Textus Receptus Bibles
Geneva Bible 1560/1599
15:1 | And I sawe another signe in heauen, great and marueilous, seuen Angels, hauing the seuen last plagues: for by them is fulfilled the wrath of God. |
15:2 | And I sawe as it were a glassie sea, mingled with fire, and them that had gotten victorie of the beast, and of his image, and of his marke, and of the number of his name, stand at the glassie sea, hauing the harpes of God, |
15:3 | And they sung the song of Moses the seruant of God, and the song of the Lambe, saying, Great and marueilous are thy workes, Lord God almightie: iust and true are thy wayes, King of Saints. |
15:4 | Who shall not feare thee, O Lord, and glorifie thy Name! for thou onely art holy, and all nations shall come and worship before thee: for thy iudgements are made manifest. |
15:5 | And after that, I looked, and beholde, the Temple of the tabernacle of testimonie was open in heauen. |
15:6 | And the seuen Angels came out of the Temple, which had the seuen plagues, clothed in pure and bright linnen, and hauing their breasts girded with golden girdles. |
15:7 | And one of the foure beastes gaue vnto the seuen Angels seuen golden vials full of the wrath of God, which liueth for euermore. |
15:8 | And the Temple was full of the smoke of the glory of God and of his power, and no man was able to enter into the Temple, till the seuen plagues of the seuen Angels were fulfilled. |
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.