Lesson 8 - The King James Bible

• What was the translators' goal?
• How did the translators do their work?
• How did they handle translation problems?
• What about the Thee's, Thou's, and the "-eths"?
• And that's that?

What Was The Translators' Goal?

Unfortunately the translation companies left little in the way of notes and diaries of their daily work. Clearly the Translation Rules required them to work build upon the Bishops' Bible and produce something that all could agree on.

The early editions included a lengthy preface entitled "The Translators to the Readers," written by Miles Smith, one of the translators. Usually this is omitted in current editions, but it gives us an idea of how the translators saw their mission. Consider this statement -

Truly (good Christian Reader) we never thought from the beginning, that we should need to make a new Translation, nor yet to make of a bad one a good one, . . . but to make a good one better, or out of many good ones, one principal good one, not justly to be excepted against; that hth been our endeavor, that our mark.

They begain, not with a blank sheet of paper, but with the results of several hundered years of Bible translation history in their hands. They sought to keep the best of the past and add to it the best of the present. As McGrath (p. 178) puts it,

The King James Bible . . . is to been in the light of the Renaissance approach to human wisdom, in which one generation is nourished and sustaind by the intellectual achievements of its predecessors. Each era draws on the wisdom of the past, and builds upon it, before handing a grater wisdom on to its successors. The King James Bible can be seen as one of the most outstanding representatives of this corporate approach to cultural advance and the enterprise of gaining wisdom.

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How Did the Translators Do Their Work?

The various companies left little evidence of how they did their work. McGrath nicely summarizes what little we have. The translating work started in in 1604 and the first edition was published in 1611. Some groups finished their work in 1608, some in 1609, and some at the last minute in 1610.

Among the few accounts of the work that survives is this note -

The translation in King James' time took an excellent way. That part of the bible was given to him who ws most excellent in such a tongue (as the Apocrypha to Andrew Downes), and then they met together, and one read the translation, the rest holding in their hands some Bible, either of the learned tongues, or French, Spanish, Italian, etc. If they found any fault, they spoke up; if not, he read on. (McGrath, p. 187)

Did you catch it? The translators designed the King James Bible for public reading! They wanted it to mean as much to the hearers as the readers.

And who were these readers? The Peface makes it plain - all English-speaking people! God's people needed direct access to God's word for spiritual growth. Ordinary people must have the Bible in their language.

The translators clearly rejected the Roman Catholic idea that the Latin Vulgate was the foundation of the Church and Christian life and thought. Jerome, argued Smith in his Preface, had translated the Bible into Latin because that was the common (vulgar) language of the people. The same principle required the Bible to be translated into the common language of the current people, i.e. English.

Smith makes it clear that the translators saw their work as an act of service to the people of God as a whole.

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How Did They Handle Translation Problems?

Ah, the language of the King James Version! The translators had to face several problems that confront everyone who does translation work - unknown and repeated words.

Unknown words, those which occur only once in the text, have vexed translators from the beginning. Even today, with all the advances we enjoy in archeology and linguistics, we still don't know what every word means. Usually contemporary versions do what the King James version does - take your best guess and add a marinal note!

As you can guess, these are the only marginal notes in the King James translation!

Repeated words present another kind of problem. The translators, Smith wrote, rejected the idea that they

. . . should express the same notion in the same particular word; as for example, if we translate the Hebrew or Greek word once by PURPOSE, never to call it INTENT; if one where JOURNEYING, never TRAVELING; if one where THINK, never SUPPOSE; if one where PAIN, never ACHE; if one where JOY, never GLADNESS, etc. . . . For is the kingdom of God to become words or syllables? why should we be in bondage to them if we may be free, use one precisely when we may use another no less fit, as commodiously? (McGrath, p. 194)

This makes for good English, but it can obscure certain aspects of the original text. In Romans 5:2-11 Paul and his friends "rejoice in hope . . . glory in tribulations . . . also joy in God." Each bolded English word translates the same Greek verb.

Of course the translators knew this, as the Preface makes clear, and made their choices between "wooden" accuracy and good style.

But What About the Thee's, Thou's, and the "-eths"?

Believe it or not, these pronouns were dropping out of English by1600. In Middle English you'll find a clear-cut distinction -

Now remember back to our second lesson where we talked about the influence of French on the English language? French, like many other languages, uses different personal prounouns depending on the social context. Thou, thy, and thee were used in familiar or inferior relationships. Plural pronouns are used when addressing superiors.

McGrath makes the point that by the late 1500s "you" had replaced "thou" in most situations. When a speaker used "thou" it was a departure from the norm and designed to make a point - sometimes an insult, for the speaker was claiming social superiority over the one addressed.

OK - two things here. What about those who claim that using thou, thy, and thee shows respect for God? Nonsense!

• In the King James Version these pronouns are applied to God, men, and even Satan.
• If anything, God may apply them to us, for we are clearly His inferior, but we insult Him when we use them, for we are claiming superiority over Him!

So why were these terms used by the translators? Rules 1 and 14! Remember Bancroft's Rules of Translation? Rule 1 required the translators to stay with the Bishop's Bible as much as possible. But what were the rules of translation for the Bishop's Bible back in 1568? Stay with the Great Bible of 1539.

And what was the Great Bible? Miles Coverdale's revision of Matthew's Bible which was a compilation of Tyndale's translation!

The bulk of Tyndale's work, including his language, makes up the King James Version because of the conservative rules given to the various translators.

The same thing is largely responsible for the -eth verb endings. In Tyndale's time this was standard practice. By 1600 it was becoming more and more uncommon. Even Shakespeare, while keeping some -eth endings, uses the modern -s endings.

McGrath (p. 272-273) presents some intriguing evidence that while the -eth ending were written, they were pronounced as -s. Since English is not a phonetic language, one could write -eth and read -s with no problem at all!

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And That's That?

Hardly! The King James version came off the press in 1611 and ran a poor second to the Geneva Bible. Even Miles Smith quoted from the Geneva in his extended preface to the King James. We still have to learn how the KJV became so popular.

And we still have to face the King James problem! Some more conservatives make the acceptance of the King James Version a test of orthodoxy. For them any doubt about the value of the King James Bible for all believers everywhere is tantamount to rejection of Christianity. The King James Version has become their Vulgate. Yet archeology, linguistics, and language are moving on, making yet another translation necessary.

Sadly, these people are rejecting the basic motivation of the King James translators themselves - give the people God's word in their language with the best scholarship possible! We know more than the KJV translators and we do not speak like they did. It's time to move on.

And that's where we go next!

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