Editing King James Version (section)

==Literary attributes==
===Marginal notes===

In obedience to their instructions, the translators provided no marginal interpretation of the text, but in some 8,500 places a marginal note offers an alternative English wording.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=56}} The majority of these notes offer a more literal rendering of the original, introduced as "Heb", "Chal" ([[Chaldea#Language|Chaldee]], referring to Aramaic), "Gr" or "Lat". Others indicate a variant reading of the source text (introduced by "or"). Some of the annotated variants derive from alternative editions in the original languages, or from variant forms quoted in the [[patristics|fathers]]. More commonly, though, they indicate a difference between the literal original language reading and that in the translators' preferred recent Latin versions: [[Immanuel Tremellius|Tremellius]] for the Old Testament, [[Franciscus Junius (the elder)|Junius]] for the Apocrypha, and [[Beza]] for the New Testament.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=43}} At thirteen places in the New Testament<ref>{{cite book|last=Metzger|first=Bruce|title=Historical and Literary Studies|year=1968|publisher=Brill|page=144}}</ref><ref>e.g. {{bibleref|Luke|17:36|KJV}} and {{bibleref|Acts|25:6|KJV}}</ref> a marginal note records a variant reading found in some Greek manuscript copies; in almost all cases reproducing a counterpart textual note at the same place in Beza's editions.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=58}}

A few more extensive notes clarify Biblical names and units of measurement or currency. Modern reprintings rarely reproduce these annotated variants, although they are to be found in the [[New Cambridge Paragraph Bible]]. In addition, there were originally some 9,000 scriptural cross-references, in which one text was related to another. Such cross-references had long been common in Latin Bibles, and most of those in the Authorized Version were copied unaltered from this Latin tradition. Consequently the early editions of the KJV retain many Vulgate verse references—e.g. in the numbering of the [[Psalms]].{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=118}} At the head of each chapter, the translators provided a short précis of its contents, with verse numbers; these are rarely included in complete form in modern editions.

===Use of typeface===
Also in obedience to their instructions, the translators indicated 'supplied' words in a different typeface; but there was no attempt to regularize the instances where this practice had been applied across the different companies; and especially in the New Testament, it was used much less frequently in the 1611 edition than would later be the case.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=70}} In one verse, 1 John 2:23, an entire clause was printed in roman type (as it had also been in the Great Bible and Bishops' Bible);{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=68}} indicating a reading then primarily derived from the Vulgate, albeit one for which the later editions of Beza had provided a Greek text.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=254}}

[[File:King_James_Bible-Psalms_83_18_Jehovah.jpg|thumb|God’s name [[JEHOVAH]] in Psalms 83:18]]
In the Old Testament the translators render the [[Tetragrammaton]] (YHWH) by "the LORD" (in later editions in [[small capitals]] as {{LORD}}),{{efn|{{bibleref|Genesis|4:1|KJV}} }} or "the LORD God" (for ''YHWH [[Elohim]]'', יהוה אלהים),{{efn|{{bibleref|Genesis|2:4|KJV}} "אלה תולדות השמים והארץ בהבראם ביום עשות '''יהוה אלהים''' ארץ ושמים"}} except in four places by "[[Iehovah|IEHOVAH]]".<ref>{{bibleref|Exodus|6:3|KJV}}, {{bibleref|Psalm|83:18|KJV}}, {{bibleref|Isaiah|12:2|KJV}} and {{bibleref|Isaiah|26:4|KJV}}) and three times in a combination form. ({{bibleref|Genesis|22:14|KJV}}, {{bibleref|Exodus|17:15|KJV}}, {{bibleref|Judges|6:24|KJV}}</ref> However, if the Tetragrammaton occurs with the Hebrew word {{lang|hbo-Latn|adonai}} (Lord) then it is rendered not as the "Lord LORD" but as the "Lord God".<ref>{{bibleref|Psalm|73:28|KJV}}, etc.</ref> In later editions it appears as "Lord {{sc|god}}",<!-- presumably only small caps, not with a big-cap G? --> with "{{sc|god}}" in small capitals, indicating to the reader that God's name appears in the original Hebrew.

===Source texts===
====Old Testament====
For the Old Testament, the translators used a text originating in the editions of the Hebrew Rabbinic Bible by [[Daniel Bomberg]] (1524/5),{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=42}}{{Failed verification|date=February 2021}} but adjusted this to conform to the Greek [[LXX]] or Latin Vulgate in passages to which Christian tradition had attached a [[Christological]] interpretation.{{sfn|Bobrick|2001|p=262}} For example, the [[Septuagint]] reading "[[They pierced my hands and my feet]]" was used in Psalm 22:16<ref>{{bibleref|Psalm|22:16|KJV}}</ref> (vs. the [[Masoretes]]' reading of the Hebrew "like lions my hands and feet"<ref>The Jewish Publication Society Tanakh, copyright 1985</ref>). Otherwise, however, the Authorized Version is closer to the Hebrew tradition than any previous English translation—especially in making use of the rabbinic commentaries, such as [[David Kimhi|Kimhi]], in elucidating obscure passages in the [[Masoretic Text]];{{sfn|Daiches|1968|p=208}} earlier versions had been more likely to adopt LXX or Vulgate readings in such places. Following the practice of the [[Geneva Bible]], the books of 1 Esdras and 2 Esdras in the medieval Vulgate Old Testament were renamed '[[Book of Ezra|Ezra]]' and '[[Book of Nehemiah|Nehemiah]]'; 3 Esdras and 4 Esdras in the Apocrypha being renamed '[[1 Esdras]]' and '[[2 Esdras]]'.

