Old book in a new world The story of Bible translations in America centers around the KJV
H. Bucholzer, Riot in Philadelphia, June [i.e. July] 7 th 1844 , Lithograph—Library of Congress / [Public domain] Wikimedia
Chris R. Armstrong In 1630 Massachusetts founding governor John Winthrop (1588–1649)—of “city on a hill” sermon fame (see CH #138)—brought his own personal copy of the King James Version ashore: the first known KJV on American soil. But this was something of an aberration; a solid majority of the earliest colonists preferred their Puritan-friendly Geneva Bible. In fact, given the popularity of that version at the time, Winthrop’s KJV seemed destined to remain a mere curiosity. Within two decades, however, the KJV was well on its way to becoming The Bible of the New World. As the Geneva ceased publication in 1644, British-printed KJVs flowed into American churches, homes, and libraries. And when, in the late 1700s, KJVs began issuing from American presses, the floodgates opened. By the 1800s American editions numbered in the millions, and the KJV was singing its cadences through the greatest American novels, shaping the solemn phrases of presidential speeches, and changing the American language itself with hundreds of new idiomatic phrases. Beloved above all in the churches, the KJV became so dominant by the 1900s that in 1936, a scholar complained that many Americans “seemed to think that the King James Version is the original Bible which God handed down out of heaven, all done up in English by the Lord himself.” 1777 saw the first publication of the KJV on American soil, a New Testament printed by Robert Aitken (1734–1802) of Philadelphia during the Revolution. Four years later he released his full Bible after petitioning Congress for support in his enterprise (they granted it). Aitken printed 10,000 copies. But the Aitken Bible struggled against better-printed, cheaper editions shipped from England—in fact, he took a significant financial hit on the project, losing over £3,000. Revivals and Bibles American Bible publishing broke wide open with the dawning of the 1790s, when came the first stirring of
not keeping the peace This 1844 engraving shows Philadelphians rioting over the use (or not) of the KJV in public schools (see p. 30).
renewed revivalism since the Great Awakening of the 1740s. These would quickly build into a veritable evangelistic tidal wave (see pp. 11–13). First came emotional frontier camp meetings in places like Cane Ridge, Kentucky; then the aggressive revivalism of Charles Finney (1792–1875) in the “burned-over district” of upstate New York; a sudden eruption in the late 1850s of noontime prayerand-testimony meetings in major East Coast cities; and the genteel but power-packed midcentury parlor meetings and camp meetings of Phoebe Palmer (1807–1874) and her Wesleyan Holiness colleagues. Eventually the movement culminated in the latecentury mass evangelism and Bible conferences of D. L. Moody (1837–1899). Countless conversions and a boom in church growth created a nationwide thirst for more Bibles. By 1800 Americans could acquire 70 different printings from the presses in 11 different towns; by 1840 more than a thousand printings. One who capitalized early on the Bible-publishing boom was craftsmanscholar Isaiah Thomas (1749–1831). This self-educated
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