Wide As the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired [Deckle Edge] [Hardcover]

Benson Bobrick (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0684847477 | ISBN-13: 978-0684847474 | Publication Date: April 11, 2001 | Edition: 1St Edition

Next to the Bible itself, the English Bible was -- and is -- the most influential book ever published. The most famous of all English Bibles, the King James Version, was the culmination of centuries of work by various translators, from John Wycliffe, the fourteenth-century catalyst of English Bible translation, to the committee of scholars who collaborated on the King James translation. "Wide as the Waters" examines the life and work of Wycliffe and recounts the tribulations of his successors, including William Tyndale, who was martyred, Miles Coverdale, and others who came to bitter ends. It traces the story of the English Bible through the tumultuous reigns of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary Tudor, and Elizabeth I, a time of fierce contest between Catholics and Protes-tants in England, as the struggle to establish a vernacular Bible was fought among competing factions. In the course of that struggle, Sir Thomas More, later made a Catholic saint, helped orchestrate the assault on the English Bible, only to find his own true faith the plaything of his king.

In 1604, a committee of fifty-four scholars, the flower of Oxford and Cambridge, collaborated on the new translation for King James. Their collective expertise in biblical languages and related fields has probably never been matched, and the translation they produced -- substantially based on the earlier work of Wycliffe, Tyndale, and others -- would shape English literature and speech for centuries. As the great English historian Macaulay wrote of their version, "If everything else in our language should perish, it alone would suffice to show the extent of its beauty and power." To this day its common expressions, such as "labor of love," "lick the dust," "a thorn in the flesh," "the root of all evil," "the fat of the land," "the sweat of thy brow," "to cast pearls before swine," and "the shadow of death," are heard in everyday speech.

The impact of the English Bible on law and society was profound. It gave every literate person access to the sacred text, which helped to foster the spirit of inquiry through reading and reflection. This, in turn, accelerated the growth of commercial printing and the proliferation of books. Once people were free to interpret the word of God according to the light of their own understanding, they began to question the authority of their inherited institutions, both religious and secular. This led to reformation within the Church, and to the rise of constitutional government in England and the end of the divine right of kings. England fought a Civil War in the light (and shadow) of such concepts, and by them confirmed the Glorious Revolution of 1688. In time, the new world of ideas that the English Bible helped inspire spread across the Atlantic to America, and eventually, like Wycliffe's sea-borne scattered ashes, all the world over, "as wide as the waters be."

"Wide as the Waters" is a story about a crucial epoch in the history of Christianity, about the English language and society, and about a book that changed the course of human events.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Benson Bobrick's Wide as the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired is a brisk and gripping work of history, religion, and literary criticism. Translation of the King James Bible took centuries to complete, and Bobrick provides colorful descriptions of the distinctive contributions of various translators who took part in the project, particularly John Wyclif in the 15th century and William Tyndale in the 16th century. (Tyndale, he points out, is the second most widely quoted writer, after Shakespeare, in the English language ["eat, drink, and be merry," is Tyndale's phrase; so is "the spirit is willing but the flesh is weak"].) Wide as the Waters interprets each translator's work according to its contemporary political context in England. The book's most dramatic passages are found in its account of Henry VIII's showdown with Rome, which resulted in (among other things) Tyndale's execution. Although Bobrick may overstate the singularity of the Bible's influence on the English Revolution (he asserts that the concepts of liberty and free will that guided revolutionaries who overthrew Charles I were primarily derived from the King James Bible), his argument is, at the very least, an effective and engaging reminder of Scripture's liberating power. --Michael Joseph Gross

