Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
| 58:1 | To him that excelleth. Destroy not. A Psalme of David on Michtam. Is it true? O Congregation, speake ye iustly? O sonnes of men, iudge ye vprightly? |
| 58:2 | Yea, rather ye imagine mischiefe in your heart: your hands execute crueltie vpon the earth. |
| 58:3 | The wicked are strangers from ye wombe: euen from the belly haue they erred, and speake lyes. |
| 58:4 | Their poyson is euen like the poyson of a serpent: like ye deafe adder that stoppeth his eare. |
| 58:5 | Which heareth not the voyce of the inchanter, though he be most expert in charming. |
| 58:6 | Breake their teeth, O God, in their mouthes: breake the iawes of the yong lions, O Lord. |
| 58:7 | Let them melt like the waters, let them passe away: when hee shooteth his arrowes, let them be as broken. |
| 58:8 | Let them consume like a snayle that melteth, and like the vntimely fruite of a woman, that hath not seene the sunne. |
| 58:9 | As raw flesh before your pots feele the fire of thornes: so let him cary them away as with a whirlewinde in his wrath. |
| 58:10 | The righteous shall reioyce when he seeeth the vengeance: he shall wash his feete in the blood of the wicked. |
| 58:11 | And men shall say, Verily there is fruite for the righteous: doutlesse there is a God that iudgeth in the earth. |
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.