The KJV is 400

Rev. Grace H. Simons

I am pretty sure that this is the first time I've ever noticed - let alone "celebrated" - the birthday of a book. But whether or not you like the idea, and whatever you think of the King James Version (or about the Bible in general) this year features conferences, television programs, new books, videos, blogs and exhibits on the KJV. Few books manage to be influential for 400 years, and though there have been a variety of other translations of the Bible, the KJV is still going strong. In fact, for a lot of Americans the KJV is the Bible.

Unitarian Universalists don't rely on the Bible exclusively, and when we refer to it, we usually prefer the NRSV - New Revised Standard Version. It's generally regarded as a more authentic translation and less sexist in its language. Of course, different UUs have their personal favorites. And we say that the Bible is one of the sources in which we find inspiration, but certainly not the only one.

So, what's the fuss? Sure, 400 years is a long time. Why would we care?

For starters, we live in an area where the King James Bible is held in high esteem. A lot of our neighbors and friends base their world view and their ideas about ethics and morality in the King James Bible. Or at least on what they know of it. It's a good idea for us to know some things about it. Not chapter and verse, though some of you may have references tucked away in your memory. I am thinking more of some history and context - things which affect the ways we understand the Bible and assess its contents and its importance. I think it's a great help to have some background knowledge when we hear the claims made by our more literal-minded neighbors.

And the King James Version has influence well beyond the circle of believers. It has become woven into our culture. Personally, I find that even though I grew up with the Douai-Reims version, and even though the Bible is no longer central to my faith, some verses from King James are filed in my memory.

"The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want ... "
"What doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?"
"Love thy neighbor as thyself."
"In my Father's house are many mansions ... "

You may have other passages that come back to you now and again. These and other references have become part of our wider cultural heritage.

So when I read a piece about the KJV anniversary, I took it as an excuse to learn more about this influential book. Here's some of what I found.

1611 is the accepted publication date for the KJV. Some people claim it was May 2, but there's no evidence of an exact date. William Shakespeare died five years later, so he was a contemporary. English was definitely different then, but my sources say that the translators chose formal, rather old-fashioned language for the day. Perhaps they were trying to give it a sense of dignity and importance right from the start. It was a yeasty time for the development of the language, and also an unsettled time for religion in England. Both of those factors influence us to this day.

Succeeding English monarchs had come from different sides of the conflicts of the Reformation. When a Protestant monarch sat on the throne, Catholics were persecuted or left for friendlier lands. When a Catholic reigned, it was the Protestants who were scattered. Besides the uncertainty and instability this caused, it meant that exiles were exposed to religious ideas that were unfamiliar in England. When they returned, they brought new patterns and ideas with them. Elizabeth I had established a Protestant church, but English religion was greatly divided.

When James I, also a Protestant, came to the throne in 1603, he became an active influence. James was interested in theology, but he also had several personal agenda items. He convened the Hampton Court Conference, a group of bishops and moderate puritans. They couldn't reach agreements on doctrine or practice, but during the conversations, someone suggested that it would be a good idea to develop a new translation of the Bible, one they might all use. It was the beginning of the KJV.

Now, some people think that the King James Version is the first English Bible, but that is not the case. In fact, partial translations (usually the Gospels and some Psalms) date back to the 9th Century. Of course, the language kept changing. That and other problems of translation mean passages are often hard to recognize. A 14th century translation of the 23rd Psalm reads, "Lord govern me and nothing shall me want: in stead of pasture there he me set." Not quite what we're used to!

Best known of the later translators are John Wycliffe, sometimes called the first English Protestant, and William Tyndale. His translation was originally banned and burned in England, but later became the source of much of the language in the King James. The two versions in common circulation in the late 1500s were the Geneva Bible and the Bishop's Bible. The Geneva Bible was earlier, and printed in Calvinist Geneva. It had some anti- monarchical and anti-episcopal notes printed in its margins. The Bishop's Bible was produced to correct those "errors" - by a group with a large number of bishops It was sent out for use in all the cathedrals in England and quickly spread to the smaller churches. As you might imagine, the Bishop's Bible was the favorite of Church of England adherents and the Geneva was commonly used by the Puritans. Could a version that might be acceptable to both be developed?

