Textus Receptus Bibles
Coverdale Bible 1535
| 16:1 | Iob answered, and sayde: |
| 16:2 | I haue oft tymes herde soch thinges. Miserable geuers of comforte are ye, all the sorte of you. |
| 16:3 | Shall not thy vayne wordes come yet to an ende? Or, hast thou yet eny more to saye? |
| 16:4 | I coude speake, as ye do also. But wolde God, that youre soule were in my soules steade: then shulde I heape vp wordes agaynst you, and shake my heade at you. |
| 16:5 | I shulde comforte you with my mouth, and release youre payne with ye talkinge of my lyppes. |
| 16:6 | But what shall I do? For all my wordes, my sorow wil not ceasse: and though I holde my toge, yet wil it not departe fro me. |
| 16:7 | And now that I am full of payne, and all that I haue destroied |
| 16:8 | (wherof my wryncles beare wytnesse) there stodeth vp a dyssembler to make me answere with lyes to my face. |
| 16:9 | He is angrie at me, he hateth me, and gnassheth vpon me with his teth. Myne enemy skouleth vpon me with his eyes. |
| 16:10 | They haue opened their mouthes wyde vpon me, and smytten me vpon the cheke despitefully, they haue eased the selues thorow myne aduersite. |
| 16:11 | God hath geuen me ouer to the vngodly, and delyuered me in to the hondes of ye wicked. |
| 16:12 | I was somtyme in wealth, but sodenly hath he brought me to naught. He hath taken me by the neck, he hath rente me, and set me, as it were a marck for him to shute at. |
| 16:13 | He hath compased me rounde aboute with his dartes, he hath wounded my loynes, & not spared. My bowels hath he poured vpon the grounde. |
| 16:14 | He hath geue me one wounde vpon another, and is falle vpon me like a giaunte. |
| 16:15 | I haue sowed a sack cloth vpon my skynne, and lye with my strength in the dust. |
| 16:16 | My face is swolle with wepinge, & myne eyes are waxen dymne. |
| 16:17 | Howbeit there is no wickednesse in my hondes, and my prayer is clene. |
| 16:18 | O earth, couer not my bloude, and let my crienge fynde no rowme. |
| 16:19 | For lo, my witnesse is in heauen, and he that knoweth me, is aboue in the heyth. |
| 16:20 | My frendes laugh me to scorne, but myne eye poureth out teares vnto God. |
| 16:21 | Though a body might pleate wt God, as one man doth with another, |
| 16:22 | yet the nombre of my yeares are come, & I must go the waye, from whence I shal not turne agayne. |
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.