====New Testament====
For the New Testament, the translators chiefly used the 1598 and 1588/89 Greek editions of [[Theodore Beza]],{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=60}}{{efn|name=Hills|[[Edward F. Hills]] made the following important statement in regard to the KJV and the Received Text:

{{blockquote|The translators that produced the King James Version relied mainly, it seems, on the later editions of Beza's Greek New Testament, especially his 4th edition (1588–9). But also they frequently consulted the editions of Erasmus and Stephanus and the Complutensian Polyglot. According to Scrivener (1884), (51) out of the 252 passages in which these sources differ sufficiently to affect the English rendering, the King James Version agrees with Beza against Stephanus 113 times, with Stephanus against Beza 59 times, and 80 times with Erasmus, or the Complutensian, or the Latin Vulgate against Beza and Stephanus. Hence the King James Version ought to be regarded not merely as a translation of the Textus Receptus but also as an independent variety of the Textus Receptus.|Edward F. Hills, [[iarchive:TheKingJamesVersionDefended|''The King James Version Defended'']], p. 220.}}}} which also present Beza's Latin version of the Greek and [[Robert Estienne|Stephanus]]'s edition of the Latin Vulgate. Both of these versions were extensively referred to, as the translators conducted all discussions amongst themselves in Latin. F. H. A. Scrivener identifies 190 readings where the Authorized Version translators depart from Beza's Greek text, generally in maintaining the wording of the ''Bishops' Bible'' and other earlier English translations.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884| pp=243–263}} In about half of these instances, the Authorized Version translators appear to follow the earlier 1550 Greek [[Textus Receptus]] of Stephanus. For the other half, Scrivener was usually able to find corresponding Greek readings in the editions of [[Erasmus]], or in the [[Complutensian Polyglot]]. However, in several dozen readings he notes that no printed Greek text corresponds to the English of the Authorized Version, which in these places derives directly from the Vulgate.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=262}} For example, at John 10:16,<ref>{{bibleref|John|10:16|KJV}}</ref> the Authorized Version reads "one fold" (as did the Bishops' Bible, and the 16th-century vernacular versions produced in Geneva), following the Latin Vulgate "unum ovile", whereas Tyndale had agreed more closely with the Greek, "one flocke" (μία ποίμνη). The Authorized Version New Testament owes much more to the Vulgate than does the Old Testament; still, at least 80% of the text is unaltered from Tyndale's translation.{{sfn|Daniell|2003|p=448}}

====Apocrypha====
Unlike the rest of the Bible, the translators of the Apocrypha identified their source texts in their marginal notes.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=47}} From these it can be determined that the books of the Apocrypha were translated from the Septuagint—primarily, from the Greek Old Testament column in the [[Antwerp Polyglot]]—but with extensive reference to the counterpart Latin Vulgate text, and to Junius's Latin translation. The translators record references to the [[Sixtine Septuagint]] of 1587, which is substantially a printing of the Old Testament text from the [[Codex Vaticanus]] Graecus 1209, and also to the 1518 Greek Septuagint edition of [[Aldus Manutius]]. They had, however, no Greek texts for [[2 Esdras]], or for the [[Prayer of Manasses]], and Scrivener found that they here used an unidentified Latin manuscript.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=47}}

====Sources====
The translators appear to have otherwise made no first-hand study of ancient manuscript sources, even those that—like the [[Codex Bezae]]—would have been readily available to them.{{sfn|Scrivener|1884|p=59}} In addition to all previous English versions (including, and contrary to their instructions,{{sfn|Daniell|2003|p=440}} the ''[[Douay–Rheims Bible|Rheimish New Testament]]''{{sfn|Bois|Allen|Walker|1969|p=xxv}} which in their preface they criticized), they made wide and eclectic use of all printed editions in the original languages then available, including the ancient [[Peshitta|Syriac New Testament]] printed with an interlinear Latin gloss in the [[Plantin Polyglot|Antwerp Polyglot of 1573]].{{sfn|Bobrick|2001|p=246}} In the preface the translators acknowledge consulting translations and commentaries in Chaldee, Hebrew, Syrian, Greek, Latin, Spanish, French, Italian, and German.{{sfn|KJV Translators to the Reader|1611|}}

