Bible History FLOWCHART In 2004 I asked myself the question, Where did the Bible we read today come from? There were many web pages on this subject, but they either treated the subject at a superficial or in-depth level. I couldn't find a flowchart, timeline or chronology, that tied it all together rather than just being a inventory of Bibles and when they were published. So I surfed the web, consulted a few reference books, and came up with the following. I'm sure the scholars may cringe, but it helped me. I've tried to steer a middle course through the myre of history, especially the reformation that was pivotal to the Bible's history in the late Middle Ages. The rest of this page contains notes on the left, and the flowchart on the right. With a high resolution monitor you will see both together, or you can use the scroll bar to flick between them. Alternately use the following table, or the heading links in the text to open a separate page with the flowcharts so you can read the notes and view the chart at the same time. PDF files ERA Notes Bible Flowchart  1450BC - 1982AD Complete chart (A1 size). There is also a  Power Point [93kBytes] version for downloading. These smaller sub-charts may be easier to plot on A4/A3 paper and view on-line Key   The key to the flowchart Origins 1450BC - 600AD  These are my four ages in the development of the Bible, the flowchart just happened to divide up into these sections. Beginnings   600AD - 1611AD post King James 1611AD - 1947AD post Dead Sea Scrolls 1947AD - 1982AD
1: ORIGINS  1450BC - 600AD The roots of the Bible go back over 3000 years, and we must consider the society and practices in that era. An excellent oral tradition - something that we have lost. e.g. the ability to memorise all the Psalms as an on-line hymnary. The few scholars that had access to documents had poor documentation control. Old documents were not handed down to us because they were used, then copied just before they ended their useful life. The copiers were very accurate, but this does account for the difficulty in finding ancient manuscripts. Up to Jesus' time, writing something as a ghost writer was seen as veneration of that person not forgery, as is sometimes suspected with some NT writings.
HEBREW The original manuscripts for the OT. Written between 1450 BC and 400 BC. Written in archaic Hebrew, gradually changed to modern square script Hebrew after 400 BC, and still used to this day. Around 500 AD the Masoretes developed a system of vowel and accents to punctuate the text, they also standardised the text and content, preparing it for printing much later (Psalter 1477, Full OT 1488). The oldest surviving material was the Masoretic from the 9C, until the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered in 1947 from 2-1C BC Certain portions of the OT (Daniel and Ezra mainly) are written in Aramaic. Aramaic was used from 900BC onwards. Aramaic was used by the common people, while Hebrew remained the language of religion and government and of the upper class. Jesus and the Apostles are believed to have spoken Aramaic, and Aramaic-language translations (Targums) of the Old Testament circulated. Aramaic continued in wide use until about 650AD, when it was supplanted by Arabic. SEPTUAGINT or LXX, from the story that 72 scholars (6 from each of the 12 tribes) working in 12 groups produced 12 identical Greek translations from Hebrew, although analysis shows widely differing Greek styles. As Greek became the daily language of the Jews in Egypt the translation was made. The Torah, or Pentateuch (first 5 books of the OT) in 3C BC and the rest in 2C BC. The Septuagint contains 29 Old Testament and 14 Apocrypha books. The language of much of the early Christian church was Greek, the Jews did not like this "highjacking" of their scripture, so Rabbis met at the city of Jamnia or Javneh in 90 AD to determine which books were truly the Word of God. They pronounced many books, including the Gospels, to be unfit as scriptures. This canon also excluded seven books (Baruch, Sirach, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, and the Wisdom of Solomon, plus portions of Esther and Daniel) that Christians considered part of the Old Testament. The Septuagint's subsequent history is in the Christian church. In the 3 C AD Origen attempted to clear up copyists' errors that had crept into the text of the Septuagint, which by then varied widely from copy to copy. Other scholars also consulted the Hebrew text in order to make the Septuagint text more accurate. But it was the Septuagint, not the original Hebrew, that was the main basis for the Old Latin,  Coptic, peasant communities of Egypt (late 3 C AD)  Ethiopic, written after conversion to Christianity 4-5 C AD. Earliest surviving version 13 C AD. Armenian, result of nationalist upsurge and church split in 5 C AD. Noted for its beauty & accuracy. Georgian, 5 C AD, some parts may be based on the Armenian version. as well as the Slavonic (numerous translations over the centuries starting 1 C AD.) and part of the Arabic translations of the Old Testament. The Septuagint has always been the standard version of the OT in the Greek church, and from it Jerome began his translation of the Vulgate