History of the King James Bible: Over 400 Years of the Authorized Version?

King James Bible

HISTORY OF THE KING JAMES BIBLE

Over four hundred fourteen years ago, on May 2, 1611, marked the publishing, at the request of the Anglican clergy, of what would become the Authorized Version of the Bible to wide acclaim.

But there are at least three problems with that statement.

While it is true that the King James Bible was published in 1611 and eventually became the most influential Bible in the English-speaking world, if not the most printed book of all time:

1. The Anglican clergy did not request it, at least not by the conformist Episcopalian ministers.
2. Nor did it subsequently become officially authorized by the King.
3. Finally, those who initially requested it, the Puritans, refused to read it, instead using the English-language Geneva Bible.

The details of how the King James Bible came to be are rather more complex. While May 2 is the date that the publication is celebrated, the actual printing date is not known with certainty.

Origin of the King James Bible

Mary Queen of Scots

It was the heyday of William Shakespeare and good manners. The Tudor dynasty came to an end with the death of Queen Elizabeth I. Following this, the Scottish King James VI, the son of Mary Queen of Scots, was brought to the English throne as James I of England.

As James made his way from Scotland to London, the Puritans intercepted him. They presented him with the Millenary Petition in 1603, signed by 1,000 Puritan ministers (1,000 = millenary, representing about 10% of all English clergy).

They requested some modest changes to the Church of England. James ignored almost all of their requests. One that interested him, and that he believed would ultimately placate the Puritans, was their request to create a new English translation of the Bible.

Who were the Puritans, and from where did they come?

Henry VIII

Henry VIII

To answer that requires a review of royal history from one of the most colorful periods in England’s history. You’ll recall that Henry VIII of England was married six times, ostensibly in the hope of producing a male heir. His first marriage to Catherine of Aragon, the daughter of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain (who funded Columbus‘ voyages to the Americas), had brought the English Crown vast tracts of land on the Continent. But she could not give him a son who survived infancy. But the Pope would not grant Henry a divorce (annulment).

The Queen’s nephew, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, the most powerful monarch in Europe – who Martin Luther appeared before at the Diet of Worms – did not take kindly to the idea of the King of England jettisoning his Aunt Catherine. For Henry to obtain an annulment so he could marry Anne Boleyn, it was expedient to break from the Roman Catholic Church and set himself up as the supreme head of the Church of England.

However, theologically, Henry did not move toward a Protestant theology. Indeed, earlier in his life, he had written a critique of Luther’s teachings, entitled “Assertion of the Seven Sacraments Against Luther,” and was declared by the Pope to be “Defender of the Faith” in 1521. Nevertheless, in rejecting the authority of Rome over the church in his realm, he seized Roman Catholic property in England and closed monasteries, and the “tithe” (one tenth of a churchgoer’s income) no longer went to Rome, but to the Crown of England.

Edward VI

Edward VI

Henry’s successor, his only son Edward VI (from his third wife, Jane Seymour), became an advanced Protestant under the tutelage of Henry Bullinger, the Swiss Protestant Reformer, and the chaplaincy of John Knox, the Scottish Reformer who would later study under John Calvin in Geneva.

However, this advanced form of Protestantism in England came to an end with Edward’s death at the age of 15.

Mary Tudor

Mary I

Edward’s half-sister, Mary I, also known as Mary Tudor, the daughter of Henry VIII’s first wife, Catherine of Aragon, succeeded Edward in 1553. Mary was bitter following her parents’ divorce. Like her mother, she was devoutly Roman Catholic.

While Mary wished to restore the Catholic Church in England, at least politically, if not economically, the Pope would not cooperate with her unless she pledged to return the Roman Church’s lands that her father had nationalized. However, Parliament would not allow Mary to do this. Doing so would have effectively brought England into the Spanish Habsburg holdings as a mere province.

Instead, Mary killed off the most influential of her Protestant opponents at home, including the Protestant Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer; Protestant leaders at Oxford, Nicholas Ridley and Hugh Latimer; and at least 300 other Protestant leaders. This earned her the title “Bloody Mary,” and prompted the writing of Foxe’s Book of Martyrs. At this time, John Knox fled to Geneva, Switzerland, where Calvin resided, while many English Protestants went into exile in the Netherlands, Germany, France, and other parts of Europe.

Elizabeth I

Elizabeth I

At Mary’s death in 1558, she was succeeded by her half-sister, Elizabeth I. Henry VIII’s last heir, “Good Queen Bess,” ruled a Golden Age of England for 45 years, although not quite as long as the recent Queen Elizabeth II, who had ruled for over 70 years.

By the way, when Elizabeth II was crowned in 1953, she ordered that every child in England receive a King James Bible. Additionally, the Commemorative Prince William and Kate Middleton Royal Wedding Bible is the King James Bible.

Elizabeth I could not be Catholic lest she admit that her father’s divorce from Catherine to marry her mother, Anne Boleyn, was invalid and that she herself was illegitimate. Instead, she pragmatically fashioned a Via Media, a Church of England of the “middle way” that featured a High Church that would appeal to her subjects in the House of Lords with a Catholic liturgy, worship style, and rituals.

Elizabeth liked the candles, clerical robes, kneeling for communion, the pomp, and the music. She did not so much care for the sermons and, on more than one occasion, would rudely interrupt sermons that annoyed her. In her model, the Low Church included a weak form of Calvinistic doctrine to appease her Protestant subjects in the House of Commons.

Here’s where the Puritans fit in:

When the Marian Exiles, those who fled the persecutions of Bloody Mary, returned from Europe to England, expecting to enjoy a new Protestant Queen, they found a church with more Catholic tendencies than they preferred. They wanted to see the Church of England change more quickly from the Catholic forms of worship and church government to a simpler form of worship that they had witnessed on the Continent.

Although they still believed the Anglican Church was the “true church” – and did not wish to be perceived as Separatists but rather as non-conformists – they called themselves “the godly.” However, they were called by those who did not like them “precise,” or less frequently, but ultimately more permanently, “Puritans.” They were Anglicans, but they did not care for the Episcopalian form of church government.

What is an Episcopalian government?

The New Testament Greek word “episcopos” or overseer is usually translated as bishop. Not unlike the Catholic Church, the Anglican Church practiced a hierarchical system of government with bishops, under whom were priests, then deacons.

Puritans preferred either a congregational form of government – each local church was independent with a democratic polity – or a presbyterian form of government.

The New Testament word “presbuteros” means “elder,” and hence, a presbyterian church government involves a plurality of elders elected as representatives of the congregation. This polity was popularized under John Calvin in Geneva and was emulated by his follower, John Knox, in Scotland. American Presbyterianism traces its roots to the Church of Scotland (Presbyterian).

James I

James I

These Puritans, who had felt suppressed under Elizabeth, now, with the advent of James as the new monarch, asked for, among other things, a new English translation of the Bible from the original languages to be translated and published in England.

King James I, a well-educated man who considered himself an intellectual and enjoyed engaging in theological debates, granted their request.

He had proposed that he had “never yet seen a Bible well translated into English.”

Bill Petro, your friendly neighborhood historian
billpetro.com

Where to read more:

Periodicals:

• Church History journal, Issue 100 “Celebrating the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible.”

Books:

• “Wide as the Waters, The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspires” by Benson Bobrick
• “In the Beginning, the Story of the King James Bible and How it Changed a Nation, a Language, and a Culture” by Alister McGrath.