If there ever has to be a sixth point of Calvinism, it should be
"free market capitalism".
The idea that somehow the KJV is purer because a King paid for it with money taken by force from the people, is ridiculous.
One thing I have always thought was ironic about the KJV only movement, is that the ENTIRE reason we have a KJV, is because a PAPIST king, was mad about some of the comments in the liner notes of the Geneva Bible.
The Reformers said a couple of things about the right of Kings taking a back seat to the Word of God, and King James, in his arrogance, got mad about it, and decided to have his own Bible translated.
So, fast forward to modern day America, and we have protestants who most likely know nothing about church history, siding with a CATHOLIC KING'S translation, while not even knowing about the Geneva Bible, the one the Pilgrims, and the Puritans and Shakespeare all used!
To me, THAT is ironic.
But on the profit motive, I would like to point out that business men, cannot make a profit UNLESS they actually make and sell their product.
In the pursuit of profit they will FIND ways to sell as many Bibles as they can, and THAT......is not a bad thing!
What if they do research and find out people in Canada want a Bible, and they need it at a lower price?
What if they find out that there are no modern copies of the Bible in Brazil and if they put a snazzy modern, brightly colored cover on it, they could make many thousands of dollars?
OK, James let's not be narrow-minded about the history of the KJV and the Genevan BIble... the KJV has not one thing to do with making money for profit, no more than the Genevan BIble... both Bibles make money for profit, because they are products that are SOLD to make money.
Genevan BIble was not translated from the original Greek text, but most was translated for what John Wycliffe had translated in 1380 when he produced the very first New Testament came out, and two years later in 1382, the Old Testamentc ame out.
So, Let's allow Bible History speak for its self for both Bibles without personal and/or religious predijuces, Calvin didnt help in the trans lations, he just happened to be there and was friends with the other reformers who did the translation. Plus, William Wittingham who is credited with the 1557 version of the English New Testament, just so happened to be married to Calvin's sister...
So allow histroy to speak for its self without making it a religious political venture of Calvinist claim or pride, just becasue his name is made mention. Jude has already posted some of this informaiton on her thread about the forgotten Bible.
Geneva Bible: Historical Report
The Historical Stage
The historical context of the Geneva Bible was the reformation and a time of persecution in England. William Tyndale�s New Testament, the first New Testament printed in the English language, was published in 1526. The Bible in the language of the people and available to the people was a death threat to the corrupt Roman Catholic Church�s power and income.
The Roman Catholic Church sold the forgiveness of sins (indulgences) and the release of loved ones from "purgatory." Salvation was through works and donations. The necessity of an intervening priesthood between the people and God was (and still is) a central doctrine of the Church. The penalty of having a Tyndale New Testament was death by burning. Tyndale was hunted for 11 years and martyred in 1536.
Miles Coverdale (1438-1569) and John Rogers (c. 1500-1555), former assistants to Tyndale, continued Tyndale�s work. In 1535, Coverdale printed the first complete Bible in the English language (Coverdale Bible). Coverdale�s translation was basically Tyndale�s. In 1537, John Rogers printed a new version of the English Bible, under the pseudonym "Thomas Matthew" (Matthew�s Bible). The Matthew�s Bible was a combination of the Tyndale and Coverdale Old Testaments and the 1535 revision of the Tyndale New Testament.
Tyndale�s last words before his death, as reported in Foxe�s Book of Martyrs, was a prayer: "Lord! open the King of England�s eyes." In 1538, two years later, Tyndale�s prayer was answered. Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII�s vice regent for ecclesiastical affairs, and Thomas Cranmer, the first Protestant Archbishop of Canterbury, wanted an English Bible in the pulpit in all of the churches in England and an injunction to do so was issued to the clergy.
Miles Coverdale led a team to revise the Matthew�s Bible and eliminate the marginal notes, which became known as the Great Bible of 1539. It was so named because of its large size. By May 1540, the Great Bible was in each of the 8,500 parish churches in England and was authorized by King Henry VIII.
Henry VIII died in 1547 and was succeeded by his 10 year old son, King Edward VI. Edward died in 1553, opening the door for the bloody reign of his half-sister.