OT. Earliest surviving versions of the Septuagint (& therefore the NT) are Codex Vaticanus (B) and the Codex Sinaiticus (S), both from the 4th C AD, and the Codex Alexandrinus (A) from the 5 C AD. Fragments of Acts, Revelation, John and Luke from as early as 3 C AD also exist in various documents. VULGATE This most famous Latin translation was by St Jerome, sponsored by Pope Damasus, with it's first edition in 383 AD. It was initially from the Septuagint Greek version of the Old Testament, but the revised version of 405 AD used Hebrew (Jerome felt the Greek was inadequate so re-translated it) for the OT, New Latin translations of the Psalms (the so-called Gallican Psalter), and thehe NT was compiled mainly from already existing Latin versions. The 80 book bible (39OT, 14A, 27NT) was revised and corrected over the years, the first printed versions were  the much respected University of Paris edition from the 13C. In 1546 the Council of Trent decreed that the Vulgate was the exclusive Latin authority for the Bible. It required its printing with as few errors as possible, resulting in the so-called (Pope) Clementine (VIII) Vulgate of 1592, with 80 Books. It became the authoritative text of the Roman Catholic Church. From it the Confraternity Version was translated in 1941 and in 1965 the revised edition authorised by the 2nd Vatican Council.
2: BEGINNINGS  600AD - 1611AD TEXTUS RECEPTUS (Received Text) Due to the original Greek having hundreds of custom symbols, even with the advent of printing around 1450 AD it took until 1516 AD for the Greek to be widely available, in a special reduced Greek character set. Printer John Froben of Basle (who stole a march on Cardinal Ximenes) engaged Desiderius Erasmus who produced a dual Greek/Latin version. The edition was full of errors, and not traceable to particular Greek originals. It was an instant success, reprinted with corrections several times, and led to nearly 200 successors, all suffering from errors to a certain degree between 1516 and 1550. The damage was done, the world was flooded with erroneous Greek text. 1550 AD saw the publication of Robert Stephanus's TR, whose third edition became the standard text, as it started to introduce rigour sadly lacking in previous work. He is credited with devising the chapter and verse delineations used to this day. 1633 AD saw further refinement by Elzevir, and the "final" major edition is the 1873 Oxford edition. The Textus Receptus is thus very far from it's Latin name, received text, it is a vast range of the Greek, of variable quality. Whilst making the Greek available to a wide range of scholars through printing, it also introduced many errors to this audience. AND SO TO ENGLISH... By 600 AD Latin was the only Language allowed for Scripture by the Rome authorities. However for the next 700 years there were numerous limited translations, of which Caedmon's rendering of Bible stories into Anglo Saxon in 680 AD, and King Alfred had parts of bible translated into the vernacular in 995 AD are worthy of a mention. In 1382 AD (updated 1400 AD) Wycliffe produced the first true English Bible, containing all 80 books, each copy was handwritten. Some copies survived of his work which was based on the Vulgate, its major weakness. The die was set, there was no going back, with the Bible or the Reformation. The next major Bible, and world, event was 40 years later. In 1455 AD Gutenberg invented the Printing Press, and the first book was his 2 volume Latin Bible. In 1516 Erasmus produced a parallel Greek / Latin Bible which was one of the first scholarly tools, and may have helped Martin Luther produce the first German NT, from The Greek (& Hebrew) in 1522. This was the basis of Danish & Swedish translations. In 1525-35 Tyndale produced his English NT, the first printed English Bible, based mainly on the Greek. It did not have the shortcomings of Wycliffe, and was a landmark in method and style. Tyndale was hunted by the establishment, and burned at the stake in 1537, although not before the Myles Coverdale's Bible; the first complete printed Bible - published in 1535. Now, within a very short time, because of the political circumstances in England, and the reformation on the continent, we move towards acceptance. 1537 saw the Thomas Matthew, a revision of Tyndale by John Rogers (80 Books), and 1539 saw the Taverners, a revision of Matthew minus most of the notes. But 1539 is a landmark as it saw the publishing of the Great Bible, or First Authorised Version. With all 80 books it is often called the Cranmer after that archbishops preface to the 2nd edition. Work now gathered pace, as did the heat generated by the reformation. The Geneva Bible (1560) was a revision of The Great. It was the first Study Bible, with hardly flattering comments about the Catholic Church. It was written by reformers in exile in Geneva, and was supported by Calvin & Knox. It was a full 80 Book Bible, based on the Tyndale Bible, and remained popular for 100 years after the King James Version, especially with Puritans in the United States. It was also notable as the first Bible to have printed verse numbers.
