A camel is a horse designed by committee goes the old maxim that ranks firm leadership by one strong individual as superior to a group working to reach a common agreement.
I know which animal I’d rather have in the desert, but is the saying true?
The four hundredth anniversary of the King James Bible suggests the truth might be a little more complex. The King James, which spawned many turns of phrase we still use today such as “salt of the earth ” and “skin of the teeth” came about as a result of a political compromise and was created by a committee.
The compromise was a challenging one – the need to find something to bring together the Bishops and the Protestants (as they were insultingly called by their opponents) at the beginning of the 17th century. A new translation of the Bible wasn’t anyone’s first choice, but proved to be something that agreement could be achieved on.
The committee – actually a series of committees – created one of the greatest works of English literature ever conceived.
So spare a thought for the poor old committee – perhaps they aren’t so terrible after all.
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8 Comments
I think you are using “created” in a very unbiblical sense there. The KJB is a political compromise and translation exercise. The creative element largely rests with the original authors, or author depending on your religious bent.
It was also designed to displace the dissenting translations that it sought to displace, and enforce conformity through the state church and monarch.
And if the goal of that was settle disputes between Puritans and other Christian factions history would tend to suggest it was a spectacular failure. We still ended up with a civil war and theocracy in no small part driven by state interference in the way people wished to worship.
I’m unclear in that regard, other than a respect for the quality of the writing, what liberals should welcome about the KJB?
Andy – I don’t think anyone suggests that the KJB united Christian factions forever; my point is simply that a political compromise and a committee of translators produced one the best selling, most influential and most respected works of literature the world has seen.
The language is beautiful. The King James Bible should be celebrated as part of English history.
The real “liberal” heroes are those such as Wycliffe and Tynedale who first made the Bible available to people in English. Even though not many people could read at the time, it was a great leap forward in allowing them to read and interpret the bible for themselves. Until then many were reliant on the snippets given to them, which as anyone who has read the bible know can be taken out of context to justify just about any position…
Wycliffe followed later by Tyndedale (and many others whose names didn’t survive through history) allowed everyone access to the Bible to make their own decisions. This was at great cost, hounded in life, after his death Wycliffe remains were exhumed and burnt. Tynedale was less lucky and died at the stake (with an attemmpted “merciful” strangulation before the flames took him!).
Whatever their motives for working on their respective translations, both were key individuals in the process that allows those lucky enough to live in this Country the freedom to read, interpet and choose for themselves whether to follow one of the various denominations of the Christian Church or none at all. Such freedom of choice is surely a true liberal achievement ?
Obviously the analogy sought here is of compromise producing better results. This is undoubtedly true in most circumstances, however, there still needs to be a place for the courageous campaigners such as Wycliffe and Tynedale.
Whether or not the King James Bible is one of the ‘greatest works of English literature ever conceived” or not is very much up for debate, methinks. It entirely depends on one’s judgement of it’s worth.
It certainly deserves credit for being an influential work but I’m not sure it’s been an entirely good thing, or any other Bible version for that matter. I tend to associate greatness with goodness, so it doesn’t quite cut it for me I’m afraid.
http://politicoid.wordpress.com/
@polticoid
The influence upon the English language is surely enough to justify the statement that it is one of the greatest works of English literature (even the Blessed Richard Dawkins thinks so). Alongside Shakespeare it is the foundation of the development of English from Early Modern to the current version (and it is amusing when people get the credit for a quote mixed up between the AV and Shakespeare!).
It also has inspired may influential people – think of the Diggers, the Levellers, Wesley’s social reforms, Wilberforce, Shaftesbury etc. All quoted from the AV Bible – the run of phrase as much as the content did much to influence where we are now.
@Steve Way
Like you, I’m a huge fan of what Wycliffe and Tynedale achieved with their translations 🙂
It depends how large the committee is and how long they rabbit on for.