Textus Receptus Bibles
Coverdale Bible 1535
| 2:1 | For ye youre selues (brethren) knowe of oure intrauce vnto you, how that it was not in vayne, |
| 2:2 | but as we had suffred afore, & were shamefully intreated at Philippos (as ye knowe) we were bolde in oure God, to speake vnto you ye Gospel of God with moch stryuynge. |
| 2:3 | For oure exhortacion was not to brynge you to erroure ner yet to vnclennes, nether was it with gyle: |
| 2:4 | but as we are alowed of God, that the Gospell shulde be commytted vnto vs to preache, euen so we speake, not as though we wolde please me, but God, which tryeth oure hertes. |
| 2:5 | For we haue not gone aboute with flateringe wordes (as ye knowe) ner wayted for oure owne profit ( God is recorde) |
| 2:6 | nether soughte we prayse of men, nether of you ner of eny other, whan we mighte haue bene chargeable vnto you as the Apostles off Christ, |
| 2:7 | but we were tender amonge you. Like as a norsse cherisheth hir children, |
| 2:8 | euen so had we hartely affeccion towarde you, and wolde with good wyl haue dealte vnto you, not onely the Gospell of God, but oure lyues also, because ye were deare vnto vs. |
| 2:9 | Ye remembre brethren oure laboure and trauayle. For daye and nighte wroughte we (because we wolde not be chargeable vnto eny of you) and preached the Gospell of God amonge you. |
| 2:10 | Ye are witnesses, and so is God, how holyly and iustly and vnblameable we behaued oure selues amoge you that beleue: |
| 2:11 | as ye knowe, how that as a father his children, euen so exhorted we and comforted and besoughte euery one of you, |
| 2:12 | that ye wolde walke worthely before God, which hath called you vnto his kyngdome & glory. |
| 2:13 | For this cause thanke we God without ceassynge, because that wha ye receaued of vs the worde of the preachinge of God, ye receaued it not as ye worde of men, but (eue as it is of a trueth) the worde of God, which worketh in you that beleue. |
| 2:14 | For ye brethren are become the folowers off the congregacions off God which in Iewry are in Christ Iesu, so that ye haue suffred euen like thinges of youre kynsmen, as they haue suffred of the Iewes. |
| 2:15 | Which as they put the LORDE Iesus to death, and their awne prophetes, euen so haue they persecuted vs also, and please not God, and are cotrary to all men, |
| 2:16 | forbyddinge vs to speake vnto the Heythen that they mighte be saued, to fulfill their synnes allwaye: for the wrath is come vpon them allready vnto ye vttemost. |
| 2:17 | But we (brethren) for as moch as we haue bene kepte from you for a season, as concernynge the bodely presence, but not in the hert, we haue haisted the more with greate desyre to se you personally. |
| 2:18 | Therfore wolde we haue come vnto you, (I Paul) two tymes, but Sathan withstode vs. |
| 2:19 | For who is oure hope, or ioye, or crowne of reioysinge? are not ye it in ye sighte of oure LORDE Iesus Christ at his commynge? |
| 2:20 | Yes ye are oure prayse and ioye. |
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.