Review: Bible: The Story of the King James Version 1611-2011

BOOK REVIEW:

Bible: The Story of the King James Version 1611-2011 by Gordon Campbell – review

A history of the King James Version celebrates the Bible's stunning scholarship – and drunken misprints

* Daisy Hay
* The Observer, Sunday 17 October 2010
* Article history

Part way through this history of the King James Bible, Gordon Campbell turns his attention from the 17th century to our own age. "It would be difficult now," he writes, "to bring together a group of more than 50 scholars with the range of languages and knowledge of other disciplines that characterised the KJV translators. We may live in a world with more knowledge, but it is populated by people with less knowledge."

Campbell's book demonstrates that this conclusion is depressingly accurate. The King James Version was, first and foremost, an unbelievable feat of scholarship: its translators were fluent in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic and Ethiopic, as well as being expert theologians and Bible historians. It was also an organisational feat, which brought together Britain's leading scholars in tiers of companies and committees, and which entailed a concerted effort by cohorts of printers, typesetters and bookbinders.

[...]

This seems to be turning into one of those media memes that journalists mouth without bothering to check the facts. That's the depressing part. I don't know if Campbell is being quoted in context, but if he is, he should know better. Briefly, yes it would be a challenge to organize such a project, but not an overwhelming one, and no it would not be hard to find the requisite number of specialists. The More Old Testament Pseudepigrapha Project has an international team of scholars about the same size as the one that produced the King James Bible and the MOTP contributors cover a much wider range of languages and specialties. Mercifully, we don't have "tiers of companies and committees." My comments here also apply.