page or responsible for its content.
P r e f a c e
T
he God-given vision to restore this special edi-
tion of the 1599 Geneva Bible was announced
in January of 2004. Soon thereafter a team
was organized to reset every word, making no changes
except these few: modern spelling; proofreading to
ensure word-for-word accuracy with the original 1599
edition; and designing an easy-to-read format. Over the
subsequent three years of meticulous work, the produc-
tion/editorial team witnessed the Providence of God
in the daily details. The Lord clearly has ordained this
special project and brought it to completion. Our hope
is that the Geneva Bible, restored to its rightful place
among frequently referenced Scriptures, will remind
Christians of their rich heritage in the Protestant Ref-
ormation and inspire them to continue advancing the
Gospel and Christs Kingdom with the same passion
and conviction of the Reformers.
We would like to share with readers the editorial
philosophy and restoration processes we employed as we
prepared this edition of the 1599 Geneva Bible.
SOURCE TEXT
Unlike most contemporary Bible translations, which
have unvarying contents because of copyright strictures,
the Geneva Bible was never a uniform publication. Due
to the relative novelty of publishing Bibles in English,
as well as the sheer number of printings (approximately
150 in its first 75 years), its many editions often varied
in content and presentation.
The Geneva Bible was first published in 1560, and
then in 1576 a revised form of the Geneva Bible was
produced by Laurence Tomson, Secretary to Sir Francis
Walsingham (then Elizabeths Secretary of State) and
formerly lecturer in Hebrew at Geneva. This contains
a few changes in the translation, the most characteristic
being Tomsons pedantic rendering of the Greek definite
article by that (e.g., Matt. 16.16, Thou art that Christ);
but the chief difference is the introduction of an English
translation of Theodore Bezas summaries of doctrine and
exposition of phrases, in Bezas Latin Bible. In 1598, the
annotations on the Book of Revelation by Francis Junius,
a Huguenot divine, were introduced into the Geneva
Bible [Metzger, Bruce M., Book Notes, Theology
Today, Vol 46, no 4 ( January 1990): 463].
The edition we have chosen as our source is a facsimile
of the work of Tomson and Junius, dated 1599; however
in 1599 alone ten editions appeared [Dr. Roger Nicole,
The Original Geneva Bible, Tabletalk Magazine, Vol.
19, no 4 (April 1995)]. Our source copy was published
by L L Brown (The 1599 Geneva Bible. Ozark, MO:
LL Brown Publishing,7th printing, 2003), with an
introduction by James W. Bennett, and back matter
containing the (undated) Sternhold & Hopkins Psalms.
The Apocrypha and metrical Psalms, included in that
edition, are omitted here, as well as the brief introduc-
tions to the Old Testament books (since they were not
available for the New Testament books, we elected to
omit them consistently). A Note to the Reader in our
source copys front matter, lists errors that, according to
the Historical Catalogue of Printed Bibles, were in the
original 1599 editionindicating an edition printed early
enough in 1599 to precede these corrections.
It has been our attempt faithfully to preserve this
single source, rather than consult many editions that
would risk producing an inauthentic pastiche. The only
exceptions are rare indiscernible sections or words; in
those cases we have consulted other editions, indicated
by citations in brackets.
AUTHENTICITY
Every word, as well as exact sentence structure, of the
source edition is retained. We carefully have preserved the
use of italics, by which the original translators indicated
that they had supplied words not found in the original
manuscripts. We retained capitalization of words, even
at the risk of presenting anomalies to contemporary eyes.
We avoided editorial tinkering in the name of stylistic
consistency. Original punctuation was retained except
in cases of egregious mistakes or obvious typographical
errors in the source edition.
David Norton, in A Textual History of the King James
Bible (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005),
describes his own editorial standards for a new edition
of the KJB for Cambridge: Very importantly, [to] not
modernise wherever possible. Modernisation must not
be at the expense of the text, even if the result is more
difficult for the reader (page 136). Similarly, we did
not attempt to make the text readable from a modern
standpointonly to offer contemporary readers what
the Geneva Bible said.
ACCESSIBILITY
The Geneva Bible was written during a period where
the English language was transforming from Middle
English to Early Modern English. English was also
going through a shift in pronunciation that was caught
in the printing press. Grammar was also changing, due
to influence from other languages, the printing press,
P r e f a c e
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xx
and from natural simplification. Sentence structure
also changed. [Bennett, introduction to The 1599
Geneva Bible, 2003, xv-xvii].
The English language evolved in major ways during
the writing of the Geneva Bible, and since then has
changed even more radically, especially in matters of
typography and print. An exact facsimile reprint of the
early Geneva Bible, therefore, would be largely inaccessible
to the modern reader. We have therefore addressed and
updated the spelling of some words, and the appearance
of some old letters, for the sake of American readers
ease of comprehension. Many times this simply meant
changing an apparent f to an s; a y to an i; a v to a u;
an i to a j; and so forth. For example, instead of what
contemporary eyes would read as Iefus faid vnto him,
we have typeset Jesus said unto him.
However, some of the spelling decisions were not
as clear-cut:
Possessives We added apostrophes for possessives
(which were not used in the English of that day), because
these were determined not to be changes in meaning.
For instance, where the source text read God his mercy,
this edition reads Gods mercy.
Proper Names We have also changed the spelling of
the proper names in the Bible to that of the NKJV, since
this can greatly help the contemporary reader, and does
not compromise the meaning of the original edition. If,
however, the NKJV used a completely different word
than the source text, we retained the word from the
source text, since to change would be to make a different
choice than the original translators made. For example,
we did not substitute Syria for Aram.
Changes in Meaning What seems like a spelling dif-
ference sometimes indicates a distinction in meaning
that the original translators intended. If we were unable
to discern whether that was the case, we retained the
language of the source text. For example, we accepted
both bewray and betray, shamefaced and shamefast,
astonied and astonished.
If, however, 16th-century spellings were freely inter-
changed with no distinction in meaning and if that
is not the case today we adjusted the text based on
current meaning. For example, the source uses beside
and besides interchangeably, yet through the subsequent
years of English usage there has developed a distinction in
meaning between the two words; so we used beside for
by the side of, and besides for in addition to. Other
such examples include: whiles and while, other and
others, then and than. In such instances the original
word no longer gives the original meaning.
We have referred above to philological challenges and
typographical errors. Occasional words or passages in the
original-source Geneva Bible are beyond the realms of
subtle ambiguity or theological debate. For example, in
Matthew 3:16, the source Geneva reads that John saw
the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lightning
upon Jesus. Because the intended word is so clearly
lighting, we made the change; but were yet concerned
to place that word in brackets, indicating that it was a
change from the source edition. Also, as has been noted
above, if we have been unable to read our source book
and have consulted another Geneva edition, we have
enclosed that text in brackets. Withal, there are very
few words in brackets in this edition.
Archaic Words If a word is archaic, obsolete, colloquial,
such that the meaning is now inaccessible or completely
changed, we were careful to retain the original word; to
completely change one word to another supersedes a
spelling correction and compromises authenticity. Instead
we have provided a glossary with short definitions in the
back of this edition to help the modern reader. Again, to
quote Norton, The English of the KJB has many archaic
words that present challenges to the understanding,
but it is obvious that changing them is translating
them [A Textual History of the King James Bible, 138].
The Geneva Bible of 1560, being even earlier than the
King James Bible of 1611, has many archaic words. The
purpose of this edition is to let the reader see what they
are, not to see how we decided to translate them.
Indiscernible Text There have been occasions when
we simply could not discern the meaning of a word, or
the intent of the original translat