The Origins of the King James Bible

 In their influence on the English language, only the works of Shakespeare can compare with the King James Bible, which is 400 years old this year. Phrases such as “by the skin of one’s teeth”, “arise and shine” and “at their wits’ end” all originated with the King James translators. Others, such as “salt of the earth”, “powers that be” and “he that is not with me is against me” have also come to us through the King James Bible (although they first appeared in the earlier translations, which the King James translators consulted assiduously as part of their task). 

For almost 270 years, the King James Bible was the only English translation of the Bible available. For the great majority of families, it was the only book they owned. Generations of children learned to read from its pages, imbibing the richness of its rhythms, syntax and imagery, which in turn shaped their own use of language, both spoken and written. According to Professor Alister McGrath, in his book In the Beginning (2008), “Without the King James Bible, there would have been no Paradise Lost, no Pilgrim’s Progress, no Handel’s Messiah, no Negro spirituals, and no Gettysburg Address.” 

In an age of instant access to any kind of information, the influence of a single book is hard for us to comprehend. But to generations of English speakers, the King James Bible was central to their lives, offering advice and guidance not only in spiritual matters, but also in political, social and economic issues. Its teachings were the guiding force of the development of the English-speaking world. And as the English-speaking world spread its horizons, the influence of the Bible spread, becoming the basis of new societies as far apart as America and Australia.

Even now, 400 years and many translations later, the King James Version still ranks third in a list of Bible sales published last year by the Christian Booksellers’ Association, outsold only by its updated version, the New King James, and the New International Version. 

So how did this extraordinary work come into being? The story begins in 1603, when James VI of Scotland came to the throne as James I of England, and inherited a realm that was riven with religious tensions. While Queen Elizabeth I’s via media had managed to keep the lid on a simmering stew of religious differences during her long reign, her death had given the various factions the courage to finally speak out. For the Puritans, long oppressed under Elizabeth, James offered hope: in Scotland he had presided over the Presbyterian kirk, which was far more reformed, having done away with many elements of the Church of England that more radical reformers regarded as papist. Primarily, the Puritans wanted to rid the church of ritual that had no basis in the Scriptures—such as the wearing of the surplice, or the use of wedding rings, or kneeling for communion. So, in the time-honoured way, a petition signed by a thousand clergy was presented to the new king on his long progress from Scotland towards his throne in London. King James, keen to address their concerns, called a conference for the following January at Hampton Court. 

The Puritans were hopeful. But they couldn’t know that in fact James detested the kirk in which he had been raised. He much preferred the English system, where the monarch, divinely appointed, reigned over a church that was governed in turn by his bishops. This antipathy to Presbyterianism was encouraged by the Bishop of London, Richard Bancroft (soon to become Archbishop of Canterbury) who saw in the new king an ally in his battle against the reformers, and at the Hampton Court conference the small Puritan faction that was invited gained very little for their cause.

They did, however, plant the seed that became the mighty oak of the King James Version when they asked for a single translation of the Bible to be authorised for reading in church. What they hoped for, one can assume, is official approval for the translation known as the Geneva, translated in 1587 by the exiled Protestant community in that city, which offered extensive marginal notes “to explain the hard places”.

King James, however, had no intention of authorising the Geneva: from his point of view many of the marginal notes came close to sedition and, in an age when the Bible represented the ultimate authority on all matters, both political and religious, a text which often emphasised the tyranny of kings, and the rightness of deposing them, had little to recommend it. A shrewd monarch, he compromised, and ordered that a new translation be made, with no marginal notes. But, having inherited a treasury that was all but empty after years of war with the Spanish, he made no offer to pay for it, and the translation was eventually financed through the church itself. The printing costs would later be borne by private enterprise, some of whom lost heavily on their investments.

By the end of 1604, the new translation was under way. Six companies were formed of the greatest biblical scholars of the day and the books of the Bible were apportioned out between them. The six companies, comprising a total of forty-seven scholars whose names have come down to us (there may have been more) were based at Westminster, Oxford and Cambridge, with two companies in each location.

