that was used by the early Church.1. The following is a list of the oldest Greek LXX translations of the Old Testament that are still in existence.
Chester Beatty Papyri: Contains nine Old Testament Books in the Greek Septuagint and dates between 100-400 A.D.
Codex Vaticanus and Codex Sinaiticus each contain almost the entire Old Testament of the Greek Septuagint and they both date around 350 A.D.
The New Testament
Autographs
45- 95 A.D. The New Testament was written in Greek. The Pauline Epistles, the Gospel of Mark, the Gospel of Luke, and the book of Acts are all dated from 45-63 A.D. The Gospel of John and the Revelation may have been written as late as 95 A.D.
Manuscripts
There are over 5,600 early Greek Manuscripts of the New Testament that are still in existence. The oldest manuscripts were written on papyrus and the later manuscripts were written on leather called parchment.
125 A.D. The New Testament manuscript which dates most closely to the original autograph was copied around 125 A.D, within 35 years of the original. It is designated "p 52" and contains a small portion of John 18. (The "p" stands for papyrus.)
200 A.D. Bodmer p 66 a papyrus manuscript which contains a large part of the Gospel of John.
200 A.D. Chester Beatty Biblical papyrus p 46 contains the Pauline Epistles and Hebrews.
225 A.D. Bodmer Papyrus p 75 contains the Gospels of Luke and John.
250-300 A.D. Chester Beatty Biblical papyrus p 45 contains portions of the four Gospels and Acts.
350 A.D. Codex Sinaiticus contains the entire New Testament and almost the entire Old Testament in Greek. It was discovered by a German scholar Tisendorf in 1856 at an Orthodox monastery at Mt. Sinai.
350 A.D. Codex Vaticanus: {B} is an almost complete New Testament. It was cataloged as being in the Vatican Library since 1475.
Translations
Early translations of the New Testament can give important insight into the underlying Greek manuscripts from which they were translated from.
180 A.D. Early translations of the New Testament from Greek into Latin, Syriac, and Coptic versions began about 180 A.D.
195 A.D. The name of the first translation of the Old and New Testaments into Latin was termed Old Latin, both Testaments having been translated from the Greek. Parts of the Old Latin were found in quotes by the church father Tertullian, who lived around 160-220 A.D. in north Africa and wrote treatises on theology.
300 A.D. The Old Syriac was a translation of the New Testament from the Greek into Syriac.
300 A.D. The Coptic Versions: Coptic was spoken in four dialects in Egypt. The Bible was translated into each of these four dialects.
380 A.D. The Latin Vulgate was translated by St. Jerome. He translated into Latin the Old Testament from the Hebrew and the New Testament from Greek. The Latin Vulgate became the Bible of the Western Church until the Protestant Reformation in the 1500's. It continues to be the authoritative translation of the Roman Catholic Church to this day. The Protestant Reformation saw an increase in translations of the Bible into the common languages of the people.
Other early translations of the Bible were in Armenian, Georgian, and Ethiopic, Slavic, and Gothic.
1380 A.D. The first English translation of the Bible was by John Wycliffe. He translated the Bible into English from the Latin Vulgate. This was a translation from a translation and not a translation from the original Hebrew and Greek. Wycliffe was forced to translate from the Latin Vulgate because he did not know Hebrew or Greek.
The Advent of Printing
Printing greatly aided the transmission of the biblical texts.
1456 A.D. Gutenberg produced the first printed Bible in Latin. Printing revolutionized the way books were made. From now on books could be published in great numbers and at a lower cost.
1514 A.D. The Greek New Testament was printed for the first time by Erasmus. He based his Greek New Testament from only five Greek manuscripts, the oldest of which dated only as far back as the twelfth century. With minor revisions, Erasmus' Greek New Testament came to be known as the Textus Receptus or the "received texts."
1522 A. D. Polyglot Bible was published. The Old Testament was in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Latin and the New Testament in Latin and Greek. Erasmus used the Polyglot to revise later editions of his New Testament. Tyndale made use of the Polyglot in his translation on the Old Testament into English which he did not complete because he was martyred in 1534.
1611 A.D. The King James Version into English from the original Hebrew and Greek. The King James translators of the New Testament used the Textus Receptus as the basis for their translations.
1968 A.D. The United Bible Societies 4th Edition of the Greek New Testament. This Greek New Testament made use of the oldest Greek manuscripts which date from 175 A.D. This was the Greek New Testament text from which the NASV and the NIV were translated.
1971 A.D. The New American Standard Version (NASV) was published. It makes use of the wealth of much older Hebrew and Greek manuscripts now available that weren't available at the time of the translation of the KJV. Its wording and sentence structure closely follow the Greek in more of a word for word style.
1983 A.D. The New International Version (NIV) was published. It also made use of the oldest manuscript evidence. It is more of a "thought-for-thought" translation and reads more easily than the NASV.
As an example of the contrast between word-for-word and thought-for-thought translations, notice below the translation of the Greek word "hagios-holy" NASV Hebrews 9:25. "...the high priest enters the holy place year by year with blood not his own."NIV Hebrews 9:25. "...the high priest enters the Most Holy Place every year with blood that is not his own."
The NIV supplies "understood" information about the Day of Atonement, namely that the high priest's duties took place in the compartment of the temple known specifically as the Most Holy Place. Note that the NASV simply says "holy place" reflecting the more literal translation of "hagios."
The Integrity of the Manuscript Evidence
As with any ancient book transmitted through a number of handwritten manuscripts, the question naturally arises as to how confident can we be that we have anything resembling the autograph. Let us now look at what evidences we have for the integrity of the New Testament manuscripts. Let us look at the number of manuscripts and how close they date to the autographs of the Bible as compared with other ancient writings of similar age.
Tacitus, the Roman historian, wrote his Annals of Imperial Rome in about A.D. 116. Only one manuscript of his work remains. It was copied about 850 A.D.
Josephus, a Jewish historian, wrote The Jewish War shortly after 70 A.D. There are nine manuscripts in Greek which date from 1000-1200 A.D. and one Latin translation from around 400 A.D.
