Textus Receptus Bibles
Coverdale Bible 1535
| 21:1 | Dauid came to Nobe to ye prest Ahimelech. And Ahimelech was astonnyed, whan he sawe Dauid comminge, and sayde vnto him: Why commest thou alone, and noman is with the? |
| 21:2 | Dauid sayde vnto Ahimelech the prest: The kinge hath comytted a matter vnto me, and sayde: Let noma knowe wherfore I haue sent the, and what I haue commaunded the: for I haue appoynted my seruautes to mete me here & there. |
| 21:3 | Yf thou haue now ought vnder thy hande, a loafe of bred or fyue, geue me the same in my hande, or what so euer thou findest. |
| 21:4 | The prest answered Dauid, and sayde: I haue no comen bred vnder my hande, but the holy bred, yf the yonge men haue onely refrained them selues from wemen. |
| 21:5 | Dauid answered the prest, and sayde vnto him: The wemen were kepte thre dayes from vs whan we departed forth, and the yonge mens vessels were holy. But this waye is vnholy, neuerthelesse it shalbe santifyed to daye in the instrumentes. |
| 21:6 | Then the prest gaue him of ye holy, in so moch as there was none other bred but the shewbredes, which were taken vp before the LORDE, that there might be other freshbredes set therin the daye wha he toke them awaye. |
| 21:7 | But the same daye was there a man sparred in before the LORDE, one of Sauls seruauntes, named Doeg an Edomite, ye mightiest amonge Sauls hyrdmen. |
| 21:8 | And Dauid sayde vnto Ahimelech: Is there not a speare or a swerde here vnder thine hande? I haue not taken my swerde and weapens with me: for the kynges matter requyred haist. |
| 21:9 | The prest sayde: The swerde of Goliath the Philistyne whom thou smotest in the Oke valley, is here wrapped in a cloth behynde the ouerbody cote. Yf thou wylt haue it, take it, for here is els none but it. Dauid sayde: There is not soch another, geue me it. |
| 21:10 | And Dauid gat him vp, and fled from Saul, and came to Achis ye kynge of Gath. |
| 21:11 | But Achis seruauntes sayde vnto him: This is Dauid the kynge of the londe, of whom they sunge in the daunse, and sayde: Saul hath smytten his thousande, but Dauid his ten thousande. |
| 21:12 | And Dauid toke these wordes to hert, and was sore afrayed of Achis the kynge of Gath, |
| 21:13 | and altered his countenaunce before them, and shewed himselfe as he had bene madd in their handes, and stackered towarde the dores of the gate, and his slauerynges ranne downe his beerd. |
| 21:14 | Then sayde Achis vnto his seruauntes: Beholde, ye se that the man is out of his wyt, why haue ye brought him vnto me? |
| 21:15 | Haue I to fewe madd men, that ye haue brought this hither to be madd before me? Shulde he come in to my house? |
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.