Writing the History of the English Bible in the Early Eighteenth Century

Abstract

The letter of Scripture suffering various Interpretations, it is plain that Error may pretend to Scripture; the antient Fathers being likewise dead, and not able to vindicate themselves, their writings may be wrested, and Error may make use of them to back itself; Reason too being bypassed by Interest, Education, Passion, Society, &c…. Tradition only rests secure.The 1680s were a difficult decade for the English Bible, just as they were for so many of the other institutions of the English Protestant establishment. Roman Catholic critics of the Church of England, emboldened by the patronage of James II and his court, engaged in controversy over the rule of faith and the identity of the true Church, much as they had done in the early years of the Reformation or in the 1630s. Nonconformists and freethinkers deployed arguments drawn from Catholic scholarship, in particular from the work of the French Oratorian Richard Simon, and joined in ridicule of the Bible as a sure and sufficient foundation for Christian belief.

Writing the History of the English Bible: A Review of Recent Scholarship

“…Norton's rigorous textual analysis and comparison of many editions published in the 17th and 18th centuries shows that the text of the KJB underwent several stages of revision and serves as an authoritative reminder that the current text of the KJB is not the same text as was originally published in 1611. There have also been a number of very useful and original essays on 17th century biblical scholarship and the role of the printed Bible that have gone far beyond the usual story of the general histories, exploring the politics of the print industry as well as the uses of the Bible by ordinary people (Hessayon & Keene 2006;King & Pratt 2010;Mandelbrote 2004a). Collectively, this work has added depth to the story of the early English Bible and the initial reception and use of the KJB.…”

“…The Enlightenment, in sharp contrast to its former portrayal as an age of spiritual apathy and indifference to the Bible, has now been redefined as an era of the Bible’s increased cultural importance and as a focus of scholarly inquiry and debate, accompanied of course by subtle as well as more overt questions regarding its authority as a sacred text. The writing of the English Bible’s history was well under way in the early 18th century, and there were already at that time political and nationalistic interests in depicting the evolution of the text in Protestant hands (Mandelbrote 2004b). Its printed text, already corrupted by decades of careless printers, was restored, given minor editorial adjustments, and standardized by Benjamin Blayney in 1769, a little‐known fact that certainly complicates modern claims of the word‐for‐word inerrancy of the KJB (Campbell 2010, pp.…”