Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
| 12:1 | For the Lord had said vnto Abram, Get thee out of thy countrey, and from thy kindred, and from thy fathers house vnto the land that I will shewe thee. |
| 12:2 | And I will make of thee a great nation, and will blesse thee, and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing. |
| 12:3 | I will also blesse them that blesse thee, and curse them that curse thee, and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed. |
| 12:4 | So Abram departed, euen as ye Lord spake vnto him, and Lot went with him. (And Abram was seuentie and fiue yeere olde, when he departed out of Haran) |
| 12:5 | Then Abram tooke Sarai his wife, and Lot his brothers sonne, and all their substance that they possessed, and the soules that they had gotten in Haran, and they departed, to goe to the land of Canaan: and to the land of Canaan they came. |
| 12:6 | So Abram passed through the land vnto the place of Shechem, and vnto the plaine of Moreh (and the Canaanite was then in ye land) |
| 12:7 | And the Lord appeared vnto Abram, and said, Vnto thy seede will I giue this land. And there builded he an altar vnto the Lord, which appeared vnto him. |
| 12:8 | Afterward remouing thence vnto a moutaine Eastward from Beth-el, he pitched his tent hauing Beth-el on the Westside, and Haai on the East: and there he built an altar vnto the Lord, and called on the Name of the Lord. |
| 12:9 | Againe Abram went forth going and iourneying toward the South. |
| 12:10 | Then there came a famine in the land: therefore Abram went downe into Egypt to soiourne there: for there was a great famine in the lande. |
| 12:11 | And when he drewe neere to enter into Egypt, he said to Sarai his wife, Beholde nowe, I know that thou art a faire woman to looke vpon: |
| 12:12 | Therefore it will come to passe, that when the Egyptians see thee, they will say, She is his wife: so will they kill me, but they will keepe thee aliue. |
| 12:13 | Say, I pray thee, that thou art my sister, that I may fare well for thy sake, and that my life may be preserued by thee. |
| 12:14 | Nowe when Abram was come into Egypt, the Egyptians behelde the woman: for she was very faire. |
| 12:15 | And the Princes of Pharaoh sawe her, and commended her vnto Pharaoh: so the woman was taken into Pharaohs house: |
| 12:16 | Who intreated Abram well for her sake, and he had sheepe, and beeues, and hee asses, and men seruants and maide seruants, and shee asses, and camelles. |
| 12:17 | But the Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues, because of Sarai Abrams wife. |
| 12:18 | Then Pharaoh called Abram, and saide, Why hast thou done this vnto me? Wherefore diddest thou not tell me, that she was thy wife? |
| 12:19 | Why saidest thou, She is my sister, that I should take her to be my wife? Nowe therefore beholde thy wife, take her and goe thy way. |
| 12:20 | And Pharaoh gaue men commandement concerning him: and they conueyed him forth, and his wife, and all that he had. |
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
The Geneva Bible is one of the most influential and historically significant translations of the Bible into English, preceding the King James translation by 51 years. It was the primary Bible of 16th century Protestantism and was the Bible used by William Shakespeare, Oliver Cromwell, John Knox, John Donne, and John Bunyan. The language of the Geneva Bible was more forceful and vigorous and because of this, most readers strongly preferred this version at the time.
The Geneva Bible was produced by a group of English scholars who, fleeing from the reign of Queen Mary, had found refuge in Switzerland. During the reign of Queen Mary, no Bibles were printed in England, the English Bible was no longer used in churches and English Bibles already in churches were removed and burned. Mary was determined to return Britain to Roman Catholicism.
The first English Protestant to die during Mary's turbulent reign was John Rogers in 1555, who had been the editor of the Matthews Bible. At this time, hundreds of Protestants left England and headed for Geneva, a city which under the leadership of Calvin, had become the intellectual and spiritual capital of European Protestants.
One of these exiles was William Whittingham, a fellow of Christ Church at Oxford University, who had been a diplomat, a courtier, was much traveled and skilled in many languages including Greek and Hebrew. He eventually succeeded John Knox as the minister of the English congregation in Geneva. Whittingham went on to publish the 1560 Geneva Bible.
This version is significant because, it came with a variety of scriptural study guides and aids, which included verse citations that allow the reader to cross-reference one verse with numerous relevant verses in the rest of the Bible, introductions to each book of the Bible that acted to summarize all of the material that each book would cover, maps, tables, woodcut illustrations, indices, as well as other included features, all of which would eventually lead to the reputation of the Geneva Bible as history's very first study Bible.