Table Of Content

hc/T c . fUl( It\/<( c<> THE KING JAMES BIBLE CCl cl\r<( { / -£(U (/cars ( /; ( SUMMER 201 SPRING 2012 1 - AN TOM PERRY L. SPECIAL. COLLECTIONS EXHIBITION HAROLD LEE LIBRARY B. BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY Much has been written in the scholarly and popular press Bible traveled with the English as they colonized the world. In about the creation of the King James Bible, its origins in earlier fact, monopolies on Bible printing ensured that the KingJames translations, the personalities who shaped its text,and the manner Bible was the only version available for export to the American ofitsprinting. Visitorstothisexhibition maybe familiarwithsome colonies, firmly establishing its place in religious life well before of the English Bible translations that came before the KingJames the War of Independence. Version: the Wycliffite Bible, Tyndale's Bible, the Great Bible, the Geneva (or Breeches) Bible, and the Bishop's Bible. Some of these earlier translations were considered heretical, while others had Twentieth century British literary critic Laurence the full endorsement o( the Church Housman asserted that no other bookor author of England. The KingJames trans- las had so wide and deep an influence on the form lators drew from many of these Bibles to create the text o( the King and substance of all the literary and poetic work James Version, essentially revising which followed during the next two centuries, as many translations into "one princi- has the {KingJames] Version of the [Bible]." pal good one" that could overcome the competing Bible versions and te KingJames Bible is a true religious, linguistic, interpretations used by quarreling id literary landmark worthy of celebration and factions within English Protestant- ism. commemoration for its 400-year impact on the The ascendancy of the King Hampton CourtPalace, where religious and cultural landscape of the James Bible as the essential Bible KingJamesIordereda newtranslation English-speaking world. text for worship and study was by oftheBiblebe undertaken no means assured. It faced stiff competition from the Geneva Bible, which was preferred by many early seventeenth-century readers, received no financial support The KingJames Version wasthe Bible for English-speaking fromthekingwhosuggested itbecreated,and imposedsignificant Protestants until fairly recently, as modern translations have sup- financial liabilities on the man who undertook its printing. planted it for individual study and denominational worship. Its Cultural, religious, and political forces over the next half decline in popularity means that it exerts less influence on the century of this version's existence finally contrived to make the languageand literatureofourmodernculture,but the KingJames KingJames Bible the only one used in England. The KingJames Bible still holds a central place in many Christian communities, includingThe Church ofJesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The centrality and ubiquity of the KingJames Bible from /(,/,'/.7' /', the late seventeenth through the early twentieth century meant that forgenerations o( English speakers, the KingJames transla- THE tion was at the forefront oi religious worship, private devotion, KING and personal or classroom reading. In fact, a copy of the King James Version may have been the only book owned by a house- hold. Small wonder, then, that so much of the speech and writ- JAMES ing and thought of previous generations borrows from the King James Bible: from direct quotation or allusion to indirect echoes of itsdiction,itssyntax,andtherhythmsof itslanguage. TheKing BIBLE James Bible translation has influenced music, politics, literature, andtheEnglish languageitself. AmericaneducatorNoah Webster observed in 1833,"The languageof the [KingJames] Bible has no inconsiderable influence in forming and preserving our national TheKingJames Bible MultipleeditionsoftheKingJamesBibleInn language" by actingas a touchstone for speech and writing. translation has influenced been usedovertheyears by TlieChurch of music, literature, andthe JesusChristofLatter-daySaints Forfurther information and a list ofsuggested readings about the history English languageitself ofthe KingJames Bible,please visit theonlineportion ofthis exhibition at http://wwwdib.byu.edu/sites/bible ./tier r THE KING JAMES BIBLE 4-00 7<7VV////// "C/// i SUMMER JO I 1 : SPRING 20 12 AN TOM PERRY I • SPECIAL COLLECTIONS EXHIBITION HAROLD B. LEE LIBRARY BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY