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Geneva Bible
From Wikipedia, the free
encyclopedia
The Geneva Bible was a
Protestant
translation of the
Bible into English. It has also been known as the
Breeches Bible, after its rendering of
Genesis 3:7, "Then the eyes of them both were
opened, and they knewe that they were naked, and they
sewed figge tree leaues together, and made them selues
breeches."
This was the Bible read by
William Shakespeare, by
John Donne, and by
John Bunyan, author of
Pilgrim's Progress. It was the Bible that was
brought to America on the
Mayflower and used by
Oliver Cromwell in the
English Civil War.
Because the language of the Geneva
Bible was more forceful and vigorous, most readers
preferred this version strongly over the
Bishops' Bible, the translation authorised by the
Church of England under
Elizabeth I.
History
During the time when England was ruled
by Queen
Mary I, who persecuted Protestants, a number of
Protestant scholars fled to
Geneva in
Switzerland, which was then ruled as a republic by
John Calvin and
Theodore Beza. Among these scholars was
William Whittingham, who supervised the translation
in collaboration with
Miles Coverdale,
Christopher Goodman,
Anthony Gilby,
Thomas Sampson, and
William Cole--several of whom became prominent
figures in the proto-puritan
nonconformist faction of the
Vestments controversy. Whittingham was directly
responsible for the New Testament, which was complete in
1557, while Gilby oversaw the Old. The first full
edition of this Bible appeared in
1560. It was revised substantially in
1576 and again in
1599, with over 150 editions coming out by 1644.
Like most English translations of the
time, the Geneva Bible was translated from scholarly
editions of the
Greek New Testament and
Hebrew scriptures that comprise the Christian Old
Testament. The English rendering was substantially based
on the earlier translations by
William Tyndale and
Myles Coverdale. (80-90% of the language in the
Genevan New Testament is from Tyndale.)
The Geneva Bible was the first English
bible to use verse numbers and an elaborate system of
commentary in marginal
glosses. This annotation was done by
Laurence Tomson, who translated (for the 1560 Geneva
Bible) L'Oiseleur's notes on the Gospels, which
themselves came from Camerarius. In 1576 Tomson added
L'Oiseleur's notes for the Epistles, which came from
Beza's
1565 and
1589/1598
Greek and Latin edition of the Bible. Beginning in 1598
Franciscus Junius' notes on Revelation were added,
replacing the original notes deriving from
John Bale and
Heinrich Bullinger. Bale's The Image of bothe
churches had a great impact on these notes as well
as
Foxe's Book of Martyrs. Both the Junius and
Bullinger-Bale annotations are explicitly anti-Roman
Catholic and representative of much popular Protestant
apocalypticism during the Reformation.
The annotations (which are a necessary
and integral part of the text) were
Calvinistic and
Puritan in character, and as such they were disliked
by the ruling conservative Protestants of the
Church of England, as well as King
James I, who commissioned the Authorised Version or
King James Bible to replace it. The Geneva Bible
also motivated the production of the
Douay-Rheims edition by the
recusant Catholic community. The Geneva Bible
remained popular among
Puritans and remained in widespread use until after
the
English Civil War.
The
frontispiece to the
1560 edition of the Geneva Bible; the
illustration depicts the Israelites before
the
Red Sea.
To compare the Geneva Bible with the
King James, here is Revelation 6: 12-17 in both versions
(with spelling modernised). The differences have been
italicised in the King James extract:
Geneva Bible
- And I beheld when he had opened
the sixth seal, and lo, there was a great
earthquake, and the sun was as black as sackcloth of
hair, and the moon was like blood. And the stars of
heaven fell unto the earth, as a fig tree casteth
her green figs, when it is shaken of a mighty wind.
And heaven departed away, as a scroll, when it is
rolled, and every mountain and isle were moved out
of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the
great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains,
and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every
free man, hid themselves in dens, and among the
rocks of the mountains, and said to the mountains
and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the presence
of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the
wrath of the Lamb. For the great day of his wrath is
come, and who can stand?
King James Bible
- And I beheld when he had opened
the sixth seal, and, lo, there was a great
earthquake; and the sun became black as
sackcloth of hair, and the moon became as
blood; and the stars of heaven fell unto the earth,
even as a fig tree casteth her untimely
figs, when she is shaken of a mighty wind.