In 1568 the Bishop's Bible became the 2nd Authorised Bible, intended to supersede the Great & Geneva. 80 Books, translated by scholarly bishops. In 1582 Rome surrendered  it's "Latin only" edict, and the preamble to the greatest Bible of them all draws to a close. In 1609-10 the Douay/Rheimes Bible was published, the first Catholic English translation (80 Books), translated from the Vulgate (a disadvantage) it became the seed bible for nearly all Catholic Bibles. However this important event was overshadowed the following year. In 1611 the King put his name to the King James, the 3rd Authorised Version. Used by many to this day, and loathed by some as clinging onto the past. The work was a masterpiece, the culmination of the 16th century work. It took the best of what had gone before in style, prose, chapter & verse division, and translation accuracy. Written to be read out-loud in public worship, a literary and spiritual giant leap, which for it's day was breathtaking. It was based on the Great Bible and on various TRs with Vulgate influence. It reigned supreme until 1881. Some early printings are famous for a typographical error in Ruth 3:15. They became known as the He bibles, rather than the correct She bibles, and command a very high price today.
3: post KING JAMES  1611AD - 1947AD The King James Bible set a standard which was not surpassed during the 17th century. The fact there was little new activity during the rest of the century, surely speaks volumes for the quality of the work of the KJV. New Testament editions in the 18th century did not question the Textus Receptus (TR), despite new manuscript evidence and study, but its limitations became apparent. E. Wells, a British mathematician and theological writer (1719), was the first to edit a complete New Testament that abandoned the TR in favour of more ancient manuscripts; and English scholar Richard Bentley (1720) also tried to go back to early manuscripts to restore an ancient text, but their work was ignored. In 1734 J.A. Bengel, a German Lutheran biblical theologian, stressed the idea that not only manuscripts but also families of manuscript traditions must be differentiated, and he initiated the formulation of criteria for text criticism. In 1782 Robert Aitken's Bible became the First English Language Bible (KJV without Apocrypha) to be printed in America. In 1833 Joseph Smith received his "Inspired Version" from God. It was published in 1867 after his death in 1866, and is considered divine by the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints. In 1841 the English Hexapla New Testament was published. An Early Textual Comparison showing the Greek and 6 Famous English Translations in Parallel Columns, it demonstrated the need for study material for bible translators and scholars. The next major works took place between 1881-5, the Revised Version. Based on the KJV, it was a  literal translation of Hebrew & Greek by 65 English scholars. Full 80 Book, based on Masoretic 500 AD material. This became the modern bible of the 19th century against the King James version from the 17th. It was also notable for its modern approach to translation rigour, and the team approach to the work. The story of the Apocrypha (or inter-testament works) is not covered here, however it was officially removed in 1885 leaving the 66 books generally accepted as the Word of God today. In 1901 the American Standard was published, an American version on the Revised / KJV line, and in 1952 the Revised Standard Version, authorised by the NCC in the USA. Whilst it has many good points, based on strong Greek originals, it is weak in its translation of key OT messianic passages.
4: post DEAD SEA SCROLLS  1947AD - 1982AD With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls (1947), making much 1 C BC material available to highly skilled and organised translators the last part of our journey changes to one where translations are all of very high quality, but have many styles and interpretations. Each translation choosing a different balance between literal translation and creative interpretation.  This trend had started earlier in the 20th century with 1934's Riverside NT, written in today's language. Notable translations through the latter part of the 20th century: 1959:   Berkeley. 1st rank translation. Faithfully rendered with lively modern English (NT only 1945, revised 1969) 1961:   NEB: Completely new translation. First attempt to abstract translation from transient modernisms. Mixed response, questioned by evangelicals. 1971:   NASB: Revision of the ASV 1901 "Modern and Accurate Word for Word English Translation" 1971:   Living Bible: Liberal translation not favoured by purists. 1976:   TEV (Good News): Wide appeal English bible with limited modern vocabulary. 1978:   NIV: New translation from Hebrew & Greek by conservative scholars. "Modern and Accurate Phrase for Phrase English Translation" 1982:   The "New King James Version" (NKJV) is Published as a "Modern English Version Maintaining the Original Style of the KJV" Since 1982 more translations have been published, most following the 20th century trend of making accurate translations available to enable the Word of God to evangelise people where they are. That's another story, and our history ends here. Written 2004, Revised 2011.

