Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
| 5:1 | My sonne, hearken vnto my wisedome, and incline thine eare vnto my knowledge. |
| 5:2 | That thou maiest regarde counsell, and thy lippes obserue knowledge. |
| 5:3 | For the lippes of a strange woman drop as an honie combe, and her mouth is more soft then oyle. |
| 5:4 | But the end of her is bitter as wormewood, and sharpe as a two edged sworde. |
| 5:5 | Her feete goe downe to death, and her steps take holde on hell. |
| 5:6 | She weigheth not the way of life: her paths are moueable: thou canst not knowe them. |
| 5:7 | Heare yee me nowe therefore, O children, and depart not from the wordes of my mouth. |
| 5:8 | Keepe thy way farre from her, and come not neere the doore of her house, |
| 5:9 | Least thou giue thine honor vnto others, and thy yeeres to the cruell: |
| 5:10 | Least the stranger should be silled with thy strength, and thy labours bee in the house of a stranger, |
| 5:11 | And thou mourne at thine end, (when thou hast consumed thy flesh and thy bodie) |
| 5:12 | And say, How haue I hated instruction, and mine heart despised correction! |
| 5:13 | And haue not obeied the voyce of them that taught mee, nor enclined mine eare to them that instructed me! |
| 5:14 | I was almost brought into all euil in ye mids of the Congregation and assemblie. |
| 5:15 | Drinke the water of thy cisterne, and of the riuers out of the middes of thine owne well. |
| 5:16 | Let thy fountaines flow foorth, and the riuers of waters in the streetes. |
| 5:17 | But let them bee thine, euen thine onely, and not the strangers with thee. |
| 5:18 | Let thy fountaine be blessed, and reioyce with the wife of thy youth. |
| 5:19 | Let her be as the louing hinde and pleasant roe: let her brests satisfie thee at all times, and delite in her loue continually. |
| 5:20 | For why shouldest thou delite, my sonne, in a strange woman, or embrace the bosome of a stranger? |
| 5:21 | For the waies of man are before the eyes of the Lord, and he pondereth all his pathes. |
| 5:22 | His owne iniquities shall take the wicked himselfe, and he shall be holden with the cordes of his owne sinne. |
| 5:23 | Hee shall die for fault of instruction, and shall goe astray through his great follie. |
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.