richardmajorpowerpointonkjb - revised for web

8/3/2019 RichardMajorPowerPointonKJB - REVISED FOR WEB

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GUNPOWDER,

SPITTLE &PARCHMENT:

The curious origins

of the greatest English Bible

Richard Major


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a talk given

at the four hundredth anniversarycommemoration

of the King James Bible

at Faculty of Teacher Education,

Zagreb, Croatia,

on 10 November 2011


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organised bythe Anglican Chaplaincy of Zagreb

(www.anglican.hr)and

Hravatsko Biblijsko Drutvo(www.hbd.hr)

[email protected]
http://www.anglican.hr/http://www.hbd.hr/http://www.hbd.hr/http://www.anglican.hr/


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Its a great privilege to be here before you. And its a pleasure to be here

to praise something as splendid and beautiful as the King James Bible.Were come together this evening to commemorate the greatest

of all modern bibles. Youll be hearing from Janet Berkovic about its

literary beauty, and from Jutta Henner about the principles of its

translation.Its my job to tell you why, humanly speaking, the King James

Bible came into existence. Im here to discuss the politics and history.

If you came expecting an edifying story youll be disappointed.

Its a matter of intrigue, perversion, menace, and above all of violence:

of gunpowder, spittle and grubby old parchment. The production of theKing James Bible was a desparate act, made in desparate times.

And that, I will argue, is why it sounds so sublime and so

peaceful. It hadto sound like that.

y old parchment. The production of the King James Bible was a desparate act, made in desparate times:and that, I will argue, is why it sounds so sublime and so peaceful. It had tosound like that.

Lets begin with the man behind the King James Bible: King James himself.


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Lets begin with the man behind the King James Bible:

King James himself.y ol

d parchment. The production of the King James Bible was a desparate act, made in desparate times: and that, I

will argue, is why it sounds so sublime and so peaceful. It had tosound like that.

Lets begin with the man behind the King James Bible: King James himself.

L


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1.

SPITTLE:King James and his Bible


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In spring of 1603 a curious little Scot travelled south to England,

a country he had never seen before.James had been King of Scotland for 33 years.

.y old parchment. The production of the King James Bible was a desparate act, made in desparate times:

and that, I will argue, is why it sounds so sublime and so peaceful. It had tosound like that.


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Now at last, after a lifetime of waiting, he had become King

of the much larger and richer realm of England.

.y old parchment. The production of the King James Bible was a desparate act, made in desparate times:

and that, I will argue, is why it sounds so sublime and so peaceful. It had tosound like that.Lets begin with the man behind the King James Bible: King James himself.


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It is difficult to like James.

Of course hed had a wretched life. His mother was the

infamous

. y old parchment. The production of the King James Bible was a desparate act, made in desparate times:


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Mary,Queenof Scots,

the most

notoriouswoman ofthe age.

His fatherwas


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the pitiful Henry, Lord Darnley,

a diseased and dimwitted teenager.

In March 1566, when Mary was heavily pregnant,

Darnleys cronies broke into her bedroom, put a gun to her head,


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and stabbed to death David Rizzio,


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her Italian secretary.Very soon afterward later James was born; then the house

where Darnley was staying was blown up with gunpowder,


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and Darnley was found in the orchard,


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dead.

Everyone thought Mary was guilty of her husbands assassination.She was forced to abdicate, and fled to England,

where she plotted to murder Queen Elizabeth.

In the end, Elizabeth had to have her


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beheaded.


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Meanwhile

her son,little James Stuart

was, fromthe age of one,


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James VI,King of Scots.


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He grew up ugly andfurtive. He stammered.

His tongue was too bigfor his mouth he had theunfortunate habit of

spitting,

which everyone noticed,which annoyed everyone,


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and which somehow seemed to define him.

James was, in a way,clever, an intellectual but without being,in any sensible

direction, intelligent.He was bookish andfoolish. His nickname

was the wisest fool in

Christendom. He wasa pedant, a bigot and abore. His mind wasfull of bent, bitter,nightmarish notions,


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and so werehis books.


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The book King James was proudest of was not the King James Bible,

but a treatise he wrote as King of Scots called


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Dmonologie (1597),

which was all about witches:how to detect if they had

got through a keyhole;how to track them down;how to prosecute

and kill them.


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Such he was,for many decades:King of Scotland;

scribbler of treasties;witch-hunter;red-headed, arrogant, sneaky,

full of spit.

He was waiting, waiting for a death, waiting for his splendid cousin


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Elizabeth I,Queen

of Englandand Ireland,


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to die; and when she did, early in 1603,

James came south to


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London,


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the greatest metropolis of Christendom,


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to be crowned


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Great thoughElizabeth had been,England was

tired of her,and expectations

were high for

king.


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King James.

All those expectations were


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disappointed.

His reign wasa failure and ascandal.

England hasnever before orsince known


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James himself was grossly fond of a succession of

a morass ofintrigue,corruptionand depravity.of almostunthinkable

wickedness,

of poisoning,assassinationand debauch.


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beautiful

young men,

of whomthe very

worst,


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Steenie, createdby JamesDuke of Buckingham,

was allowed to

dominate thegovernment.

James was notoriouseverywhere.

About the time he washaving theKing James Bibleprinted, this


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filthy poemwas being circulatedin France


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James was despised throughout Europe,and under the mismanagement of Buckingham

the prestige of the kingdom sank low.

More seriously, the king abused the English constitution,and bequeathed a civil war to his saintly son and successor.

James was, surely,


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the worst kingwe have ever had.He left our history

defiled withhis spittle.


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But one very good thing came out of James reign.