English Bible History byDon and Greatsite

English Bible History

This English Bible History Article & Timeline is ©2013 by author & editor: John L. Jeffcoat III. Special thanks is also given to Dr. Craig H. Lampe for his valuable contributions to the text. This page may be freely reproduced or quoted, in whole or in part, in print or electronically, under the one condition that prominent credit must be given to “WWW.GREATSITE.COM” as the source.
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English Bible History Background

The Pre-Reformation History of the Bible
From 1,400 BC to 1,400 AD

The story of how we got the English language Bible is, for the most part, the story of the Protestant Reformation which began in the late 14th Century AD with John Wycliffe. Indeed, if we go back more than just one thousand years, there is no language recognizable as “English” that even existed anywhere. The story of the Bible is much older than that, however.

The first recorded instance of God’s Word being written down, was when the Lord Himself wrote it down in the form of ten commandments on the stone tablets delivered to Moses at the top of Mount Sinai. Biblical scholars believe this occurred between 1,400 BC and 1,500 BC… almost 3,500 years ago. The language used was almost certainly an ancient form of Hebrew, the language of Old Covenant believers.

The earliest scripture is generally considered to be the “Pentateuch”, the first five books of the Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, & Deuteronomy… though there is some scholarly evidence to indicate that the Old Testament Book of Job may actually be the oldest book in the Bible. The Old Testament scriptures were written in ancient Hebrew, a language substantially different than the Hebrew of today. These writings were passed down from generation to generation for thousands of years on scrolls made of animal skin, usually sheep, but sometimes deer or cow. Animals considered “unclean” by the Jews, such as pigs, were of course, never used to make scrolls.

When the entire Pentateuch is present on a scroll, it is called a “Torah”. An entire Torah Scroll, if completely unraveled, is over 150 feet long! As most sheep are only about two to three feet long, it took an entire flock of sheep to make just one Torah scroll. The Jewish scribes who painstakingly produced each scroll were perfectionists. If they made even the slightest mistake in copying, such as allowing two letters of a word to touch, they destroyed that entire panel (the last three or four columns of text), and the panel before it, because it had touched the panel with a mistake! While most Christians today would consider this behavior fanatical and even idolatrous (worshiping the scripture, rather than the One who gave it to us), it nevertheless demonstrates the level of faithfulness to accuracy applied to the preservation of God’s Word throughout the first couple of thousand years of Biblical transmission.

Hebrew has one thing in common with English: they are both “picture languages”. Their words form a clear picture in your mind. As evidence of this; the first man to ever print the scriptures in English, William Tyndale, once commented that Hebrew was ten times easier to translate into English than any other language. Tyndale would certainly be qualified to make such a statement, as he was so fluent in eight languages, that it was said you would have thought any one of them to be his native tongue.

By approximately 500 BC, the 39 Books that make up the Old Testament were completed, and continued to be preserved in Hebrew on scrolls. As we approach the last few centuries before Christ, the Jewish historical books known as the “Apocrypha” were completed, yet they were recorded in Greek rather than Hebrew. By the end of the First Century AD, the New Testament had been completed. It was preserved in Greek on Papyrus, a thin paper-like material made from crushed and flattened stalks of a reed-like plant. The word “Bible” comes from the same Greek root word as “papyrus”. The papyrus sheets were bound, or tied together in a configuration much more similar to modern books than to an elongated scroll.

These groupings of papyrus were called a “codex” (plural: “codices”). The oldest copies of the New Testament known to exist today are: The Codex Alexandrius and the Codex Sinaiticus in the British Museum Library in London, and the Codex Vaticanus in the Vatican. They date back to approximately the 300’s AD. In 315 AD, Athenasius, the Bishop of Alexandria, identified the 27 Books which we recognize today as the canon of New Testament scripture.

In 382 AD, the early church father Jerome translated the New Testament from its original Greek into Latin. This translation became known as the “Latin Vulgate”, (“Vulgate” meaning “vulgar” or “common”). He put a note next to the Apocrypha Books, stating that he did not know whether or not they were inspired scripture, or just Jewish historical writings which accompanied the Old Testament.

The Apocrypha was kept as part of virtually every Bible scribed or printed from these early days until just 120 years ago, in the mid-1880’s, when it was removed from Protestant Bibles. Up until the 1880’s, however, every Christian… Protestant or otherwise… embraced the Apocrypha as part of the Bible, though debate continued as to whether or not the Apocrypha was inspired. There is no truth to the popular myth that there is something “Roman Catholic” about the Apocrypha, which stemmed from the fact that the Roman Catholics kept 12 of the 14 Apocrypha Books in their Bible, as the Protestants removed all of them. No real justification was ever given for the removal of these ancient Jewish writings from before the time of Christ, which had remained untouched and part of every Bible for nearly two thousand years.

By 500 AD the Bible had been translated into over 500 languages. Just one century later, by 600 AD, it has been restricted to only one language: the Latin Vulgate! The only organized and recognized church at that time in history was the Catholic Church of Rome, and they refused to allow the scripture to be available in any language other than Latin. Those in possession of non-Latin scriptures would be executed! This was because only the priests were educated to understand Latin, and this gave the church ultimate power… a power to rule without question… a power to deceive… a power to extort money from the masses. Nobody could question their “Biblical” teachings, because few people other than priests could read Latin. The church capitalized on this forced-ignorance through the 1,000 year period from 400 AD to 1,400 AD knows as the “Dark and Middle Ages”.

Pope Leo the Tenth established a practice called the “selling of indulgences” as a way to extort money from the people. He offered forgiveness of sins for a fairly small amount of money. For a little bit more money, you would be allowed to indulge in a continuous lifestyle of sin, such as keeping a mistress. Also, through the invention of “Purgatory”, you could purchase the salvation of your loved-one’s souls. The church taught the ignorant masses, “As soon as the coin in the coffer rings, the troubled soul from Purgatory springs!” Pope Leo the Tenth showed his true feelings when he said, “The fable of Christ has been quite profitable to us!”