So how did they work? The fifteen rules listed in Professor McGrath’s book were drawn up by Archbishop Bancroft with the King’s approval, and they were very specific. The first required that the translators follow “The ordinary Bible read in the Church, commonly called the Bishop’s Bible … as little altered as the Truth of the original will permit.” Another rule allowed for use of other translations “when they agree better with the Text than the Bishop’s Bible”. There were to be no marginal notes, and after each man in the company had translated the same chapters they were to “meet together, confer what they have done, and agree for their Parts what shall stand”.

Unlike our modern view of creative production, which tends to value originality above almost all other qualities, writers of the Jacobean period worked on the understanding that they were standing on the shoulders of giants. As Professor McGrath observes, they “were conscious of standing within a stream of cultural and intellectual achievement, from which they benefited and to which they were called to contribute”. With our modern consciousness it is hard to imagine that such a masterpiece could be produced by committee, but that is how it was done. And the manner of its writing is in stark contrast to most of the English translations that had come before, which, with the exception of the Bishop’s Bible, were produced in fear and great secrecy, or in exile, or both. 

Some of the translators were famous in their own right. Lancelot Andrewes, dean of Westminster Abbey, headed the First Westminster Company, which translated the first twelve books of the Old Testament. Well known to scholars of ecclesiastical writing, his words are also known to readers of T.S. Eliot, who said of his sermons that “they rank with the finest English prose of their time, of any time”. Eliot’s poem “Journey of the Magi” begins with lines from Andrewes’s Christmas sermon of 1622: “A cold coming they had of it at this time of the year, just the worst time of the year to take a journey …”

Others translators were famous for less lofty achievement. Olga Opfell, in her book The King James Bible Translators, tells us that Richard Thomson, known for his translations of the obscene epigrams of the Roman poet Martial, was “a debauched … English Dutchman, who seldom went to bed one night sober”. George Abbot, member of the Second Oxford Company, later to become Archbishop of Canterbury, was known for his heated temper. According to Opfell, “He once sent to prison 140 undergraduates, who had sat with their hats on while he preached!”

Perhaps it is not surprising that the translation took over six years to complete, finally being published in 1611 to universal lack of interest. Most people, it seems, were already happy with their Geneva, which contained all those helpful (and possibly seditious) marginal notes. And as the Puritan agenda came to the fore in the years preceding the English Civil War, a Bible commissioned by a king would inevitably take second place to a Bible that was more obviously sympathetic to the Parliamentarian cause, in spite of various measures that had been taken to suppress it. 

So how did the King James Bible come to occupy such a central place in our culture and language? 

The answer lies partly in the backlash against the Puritans that followed the demise of the Commonwealth. With Charles II restored to the throne, the Geneva, a symbol of the Parliamentarian cause, fell from favour. The King James Bible, according to Professor McGrath, “was now seen as a pillar of Restoration society, holding together church and state, the bishops and monarch, at a time when social cohesion was essential to England’s future as a nation”.

So successful was the King James Bible in assuring conformity that no new translation was attempted for 270 years. As Associate Professor Ian Young, Chair of the Department of Hebrew, Biblical and Jewish Studies at Sydney University, says, its “long-standing history had established its place throughout the English-speaking world and it was hard for people to see the need to replace it”. And it was recognised “as an enduring literary masterpiece … the phrases in the King James are so well put together”. 

But in the light of modern scholarship is it still the best translation? The answer, sadly, has to be no. According to Professor Young:

The King James doesn’t make any sense at all in places … some few bits actually didn’t make any sense when the translators translated it, but more often the situation is that other parts have become so archaic that they don’t mean much to modern people.

But, he adds, “it is closer to the textures of the traditional Hebrew text than other versions”.

The King James translators would take no offence. They had no pretensions to literary greatness or to a monopoly on the truth. Clarity was the quality they sought, for as the Bible’s preface asks, “how shall men meditate in that, which they cannot understand?”

And as other new translations continue to take their place on bookshop shelves, the King James translators would be pleased to know that their work became the tallest of the giants on whose shoulders others now stand.

Samantha Grosser is a Sydney author whose first novel, Another Time and Place, has just been released in Australia. She is currently working on a new novel, A Silent Voice, which is set against the world of the King James translators.