Most people think of the King James Version as the original Bible in English, and when I first thought about writing my book on Bible translations, I assumed I would start “in the beginning” with the legendary KJV.
But when I started doing my research, I learned there is a long and fascinating list of Bibles in English that not only came before the KJV but also played a significant role in its development.
John Wycliffe (ca. 1331–1384)
The first English translation of the entire Bible was the work of Oxford scholar John Wycliffe and his students, which was completed in the late 1300s. Wycliffe’s Bible was based on the Vulgate, a late fourth-century translation of the Bible in Latin that was the official Bible of the Catholic Church at that time. This means Wycliffe did not translate from the original languages but from Latin into English.
Wycliffe was a vocal critic of the church. His writings challenged many church practices he believed to be unbiblical and undermined the very authority of Catholic bishops and the political power of the pope. Because of this, Wycliffe and his followers (the Lollards) were accused of heresy.
The translation of the Bible that Wycliffe developed was, of course, not authorized by the church, yet it became quite popular during the Middle Ages. This created even more tension with church leaders, who had concerns about the Bible being available for everyone to read without leadership’s approval or ability to control how it was produced and distributed.
This tension between Bible translators and the established religious authorities would become a recurring theme in the history of early translations of the Bible.
William Tyndale (ca. 1494–1536)
John Wycliffe gets credit for producing the first complete English translation of the Bible, but the person historians widely recognize as the most important figure in the history of the English Bible is William Tyndale. Tyndale was a leading figure of the Protestant Reformation, and he was the first person to create an English translation of the Bible using Hebrew and Greek manuscripts as the textual basis.
It is hard to overstate the importance of Tyndale’s work, not only because he was focused on translating directly from the Hebrew and Greek but also because of his passion for creating a Bible that could be read by everyday people. This approach became the archetype for many future translations, and Tyndale’s work was so significant that much of what we find in the King James Bible is a direct result of his efforts.
Much like Wycliffe, William Tyndale was met with opposition by the church, and he lived in exile for years in various locations throughout Europe. The first complete copies of his translation of the New Testament were produced in 1526 in the German city of Worms, but only after an earlier printing in Cologne had to be abandoned when authorities raided the printer’s shop.
Tyndale also found himself on the wrong side of King Henry VIII when he publicly opposed the king’s decision to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. While working to complete his translation of the Old Testament in Belgium in 1535, Tyndale was betrayed by a so-called friend and arrested on charges of heresy. He was executed before he could complete his translation of the entire Bible. Despite his untimely death, William Tyndale’s work carried on.
Myles Coverdale (ca. 1488–1569)
Enter Myles Coverdale, Tyndale’s friend and fellow translator who completed and revised the work begun by Tyndale. The resulting translation was known as the Coverdale Bible, which became the first complete printed Bible into English when it was published in 1535. Coverdale dedicated his Bible to King Henry VIII even though it wasn’t an authorized version. Perhaps he hoped for a different fate than his friend Tyndale.
Two years later, in 1537, a man named John Rogers revised Coverdale’s work under the pseudonym Thomas Matthew and published it as the Matthew Bible. By this time, the position of the king and leaders of the Church of England had softened, or perhaps they had simply come to the realization that they were not going to be able to stop the Bible from being translated into English.
Either way, they decided to get in on the game, but the Matthew Bible was still too closely connected to Tyndale for their liking. So in 1538, they commissioned none other than Myles Coverdale to produce a revision of the Matthew Bible. The result was the Great Bible of 1539, so named for its size. It was approved by King Henry VIII and included a preface from the archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, making it the first officially sanctioned Bible in English.
Henry VIII and the English Reformation
Having mentioned Henry VIII several times now, I suppose it is important to note that all of this took place during the English Reformation (approximately 1527–1590), which — as you may remember from history class — was sparked when England’s most notorious king had his marriage to Catherine of Aragon annulled so that he could marry Anne Boleyn. It was a big mess, and in the process, the Church of England broke away from the Catholic Church.
Henry VIII died in 1547, succeeded briefly by his son, Edward VI, who died six years later in 1553. That’s when Henry’s daughter, Mary I (a.k.a. “Bloody Mary”), became queen. Mary was a devout Catholic, and she aimed to undo the reforms of her father by any means necessary. And that is what led to the Geneva Bible.