Editorial Note: Let us state at this point, that it is not our intent to offend or “bash” Roman Catholics. It is unavoidable that every historical account has its “good guys” and its “bad guys”. Just as it is impossible to accurately tell the story of World War Two without offending the Germans and the Italians who were undeniably the enemies of world peace at that time… it is equally impossible to accurately tell the story of the English Bible without unintentionally offending those who continue to revere the Roman Catholic and Anglican Churches.

Where was the true church of God during these Dark Ages?

On the Scottish Island of Iona, in 563 AD, a man named Columba started a Bible College. For the next 700 years, this was the source of much of the non-Catholic, evangelical Bible teaching through those centuries of the Dark and Middle Ages. The students of this college were called “Culdees”, which means “certain stranger”. The Culdees were a secret society, and the remnant of the true Christian faith was kept alive by these men during the many centuries that led up to the Protestant Reformation.

In fact, the first man to be called a “Culdee” was Joseph of Aremethia. The Bible tells us that Joseph of Aremethia gave up his tomb for Jesus. Tradition tells us that he was actually the Uncle of the Virgin Mary, and therefore the Great-Uncle (or “half-Uncle” at least) of Jesus. It is also believed that Joseph of Aremethia traveled to the British Isles shortly after the resurrection of Christ, and built the first Christian Church above ground there. Tradition also tells us that Jesus may have spent much of his young adult life (between 13 and 30) traveling the world with his Great Uncle Joseph… though the Bible is silent on these years in the life of Jesus.

In the late 1300’s, the secret society of Culdees chose John Wycliffe to lead the world out of the Dark Ages. Wycliffe has been called the “Morning Star of the Reformation”. That Protestant Reformation was about one thing: getting the Word of God back into the hands of the masses in their own native language, so that the corrupt church would be exposed and the message of salvation in Christ alone, by scripture alone, through faith alone would be proclaimed again.

This concludes our overview of the Pre-Reformation history of the Bible. You should now go a few inches below or click here to return to the main English Bible History Page, to pick up this story with John Wycliffe in the 14th Century, and continue on to the 21st Century.

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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 (1320-1384, age 64)

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.

1863 AD: Robert Young's "Literal" Translation; often criticized for being so literal that it sometimes obscures the contextual English meaning.

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.

1952 AD: The "Revised Standard Version" (RSV); said to be a Revision of the 1901 American Standard Version, though more highly criticized. 

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."

1990 AD: The "New Revised Standard Version" (NRSV); further revision of 1952 RSV, (itself a revision of 1901 ASV), criticized for "gender inclusiveness".

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

This English Bible History Article & Timeline is ©2013 by author & editor: John L. Jeffcoat III. Special thanks is also given to Dr. Craig H. Lampe for his valuable contributions to the text. This page may be freely reproduced or quoted, in whole or in part, in print or electronically, under the one condition that prominent credit must be given to “WWW.GREATSITE.COM” as the source.

Hebrews and Judaism Questions

Questions about the Hebrews and Judaism

http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/wcsyllabus/answers/jews.html

Warning: religion is always a controversial subject, and the information given below will depart in many cases from what believers in particular faiths accept as true; however it is representative of a good deal of nonsectarian modern scholarship. An outline of Jewish history: Would you go over in more detail the periods during which the Jews were in exile or when they ruled themselves?
Good question. It's always difficult to know how much of this to emphasize in class because some people learn it in Bible study classes and others have never encountered it before. The periodic exiles of the Jews are important for three main reasons: they help to explain how the religion evolved, they have become symbols of oppression and liberty for other peoples in many lands, and they help to explain current conflicts in the Middle East.
There is a chart on p. 27 of Duiker that gives you some of this, but I looked ahead further to put these early experiences in a larger context.
Jump to other questions