Homer's Iliad was written around 800 B.C. It was as important to ancient Greeks as the Bible was to the Hebrews. There are over 650 manuscripts remaining but they date from 200 to 300 A.D. which is over a thousand years after the Iliad was written.
The Old Testament autographs were written 1450 - 400 B. C.
The Dead Sea Scrolls date between 200 B.C. to 70 A. D and date within 300 years from when the last book of the Old Testament was written.
Two almost complete Greek LXX translations of the Old Testament date about 350 A. D.
The oldest complete Hebrew Old Testament dates about 950 A. D.
Genesis-Deuteronomy were written over 1200 years before the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Codex Vaticanus is an almost complete Greek translation of the Old Testament dating around 350 A.D. The Aleppo Codex is the oldest complete Old Testament manuscript in Hebrew and was copied around 950 A.D. The Dead Sea Scrolls date from within 200-300 years from the last book of the Old Testament. However since the five books of Moses were written about 1450- 1400 B.C. the Dead Sea Scrolls still come almost 1200 years after the first books of the Old Testament were written.
The New Testament autographs were written between 45-95 A. D.
There are 5,664 Greek manuscripts some dating as early as 125 A. D. and an complete New Testament that dates from 350 A. D.
8,000 to 10,000 Latin Vulgate manuscripts.
8,000 manuscripts in Ethiopic, Coptic, Slavic, Syriac, and Armenian.
In addition, the complete New Testament could be reproduced from the quotes that were made from it by the early church fathers in their letters and sermons.
Authorship and dating of the New Testament books
Skeptics and liberal Christian scholars both seek to date the New Testament books as late first century or early second century writings. They contend that these books were not written by eyewitnesses but rather by second or third hand sources. This allowed for the development of what they view as myths concerning Jesus. For example, they would deny that Jesus actually foretold the destruction of Jerusalem. Rather they would contend that later Christian writers "put these words into his mouth."
Many of the New Testament books claim to be written by eyewitnesses.
The Gospel of John claims to be written by the disciple of the Lord. Recent archeological research has confirmed both the existence of the Pool of Bethesda and that it had five porticoes as described in John 5:2. This correct reference to an incidental detail lends credibility to the claim that the Gospel of John was written by John who as an eyewitness knew Jerusalem before it was destroyed in 70 A. D.
Paul signed his epistles with his own hand. He was writing to churches who knew him. These churches were able to authenticate that these epistles had come from his hands (Galatians 6:11). Clement an associate of Paul's wrote to the Corinthian Church in 97 A. D. urging them to heed the epistle that Paul had sent them.
The following facts strongly suggest that both the Gospel of Luke and the Book of Acts were written prior to 65 A.D. This lends credibility to the author's (Luke) claim to be an eyewitness to Paul's missionary journeys. This would date Mark prior to 65 A.D. and the Pauline epistles between 49-63 A.D.
Acts records the beginning history of the church with persecutions and martyrdoms being mentioned repeatedly. Three men; Peter, Paul, and James the brother of Jesus all play leading roles throughout the book. They were all martyred by 67 A.D., but their martyrdoms are not recorded in Acts.
The church in Jerusalem played a central role in the Book of Acts, but the destruction of the city in 70 A.D. was not mentioned. The Jewish historian Josephus cited the siege and destruction of Jerusalem as befalling the Jews because of their unjust killing of James the brother of Jesus.
The Book of Acts ends with Paul in Rome under house arrest in 62 A.D. In 64 A.D., Nero blamed and persecuted the Christians for the fire that burned down the city of Rome. Paul himself was martyred by 65 A.D. in Rome. Again, neither the terrible persecution of the Christians in Rome nor Paul's martyrdom are mentioned.Conclusion: These books, Luke-Acts, were written while Luke was an eyewitness to many of the events, and had opportunity to research portions that he was not an eyewitness to.
The church fathers bear witness to even earlier New Testament manuscripts
The earliest manuscripts we have of major portions of the New Testament are p 45, p 46, p66, and p 75, and they date from 175-250 A. D. The early church fathers (97-180 A.D.) bear witness to even earlier New Testament manuscripts by quoting from all but one of the New Testament books. They are also in the position to authenticate those books, written by the apostles or their close associates, from later books such as the gospel of Thomas that claimed to have been written by the apostles, but were not.
Clement (30-100 A.D.) wrote an epistle to the Corinthian Church around 97 A.D. He reminded them to heed the epistle that Paul had written to them years before. Recall that Clement had labored with Paul (Philippians 4:3). He quoted from the following New Testament books: Luke, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Ephesians, Titus, 1 and 2 Peter, Hebrews, and James.
The apostolic fathers Ignatius (30-107 A.D.), Polycarp (65-155 A.D.), and Papias (70-155 A.D.) cite verses from every New Testament book except 2 and 3 John. They thereby authenticated nearly the entire New Testament. Both Ignatius and Polycarp were disciples of the apostle John.
Justin Martyr, (110-165 A.D.), cited verses from the following 13 books of the New Testament: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Galatians, 2 Thessalonians, Hebrews, 1 and 2 Peter, and Revelation.
Irenaeus, (120-202 A.D.), wrote a five volume work Against Heresies in which,
He quoted from every book of the New Testament but 3 John.
He quoted from the New Testament books over 1,200 times.
How was the New Testament canon determined?
The Early church had three criteria for determining what books were to be included or excluded from the Canon of the New Testament.
First, the books must have apostolic authority-- that is, they must have been written either by the apostles themselves, who were eyewitnesses to what they wrote about, or by associates of the apostles.
Second, there was the criterion of conformity to what was called the "rule of faith." In other words, was the document congruent with the basic Christian tradition that the church recognized as normative.
Third, there was the criterion of whether a document had enjoyed continuous acceptance and usage by the church at large.
The gospel of Thomas is not included in the Canon of the New Testament for the following reasons.
The gospel of Thomas fails the test of Apostolic authority. None of the early church fathers from Clement to Irenaeus ever quoted from the gospel of Thomas. This indicates that they either did not know of it or that they rejected it as spurious. In either case, the early church fathers fail to support the gospel of Thomas' claim to have been written by the apostle. It was believed to by written around 140 A.D. There is no evidence to support its purported claim to be written by the Apostle Thomas himself.
