Textus Receptus Bibles
Coverdale Bible 1535
| 10:1 | The Philistynes foughte agaynst Israel. And they of Israel fled before the Philistynes, and ye wounded fell vpon mount Gilboa. |
| 10:2 | And the Philistynes folowed vpon Saul and his sonnes, and smote Ionathas, Abinadab and Malchisua ye sonnes of Saul. |
| 10:3 | And the battayll was sore agaynst Saul. And the archers came vpon him, so that he was wounded of the archers |
| 10:4 | Then sayde Saul vnto his weapenbearer: Drawe out thy swerde, and thrust it thorow me, that these vncircumcysed come not, and deale shamefully with me. Neuertheles his weapenbearer wolde not, for he was sore afrayed. Then toke Saul his swerde, and fell therin. |
| 10:5 | Whan his weapenbearer sawe that Saul was deed, he fell vpon his swerde also, and dyed. |
| 10:6 | Thus died Saul and his thre sonnes, and all his housholde together. |
| 10:7 | And whan the men of Israel which were in ye valley, sawe, that Saul and his sonnes were deed, they lefte their cities and fled: and the Philistynes came and dwelt therin. |
| 10:8 | On the morowe came the Philistynes to spoyle the slayne, and founde Saul, and his sonnes lyenge vpon mount Gelboa, |
| 10:9 | and stryped him out, and toke his heade, and his harnesse, and sent it aboute in to ye londe of the Philistynes, and caused it to be shewed before their Idoles and the people. |
| 10:10 | And his weapens layed they in the house of their god, and styckte vp his heade vpon the house of Dagon. |
| 10:11 | But whan all they of Iabes in Gilead herde of euery thinge, that the Philistynes had done vnto Saul, |
| 10:12 | they gat them vp (as many as were men of armes) and toke the body of Saul and of his sonnes, and broughte them vnto Iabes, and buryed their bones vnder the Oke at Iabes, and fasted seuen dayes. |
| 10:13 | Thus dyed Saul in his trespace which he commytted agaynst the LORDE, because he kepte not the worde of the LORDE: & because he axed councell at the soythsayer, |
| 10:14 | and axed not at the LORDE, therfore slewe he him, & turned the kyngdome vnto Dauid. |
Coverdale Bible 1535
The Coverdale Bible, compiled by Myles Coverdale and published in 1535, was the first complete English translation of the Bible to contain both the Old and New Testament and translated from the original Hebrew and Greek. The later editions (folio and quarto) published in 1539 were the first complete Bibles printed in England. The 1539 folio edition carried the royal license and was, therefore, the first officially approved Bible translation in English.
Tyndale never had the satisfaction of completing his English Bible; but during his imprisonment, he may have learned that a complete translation, based largely upon his own, had actually been produced. The credit for this achievement, the first complete printed English Bible, is due to Miles Coverdale (1488-1569), afterward bishop of Exeter (1551-1553).
The details of its production are obscure. Coverdale met Tyndale in Hamburg, Germany in 1529, and is said to have assisted him in the translation of the Pentateuch. His own work was done under the patronage of Oliver Cromwell, who was anxious for the publication of an English Bible; and it was no doubt forwarded by the action of Convocation, which, under Archbishop Cranmer's leading, had petitioned in 1534 for the undertaking of such a work.
Coverdale's Bible was probably printed by Froschover in Zurich, Switzerland and was published at the end of 1535, with a dedication to Henry VIII. By this time, the conditions were more favorable to a Protestant Bible than they had been in 1525. Henry had finally broken with the Pope and had committed himself to the principle of an English Bible. Coverdale's work was accordingly tolerated by authority, and when the second edition of it appeared in 1537 (printed by an English printer, Nycolson of Southwark), it bore on its title-page the words, "Set forth with the King's most gracious license." In licensing Coverdale's translation, King Henry probably did not know how far he was sanctioning the work of Tyndale, which he had previously condemned.
In the New Testament, in particular, Tyndale's version is the basis of Coverdale's, and to a somewhat less extent this is also the case in the Pentateuch and Jonah; but Coverdale revised the work of his predecessor with the help of the Zurich German Bible of Zwingli and others (1524-1529), a Latin version by Pagninus, the Vulgate, and Luther. In his preface, he explicitly disclaims originality as a translator, and there is no sign that he made any noticeable use of the Greek and Hebrew; but he used the available Latin, German, and English versions with judgment. In the parts of the Old Testament which Tyndale had not published he appears to have translated mainly from the Zurich Bible. [Coverdale's Bible of 1535 was reprinted by Bagster, 1838.]
In one respect Coverdale's Bible was groundbreaking, namely, in the arrangement of the books of the. It is to Tyndale's example, no doubt, that the action of Coverdale is due. His Bible is divided into six parts -- (1) Pentateuch; (2) Joshua -- Esther; (3) Job -- "Solomon's Balettes" (i.e. Canticles); (4) Prophets; (5) "Apocrypha, the books and treatises which among the fathers of old are not reckoned to be of like authority with the other books of the Bible, neither are they found in the canon of the Hebrew"; (6) the New Testament. This represents the view generally taken by the Reformers, both in Germany and in England, and so far as concerns the English Bible, Coverdale's example was decisive.