• About 4,000 years ago the ancestors of the Hebrews were wandering nomads. Biblical tradition says that Abraham, the founder of the line, came from Ur, but we cannot be sure that this was the Ur located in Mesopotamia. There are no records of these people except for the traditions laid down in the Bible many centuries later. The story says that Abraham entered Canaan briefly, and God promised him that his descendents would inherit the land. This is the earliest mention of a claim which was to prove controversial right down to the present day. It is the religious basis of the tradition that Israel belongs to the Jewish people because it was promised to them by God. Of course a long string of other inhabitants, from the Canaanites and Philistines to the modern Arabs who call themselves "Palestinians," have disagreed. This era, up to the entry into Egypt, is known as the era of the Patriarchs (fathers): people like Abraham, Isaac, and Joseph.
• The Bible further says that some group of these nomads entered Egypt, perhaps around 1720 (this date is much disputed), to escape relief from a long-lasting drought, and found themselves enslaved permanently and treated badly by the Pharoahs. No trace of them has been found in any digging or record in Egypt (unless the troublesome nomads called "'Apirus" in Egyptian records are the Hebrews, and most modern scholars doubt this--the dates are wrong). However, the general outlines of the story are plausible: it would make sense to go to the regularly flooded Nile valley to get food when one's own territory was parched, the Egyptians did enslave foreign peoples, and the name "Moses" is a distinctively Egyptian one (there were Pharoahs with names like "Tutmoses," for instance). However, the pyramids had been built long before this: only in Hollywood movies did the Hebrews work on the Pyramids.
• The book of Exodus, the second book of the Bible, tells the sensational story of Moses, and how he led the Hebrews out of captivity, purportedly with the assistance of ten devastating "plagues" inflicted on the Egyptians, including turning all the water in the land to blood and killing all the eldest children of the Egyptians. Forewarned, the Hebrews were able to spare their own children by sacrificing a sheep instead and smearing the blood on their thresholds so that the angel of death should pass by their homes. The ritual of Passover commemorates this pivotal event in Jewish history. If anything like this really happened, it probably occurred some time between 1300 and 1200 BCE. This is the first "exile," the one which molded Jewish conceptions from then on and with which so many oppressed peoples, including African-American slaves, have identified.
• The Bible then says that the people leaving Egypt followed Moses to Mt. Sinai, where God made known his will by giving them not only the Ten Commandments, but a huge body of law later known as the Torah. Modern literary scholars suspect that much of this law was inserted into the Torah relatively late, by later generations who felt that certain traditions were so important that they must have been known even back in Moses' time. It is possible to trace many historic layers in the Hebrew Law, but that is a topic for a more advanced class.
• The Torah says that because the Hebrew people sinned by doubting that God would rescue them and turned to the worship of other gods, including a golden calf, God punished them by making them wander for forty years in the wilderness (presumably in the Sinai Peninsula), until that whole generation had died. No traces of this sojourn have been found in the Sinai despite repeated attempts: many modern historians suspect that the truth may have been a much shorter transit of the Sinai Peninsula by far fewer people than are depicted in the Bible. Only their children were to be allowed to enter into the "promised land" of Canaan. People still frequently use the metaphor of "wandering in the wilderness" today to talk about some unpleasant form of exile or ostracism. In Jewish history, this experience of exile in Egypt followed by wandering in the wilderness becomes a metaphor for the struggle to discover God's will and follow it; but it also becomes a lesson on the importance of compassion for others. Again and again the Hebrew Bible stresses the importance of being kind to foreigners, the poor, etc., and reminds the Jewish people of when they were wandering outcasts themselves.
• Although the Bible depicts a massively successful invasion and conquest of Canaan by the Hebrews (perhaps around 1240 BCE), there is a good deal of evidence to suggest that they slowly infiltrated the land and never conquered all of it, settling mostly in the higher hill areas, while groups like the Philistines continued to dominate the richer lowlands. Many modern scholars believe that the group coming out of Egypt actually united with various peoples already living in Canaan, and adapting their own Egyptian-influenced beliefs to those of the Canaanites, forged a new religion and created the "twelve tribes" which make up the traditional Hebrew nation. Little can be said for certain about this period, which is traditionally known as the period of Judges, after mighty leaders like Samson and even a woman--Deborah. These "Judges" seem to have been popular tribal leaders or heroic individuals rather than legal officers.
• Around 1050 BCE a monarchy was established and Saul chosen as the first king. The history books of the Bible (in the Hebrew Bible, they are part of the "Prophets") are written from a pro-priestly, generally anti-monarchical perspective. Saul is depicted as a madman who is succeeded by the brilliant figure of David. It is David, not Saul, who becomes the ancestral figure that Jews look back to for political inspiration. Christians trace Jesus' ancestry back to David for reasons we will explore later, so they too have paid great attention to this figure. He is said to have been a poet and musician (he is given credit for the whole collection of Psalms in the Bible, though modern scholars doubt that he was responsible for many of them, if any). Although he is portrayed as being especially blessed by God in the Bible, he is also portrayed as a sinner: the seducer of Bathsheba, the murderer of her husband. He is a richly complex figure. One relatively painless way to learn more about him is to rent the videotape of the feature film "King David" starring Richard Gere. It is the closest Hollywood has ever got to being faithful to Biblical history.
