THE BIBLE IN ENGLISH

A brief history - Part Two

Miles Coverdale

Miles Coverdale was an Augustinian friar who left his order under the influence of the Reformation movement and sought safety on the continent. There he worked as Tyndale's assistant and proof reader. By the time of Tyndale's death, he had completed his own version of the complete Bible in English. Unlike Tyndale, Coverdale was unable to work from the original Hebrew and Greek. Instead he consulted German and Latin translations. He also consulted Tyndale's translations. His Old Testament relies on Tyndale's work, and his New Testament is essentially Tyndale's with some revision based on other texts. Coverdale's Bible was printed in 1535 and, with a dedication to Henry VIII incorporated, was imported into England. Now Henry had earlier ordered Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, to produce an English Bible, and when Coverdale's Bible appeared, the clergy reviewed it for heresy and, finding none, recommended it to Henry, who approved its circulation.

Then, in 1537 a version known as 'Matthew's Bible' appeared. This version was probably edited by John Rogers using the pseudonym 'Thomas Matthews'. This, too, owes a great debt to Tyndale. This 1537 edition was also licensed by the King.

Again, in 1537, a new edition of Coverdale's Bible, this time printed in England (the first complete Bible to be printed here) also received the King's license. Another, the Great Bible of 1539, which claimed to be the product of the efforts of diverse scholars, is essentially Coverdale's revision of 'Matthew's Bible'. The Great Bible became the official Bible of the Church of England and in 1543, Parliament banned Tyndale's translation. Ironically, this act also forbade any unlicensed person to read the Bible or explain it to others publicly, and for the lower classes to read it privately. In 1546, Henry explicitly banned both Tyndale's and Coverdale's versions, despite the fact that the Great Bible was a combination of the work of both men.

Controversies concerning translations of the Bible continued for many years. After the death of Henry VIII, the Reformation movement flourished under Edward, only to be suppressed under Mary Tudor. Some who had been closely associated with the work of Biblical translation, such as John Rogers and Thomas Cranmer, were executed. Others, including Coverdale, fled the country. But throughout these trials and tribulations the Great Bible remained the official English Bible. But by the time Elizabeth I ordered that each parish church should have a copy of the Bible in English a new version was available. This was the Geneva Bible, another revision of the Great Bible and thus highly dependant on Tyndale's work. It was produced by a group of English exiles in Geneva who were strongly influenced by John Calvin, and it quickly became the most widely used English Bible. In this version, those books of the Old Testament that Tyndale had not translated were revised with attention to the Hebrew originals, and contained extensive notes, many of them strongly Calvinist in content. In reaction to this bias, a group of English bishops, under the direction of Matthew Parker, produced a new version of the Great Bible, which they published in 1568, that eliminated any offensive notes, but it never gained widespread popularity.

Bill Hutchings

 to be continued.