Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
| 20:1 | And when the yere was expired, in the time that Kings goe out a warfare, Ioab caryed out the strength of the armie, and destroyed the countrey of the children of Ammon, and came and besieged Rabbah (but Dauid taryed at Ierusalem) and Ioab smote Rabbah and destroyed it. |
| 20:2 | Then Dauid tooke the crowne of their King from off his head, and founde it the weight of a talent of golde, with precious stones in it: and it was set on Dauids head, and he brought away the spoyle of the citie exceeding much. |
| 20:3 | And he caryed away the people that were in it, and cut them with sawes, and with harowes of yron, and with axes: euen thus did Dauid with all the cities of the children of Ammon. Then Dauid and all the people came againe to Ierusalem. |
| 20:4 | And after this also there arose warre at Gezer with the Philistims: then Sibbechai the Hushathite slewe Sippai, of the children of Haraphah, and they were subdued. |
| 20:5 | And there was yet another battell with the Philistims: and Elhanan the sonne of Iair slewe Lahmi, the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spearestaffe was like a weauers beame. |
| 20:6 | And yet againe there was a battel at Gath, where was a man of a great stature, and his fingers were by sixes, euen foure and twentie, and was also the sonne of Haraphah. |
| 20:7 | And when he reuiled Israel, Iehonathan the sonne of Shimea Dauids brother did slay him. |
| 20:8 | These were borne vnto Haraphah at Gath, and fell by the hand of Dauid: and by the hands of his seruants. |
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.