• The ambivalent attitudes of the historians who wrote the story of the Hebrew monarchy mean that this is the only national history which takes a critical stance toward almost all of its rulers, including the most beloved ones. The editors, probably living in the Babylonian Captivity (see below) blamed the monarchy for the loss of the Promised Land and the enslavement of the Jews; and they tell the story with an eye to its tragic conclusion.
• David's successor was his son Solomon, a wealthy monarch who supposedly married 300 wives and had many more concubines, yet who was regarded as wise and pious early in his reign when he built the temple in Jerusalem. This is another pivotal event in Jewish history because once the priesthood at the temple became well established, they denounced all other regional shrines and tried to centralize all sacrifice in the capital city. Although they never entirely succeeded, this was a hazardous move because it could have meant that if the Jews were ever separated from the Temple, they would have to cease being Jews.
• In 930, after Solomon's death, the land was divided into two rival and often warring kingdoms: Israel in the North, with Samaria as its capital and Judah in the south, with the capital remaining in Jerusalem. The Bible depicts these monarchs almost exclusively in terms of whether they enforced the worship of the Hebrew God (whose name may have been something like "Yahweh"--the name later became too sacred to pronounce, and only the consonants were written down). The writers refer those curious about other details of this period to histories of Israel and Judah which have long since vanished. Archeological evidence shows, however, that a king like Omri--a rather obscure figure in the Bible's account--was internationally famous as a great ruler for generations after his death.
• Some of the more radical modern scholars have suggested that Yahweh was never the completely dominant God of the Hebrews: that his worshippers struggled against formidable odds to establish him at the center of the nation, more often failing than not. This would explain a good deal that is otherwise puzzling about the account of this period after 930; but the Bible depicts the people as "turning away" from a deity long worshipped by their ancestors.
• The Assyrians gradually conquered much of the Middle East in a long series of extremely violent campaigns in the 8th century. Samaria fell to them in 722, and the entire northern nation of Israel was subjected to their often merciless rule. It is assumed that much of the population was enslaved and many must have converted to the religion of their masters. These are the "ten lost tribes" of Israel.
• The Neo-Babylonian Chaldeans conquered the Assyrians and seized their empire, seeking to expand it further. After many attempts, they finally seized Jerusalem in 587 BCE and took most of the inhabitants into captivity in Babylon. This second exile is known as the "Babylonian Captivity." The writers who experienced it compared their lot with that of their ancestors in Egypt, and a powerful body of writing and thought developed which defined their people as wanderers seeking a home in the land promised them by God.
• Cut off from the now-destroyed Temple in Jerusalem, the priests became radically less important. Figures like prophets and historians became the most important figures to keep alive the flame of Yahwism. They compiled and edited the histories of the past (the "Deuteronomic History") to explain why a people supposedly chosen by God could have suffered such a disaster. But an important side-effect of their effort was to move the religion decisively away from an ethnocentric, nationalistic religion to a more abstract one which could be followed anywhere. It was at this point that the Torah (law) replaced the Temple as the heart of Judaism. Once again, exile becomes a defining experience for this people.
• The resurgence of Babylon was short-lived, because they were conquered by the insurgent Persians in 538, under Cyrus, a ruler who is depicted in the Bible as having been hand-picked by God for the purpose of returning the exiles to Judah. Some (but probably not most) did return to this land their parents had come from, but which was a legend for most of them. These would have been the hard core of Yahwistic believers; and from this time on we do not hear of renewed tendencies to worship "false" Gods. These people, now known as "Jews" after the land and tribe of Judah, now identified themselves completely with their religion, forged in exile. After a long delay, they tried to rebuild the Temple, but it was a pale shadow of its former self, and Judaism continued to flourish in people's study of the law, in their daily lives, and was no longer exclusively tied to the Jerusalem Temple.
• One controversial but plausible thesis says that it was under Babylonian and Persian rule that the Jews were first exposed to Zoroastrianism and its beliefs in heaven and hell, a satanic opponent to a good God, angels, and much else that was adapted by them into the classic Judaism that we know today. Such ideas circulated at first mainly among the scholars later known as Pharisees, who created a popular form of Judaism which had little to do with the ceremonial Judaism of the Jerusalem Temple priesthood.
• The returned exiles did not return to freedom: they were still subject to the Persians, who were relatively benign rulers who interfered little in their internal affairs.
• In 331 Alexander the Great arrived with his troops as he swept through the Middle East on the way to conquer all of the world that he knew about. After his death in 320, his kingdom was subdivided into various Macedonian-ruled monarchies, with the Jews falling under the sway of the Ptolemaic dynasty ruling Egypt and other lands in the area.