Then there was King James' personal agenda. The new translation, dedicated to him, had three advantages in his eyes. These advantages were ensured by a set of fifteen rules established to govern the work of the translators. First, it removed the anti-royalty notes, so that any criticism of the king or bishops was dissociated from Biblical authority. Second, it tried to bring together the two main factions of English Protestants, a unifying influence for the country. (The Catholics and Jews were on their own.) Third, since the edition was published under his name, and the introduction lauded him, it reinforced the king's position as head of the English Church as well as the head of state. He liked the way it buttressed his overall authority.

The translation project itself was a major undertaking. Six teams of translators were appointed, mostly outstanding Biblical scholars. They were fluent in a range of ancient and contemporary languages that is astounding to me: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, Syriac, Coptic, Arabic and Ethiopic plus French, German and Italian, which were used to compare foreign translations as they set the English.

Even with this background, the work was far from trivial. For starters, no "original" text of any of the books of the Bible existed, even in the 17th Century. Fragments of copies had long been used and compared in hopes of discerning the original writer's words. To complicate matters for the Hebrew Scriptures, the ancient writing system contains no vowels. Here's one example of the problems that caused: the consonants MLK can be read as MeLek - king - or MoLeK - the name of the false and wicked god of the Ammonites. If you're the translator, you want to get the right character.

Sometimes the difference of a single word has theological implications. In Timothy 3:16, Wycliffe wrote, "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and profitable to doctrine ... (and) instruction ... in righteousness." Tynsdale rendered the same passage, "For all scripture given by inspiration of god is profitable ... " and so on. The word "and" makes the difference between all Scripture being inspired by God and the possibility that only some of it is inspired. If that is so, only the inspired parts would be profitable for doctrine and instruction. So is it all inspired or not? This is a theological point argued to this day.

Another theological dispute - one critical to our own tradition, is the inclusion of the passage called the Johanine Comma. It's 1 John 5:7: "For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one." This verse is the only direct biblical reference to the trinity and it may not be original. Many believe it was added to support church doctrine. Erasmus' first two editions omit it. Some believe he was pressured to put it into his third edition. Its inclusion in the KJV has made the divinity of Jesus an article of faith for most Christians. Unitarians disagree, so we've been considered heretics ever since.

Other theological insertions are made by adding titles and sub titles to chapters and sections. Perhaps the most notable are those in the Song of Solomon. It's a book so sensuous that many wonder how it was ever included in the canon at all. The inserted titles frame its passages as an allegory of Christ's love for the church, rather than the words of a human lover. I have to say that's not what I see when I read it!

The KJV finally went to print in 1611, but no exact date is known. Actually, two versions were printed that year - the "He" Bible and the "She" Bible. The difference is one word in the story of Ruth - the pronoun in one, he, refers to Boaz going into the city and the other, she, to Ruth entering it. The switch was made to improve the story's coherence.

These folio editions were large - each page was about 11 x 16 inches. They were meant to be kept on church lecterns. Remember that few people could read in those days, so most learned the Bible by listening. Scholars believe that the meter of the language shows choices made to make the text easier to hear, understand and remember.

From 1611 on, new printings have appeared at irregular intervals. To my amusement, several are named for the errors they contain. The Wicked Bible left out the "not" in the sixth commandment - so it read, "Thou shalt commit adultery." A Bible printed in 1795 had Jesus saying, "Let the children first be killed" in the book of Mark, when it should have read "filled." One from 1801 became known as the Murderer's Bible because in Jude 16 the murmurers became "murderers." Misprints or no, the King James Version quickly eclipsed the other Bibles of the day. Neither the Bishop's Bible nor the Geneva was printed after 1620, less than 10 years after the KJV appeared.

Now let's cross the Atlantic. The Pilgrims who arrived in Massachusetts in 1620 most likely brought the Geneva Bible favored in their tradition. However it was soon overtaken by the KJV, which was used by the other Protestant colonies. (Maryland was Catholic.) The two Great Awakening movements of the 1700s made use of the KJV and emphasized the importance of emotional conversion - a feature we still see in conservative Christian churches.

