OPINION:One version of the Bible has been abused since its inception 400 years ago. It's high time to reappraise it, writes GILES FRASER
WHO SAID this? “We are a Christian culture, we come from a Christian culture and not to know the King James Bible is to be, in some small way, barbarian.”
No, it’s not former archbishop George Carey complaining again of Christianity being marginalised in modern Britain. In fact this is Richard Dawkins, lending his support to next year’s 400th anniversary of the King James Bible.
Fans of the feisty atheist need not worry that their hero has gone soft. “It is important that religion should not be allowed to hijack this cultural resource,” he added. I had a little chuckle at that one. Religion hijacking the Bible? What next? Except, of course, that is precisely what the KJB was: an attempt by the Church of England to control the religious and cultural agenda.
A team of academics was set up in 1604 to translate the Bible in such a way that it bolstered the authority of the established church. James I gave the specific instruction that the translation must toe the official line on the importance of bishops.
The Greek word ekklesia was to be translated as “church”, rather than “congregation” or “assembly” – the translators thus giving the impression that the Bible proposes a top-down form of ecclesiastical authority.
Next year, cultural Britain is set to go "Bible bananas", as the London-based Daily Telegraphrecently put it. The King James Bible will be everywhere, feted alongside Shakespeare as one of the formative influences on the English language.
We are going to be reminded, repeatedly, of those phrases of everyday use that originated with the KJB: “Am I my brother’s keeper?”; “All things to all men’; “The salt of the Earth”.
In this there is much nostalgia for some golden age of dignified public speech, but even at the time of its publication, there was something artificial about the KJB’s use of language.
The use of “thou” had almost disappeared from common use by 1611, as had words ending in “-eth”: their reintroduction was part of a deliberate strategy to invoke historic authority.
Perhaps this is why the KJB received a lukewarm reception.
Lancelot Andrewes, one of the leading lights of the translation project, rarely used it in his preaching. Hugh Broughton, then one of England’s leading Hebrew scholars, loathed it. “It is so ill done. Tell his Majestie that I had rather be rent in pieces with wilde horses, than any such translation, by my consent, should bee urged upon poore churches.”
Perhaps this is why the translators were a bit embarrassed about their creation.
The explosion in popularity of the KJB came much later, in the mid-18th century, and was driven by a restoration nostalgia for the mythic romance of Stuart monarchy. What really delivered the KJB into the cultural bloodstream was things like Handel's Messiah, the libretto for which was a compilation from the KJB by the deeply conservative non-juror Charles Jennens.
It is quite true that the translation trips off the tongue with style and elegance. That’s because it has always been about performance – it was designed to be read aloud in church, where its meaning could be controlled. Hence, early editions were vast tomes, to be placed on a lectern.
Throughout 2011, a myriad of cultural events are planned to celebrate the KJB. Rightly so. It marks an influential turn in our cultural history.
What will be irritating is all those who want to make a fetish of the text itself: American fundamentalists who think it is the only acceptable translation – “the Bible fell from heaven in 1611”; windbag actors intoning thees and thous in a knowing sonorous baritone; public school bores who couldn’t care two hoots whether the Bible is a faithful translation, as long as it’s the one they recall from chapel.
The Bible needs saving from all of these. – ( Guardianservice)