• Eventually Syrian monarchs seized control, and the Greek/Syrian ruler Antiochus IV Epiphanes tried to impose a strictly Greek culture on his realm, attempting to suppress Judaism by outlawing it and by defiling the Temple. Astonishingly a group of Jewish rebels led by the Maccabees succeeded in driving him out and freeing the land in 142 BCE, placing power back in Jewish hands for the first time since 587. Their reign, though brief, whetted the Jewish appetite for independence, and reinforced tendencies toward nationalism which have been revived at various periods in history. One incident from their victory of Antiochus is commemorated at annually at Hanukkah. (For more information, see Aish HaTorah's Chanukah Site.)
• This brief period of independence was ended by Roman armies under Pompey in 63 BCE, when Judea became a Roman province. (It was also sometimes referred to as "Palestine" after the Philistines who also lived there. Because the Philistines were bitter historical enemies of the Jews, this explains why Jews general reject the name "Palestine" for their homeland.) The Romans were generally quite tolerant of other religions, and the Temple priests generally aligned themselves with Roman policy; but this alienated them from other Jews who resented Roman domination. Popular Judaism continued to develop richly among the Pharisees, who were busily creating classic Judaism as we know it, including slowly compiling what was to become the official collection of Hebrew writings we now know as the Bible.
• Roman tolerance of other religions was bounded, however, by their insistence on loyalty to Rome and the Emperor. They knew that the Pharisees were expecting a figure called "the Messiah," who would lead a triumphant war of liberation against the enemies of the Jews and restore the royal line of David. Such hopes could only be seen as treasonous by the Romans. In a reckless attempt to impose loyalty they erected the Imperial eagle on the Temple, outraging many Jews. When the latter tore it down, they triggered a violent reaction: essentially war between Rome and rebellious Jews, which lasted from 66 to 73 CE; and whose most famous outcome was the destruction of the Temple in 70 CE, leaving standing only part of the wall surrounding the Temple Mount, which is known today as the "Western Wall" or "the Wailing Wall," where pious Jews from all over the world come to grieve and pray.
• Centuries later, in 687, triumphant Muslims built the shrine of the Dome of the Rock on the site of the old Temple, declaring it to be the site of Muhammad's miraculous ascent into heaven (as well as the site of the near-sacrifice of Ishmael by Abraham, for in their version of the story Ishmael replaces Isaac). In modern times this site has been much contested, and during the Cold War some thought that World War III might begin there. Even in very recent years people have died because of conflicting claims to the Temple Mount; and it is one of the most intractable issues dividing Jewish Israelis and Muslim Palestinians. According to Messianic Jewish beliefs, the Messiah will appear here and the Temple must be rebuilt to bring in the Messianic age; but to do so they would have to tear down the Dome of the Rock, defiling the third most sacred spot in Islam.
• The end of the Temple marked the end of the priesthood as well. The Pharisees with their radical but popular ideas of an afterlife in Heaven or Hell, angels, resurrection, and a Messianic restoration of Jewish rule in Jerusalem (to be extended eventually to the whole world, with all nations worshipping the Jewish God) triumphed in the vacuum left behind by the death of "official" Judaism. Despite the hostile portrait made of them in the Christian scriptures, the Pharisees were genuinely popular, responding to the needs of the people whom they served. The Judaism of the next two thousand years was to be the Judaism of the Pharisees.
• In 132 CE radical Jews rebelled against Rome again under a fanatical and charismatic leader named "Bar Kokhba" (originally Simeon Bar Kosba) who many believed to be the long-expected Messiah. They were initially successful in some battles, but Rome was determined to crush the rebels, a remnant of which committed suicide at the fortress of Masada after Bar Kokhba himself was killed in 135. This mass suicide has often been cited in modern times by Jews as an example of the determination to fight back which has been necessary for them to survive as a people. Other Jews criticize this use of Masada as ultimately self-destructive. This is a complex subject, but you should know that the word "Masada" has powerful meaning for modern Jews.
• What about Jesus? you may be wondering. There is no clear reflection of his existence in the many Jewish writings that survive from this period. Several figures were presented as possible Messiahs during the first and second centuries, but by far the most successful of them among Jews was Bar Kochba. If we did not have the Christian scriptures, we would have no record of Jesus' brief career among the Jews at all.
• The Romans drove the Jews out of Jerusalem and in so far as they could out of Judea altogether. This third exile is known as the "Diaspora" and was to be a powerful force throughout the next two millennia. Armed with their sacred books, their hopes, and their memories, the Jews scattered over much of Asia, northern Africa, and around the Caribbean, eventually winding up in such far-flung places as Russia and India: but always they were tied together by the Bible and by the Hebrew language in which it was written. It was no longer their spoken language (Jews in Judea spoke Aramaic, Jews elsewhere Greek); but it was studied as an ancient scholarly language in which God had spoken. In modern Israel the language has been revived and restored to daily use.
• The result of this troubled history has been that much of what makes classic Judaism Jewish was forged in the suffering of exile. The creation of the modern state of Israel, mostly by secular Jewish settlers at first, has enormously complicated the relationship between this history and current events; but much that you will read in the newspapers about crises in the Middle East can only be properly understood by understanding this background from many centuries ago. 
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