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Question #16
QUESTION:
Did King James authorize his translation to be used in the churches in
England?
ANSWER:
No. He authorized it's translation, but not its usage.
EXPLANATION:
It is difficult for someone in the twentieth century, especially someone
in America to fathom the conditions of nearly four hundred years ago. We
Christians not only have a Bible in our language, but more often than not,
we have several. Added to that is our concordance and a raft of Bible
commentaries and sundry other "Christian" books.
Yet the world of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries was
quite different. The common man in England had no Bible. The only copy
available to him was chained to the altar of the church. As recently as
1536, William Tyndale had been burned at the stake for the high crime of
printing Bibles in the language of the common man, English. When King
James commissioned the fifty-four translators in 1603 he did not mandate
the upcoming translation to be used in churches. In fact, that it was
translated and not intended for the churches left it only
one explainable destiny. That is, that it should be supplied to the common
man.
It might be noted that the world has no greater power than the common
man with the common Bible in his hand.
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