The gospel of Thomas fails to conform to the rule of faith. It purports to contain 114 "secret sayings" of Jesus. Some of these are very similar to the sayings of Jesus recorded in the Four Gospels. For example the gospel of Thomas quotes Jesus as saying, "A city built on a high hill cannot be hidden." This reads the same as Matthew's Gospel except that high is added. But Thomas claims that Jesus said, "Split wood; I am there. Lift up a stone, and you will find me there." That concept is pantheistic. Thomas ends with the following saying that denies women salvation unless they are some how changed into being a man. "Let Mary go away from us, because women are not worthy of life." Jesus is quoted as saying, "Lo, I shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit, resembling you males. For every woman who makes herself male will enter into the kingdom of heaven."
The gospel of Thomas fails the test of continuous usage and acceptance. The lack of manuscript evidence plus the failure of the early church fathers to quote from it or recognize it shows that it was not used or accepted in the early Church. Only two manuscripts are known of this "gospel." Until 1945 only a single fifth-century copy translation in Coptic had been found. Then in 1945 a Greek manuscript of the Gospel of Thomas was found at Nag Hammadi in Egypt. This compares very poorly to the thousands of manuscripts that authenticate the Four Gospels.
Textual Criticism: What Is It And Why It Is Necessary
Important terms:
Textual criticism is the method used to examine the vast number of manuscripts to determine the probably composition of the original autographs.
"Lower" Textual Criticism: the practice of studying the manuscripts of the Bible with the goal of reproducing the original text of the Bible from this vast wealth of manuscripts. This is a necessary task because there exists minor variations among the biblical manuscripts. So, unless one manuscript is arbitrarily chosen as a standard by which to judge all others, then one must employ textual criticism to compare all manuscripts to derive the reading which would most closely reflect the autographs.
"Higher" criticism: "The Jesus Seminar" is a group of liberal Christian higher critics who vote on which of the sayings of Christ they believe to have actually been spoken by Him. This is an example of "higher" criticism. It is highly subjective and is colored by the view points of various "higher" critics.
Textual Variants: Since all Greek manuscripts of the New Testament prior to Erasmus' first printed Greek New Testament were copied by hand scribal errors or variants could have crept into the texts.. When these Greek New Testament manuscripts are compared with each other we find evidence of scribal errors and places where the different manuscripts differ with one another.
Textual variants and the integrity of the New Testament text
Many scholars have spent a lifetime of study of the textual variants. The following is the conclusion of the importance of these variants as they relate to the integrity of the New Testament text.
There are over 200,000 variants in the New Testament alone. How do these variants effect our confidence that the New Testament has been faithfully handed down to us?
These 200,000 variants are not as large as they seem. Remember that every misspelled word or an omission of a single word in any of the 5,600 manuscript would count as a variant.
Johann Bengel 1687-1752 was very disturbed by the 30,000 variants that had recently been noted in Mill's edition of the Greek Testament. After extended study he came to the conclusion that the variant readings were fewer in number than might have been expected and that they did not shake any article of Christian doctrine.
Westcott and Hort, in the 1870's, state that the New Testament text remains over 98.3 percent pure no matter whether one uses the Textus Receptus or their own Greek text which was largely based on Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus.
James White, on p. 40 of his book The King James Only Controversy states: "The reality is that the amount of variation between the two most extremely different manuscripts of the New Testament would not fundamentally altar the message of the Scriptures! I make this statement (1) fully aware of the wide range of textual variants in the New Testament, and (2) painfully aware of the strong attacks upon those who have made similar statements in the past."
Scholars Norman Geisler and William Nix conclude, "The New Testament, then, has not only survived in more manuscripts that any other book from antiquity, but it has survived in a purer form than any other great book-a form that is 99.5 percent pure."
When textual critics look at all 5,600 Greek New Testament manuscripts they find that they can group these manuscripts into text-types or families with other similar manuscripts. There are four text-types.
Figure 1. Age differences between Alexandrian and Byzantine manuscripts.
The Alexandrian text-type, found in most papyri and in Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus all of which date prior to 350 A.D.
The Western text-type, found both in Greek manuscripts and in translations into other languages, especially Latin.
The Byzantine text-type, found in the vast majority of later Greek manuscripts. Over 90 percent of all 5,600 Greek New Testament manuscripts are of the Byzantine text-type. The Byzantine text-type is "fuller" or "longer" than other text-types, and this is taken as evidence of a later origin. The reason that we have so many manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type is because the Byzantine Empire remained Greek speaking and Orthodox Christian until Islamic Turks overran its capital, Constantinople, in 1453. Constantinople is now called Istanbul and is Turkey's largest city, although no longer its capital.
The Caesaarean text-type, disputed by some, found in p 45 and a few other manuscripts.
Why does the KJV differ from the NIV?
The reason the King James version differ from the NASV and the NIV in a number of readings is because it is translated from a different text-type than they are.
The King James Version was translated from Erasmus' printed Greek New Testament which made use of only five Greek manuscripts the oldest of which dated to the 1,100 A.D. These manuscripts were examples of the Byzantine text-type.
The NASV and the NIV make use of the United Bible Societies 4th Edition 1968 of the New Testament. This edition of the Greek New Testament relies more heavily on the Alexandrian text-type while making use of all 5,664 Greek manuscripts. The reasons that the NASV and NIV find the Alexandrian text-type more reliable are the following:
This text-type uses manuscripts date from 175-350 A.D. which includes most of the papyri, Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus.
The church fathers from 97-350 A.D. used this text-type when they quoted the New Testament.
The early translations of the New Testament used the Alexandrian text-type.
Examples that show why the KJV differs from the NIV and NASV in certain verses
In the following examples the King James Version differs from the NIV, and NASV. because it bases it's translation on the Byzantine text-type and the NIV and NASV base theirs on the Alexandrian text-type.
KJV 1 John 5:7-8 "For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and Holy Ghost: and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness in earth, the spirit, and the water, and the blood; and these three agree in one."NIV 1 John 5:7 "For there are three that testify: v. 8 the Spirit, the water and the blood: and the three are in agreement."
When Erasmus first printed the Greek New Testament in 1514 it did not contain the words "in heaven, the Father, the Word, and Holy Ghost: and these three are one. And there are three that bear witness in earth," because they were not found in any of the Greek manuscripts that Erasmus looked at.