Protestants had long claimed that the Bible is the foundation of faith, since that removed the ecclesiastical authority claimed by the Catholic Church. As bibles became more available, literacy increased and emotion buttressed the certainty of faith in America, biblical literalism became more common. Gordon Campbell, in his book Bible: The Story of the King James Version, notes that American Protestants diverged from British Christianity as the Brits became more rational in their approach to religion. He writes that the Americans who were more rational exceptions - well - they became Unitarians.

The movement toward more personal, emotional conversion and insistence on the literal truth of the words of the Bible were crystallized in a series of tracts printed between 1910 and 1915. They were titled The Fundamentals. Using biblical quotations from the King James Version, five requirements for Christian believers were explained. One of them was belief in the literal truth of the words of the Bible. This is where the name "fundamentalist" originated. The tides of religious times and fortunes have ebbed and flowed in the century since then, but it's clear that we live in a period of great fundamentalist influence. Their efforts and claims appear in nearly every aspect of contemporary life.

Plenty of other stories about the history of the KJV, its use and importance have been retold in several readily available books. I will leave those to your own reading. One of the interesting areas is the influence of the KJV on our literature and language. The basic stories are present in all the versions. But many of our common phrases come from the KJV. Let me list just a few:

"eat, drink, and be merry" (I thought that was Shakespeare)
"the apple of his eye"
"fight the good fight"
"Am I my brother's keeper?"
"in the fullness of time"
and - a surprise to me - "fell flat on his face!"

David Crystal lists 257 idioms that the KJV has contributed to contemporary English. Quite a record of influence considering how much the language has changed in the last 400 years!

So what's the message I'd like you to take away with you this morning? Well, I hope you think there were some interesting stories and facts. I am always intrigued by quirky details like the Wicked Bible or underlying motives like King James' power agenda. But I also think there are some helpful pieces and important implications in the story of the KJV.

My understanding of the Bible - whatever version - is that the books are a record of a people's understanding of their place in existence and their relationship to the power that creates and upholds life. They saw that power as divine and conceptualized a Being that embodied it. That Being has been called by many names, but our culture calls it God.

The Bible has lots of images and references that come out of an ancient understanding of the structure of the cosmos. So the earth is central. The sun moves around the earth and can be made to stand still. God can be visited on the mountain top. A holy person can be carried up into the heavens. Given our current knowledge of the solar system and its place in the universe, none of this is credible.

At the same time, the Bible contains timeless truths about human nature and behavior - about love and loyalty, temptation and treachery, inspiration, hope and resolve. My colleague at UU Livermore, the Rev Lucas Hergert, says we UUs take the Bible seriously but not literally. I'm OK with that. Surely there are plenty of things in the Bible that I reject. There are passages that contradict each other. But the various books were written at different times and by different authors. I think they represent the earnest understanding of their author's day. And surely we can learn from rejecting bad examples and advice as well as from embracing good ones.

There is also much of lyrical comfort and inspiration in the Bible.

• "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want ... " speaks to us when we feel that no one understands.
  
  
• Who can face the loss of a loved one and not know the truth that "Love is strong as death?"
  
  
• I would say the ethical advice of Micah 6 can't be surpassed: "What is required of you but to do justice, love kindness and walk humbly?"
  
  
• "Love thy neighbor as thyself," opens the doors of compassion.
  
  
• "I come that you may have life and have it abundantly," puts a frame on all the teachings of Jesus.

And to those who say that every word of the Bible is God's word, I sadly shake my head. Too often they refer to the words of the KJV - a translation drawn from ancient fragments written in languages understood by few. No one can prove they have the sense of the original, though they may come close. The Bible contains too many possibilities for interpretation, for small changes with big theological implications. And all that is true even if you believe that the original writers were divinely inspired. I am not convinced of that. So I echo Lucas' words - I take the Bible seriously but not literally. I say its writers were earnest but not divinely inspired. And I say we cannot afford to ignore the KJV. How about you?

September 25, 2011

Rev. Grace Simons left us a collection of her sermons when she retired in October, 2011. We have a brief biography of Rev. Grace, and the last edition of Grace Notes, a column she wrote for our newsletter.
We also have sermons by Rev. Joe Cherry, our Interim Minister.
Our Guests, who include visiting clergy, lay people and one rocket scientist.