William Tyndale

Continuing from my blog post about a book I have just finished reading, I was fascinated to learn something about William Tyndale, whose earlier translation of the bible from the early 1500s was used intact for large amounts of the King James version (1611). Another quote from this most excellent book, which I recommend whether you are a believe or not:

"There is an important point here. Tyndale enthusiasts have calculated that 94 per cent of the New Testament in the King James Bible is exactly as Tyndale left it. Therefore, the argument goes, the Jacobean Translators were in some ways little better than plagiarists, promoting as their own work a translation that belonged essentially to another man, a Protestant martyr, who died a horrible death, attacked repeatedly and mercilessly by Thomas More, and who nevertheless reshaped the English language, who framed the phrases we all know: 'Love suffereth long and is courteous, Love envieth not'; 'When I was a child, I spake as a child, I imagined as a child'; 'eat, drink and be merry'; 'salt of the earth'; the 'powers that be'; 'as bald as a coot'; 'Our Father which art in heaven', and so on."

I'm just saying... it's a good read!