The Bible of Intended Victims
Mary I, the daughter of Henry VIII, became Queen of England in 1553. Known as "Bloody Mary", she was brutally determined to turn England back to Roman Catholicism. During her reign, the English Bibles placed in churches were burned, public reading of the Bible was forbidden, and the works of the reformers, such as Tyndale, Rogers, Coverdale and Cranmer, were forbidden. Even quotes from the Bible on church walls were banned.
Persecution was not limited to banning the English Bible. Mary persecuted any person who agreed with the reformers� views or who attempted to circulate Scripture in English. John Rogers, who produced the Matthew�s Bible, was the first British reformer to be burned at the stake in 1555. Thomas Cranmer suffered the same fate later that same year. Almost three hundred people were burned to death during Mary�s regime, and many more were imprisoned and tortured.
Geneva a Refuge
Protestants by the hundreds fled England for the Continent during this time, known as the Marian exile. Geneva in Switzerland was a refuge for many. Geneva was a republic at the time controlled by John Calvin and Theodore Beza. Protestant theology prevailed in the city and John Calvin offered protection. Geneva was also a center for biblical textual scholarship at that time. For example, Robert Estienne�s Greek New Testament of 1551 and at least 22 editions of French Bibles were published in Geneva in the 1550�s.
The theological climate and scholarship made Geneva a natural for the English church leaders to study the text of the Bible. Moreover, a Bible was needed that could help educate the Protestants during their exile and that was appropriate for their worship. A group of exiled scholars who were part of the English church in Geneva began the creation of an English version of the Bible to meet their needs. That Bible became known as the Geneva Bible.
The Translation Begins: Geneva New Testament of 1557
The Geneva Bible was completed in two stages. The New Testament was published first on June 10, 1557. The identity of the Geneva Bible translators is not known for certain. They did not name themselves anywhere in the Bible.
However, most scholars agree that William Whittingham was primarily responsible for the New Testament. Whittingham was skilled in Hebrew and Greek as well as other languages and a leader in the English church at Geneva. Whittingham was related to John Calvin by marriage.
Whittingham used the Tyndale New Testament as his basic English text, most likely Jugge�s 1552 edition. The Greek texts were probably Estienne�s Greek New Testament of 1551 and Beza�s Greek New Testament of 1556. Hence, what is now called the Textus Receptus was the Greek New Testament used for the Geneva Bible.
The Geneva New Testament of 1557 Described
The Geneva New Testament of 1557 was a small, octavo edition in easier to read Roman type, rather than black letter (Gothic). It included numbered verses and explanatory and textual notes. Italics were used for interpolated words.
The preface of the New Testament contained a sixteen page letter from John Calvin regarding "Christ is the end of the Lawe." The preface also indicated the 1557 Geneva New Testament was "conferred diligently with the Greke, and the best approved translations" and included "diversities of readings and moste proffitable annotations of all harde places."
Letter to the "Simple Lambs" and "Arguments"
A letter to the reader was also included in the 1557 Geneva New Testament which indicated the translation was primarily directed to the "simple lambs" in the Church of Christ. The city of Geneva was also praised as a "store of heavenly learning." With the spelling modernized, it reads:
In the Church of Christ there are three kinds of men: some are malicious despisers of the Word and graces of God, who turn all things into poison, and a further hardening of their hearts. Others do not openly resist and contemn [condemn] the Gospel, because they are struck as it were in a trance with the majesty thereof, yet either they quarrel and cavel, or else deride and mock at whatsoever is done for the advancement of the same. The third sort are simple lambs which partly are already in the fold of Christ, and so willingly hear their Shepard�s voice, and partly wandering astray by ignorance tarry the time till the Shepherd find them and bring them unto His flock. To this kind of people in this translation I chiefly had respect, as moved unto zeal, counseled by the godly, and drawn by occasion, both of the place where God hath appointed us to dwell, and also to the store of heavenly learning and judgment which so abounded in the city of Geneva, that justly it may be called the patron and mirror of true religion and godliness.
At the beginning of the four Gospels was a summary of their teaching called an "argument." Summaries were also included at the beginning of Acts, the Epistles (except 2 and 3 John), and Revelation.
