Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
| 2:1 | The destroyer is come before thy face: keepe the munition: looke to the way: make thy loynes strong: increase thy strength mightily. |
| 2:2 | For the Lord hath turned away the glorie of Iaakob, as the glorie of Israel: for the emptiers haue emptied them out, and marred their vine branches. |
| 2:3 | The shield of his mightie men is made red: the valiant men are in skarlet: the charets shalbe as in the fire and flames in the day of his preparation, and the firre trees shall tremble. |
| 2:4 | The charets shall rage in the streetes: they shall runne to and from in the hie wayes: they shall seeme like lampes: they shall shoote like the lightning. |
| 2:5 | He shall remember his strong men: they shall stumble as they goe: they shall make haste to the walles thereof, and the defence shall bee prepared. |
| 2:6 | The gates of the riuers shalbe opened, and the palace shall melt. |
| 2:7 | And Huzzab the Queene shalbe led away captiue, and her maides shall leade her as with the voyce of doues, smiting vpon their breastes. |
| 2:8 | But Nineueh is of olde like a poole of water: yet they shall flee away. Stande, stande, shall they crie: but none shall looke backe. |
| 2:9 | Spoyle ye the siluer, spoyle the golde: for there is none ende of the store, and glorie of all the pleasant vessels. |
| 2:10 | She is emptie and voyde and waste, and the heart melteth, and the knees smite together, and sorowe is in all loynes, and the faces of the all gather blackenesse. |
| 2:11 | Where is the dwelling of the lyons, and the pasture of the lyons whelpes? where the lyon, and the lionesse walked, and the lyons whelpe, and none made them afrayde. |
| 2:12 | The lyon did teare in pieces ynough for his whelpes, and woryed for his lyonesse, and filled his holes with praye, and his dennes with, spoyle. |
| 2:13 | Beholde, I come vnto thee, sayeth the Lord of hostes, and I will burne her charets in the smoke, and the sworde shall deuoure thy yong lyons, and I will cut off thy spoyle from the earth, and the voyce of thy messengers shall no more be heard. |
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.