James I commissioned a revised translation of the Bible; and the

beauty and dignity of its English dazzled everyonethen, and eversince. As long as the language lasts, people, religious or not, will read

the King James Version with delight.

The very phrase King Jameshas come to mean, most often, not

the ghastly little monarch, but the glorious book he ordered intoexistence.

Did King James commission the King James Bible out of virtue or

poetry or good taste?

No; not a bit of it. He commissioned it out of fear. His fear was

the origin of its beauty.y old

parchment. The production of the King James Bible was a desparate act, made in desparate times: and that,

I will argue, is why it sounds so sublime and so peaceful. It had tosound like that.


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2.

GUNPOWDER:

The explosive nature of

translating the Bible


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A mediaevalmanuscriptof the

Vulgate Bible


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Gutenbergsprinted

Vulgate Bible

of 1454

The Louvain printing of the Vulgate Bible of 1583


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William

Tyndale,

executed1536


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TyndalesNew Testament(1525)


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Coverdales Bible1535


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VIVAT REX!


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GOD SAVETHE KING!


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TheBishops Bible

1568


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TheBishops Bible

1568


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The Geneva Bible,


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,1560, 1576


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Ephesians i3-4

headers,d f h b


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defining the subject

interpolated essays

marginal commentary,

setting out Calvinistdoctrine

the actual text


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Douai-RheimsBible1582


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A crash-test dummy mock-up of the House of Lords inThe Gunpowder Plot: Exploding The Legend(ITV, 2005).


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A crash-test dummy mock-up of King James opening parliament inThe Gunpowder Plot: Exploding The Legend(ITV, 2005).


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The peers of the realm seconds before the blast


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3.

PARCHMENT:

The creation of a new Bible


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Hampton Court


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The Hampton Court conference, 1604

Psalm xci5


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Psalm xci5

Thou shalt not be afraid for theterror by night

(King James Bible)

Psalm xci5


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Psalm xci5

Thou shall not nede to be afrayed forenybugges by night.

The Coverdale Bible(popularly known as the Bug Bible)

Jeremiah viii22


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Jeremiah viii

Is there no balm in Gilead?

(King James Bible)

Jeremiah viii22


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Jeremiah viii

Is there no tryacle in Gilead?

The Great Bible(henceforth known as

the Treacle Bible)

Genesis iii7


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Genesis iii7

they sewed fig leaves together,and made themselves aprons.

(King James Bible)

Genesis iii7


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Genesis iii7

they sowed figge-tree leaves together,and made themselves breeches.

The Geneva Bible

(generally known asthe Breeches Bible)

L l t


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Lancelot

Andrewes,

general editorof the KingJames Bible,

Bishop ofChichester

and then Ely

h d


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Richard

Bancroft,

Archbishopof Canterbury(died 1610)


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The translators present their workto King James


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TheKing James

Bible1611


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A title-page thatavoids looking like

mere royalistgovernmentpropanda


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no doctrinalcommentary,


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no doctrinalcommentary

just a few marginal

notes to explainGreek and Hebrew

terms;


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elegantly


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elegantly

printedwith

modest,uncontroversiaheadnotes.

The there was, alas, a nasty Preface,dedicating the whole Bible :


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dedicating the whole Bible :

and continuing:


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Its unpleasantly aggressive towardRoman Catholics and Puritans:


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Roman Catholics and Puritans:


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But what does that matter?

We can skip the fawning

Dedication to King James;

we can forget what King Jameshimself was like.

The King James Bible will always be


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The King James Bible will always be

the greatest English Bible

notbecause it was a fresh translation(it wasnt; 70% of the KJB

New Testament is simply Tyndale),


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butbecause it was thefinal perfectionof nine decades of developmentin English Bible translation.


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The first decade of King Jamesreign saw the mature perfectionof the English language.

It was the age of Shakespeares


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final plays, for instance.


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The political background ofthe King James Bible is sordid.

King James himself isan obscene figure.


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And his revised translationdid not fulfil his political goals.

For although its literary excellencedrove all competitors


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drove all competitors

from the market;although it soon became

the English Bible.although Papists and Puritans

embraced it

the Roman Catholicswere never reconciled to the

Church of England


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And, as for the Puritans,they rebelled against King Jamesson, the saintly Charles Stuart,


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The English dynastyKing James founded

was overthrown,its place eventually usurped

by princes from Germany.


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But the English BibleKing James sponsored

has never been overthrown,nor had its place usurped.

The glory of King James Bibleh l d h d


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has outlasted the disgraces

and scandals of his reign the gunpowder and the spittle.

In the end no one could resist it.It has dominated English literature

and the English languageever since 1611,

unaltered


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except for printers errors!

beginning with the so-calledPrinters Bible of 1612,its second year of publication:

Psalm cxix161


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Princes have persecuted mewithout a cause

was misprinted as

Psalm cxix161


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Printers have persecuted mewithout a cause

(Printers Bible of 1612)

Exodus xx14


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Thou shaltnot commit adultery.

(King James Bible)

Exodus xx14


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Thou shaltcommit adultery.

(TheAdulterous Bible of 1631;

printers fined 300;only 11 copies survive)

John viii11


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Go and sin no more

(King James Bible)

John viii11


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Go and sin on more

(Sin On Bible of 1716)

Psalm xiv1


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the fool hath said in his heartthere is no God

(King James Bible)

Psalm xiv1


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the fool hath said in his heartthere is a God

(The Fools Bible of 1763;

printers fined 3000;all copies ordered destroyed)


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Marko Antun Domniani[

(or de Dominis)

Archbishop of Split 1602,Dean of Windsor 1618;

died a prisoner of theInquisition in Rome 1624


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St Georges Chapel,Windsor


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Title-page,

1611


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