Other Interim Translations
Not always mentioned in the history of the Geneva Bible is that a translation of the Psalms into English was also published in Geneva in 1557. Anthony Gilby was probably the editor and translator, given his expertise in Hebrew. The Psalms included numbered verses and roman type. In 1559, the English translators with "moste joyful mindes and great diligence," published another edition of the Psalms in Geneva in honor of Elizabeth I when she was crowned Queen of England.
The Translation Completed: The Geneva Bible of 1560
The whole Geneva Bible was completed in 1560. The New Testament of 1557 was also revised for the Geneva Bible of 1560, probably by Whittingham. Whittingham is considered by most scholars as the general editor of the complete Geneva Bible.
Whittingham and others apparently remained in Geneva to finish the translation even after it was safe to return to England. Queen Mary died in November, 1558. Mary was succeeded by Elizabeth I and England was no longer dangerous for the reformers. Many of the exiles at Geneva did return to England at that time, but Whittingham and others stayed in Geneva a year and a half longer to complete the Geneva Bible.
A long list of men are cited as associated with Whittingham in the translation, including Miles Coverdale, Christopher Goodman, Anthony Gilby, Thomas Sampson, William Cole, John Knox, William Kethe, Rowland Hall, John Pullain, John Bodley, John Baron, and William Williams.
The revised New Testament continued to follow Tyndale�s text, but gave more attention to Beza�s Latin text of 1556 than the 1557 version. The Great Bible was a significant basis for the Old Testament, and to a lesser degree the Coverdale and Matthew Bibles.
However, the Geneva Bible translators also translated from the original Hebrew. Tyndale had translated Genesis through 2 Chronicles and the book of Jonah from the original Hebrew into English before he died. The English reformers translated the remainder of the Old Testament directly from the Hebrew (Masoretic) text into English for the first time in the Geneva Bible of 1560.
Scholars vary on exactly what all of the sources were for the 1560 Geneva Bible. Westcott indicated the sources were the original text, the Great Bible, the Latin version of the Old Testament by Leo Juda, the Greek Latin Testament of Beza 1556 and 1559, and the French Bible version of Pierre Robert Olivetan revised in Geneva in 1558. Another scholar indicates the 1553 rather than the 1558 French Bible of Olivetan was used as well as Estienne�s own Bible published in Geneva in 1557 and the Hebrew-Latin Bible of Sebastian Muster of 1534-1535.
Sorry, if you would like to finish reading the whole history you can do so on this site Logos Resource Pages.
Also, you must understand that Bible translations DOES NOT MEAN that a particulr bible is explaing from the Greek or Hebrew something different than what is record, Bible translations only mean that the words written text has been made plain for the READER to clearly understand what the orignial Greek and the Hebrew manuscripts have already said
Conclusion
Every Bible in the English Bible chain has a story, but the report, rule, and role of the Geneva Bible is truly remarkable. Its historical backdrop of persecution, martyrdom, and exile during the reformation is both sobering and fascinating.
The Geneva Bible was first a Bible of good scholarship. The scholarship of the Geneva Bible was the most advanced of its time. It was translated completely from the Biblical languages. In the Old Testament, the translation retains the literal meaning of the Hebrew, while capturing its poetry.
The Geneva Bible was a Bible of bold innovation. Among it�s most notable innovations are that it was the first English Bible with verse divisions through out, the first with Roman type, the first to use italics for interpolated words, and the first English Bible wholly translated from the original Biblical languages.
The Geneva Bible margin notes played a key role in its rise to popularity and eventually in its demise. The notes are still famous and are still controversial. The notes are either Calvinistic and anti-papal, or simply Biblical, depending on your theology and hermeneutics.
The Geneva Bible notes helped establish Protestantism in England, and eventually in America. The Geneva Bible was not only the Bible of the English reformers, but of the Pilgrims, as well.
The Geneva Bible influenced later versions of the Bible, including the King James Version, and great writers, such as William Shakespeare, John Milton, and John Bunyan. Small in size, the Geneva Bible was great in impact.
While much has been written about the Geneva Bible, there are still opportunities for further research. The richest area to be mined is the marginal notes. The greatest need seems to be an objective, comprehensive, and systematic analysis of the theology of the notes.