These words were not quoted by any of the Greek church fathers. They most certainly would have been used by the church fathers in their 3rd and 4th century letters if found in the Greek manuscripts available to them.
These words are not found in any ancient versions of the New Testament. These include Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, Ethiopic, Arabic, Slavonic, nor in the Old Latin in its early form.
These words begin to appear in marginal notes in the Latin New Testament beginning in the fifth century. From the sixth century onward these words are found more and more frequently.
Erasmus finally agreed to put these words into new editions of his Greek New Testament if his critic's could find one Greek manuscript that contained these words. It appears that his critics manufactured manuscripts to include these words.
These additional words are found in only eight manuscripts as a variant reading written in the margin. Seven of these manuscripts date from the sixteenth century and one is a tenth century manuscript.
Erasmus' New Testament became the basis for the Greek New Testament, "Textus Receptus", which the King James translators used as the basis for their translation of the New Testament into English.
Mark 16 verses 9-20 are found in the King James Version. However, both the NASV and the NIV note that these verses are not found in the earliest manuscripts of the Gospel of Mark (see The Authenticity of Mark 16:9-20).
Neither Codex Sinaiticus nor Codex Vaticanus have Mark 16:9-20.
Mark 16:9-20 is also absent from some Old Latin, Syriac, Armenian, and Georgian manuscripts.
Clement of Alexandria and Origen show no knowledge of the existence of these verses.
4. The earliest church father to note the longer ending of Mark 16:9-20 was Irenaeus, around 180 A. D.
Luke 2:14 reads:
KJV: "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace, good will toward men."NIV: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests."
The Greek text from which these two versions are translated differ by only one letter. The NIV is translated from manuscripts that have an "s" on the end of the Greek word for good will. This reading is supported by the oldest Alexandrine text-types.
Bibliography
The following is a list of books that deal with the issue of how the Bible came to us. I have listed them from the easiest to most the complex.
Strobel, Lee. The Case for Christ: A Journalist's Personal Investigation of the Evidence for Jesus. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1998
White, James R. The King James Only Controversy: Can You Trust the Modern Translations? Minneapolis, Bethany House Publishers, 1995
Metzger, Bruce M. The Text of the New Testament: Its Transmission, Corruption, and Restoration. Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1992
Aland, Kurt and Barbara. The Text of The New Testament an Introduction to the Critical Editions and to the Theory and Practice of Modern Textual Criticism. Grand Rapids, Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995
Wurthwein, Ernst. The Text of The Old Testament: An Introduction to the Biblia Hebraica. Grand Rapids, Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995
Metzger, Bruce M. A Textual Commentary of the Greek New Testament. Stuttgart, United Bible Societies, 1995 .
Historical Criticism
History is a closed continuum of cause and effect. This first principle rejects even the possibility of God’s supernatural intervention in the affairs of mankind.
The principle of analogy: if it is possible now it was possible then. If it is not possible now it was not possible then. This second principle would reject the possibility of any supernatural miracle. Men dead for three days do not now rise from the dead. Therefore, Jesus Christ could not have risen from the dead, nor could he have raised Lazarus from the dead.
You decide what is logical and what is not. This principle allows for the much speculation. If it does not seem logical to you that men can walk on the water then Jesus did not walk on the water.
History is a closed continuum of cause and effect. This first principle rejects even the possibility of God’s supernatural intervention in the affairs of mankind.
The principle of analogy: if it is possible now it was possible then. If it is not possible now it was not possible then. This second principle would reject the possibility of any supernatural miracle. Men dead for three days do not now rise from the dead. Therefore, Jesus Christ could not have risen from the dead, nor could he have raised Lazarus from the dead.
You decide what is logical and what is not. This principle allows for the much speculation. If it does not seem logical to you that men can walk on the water then Jesus did not walk on the water.
The Transmission of the Bible to English Text .
"He being dead yet speaketh." Heb.11:4 "The memory of the just is blessed." Prov. 10:7500 BC: Completion of All Original Hebrew Manuscripts which make Up The 39 Books of the Old Testament.
200 BC: Completion of the Septuagint Greek Manuscripts which contain The 39 Old Testament Books AND 14 Apocrypha Books.
1st Century AD: Completion of All Original Greek Manuscripts which make Up The 27 Books of the New Testament.
390 AD: Jerome's Latin Vulgate Manuscripts Produced which contain 80 Books (39 Old Test. + 14 Apocrypha + 27 New Test).
500 AD: Scriptures have been Translated into Over 500 Languages.
600 AD: LATIN was the Only Language Allowed for Scripture.
995 AD: Anglo-Saxon (Early Roots of English Language) Translations of The New Testament Produced.
1384 AD: Wycliffe is the First Person to Produce a (Hand-Written) manuscript Copy of the Complete Bible in English (80 Books). Wycliffe had no access to Greek or Hebrew manuscripts and was thus totally reliant on the fourth century Latin translation of St. Jerome.
1455 AD: Gutenberg Invents the Printing Press; Books May Now be mass-produced Instead of Individually Hand-Written. The First Book Ever Printed is Gutenberg's Bible in Latin.
1516 AD: Erasmus Produces a Greek/Latin Parallel New Testament.
1522 AD: Martin Luther's German New Testament.
1526 AD: William Tyndale's New Testament; The First New Testament to be Printed in the English Language. (Worms edition)
1530 AD: Tyndale's translation of the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Old Testament is Printed.
1531 AD: Tyndale's translation of the Book of Jonah is Printed.
1534 AD: Tyndale's revised New Testament is Printed.
1535 AD: Myles Coverdale's Bible; The First Complete Bible to be printed in the English Language (80 Books: O.T. & N.T. & Apocrypha).
1537 AD: Matthews Bible; The Second Complete Bible to be Printed in English. Done by John "Thomas Matthew" Rogers (80 Books).
1539 AD: The "Great Bible" Printed; The First English Language Bible to be Authorized for Public Use (80 Books).
1560 AD: The Geneva Bible Printed; The First English Language Bible to Add Numbered Verses to Each Chapter (80 Books).
1568 AD: The Bishops Bible Printed; The Bible of which the King James was a Revision (80 Books).
1609 AD: The Douay Old Testament is added to the Rheimes New Testament (of 1582) Making the First Complete English Catholic Bible; Translated from the Latin Vulgate (80 Books).
