Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
| 1:1 | The words of Nehemiah the sonne of Hachaliah. In ye moneth Chisleu, in the twentieth yeere, as I was in the palace of Shushan, |
| 1:2 | Came Hanam, one of my brethren, he and the men of Iudah, and I asked them concerning the Iewes that were deliuered, which were of the residue of the captiuitie, and concerning Ierusalem. |
| 1:3 | And they sayde vnto me, The residue that are left of the captiuitie there in the prouince, are in great affliction and in reproche, and the wall of Ierusalem is broken downe, and the gates thereof are burnt with fire. |
| 1:4 | And when I heard these wordes, I sate downe and wept, and mourned certeine dayes, and I fasted and prayed before the God of heauen, |
| 1:5 | And sayde, O Lord God of heauen, the great and terrible God, that keepeth couenant and mercy for them that loue him, and obserue his commandements, |
| 1:6 | I pray thee, let thine eares be attet, and thine eies open, to heare the praier of thy seruat, which I pray before thee dayly, day and night for ye childre of Israel thy seruats, and confesse the sinnes of the children of Israel, which we haue sinned against thee, both I and my fathers house haue sinned: |
| 1:7 | We haue grieuously sinned against thee, and haue not kept the commandements, nor the statutes, nor the iudgements, which thou commandedst thy seruant Moses. |
| 1:8 | I beseeche thee, remember the worde that thou commandedst thy seruant Moses, saying, Ye wil transgresse, and I will scatter you abroade among the people. |
| 1:9 | But if ye turne vnto me, and keepe my commandements, and doe them, though your scattering were to the vttermost part of the heauen, yet will I gather you from thence, and will bring you vnto the place that I haue chosen to place my Name there. |
| 1:10 | Now these are thy seruants and thy people, whome thou hast redeemed by thy great power, and by thy mightie hand. |
| 1:11 | O Lord, I beseech thee, let thine eare now hearken to the prayer of thy seruant, and to the prayer of thy seruants, who desire to feare thy Name, and I pray thee, cause thy seruant to prosper this day, and giue him fauour in the presence of this man: for I was the Kings butler. |
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.