Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
| 1:1 | Pavl, and Siluanus, and Timotheus, vnto the Church of the Thessalonians, which is in God the Father, and in the Lord Iesus Christ: Grace be with you, and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Iesus Christ. |
| 1:2 | We giue God thankes alwayes for you all, making mention of you in our prayers |
| 1:3 | Without ceasing, remembring your effectuall faith, and diligent loue, and the patience of your hope in our Lord Iesus Christ, in the sight of God euen our Father, |
| 1:4 | Knowing, beloued brethren, that ye are elect of God. |
| 1:5 | For our Gospell was not vnto you in worde only, but also in power, and in the holy Ghost, and in much assurance, as ye know after what maner we were among you for your sakes. |
| 1:6 | And ye became followers of vs, and of the Lord, and receiued the worde in much affliction, with ioy of the holy Ghost, |
| 1:7 | So that ye were as ensamples to all that beleeue in Macedonia and in Achaia. |
| 1:8 | For from you sounded out the worde of the Lord, not in Macedonia and in Achaia only: but your faith also which is toward God, spred abroad in all quarters, that we neede not to speake any thing. |
| 1:9 | For they themselues shew of vs what maner of entring in we had vnto you, and how ye turned to God from idoles, to serue the liuing and true God, |
| 1:10 | And to looke for his sonne from heauen, whome he raised from the dead, euen Iesus which deliuereth vs from that wrath to come. |
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.