1611 AD: The King James Bible Printed; Originally with 80 Books. The Apocrypha was Officially Removed in 1885 Leaving 66 Books.
1782 AD: Robert Aitken's Bible; The First English Language Bible (a King James Version without Apocrypha) to be Printed in America.
1791 AD: Isaac Collins and Isaiah Thomas Respectively Produce the First Family Bible and First Illustrated Bible Printed in America. Both were King James Versions.
1808 AD: Jane Aitken's Bible (Daughter of Robert Aitken); The First Bible to be Printed by a Woman.
1833 AD: Noah Webster's Bible; After Producing his Famous Dictionary, Webster Printed his Own Revision of the King James Bible.
1841 AD: English Hexapla New Testament; an Early Textual Comparison showing the Greek and 6 Famous English Translations in Parallel Columns.
1846 AD: The Illuminated Bible; The Most Lavishly Illustrated Bible printed in America. A King James Version.
1885 AD: The "Revised Version" Bible; The First Major English Revision of the King James Bible.
1901 AD: The "American Standard Version"; The First Major American Revision of the King James Bible.
1971 AD: The "New American Standard Bible" (NASB) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Word for Word English Translation" of the Bible.
1973 AD: The "New International Version" (NIV) is Published as a "Modern and Accurate Phrase for Phrase English Translation" of the Bible.
1982 AD: The "New King James Version" (NKJV) is Published as a "Modern English Version Maintaining the Original Style of the King James."
The Word of God for Ye Ploughman .
The Bible in English: A brief history.
Early English translations Since the clergy and the upper classes were trained in Latin and much of the rest of the population was illiterate, there was for many years little need for translations of the Bible into English. With written material available only in manuscript, even those able to read Latin had little access to the Biblical text. The lay population received instruction from the clergy and through the images presented in stone and glass on the great cathedrals.
A few translations were made of portions of the Bible; these included short glosses to Latin texts and longer, sometimes poetic version of whole books. Some of these were apparently created for the use of monks and nuns; there is little indication they were available to the lay population. As manuscripts, their circulation, even among clergy, was limited.
The rise of Protestantism, with its greater emphasis on individual access to God, led, perhaps inevitably, to attempts to create an English Bible. If each individual was equally able to interpret God's law without mediation from the church, than each individual should have access to the word of God as recorded in the Bible. Sometime between 1380 and 1384 friends and colleagues of John Wycliffe (1330-1384) produced a very literal English translation of the Latin Vulgate which was circulated in manuscript copies.
This translation preserved Latin constructions and word order even when they conflicted with English usage. A revised version, circulated after Wycliffe's death and probably created by Wycliffe's secretary, John Purvey, used English idiom and syntax. While there was nothing heretical about either translation, accompanying introductions and notes suggested the theological bias of the translators, which the Catholic hierarchy associated with the Lollards, a sect of reformers associated with John Wycliffe. Both Purvey and Nicholas of Hereford, a contributor to the early version, were imprisoned for their activities and some of their associates were executed. Despite this condemnation, manuscripts of the translation, minus the incriminating notes, remained in many Catholic homes, even after a synod of clergy at Oxford in 1408 forbade anyone to translate, even to read, a vernacular version of the Bible without the approval of a diocesan bishop or a provincial council.
Early Printed Bibles The advent of printing had a far-reaching effect on the creation of an English Bible. The first dated printed book was a Latin Psalter (1454), and the first major work was the Gutenberg Bible (1456). A complete Hebrew Bible was printed by 1488. A Greek New Testament was printed in 1514 but not published until later, making Eramus's 1516 edition the first published New Testament in Greek. These and other printings made it possible for translators to work from the original languages rather than from the Latin Vulgate translation on which other English versions had been based. Erasmus's edition was the basis for Luther's German New Testament, printed in 1522, and the first English New Testament, translated by William Tyndale and first printed in 1525.
Tyndale's Translation Tyndale was born in 1494 or 1495 and educated at Oxford and Cambridge. As a tutor, he translated an early work by Erasmus and came to the attention of county ecclesiastical authorities who charged him with heresy, a charge that was not sustained. Tyndale became convinced that much of the confusion concerning various matters then under debate was the general ignorance of the Bible, even among the clergy, and determined to make a vernacular English translation from the original Greek. He could not do so legally in England, however, without church approval. In the summer of 1523, he sought permission for the endeavor from the Bishop of London but did not receive it. Eventually, he decided to go abroad to work on his translation.
Printing of Tyndale's translation of the New Testament, based on Erasmus's Greek edition, was completed by the end of February, 1526. Tyndale revised his New testament in 1534 and 1535; the 1534 version became the definitive one. By 1530, Tyndale had published his translation of the first five books of the Old Testament; a year later he published an edition of Jonah. He also completed a translation of the Old Testament books from Joshua to Second Chronicles although it was not published until it was incorporated into "Matthew's Bible," in 1537. Many of Tyndale's readings found their way into the Authorized Version of 1611 (eventually known as the King James Version).
Tyndale's Old Testament translation was the first to be rendered directly from the Hebrew rather than from the Latin Vulgate. While most educated men of the period read some Greek and Latin, few knew Hebrew, and Tyndale spent many years studying the language before making his translation. The Tyndale Old Testament, is idiomatic and surprisingly fresh. In Genesis 3, for example, the snake replies to Eve's protests with "Tush, ye shall not die." Elsewhere we read that Joseph was a "lucky fellow" and that pharaoh's "jolly captains" drown in the red sea. Not only was this an English Old Testament, the volume was small enough to fit in a pocket; anyone could carry and read these books on their own, without the mediation of the clergy.
A Complete English Bible By the time of Tyndale's death, a version of the complete Bible, in English and drawing largely on Tyndale's work, was being circulated. This Bible was the work of Miles Coverdale, an Augustinian friar who left his order under the influence of the Reformation movement and sought safety on the continent. There, he worked as Tyndale's assistant and proof reader before returning to England in 1535. For much of the rest of his life, he alternated between periods of English residence and exile, escaping death under Mary Tudor only because of the intervention of the King of Denmark, but finally settling in England permanently in 1559.
