The King James Bible and biblical images of desolation
Edwards, KL
Date: 12 November 2015
Publisher
Oxford University Press
Publisher DOI
Abstract
This chapter attends to the politics of translation, comparing how the King James Bible
and the Geneva Bible represent the terrible desolation wrought by God’s punishment of
nations in Isaiah 13 and 34. The Geneva’s rendering of the chapters includes the
transliterated Hebrew names of abhorrent and frightening creatures that ...
This chapter attends to the politics of translation, comparing how the King James Bible
and the Geneva Bible represent the terrible desolation wrought by God’s punishment of
nations in Isaiah 13 and 34. The Geneva’s rendering of the chapters includes the
transliterated Hebrew names of abhorrent and frightening creatures that are
demonstrably ‘hard in the ears’ of readers. Glosses setting the meanings of those ‘hard’
words are furnished in the margins. The KJB, in contrast, translates the rare and difficult
words and relegates the transliterated Hebrew terms to the margins. Edwards argues
that the KJB’s infrequent marginal glosses embody the clear lesson that the task of
exegesis belongs to the clergy. The political effect of the KJB’s translational strategy is to
bolster the established church, and to downplay the difficulty of the Bible as a translated
text.
English
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