Textus Receptus Bibles
Coverdale Bible 1535
| 1:1 | Paul an Apostle of Iesus Christ by the will of God. To ye sayntes which are Ephesus, & to the that beleue on Iesus Christ. |
| 1:2 | Grace be with you and peace from God oure father, & fro the LORDE Iesus Christ. |
| 1:3 | Blessed be God the father of oure LORDE Iesus Christ, which hath blessed vs wt all maner of spirituall blessynge in heauenly thynges by Christ |
| 1:4 | acordinge as he had chosen vs by him, or euer the foundacion of the worlde was layed, that we shulde be holy and without blame before him in loue, |
| 1:5 | & ordeyned vs before, to receaue vs as children thorow Iesus Christ, acordinge to the pleasure of his will, |
| 1:6 | vnto the prayse of the glory of his grace, wherby he hath made vs accepted in the Beloued, |
| 1:7 | in whom we haue redempcion thorow his bloude (namely) the forgeuenes of synnes, acordynge to ye riches of his grace, |
| 1:8 | which he hath shed vpon vs abundauntly in all wyssdome and prudece: |
| 1:9 | and hath opened vnto vs the mystery of his wil acordinge to his pleasure, which he had purposed in himselfe, |
| 1:10 | yt it shulde be preached wha the tyme was full come, that all thinges shulde be gathered together by Christ, both the thinges which are in heauen, and also the thinges that are vpon earth, |
| 1:11 | euen by him, by whom also we are come to the inheritaunce we that were therto predestinate before, acordinge to ye purpose of him, which worketh all thinges after ye councell of his owne wyll, |
| 1:12 | that we mighte be to the prayse of his glory, euen we that before beleued on Christ, |
| 1:13 | on who also ye beleued, after that ye herde the worde of trueth, namely ye Gospell of youre saluacion: wherin whan ye beleued, ye were sealed with the holy sprete of promes, |
| 1:14 | which is the ernest of oure inheritaunce to oure redempcion, that we mighte be his owne to the prayse off his glory. |
| 1:15 | Wherfore I also, (in so moch as I haue herde of the faith which ye haue in ye LORDE Iesu, and of youre loue vnto all ye sayntes) |
| 1:16 | ceasse not to geue thankes for you, and make mencion of you in my prayers, |
| 1:17 | that ye God of oure LORDE Iesus Christ, the father of glory maye geue vnto you the sprete of wyssdome, and open vnto you the knowlege of himselfe, |
| 1:18 | and lighten the eyes of youre vnderstondinge, that ye maye knowe what is the hope of youre callynge, and what the riches of his glorious enheritaunce is vpon the sayntes, |
| 1:19 | & what is the exceadinge greatnesse of his power towarde vs, which beleue acordinge to ye workynge of his mightie power, |
| 1:20 | which he wroughte in Christ, whan he raysed him vp fro the deed, and set him on his righte hade i heauely thinges, |
| 1:21 | aboue all rule, power, and mighte, and dominacio, and aboue all that maye be named, not onely in this worlde, but also in ye worlde to come. |
| 1:22 | And hath put all thinges vnder his fete, and hath made him aboue all thinges the heade of the cogregacion, |
| 1:23 | which is his body, and the fulnesse of him that fylleth all in all. |
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.