From Publishers Weekly

Independent scholar Bobrick's (Angel in the Whirlwind; etc.) erudite yet accessible history chronicles the turbulent period from the first English translation of the Bible, sponsored by John Wycliffe in 1382, to the King James Version in 1611. Rendering the Scriptures in the vernacular was an act fraught with peril, he reminds readers. Simply possessing a Wycliffe Bible was enough to get a layperson tried for heresy. William Tyndale, whose early-16th-century renderings of the New Testament and Pentateuch greatly influenced the King James translators, saw his work confiscated and destroyed by English ecclesiastical authorities; he was burned at the stake in 1536. Though Henry VIII's break from Rome prompted more English versions in the late 16th century, conservatives still feared that giving the common people access to the Scriptures would lead to civic as well as religious unrest; eventually, the Civil War of 1642-1649 suggested they were right. Succeeding Elizabeth in 1603, James I aimed to consolidate his position as head of church and state with a new Bible that would take the best from all previous English versions and maintain the Anglo-Catholic terms (such as "church" rather than the more Puritan "congregation") favored by the Bishop's Bible of 1568. Bobrick offers cogent minibiographies of the remarkable team of scholars James assembled, and his lucid exegeses show how seemingly small changes (from "the earth was void and empty" into "the earth was without form and void") transformed the text, rendering it majestic yet easily understandable. Bobrick's analysis of how dissemination of the Bible helped spark the Civil War is oversimplified, but historians have long agreed that putting the Scriptures in the hands of the people was indeed a revolutionary act. It's a pleasure to have this stirring story so well told for the general reader. (Apr.) Forecast: The publisher may be going too far in comparing this to The Professor and the Madman, but this is a rich, accessible history that will appeal to students of religion, English and history, and so should rack up generous sales.
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 384 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster; 1St Edition edition (April 11, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0684847477
• ISBN-13: 978-0684847474
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.7 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (32 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #353,119 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

78 of 81 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Translators Brought Us Liberty, April 12, 2001

By 

R. Hardy "Rob Hardy" (Columbus, Mississippi USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Wide As the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired (Hardcover)

There is a famous Italian proverb, "Traduttore, traditore," which means, "The translator is a traitor." It is generally taken to mean that someone who translates a work betrays the work itself, as a translation cannot sufficiently convey the original. But in the case of the Bible, translation has been regarded literally as a betrayal, a betrayal against religious or civic authority that might result in the most severe of punishments. In _Wide as the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired_ (Simon & Schuster) Benson Bobrick tells about the dangers of this particular betrayal as the Bible was launched by various attempts over the centuries into English. The popes and monarchs were right to be worried about putting the Bible into the vernacular.

The right of the individual to make private religious inquiry may be said to have started with John Wycliffe, who was involved in translating the Bible in 1380. His work was suppressed and condemned as heretical. The offended and unforgiving church dug up his bones forty years after he died and burned them. The father of the English Bible as we know it is William Tyndale. He was a child prodigy in languages and "singularly addicted to the study of the scriptures." Influenced by the Humanists and by Luther, and taking advantage of the advent of printing by movable type, he wanted lay-people themselves to see the "process, order, and meaning of the text." He was hounded into Europe, and Henry VIII put watches on English ports to ensure his dangerous book did not sully their shores. Tyndale lived a hunted life in Europe, was betrayed and captured in Antwerp, tried for heresy, and strangled and burned.

Bobrick, of course, explains much about the formation of the King James Version by fifty distinguished scholars, and he gives examples of the evolution of the Bible, with the KJV shining admirably in comparison to its predecessors. Although the story of how we came to have an English Bible is a fascinating one, Bobrick's main thesis is that a popular Bible changed the way everyone regarded kings, popes, and governments. Removed from the clutches of the clergy, the Bible became the instruction for any individual who cared to take it up and interpret it in any manner. It was not necessarily that the Bible had instruction in liberty, but being able to read it freely was a token of the importance of liberty; it wasn't especially important whether reading the Bible turned readers into Christians. Those who upheld the individual reading of scripture were those who promoted freedom of the press and who saw the conscience of the individual as the authority in all things. They thereby reduced the authority of clergy and kings. Those who could read the Bible themselves began to cite its many examples of bad kings and religious leaders when making comparisons to contemporaries. The read-it-yourself Bible was a blow for individual conscience, one which brought on a constitutional crisis in Britain and eventually spurred independence for the United States. Bobrick's well-researched and persuasive book shows that all of us, believers or not, are in debt to those who thought the Bible ought to be in everyone's hands.

35 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The King James Bible: Secular and Religious Reformations, June 20, 2001

By 

Richard Rinn (Richmond Hill, Ontario Canada) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Wide As the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired (Hardcover)

Benson Bobrick was critically acclaimed for his history of the American Revolution, "Angel in the Whirlwind: The Triumph of the American Revolution". "Wide as the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired" is equally well written, but deals with the less well known--although nonetheless related--topic of the evolution of the various English language bibles into the linguistically glorious King James version.