The Geneva Bible
Under Bloody Mary’s rule, Protestant scholars began to be imprisoned on charges of heresy (Mary executed two of the men mentioned previously, John Rogers and Thomas Cranmer, as heretics). Many of those not locked away fled from England and relocated to Switzerland.
One of the results of this new hub of Protestant scholars was the development of a collaborative new English Bible translation called the Geneva Bible, published in 1560. Even though it wasn’t authorized for use in England, the Geneva Bible was immensely popular among laypeople and clergy, and it remained so for the better part of a century.
I am convinced that the Geneva Bible was so successful because it presented the text of Scripture in a way that was unheard of at that time. It was the first English Bible to use verse numbers, and it featured a more modern and legible “Roman” typeface. It was made available in a variety of editions that were affordable for everyday people.
The Geneva Bible was also the first mass-produced Bible to include annotations, cross-references, book introductions, maps, and other study tools. You can imagine why people loved this Bible so much. It was, quite literally, the most reader-friendly Bible that had ever been produced.
The Bishops’ Bible
Back in England, after the death of Bloody Mary in 1558, her Protestant half-sister, Elizabeth I, became queen. As officials from the Church of England watched the success of the Geneva Bible, they realized that the Great Bible of 1539 needed an update, and this effort was led by the new archbishop of Canterbury, Matthew Parker.
The result was published in 1568 as the Bishops’ Bible, but it failed to include many of the innovative features that made the Geneva Bible so popular, and it wasn’t made available in affordable editions. So even though the Bishops’ Bible was the new authorized Bible of the Church of England, it was unable to match the popularity of the Geneva Bible.
The Douay-Rheims Bible
The flourish of new English Bible translations from the Protestant world demanded a response from the Catholic Church, and this task was assigned to members of the English College in Douay, France, which had become the home of many exiled English Catholics during the English Reformation.
Translated from the Latin Vulgate (the authoritative text of the Bible for the Catholic Church), the New Testament was published in 1582 in Rheims, France, and was originally known as the Rheims New Testament. Twenty-seven years later, an English translation of the Old Testament was published in two volumes from 1609 to 1610 in Douay. The combined work later became known as the Douay-Rheims Bible, the first complete Catholic translation of the Bible in English.
The primary purpose of the Douay-Rheims Bible, as stated on its title page and in its preface, wasn’t to provide English-speaking Catholics a Bible in their own language, but to enable Catholic clergy to better oppose what they saw as inadequacies in the ever-growing number of Protestant translations. The Old Testament arrived too late to make any significant impact on the King James Bible, but the publication of the Rheims New Testament and subsequent criticism of early English Protestant translations certainly had an influence on the King James translators.
Conclusion
The period spanning the Middle Ages to the Reformation era saw a flurry of activity in the realm of Bible translations. Numerous individuals and groups, often risking their lives, committed themselves to the monumental task of editing and improving upon the initial work of William Tyndale.
It cannot be overstated how important these remarkable contributions were to the ongoing development of the Bible in English. By the beginning of the seventeenth century, the unauthorized Geneva Bible had gained widespread popularity, vastly outpacing the Church of England’s officially recognized Bishops’ Bible.
However, with the ascension of King James to the throne in 1603, a new directive was issued. The king sought to outdo all previous translations by commissioning a superior version of the Bible. This new iteration, simply called the Authorized Version, would eventually become known as the King James Bible.
Bible Translations for Everyone is a fun and engaging guide through the complex world of Bible translations. It will help you understand the histories, advantages, and shortcomings of the most popular Bible versions, so you can choose the best version for each purpose. Get your copy today!
Rev.Tim Wildsmith (MDiv,Fuller Theological Seminary) is a pastor,writer, and YouTuberwhose Bible-related content has been viewed tens of millions of times by people around the globe from a wide array of Christian traditions and denominations. Tim has more than two decades of ministry experience and currently serves as one of the campus ministers at Belmont University, the largest ecumenical Christian college in the United States, where he teaches a course called “Understanding the Bible.” His first book,Bible Translations for Everyone, is out now from Zondervan Reflective.Tim lives in Nashville with his wife, Becca.