Coverdale's Bible was printed in 1535 and imported into England, a dedication to the Henry VIII being added to the imported copies. Henry had earlier directed Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, to produce an English Bible. When Coverdale's Bible appeared, the clergy reviewed it for heresy and, finding none, recommended it to Henry, who approved its circulation. Unlike Tyndale, Coverdale was unable to work from the original Hebrew and Greek. Instead he created his version by consulting German and Latin translations. He clearly also consulted Tyndale's translations: his Old Testament relies on Tyndale's work for those books
Tyndale had published before his imprisonment and his New Testament is essentially Tyndale's with some revision based on other tests. Coverdale never identified himself with Lutheranism to the extent Tyndale did; because of this his work met with greater acceptance, even among a court that, while no longer Catholic, was strongly anti-Lutheran. Its acceptance was due at least in part to the patronage of Anne Boleyn.
Soon after Coverdale's Bible was printed, a version known as "Matthew's Bible" appeared. Again owing a great debt to Tyndaleand probably edited by his assistant John Rogers using the pseudonym Thomas Matthew, this 1537 edition was licensed by the king.
Early English translations Since the clergy and the upper classes were trained in Latin and much of the rest of the population was illiterate, there was for many years little need for translations of the Bible into English. With written material available only in manuscript, even those able to read Latin had little access to the Biblical text. The lay population received instruction from the clergy and through the images presented in stone and glass on the great cathedrals.
A few translations were made of portions of the Bible; these included short glosses to Latin texts and longer, sometimes poetic version of whole books. Some of these were apparently created for the use of monks and nuns; there is little indication they were available to the lay population. As manuscripts, their circulation, even among clergy, was limited.
The rise of Protestantism, with its greater emphasis on individual access to God, led, perhaps inevitably, to attempts to create an English Bible. If each individual was equally able to interpret God's law without mediation from the church, than each individual should have access to the word of God as recorded in the Bible. Sometime between 1380 and 1384 friends and colleagues of John Wycliffe (1330-1384) produced a very literal English translation of the Latin Vulgate which was circulated in manuscript copies.
This translation preserved Latin constructions and word order even when they conflicted with English usage. A revised version, circulated after Wycliffe's death and probably created by Wycliffe's secretary, John Purvey, used English idiom and syntax. While there was nothing heretical about either translation, accompanying introductions and notes suggested the theological bias of the translators, which the Catholic hierarchy associated with the Lollards, a sect of reformers associated with John Wycliffe. Both Purvey and Nicholas of Hereford, a contributor to the early version, were imprisoned for their activities and some of their associates were executed. Despite this condemnation, manuscripts of the translation, minus the incriminating notes, remained in many Catholic homes, even after a synod of clergy at Oxford in 1408 forbade anyone to translate, even to read, a vernacular version of the Bible without the approval of a diocesan bishop or a provincial council.
Early Printed Bibles The advent of printing had a far-reaching effect on the creation of an English Bible. The first dated printed book was a Latin Psalter (1454), and the first major work was the Gutenberg Bible (1456). A complete Hebrew Bible was printed by 1488. A Greek New Testament was printed in 1514 but not published until later, making Eramus's 1516 edition the first published New Testament in Greek. These and other printings made it possible for translators to work from the original languages rather than from the Latin Vulgate translation on which other English versions had been based. Erasmus's edition was the basis for Luther's German New Testament, printed in 1522, and the first English New Testament, translated by William Tyndale and first printed in 1525.
Tyndale's Translation Tyndale was born in 1494 or 1495 and educated at Oxford and Cambridge. As a tutor, he translated an early work by Erasmus and came to the attention of county ecclesiastical authorities who charged him with heresy, a charge that was not sustained. Tyndale became convinced that much of the confusion concerning various matters then under debate was the general ignorance of the Bible, even among the clergy, and determined to make a vernacular English translation from the original Greek. He could not do so legally in England, however, without church approval. In the summer of 1523, he sought permission for the endeavor from the Bishop of London but did not receive it. Eventually, he decided to go abroad to work on his translation.
Printing of Tyndale's translation of the New Testament, based on Erasmus's Greek edition, was completed by the end of February, 1526. Tyndale revised his New testament in 1534 and 1535; the 1534 version became the definitive one. By 1530, Tyndale had published his translation of the first five books of the Old Testament; a year later he published an edition of Jonah. He also completed a translation of the Old Testament books from Joshua to Second Chronicles although it was not published until it was incorporated into "Matthew's Bible," in 1537. Many of Tyndale's readings found their way into the Authorized Version of 1611 (eventually known as the King James Version).
Tyndale's Old Testament translation was the first to be rendered directly from the Hebrew rather than from the Latin Vulgate. While most educated men of the period read some Greek and Latin, few knew Hebrew, and Tyndale spent many years studying the language before making his translation. The Tyndale Old Testament, is idiomatic and surprisingly fresh. In Genesis 3, for example, the snake replies to Eve's protests with "Tush, ye shall not die." Elsewhere we read that Joseph was a "lucky fellow" and that pharaoh's "jolly captains" drown in the red sea. Not only was this an English Old Testament, the volume was small enough to fit in a pocket; anyone could carry and read these books on their own, without the mediation of the clergy.
A Complete English Bible By the time of Tyndale's death, a version of the complete Bible, in English and drawing largely on Tyndale's work, was being circulated. This Bible was the work of Miles Coverdale, an Augustinian friar who left his order under the influence of the Reformation movement and sought safety on the continent. There, he worked as Tyndale's assistant and proof reader before returning to England in 1535. For much of the rest of his life, he alternated between periods of English residence and exile, escaping death under Mary Tudor only because of the intervention of the King of Denmark, but finally settling in England permanently in 1559.