And the heaven departed as a scroll
when it is rolled together; and every
mountain and island was moved out of their
places. And the kings of the earth, and the great
men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and
the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free
man, hid themselves in the dens and in
the rocks of the mountains; and said to the
mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from
the face of him that sitteth on the throne
and from the wrath of the Lamb; for the great day of
his wrath is come; and who shall be able to
stand?
It is striking how close the two
versions are to each other, one might think that the
King James Version is a revision of the Geneva.
Examination of their differences reveals that the
earlier Geneva version frequently sounds more direct and
modern than the later King James, e.g.
“and the moon was like blood” (Geneva)
versus “and the moon became as blood” (King James)
“as a fig tree casteth her green figs”
(Geneva) versus “even as a fig tree casteth her untimely
figs” (King James)
External links
Facsimilies
Text
Articles
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 he
Geneva Bible is a critical, yet almost completely forgotten part of the
Protestant Reformation. Driven out of England by the persecutions of
Bloody Mary, several future leaders of the Reformation came to Geneva to
create a pure and accurate translation of the Holy Writ. Concerned about
the influence that the Catholic Church had on the existing
 translations
of the Bible from the Latin, these men turned to the original Hebrew and
Greek texts to produce the Geneva Bible. This made the Geneva Bible the
first complete Bible to be translated into English from the original
Hebrew and Greek texts.
The creation of the Geneva Bible was a substantial undertaking. Its
authors spent over two years, working diligently day and night by
candlelight, to finish the translation and the commentaries. The entire
project was funded by the exiled English congregation in Geneva, making
the translation a work supported by the people and not by an
authoritarian church or monarch.
All the marginal commentaries were finished by 1599, making the 1599
edition of the Geneva Bible t he
most complete study aide for Biblical scholars and students. This editon
does contain the Apocrypha. The Apocrypha’s notes are minimal or absent
in other editions. Additional highlights of this edition include maps of
the Exodus route and Joshua’s distribution of land, a name and subject
index, and Psalms sung by the English congregation in Geneva.
The greatest
distinction of the Geneva Bible, however, is the extensive collection of
marginal notes that it contains. Prominent Reformation leaders such as
John Calvin, John Knox, Miles Coverdale, William Whittingham, Theodore
Beza, and Anthony Gilby wrote the majority of these notes in order to
explain and interpret the scriptures. The notes comprise nearly 300,000
words, or nearly one-third the length of the Bible itself, and they are
justifiably considered the most complete source of Protestant religious
thought available.
Owing
to the marginal notes and the superior quality of the translation, the
Geneva Bible became the most widely read and influential English Bible
of the 16th and 17th centuries. It was continually printed from 1560 to
1644 in over 200 different editions. It was the Bible of choice for many
of the greatest writers, thinkers, and historical figures of the
Reformation era. William Shakespeare’s plays and the writings of John
Milton and John Bunyan were clearly influenced by the Geneva Bible.
Oliver Cromwell issued a pamphlet containing excerpts from the Geneva
Bible to his troops during the English Civil War. When the Pilgrims set
sail on the Mayflower they took with them exclusively the Geneva Bible.
The
marginal notes of the Geneva Bible enraged the Catholic Church, since
the notes deemed the act of confession to men – the Catholic Bishops –
as unjustified by Holy Script. Man should confess to God only; man’s
private life was man’s private life. The notes also infuriated King
James, since they allowed disobedience to tyrannical kings. King James
went so far as to make ownership of the Geneva Bible a felony. He then
proceeded to make his own version of the Bible, but without the marginal
notes that had so disturbed him. Consequently, during King James’s
reign, and into the reign of Charles I, the Geneva Bible was gradually
replaced by the King James Bible.
Because of the print size, this facsimile reproduction is
more difficult for some readers. A magnifying glass is often necessary
for the marginal notes. On some of the printing the marginal notes are
not entirely clear. Also, some adjustment is required to get accustomed
to the interchanged I and J, u and v, and f and s in the old print
style. L. L. Brown Publishing is proud to offer the Geneva Bible to
Christians serious about understanding the Bible. A wealth of
information that has been left to us by the Leaders of the Protestant
Reformation is now available after four centuries of being out of print. |
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