This is a multilayered story which combines the chronological histories of the various biblical translations with the political and religious transformations/reformations occuring in England at the same time. Bobrick skillfully interweaves the linguistic and literary aspects of a great feat of religious publishing with the social, political, religious, and intellectual revolutions that were taking place concurrently, and convincingly shows how one area of change was inextricably connected and causally related to each of the others. The conerstone of his interpretation is the thesis that history is not a set of unrelated, individual, unconnected events or processes, but a seamless flow where all historical forces are intimately and irrevocably intertwined. While the literal "revolution" that he referres to is ultimately the American separation from Great Britain beginning in 1776, the term could equally be a reference to the development of democratic parliamentary government in England at the expense of monarchial power; or the dramatic transformation in religion in Britain that came about as a result of the schism in the Roman Catholic Church; or the social and intellectual upheaval brought about by easy access to scriptural reading in colloquial language; or, perhaps most signficantly, the simple freedom to read in your own language, uncensored and for yourself, whatever it is that you want to read. All of these things set the stage both metaphorically and concretely for the American Revolution that was shortly to follow.

This is a book which is not simply religious in context, although it makes a valuable contribution to theological history. Rather, it is foremost a history of ideas (primarily religious though they may be), and therefore also falls well within the realm of political and social history.

28 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent History Regardless Of Specific Faith, July 26, 2001

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taking a rest - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Wide As the Waters: The Story of the English Bible and the Revolution It Inspired (Hardcover)

"Wide As The Waters", could easily be classified as a book about the evolution of The English Bible, and by extension a discussion exclusively of The Christian Faith. This presumption would greatly decrease the potential audience, and do a disservice to a remarkably readable and scholarly dissertation upon the events that produced what many consider the finest version of this book. This is not simply an explanation about The King James Bible and those that did the necessary translation. It is a sweeping view of the history of The Bible, its misuse as a political defense and weapon, and the centuries it took to bring the work to fruition. Contrary to what many believe, The King James Bible was not the first Bible in English, it was not the second, fifth, or even the tenth. Bibles that preceded it were produced in dozens of editions preceding the King James. The story of those who brought this remarkable product of scholarship to its fruition is nothing short of astounding. Whether or not your Faith coincides with The Bible, or whether you enjoy excellent dispassionate History, this book is a brilliant work, penned by the inspired Historian Benson Bobrick.

The variety of interests that sought to produce the definitive English translation was a varied group. There were Kings, Queens, Popes, and dozens of others that would eventually contribute to the final product. At one point The Catholic Church was so fragmented that it had no less than 3 Popes claiming St. Peter's Throne simultaneously. These same people in power either encouraged or caused the martyrdom of men like John Wycliffe, William Tyndale, and Miles Coverdale. Henry VIII, Edward IV, Mary Tudor, and Elizabeth I, were just some of the memorable monarchs in the drama.

The greatest impact was the knowledge that was taken from the obscurity of languages known only be a few, who often would interpret the writings for their own agenda. No longer would The Bible be the hostage of Church Monopoly; it would finally be in the hands for which it was intended. While this event promoted the massive increase in books and printing, it also gave rise to individual interpretation that eventually leads to The Reformation. It will also bring to an end the Divine Right Of Kings, and other events of major Historical import.

Anyone who has looked at comparisons between the varieties of English Bibles can see how easily meaning can be changed, how entire concepts can be altered. The Author does a wonderful job of supplying enough examples of the issues the original translators faced without making the reading obscure. He demonstrates the importance of what text was to be used, Latin, Latin Vulgate, Ancient Greek, Hebrew, or Aramaic. He makes clear that rarely would any two people make identical translations whether due to style or personal agenda. It forces readers to ponder just what would be read if the ancient texts were read as intended. Instead we read a book that has been revised and edited extensively.

One portion that I greatly enjoyed were the familiar passages that the Author highlighted as some of the great English Prose that has been written. Like Shakespeare's words they remain so familiar to the ear though written in the 14th Century.

This is a remarkable work that virtually anyone can enjoy.