Coverdale's Bible was printed in 1535 and imported into England, a dedication to the Henry VIII being added to the imported copies. Henry had earlier directed Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, to produce an English Bible. When Coverdale's Bible appeared, the clergy reviewed it for heresy and, finding none, recommended it to Henry, who approved its circulation. Unlike Tyndale, Coverdale was unable to work from the original Hebrew and Greek. Instead he created his version by consulting German and Latin translations. He clearly also consulted Tyndale's translations: his Old Testament relies on Tyndale's work for those books
Tyndale had published before his imprisonment and his New Testament is essentially Tyndale's with some revision based on other tests. Coverdale never identified himself with Lutheranism to the extent Tyndale did; because of this his work met with greater acceptance, even among a court that, while no longer Catholic, was strongly anti-Lutheran. Its acceptance was due at least in part to the patronage of Anne Boleyn.
Soon after Coverdale's Bible was printed, a version known as "Matthew's Bible" appeared. Again owing a great debt to Tyndaleand probably edited by his assistant John Rogers using the pseudonym Thomas Matthew, this 1537 edition was licensed by the king.
A 1537 edition of Coverdale's Bible, printed in England (the first complete Bible to be printed there) also received the king's license. The Great Bible of 1539, claimed to be the product of the efforts of diverse scholars, is essentially Coverdale's revision of Matthew's Bible (which was principally a revision of Tyndale's work). The Great Bible became the official Bible of the Church of England and in 1543, Parliament banned Tyndale's translation. Ironically, this act also forbade any unlicensed person to read the Bible or explain it to others publicly and for the lower classes to read it privately. In 1546, Henry explicitly banned both Tyndale's and Coverdale's versions, despite the fact that the Great Bible combined the work of both men.
Controversies concerning Biblical translation continued through the reigns of Edward VI, Mary Tudor, and Elizabeth I. After the conservative reaction at the end of Henry's reign, the Reformation movement flourished under Edward, only to be suppressed again under Mary Tudor. Some closely associated with the work of Biblical translation, including John Rogers and Thomas Cranmer, were executed; others, including Coverdale, fled the continent. The Great Bible, however, remained the official English Bible during these years, but when Elizabeth I ordered that each parish church should have a copy of the Bible in English a new version was available. First printed in 1560, the Geneva Bible, produced by a group of English exiles in Geneva and strongly influenced by John Calvin, quickly became the most widely used English Bible.
The Geneva Bible was again a revision of the Great Bible and thus highly dependent on Tyndale's work. For the first time, however, those books of the Old Testament that Tyndale had not translated were revised with attention to the Hebrew originals. The Geneva Bible contained extensive notes, many of them strongly Calvinist in content. In reaction to this Calvinist bias, a group of English bishops, under the direction of Matthew Parker, revised once again the Great Bible, producing a version, published in 1568, that eliminated any offensive notes, but it never gained widespread popularity.
The Authorized Version of 1611 After James I became king in 1603, a conference of churchmen recommended that a new translation of the Bible be created, without any marginal notes, for use in the services of the Church of England. James, who particularly disliked the Geneva Bible, welcomed the proposal and supervised the organization of the project. Six panels of forty-seven men, including most of the leading Biblical scholars of the time, divided the work of the initial translation. The resulting draft was then submitted to a smaller group, including representatives from each panel, for review; the resulting text was printed in 1611. The translators agreed upon rules that may have been drawn up by James himself: the Bishop's Bible was to serve as the basis for the new version; the most commonly used version of proper names was to be used; the old version of disputed words was to be used ("church" instead of "congregation"); marginal notes would be used only to explain Greek or Hebrew words or to point to parallel passages; existing chapter and verse division would be kept but new headings would be created for the chapters. Although commonly called the Authorized Version, it was never officially authorized by either church or state. James's active participation in its creation, however, did much to recommend it and this version, popularly known in the United States as the King James version, became the most widely used Protestant English Bible.
The Douai Bible The development of an English Bible was not entirely a Protestant undertaking. At the same time that English exiles in cities such as Antwerp and Geneva worked on a Protestant Bible, another group of exiles in northern France worked on a Catholic Bible. The English College at Douai was founded in 1568 by William Allen, moved to Rheims in 1578 and back to Douai five years later.
During the time it was located in Rheims one of its professors, Gregory Martin, produced a Bible in English, translated from the Latin Vulgate. The New Testament was published in Rheims in 1582 and the Old Testament in Douai in 1609-10. Together these books form the Douai Bible, the principal English Catholic Bible until the creation of the Jerusalem Bible in the mid-twentieth century.
HISTORY OF BIBLE TRANSLATIONS
The Old Testament in Greek: 3rd c. BC - 3rd c. AD
There is no need for any part of the Bible to be translated until a community of Jews, in the Diaspora, forget their Hebrew. For the Jews of Alexandria, in the 3rd century BC, Greek is the first language. They undertake the translation of the Old Testament now known as the Septuagint. Five centuries later the early Christians, who use Greek for their own New Testament, need to read both Old and New Testaments - for they see themselves as the inheritors of the Old Testament tradition. It is essential for their arguments, when debating with Jewish rabbis, that they have an accurate understanding of the original Hebrew. Their need prompts the great work of biblical scholarship undertaken by Origen in the 3rd century AD.
In his Hexapla (from the Greek word for 'sixfold') Origen arranges six versions of the Old Testament in parallel columns for comparative study. The first column is the original Hebrew; next comes a transliteration of this in Greek letters, so that Christians can pronounce the Hebrew text; this is followed by the Septuagint, and then by Greek translations by Christian scholars. When it comes to the Psalms, Origen adds a further two versions. One of them is the text of a scroll which he has himself discovered in a jar in the valley of the Jordan - exactly as with the Dead Sea Scrolls in our own time.
The Bible in Latin: 2nd - 4th century AD
During the 1st century Greek remains the language of the small Christian community, but with the spread of the faith through the Roman empire a Latin version of the Bible texts is needed in western regions. By the second century there is one such version in use in north Africa and another in Italy. These versions become corrupted and others are added, until by the 4th century - in the words of St Jerome, the leading biblical scholar of the time - there are 'almost as many texts as manuscripts'.
In 382 the pope, Damasus, commissions Jerome to provide a definitive Latin version. In his monastery at Bethlehem, tended by aristocratic virgins, the saint produces the Vulgate. This eventually becomes established as the Bible of the whole western church until the Reformation. By the time the Vulgate is complete (in about 405), the barbarian Goths also have their own version of parts of the Bible - thanks to the astonishing missionary effort of Ulfilas.