While some work has been done on the note�s theology, such as by David Daniell, in The Bible in English, thoroughness is lacking. Systematically studying the theology of the notes could be illuminating in understanding the doctrinal development of Protestantism and contemporary dogmatic theology, such as covenant theology.
Another way the Geneva Bible notes could be mined is to compare them to the notes of popular contemporary study Bibles. A comparison of the notes could reveal areas of Protestant doctrinal drift.
The true nature of the demise of the Geneva Bible would also be an interesting historical analysis. Was it driven out by political and commercial interests or superseded by a better translation? Research on this topic could provide insights into the Bible publishing and marketing practices of our time.
The KJV is not under a copyright. But the new translations, almost all from the corrupt Westcott-Hort Greek text, can be copyrighted. Anybody can print a KJV and give it away free if he wants to. You cannot do that with the NIV, unless you pay whoever owns the copyright. Hence, more money can be made from the copyrighted versions. Copyrighting a Bible is not exactly what the Gospel is about. But copyrighting helps a large publisher sell more of his Bibles and to make more money.
In addition, it was Calvinism which helped to set the stage for modern capitalism which exalts making money.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvinism
"One school of thought attributes Calvinism with setting the stage for the later development of capitalism in northern Europe. In this view, elements of Calvinism represented a revolt against the medieval condemnation of usury and, implicitly, of profit in general.[citation needed] Such a connection was advanced in influential works by R. H. Tawney (1880�1962) and by Max Weber (1864�1920).
Calvin expressed himself on usury in a 1545 letter to a friend, Claude de Sachin, in which he criticized the use of certain passages of scripture invoked by people opposed to the charging of interest. He reinterpreted some of these passages, and suggested that others of them had been rendered irrelevant by changed conditions. He also dismissed the argument (based upon the writings of Aristotle) that it is wrong to charge interest for money because money itself is barren."
From our view in 2011, with the long recession due in large part the power, lack of morality and greed of big usury bankers and their deceptive practices, including loan amortization, God's moral law opposing usury is a very good thing. Ol Calvin was wrong. We may be seeing the start of a popular opposition to big bankers and their usury in the Occupy Wall Street movement.
The early German sociologist Max Weber in his "The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism" said that capitalism got going in the northern European nations under Calvinism which encouraged large number of people to work hard many hours a day to make money.
The Calvinist "calling" which is a calling to devote one's life to hard work in an occupation contributed to the Protestant work ethic which was necessary to build a capitalist industrial economy.
I have not read Weber's book on the rise of capitalism due to Protestant or Calvinist theology in Northern Europe (and in England). But it is true that the Catholic nations continued to oppose usury. Usury was necessary for the development of capitalism, and guess who liberalized the older Christian prohibition on usury?
Over the centuries since capitalism began in the protestant nations of Europe, usury has become the major instrument for the ruling elite, which is largely the financial elite of big usury bankers, to control the masses of people and to rule over them. Without usury the elites could not have the power they have.
Though usury is not mentioned in Revelation 18, Revelation 18: 10-11 says "Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come. And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any more:"
Merchants, from emporos, are like our world traders, or international corporations.
Then Revelation 18: 23-24 says "...for thy merchants were the great men of the earth; for by thy sorceries were all nations deceived. And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth."
The Babylon of prohecy has its economic and financial side, and it runs on usury. The "circulation" system of the first beast of Revelation 13: 1-10 is money. And the metaphor of Babylon points to the same international system run by money, which empowers the "King of the North" in the modern timeline of Daniel 11.
The northern command of nations, the industrized nations of the North, are now in conflict with the mostly Islamic nations of the South, who have not gone in for usury as much as the nations of the North. There are no "good" and "bad" players in the North versus South seen in the present day reality of world affairs and in Daniel's eleventh chapter. The nation of Israel is likely to be a trigger for World War III which will be between the international North and the South. And - you are not a "good" guy by supporting the North and the country of Israel against the Islamics. But the Islamics are one manifestation of the spirit of anti-Christ, and are not the "good" guys either.
And - John Calvin and his theology liberalizing usury helped make all this possible. It did increase the standard of living for many in the West. But now usury is a key to totalitarian domination by the financial ruling elite - and its going to get worse.