Ulfilas and his alphabet: AD c.360
Ulfilas is the first man known to have undertaken an extraordinarily difficult intellectual task - writing down, from scratch, a language which is as yet purely oral. He even devises a new alphabet to capture accurately the sounds of spoken Gothic, using a total of twenty-seven letters adapted from examples in the Greek and Roman alphabets. God's work is Ulfilas' purpose. He needs the alphabet for his translation of the Bible from Greek into the language of the Goths. It is not known how much he completes, but large sections of the Gospels and the Epistles survive in his version - dating from several years before Jerome begins work on his Latin text.
A restricted Bible: 8th - 14th century AD
The intention of St Jerome, translating into Latin the Hebrew of the Old Testament and the Greek of the New Testament, was that ordinary Christians of the Roman empire should be able to read the word of God. 'Ignorance of the scriptures', he wrote, 'is ignorance of Christ'. Gradually this perception is altered. After the collapse of the western empire, the people of Christian Europe speak varieties of German, French, Anglo-Saxon, Italian or Spanish. The text of Jerome's Vulgate is understood only by the learned, most of whom are priests. They prefer to corner the source of Christian truth, keeping for themselves the privilege of interpreting it for the people. Translation into vulgar tongues is discouraged.
There are exceptions. In the late 8th century Charlemagne commissions translation of parts of the Bible for the use of his missionaries in the drive to convert pagan Germans. In the 9th century the Greek brothers Cyril and Methodius, sent from Constantinople to Moravia at royal request, translate the Gospels and parts of the Old Testament into Slavonic. These are missionary endeavours, promoted by rulers as an act of government when pagan Europe is being brought into the Christian fold. In the later fully Christian centuries there is no equivalent need to provide the holy texts in vernacular form. Any such impulse is now a radical demand on behalf of ordinary Christians against the church hierarchy.
The strongest medieval demand for vernacular texts comes in France from a heretical sect, the Cathars. The suppression of the Cathars is complete by the mid-13th century. But in the following century the same demand surfaces within mainstream western Christianity. John Wycliffe and his followers produce full English versions of the Old and New Testament in the late 14th century. At the same period the Czechs have their own vernacular Bible, subsequently much improved by John Huss.
These translations are part of the radical impulse for reform within the church. Indeed the issue of vernacular Bibles becomes one of the contentious themes of the Reformation. A complaint by an English contemporary of Wycliffe, the chronicler Henry Knighton, is a measure of how far the church of Rome has swung on this issue since Jerome's campaign against 'ignorance of scripture'. Knighton rejects translation of the Bible on the grounds that by this means 'the jewel of the church is turned into the common sport of the people'.
Erasmus, Luther and Tyndale: AD 1516-1536
By the 16th century the view is gaining ground that a personal knowledge of scripture is precisely what ordinary people most need for their own spiritual good. Erasmus, though he himself translates the New Testament only from Greek into Latin, expresses in his preface of 1516 the wish that the holy text should be in every language - so that even Scots and Irishmen might read it. In the next decade this wish becomes a central demand of the Reformation. Fortunately writers with a vigorous style undertake the task. Notable among them are Luther and Tyndale. At a time of increasing literacy, their phrases have a profound influence on German and English literature.
Luther's interest in translating the New Testament from the original Greek into German has been stimulated, in 1518, by the arrival in Wittenberg of a new young professor, Philip Melanchthon. His lectures on Homer inspire Luther to study Greek. Melanchthon - soon to become Luther's lieutenant in the Reformation - gives advice on Luther's first efforts at translation. Luther revives the task in the Wartburg. His New Testament is ready for publication in September 1522 (it becomes known as the September Bible). Luther's complete Bible, with the Old Testament translated from the Hebrew, is published in 1534.
Soon after the publication of Luther's New Testament an English scholar, William Tyndale, is studying in Wittenberg - where he probably matriculates in May 1524. Tyndale begins a translation of the New Testament from Greek into English. His version is printed at Worms in 1526 in 3000 copies. When they reach England, the bishop of London seizes every copy that his agents can lay their hands on. The offending texts are burnt at St Paul's Cross, a gathering place in the precincts of the cathedral. So effective are the bishop's methods that today only two copies of the original 3000 survive.
Tyndale continues with his dangerous work (his life demonstrates the benefit to Luther of a strong protector, Frederick the Wise). By 1535 he has translated the first half of the Old Testament. In that year, living inconspicuously among English merchants in Antwerp, his identity is betrayed to the authorities. This city is in the Spanish empire, so Tyndale is unmistakably a heretic. He is executed at the stake in 1536. In spite of the destruction of printed copies, Tyndale's words survive in a living form. His texts become the source to which subsequent translators regularly return once it has been decided - by Henry VIII in 1534 - that there shall be an official English Bible.
The first authorized translation in England is that of Miles Coverdale, whose Bible of 1535 is dedicated to Henry VIII. Soon Henry commissions another version, edited under the supervision of Coverdale, with the intention that every church in the land shall possess a copy. This is the Great Bible, the saga of which from 1539 provides an intriguing insight into the politics of reform. The translation which becomes central to English culture, as Luther's is to German, is the King James Bible (also called the Authorized Version). Edited by forty-seven scholars between 1604 and 1611, it aims to take the best from all earlier translations. By far its major source is Tyndale.
The missionary's weapon: 19th - 20th century AD
The Bible in vernacular languages, a central demand of the Protestant Reformation, subsequently becomes the main weapon in the armoury of Protestant missionaries. Spreading around the world, along with the traders and administrators of the expanding European empires of the 19th century, these missionaries encounter more and more languages into which the holy text can be usefully translated. During the 19th century translations of the Bible, in whole or in part, are published in some 400 new languages. The 20th century has added at least double that number.
One small local example can give an idea of the pace and energy of the missionary programme. In Papua New Guinea more than 800 languages are spoken. The first translation of the New Testament into one of these languages is not published until 1956. Yet by the 1990s the New Testament is available in more than 100 languages of the region, with almost 200 other versions in preparation. Ulfilas, the pioneer in this great task, would be impressed.