The translators took the Bishops' Bible as their source text, and where they departed from that in favour of another translation, this was most commonly the Geneva Bible. However, the degree to which readings from the Bishops' Bible survived into final text of the King James Bible varies greatly from company to company, as did the propensity of the King James translators to coin phrases of their own. John Bois's notes of the General Committee of Review show that they discussed readings derived from a wide variety of versions and [[patristic]] sources, including explicitly both [[Henry Savile (Bible translator)|Henry Savile]]'s 1610 edition of the works of [[John Chrysostom]] and the Rheims New Testament,{{sfn|Bois|Allen|Walker|1969|p=118}} which was the primary source for many of the literal alternative readings provided for the marginal notes.

===Variations in recent translations===
{{main|List of major textual variants in the New Testament}}
{{see also|List of New Testament verses not included in modern English translations}}

A number of [[Bible verses]] in the King James Version of the New Testament are not found in more recent Bible translations, where these are based on [[textual criticism|modern critical texts]]. In the early seventeenth century, the source Greek texts of the New Testament which were used to produce Protestant Bible versions were mainly dependent on manuscripts of the late [[Byzantine text-type]], and they also contained minor variations which became known as the [[Textus Receptus]].{{sfn|Metzger|1964|pp=103–06}} With the subsequent identification of much earlier manuscripts, most modern textual scholars value the evidence of manuscripts which belong to the [[Alexandrian text-type|Alexandrian family]] as better witnesses to the original text of the biblical authors,{{sfn|Metzger|1964|p=216}} without giving it, or any family, automatic preference.{{sfn|Metzger|1964|p=218}}

===Style and criticism===
A primary concern of the translators was to produce an appropriate Bible, dignified and resonant in public reading.<ref>For more, see Timothy Berg, [https://textandcanon.org/misconceptions-about-the-king-james-bible/ textandcanon.org], "Seven Common Misconceptions about the King James Bible", Text & Canon Institute (2022).</ref> Although the Authorized Version's written style is an important part of its influence on English, research has found only one verse—Hebrews 13:8—for which translators debated the wording's literary merits. While they stated in the preface that they used stylistic variation, finding multiple English words or verbal forms in places where the original language employed repetition, in practice they also did the opposite; for example, 14 different Hebrew words were translated into the single English word "prince".{{r|hunt20110209}}{{context inline|reason=the English word 'prince' is not a broad descriptor; there are no synonyms in English for prince. if Hebrew has 14b words that all would carry the meaning of prince in English, this is not a fault of the translators. This article should address this matter (what are the meanings of these 14n Hebrew words?)|date=September 2021}}

In a period of rapid linguistic change the translators avoided contemporary idioms, tending instead towards forms that were already slightly archaic, like ''verily'' and ''it came to pass''.{{sfn|Bobrick|2001|p=264}} The pronouns ''thou''/''thee'' and ''ye''/''you'' are consistently used as singular and plural respectively, even though by this time ''you'' was often found as the singular in general English usage, especially when addressing a social superior (as is evidenced, for example, in Shakespeare).{{sfn|Barber|1997|pp=153–54}} For the possessive of the third person pronoun, the word ''its'', first recorded in the ''[[Oxford English Dictionary]]'' in 1598, is avoided.{{sfn|Barber|1997|p=150}} The older ''[[grammatical gender|his]]'' is usually employed, as for example at Matthew 5:13:<ref>{{bibleref|Matthew|5:13|KJV}}</ref> <!-- ORIGINAL SPELLING: PLEASE DO NOT CHANGE -->"if the salt have lost ''his'' savour, wherewith shall it be salted?";{{sfn|Barber|1997|p=150}} in other places ''of it'', ''thereof'' or bare ''it'' are found.{{efn|e.g. {{bibleref|Matthew|7:27|KJV}}: "great was the fall ''of it''.", {{bibleref|Matthew|2:16|KJV}}: "in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts ''thereof''", {{bibleref|Leviticus|25:5|KJV}}: "That which groweth of ''it'' owne accord of thy harvest". ({{bibleref|Leviticus|25:5|KJV}} is changed to ''its'' in many modern printings).{{sfn|Barber|1997|pp=150–51}} }} Another sign of [[linguistic conservatism]] is the invariable use of ''-eth'' for the third person singular present form of the verb, as at Matthew 2:13: "the Angel of the Lord appear''eth'' to Joseph in a dreame". The rival ending ''-(e)s'', as found in present-day English, was already widely used by this time (for example, it predominates over ''-eth'' in the plays of Shakespeare and Marlowe).{{sfn|Barber|1997|pp=166–67}} Furthermore, the translators preferred ''which'' to ''who'' or ''whom'' as the relative pronoun for persons, as in Genesis 13:5:<ref>{{bibleref|Genesis|13:5|KJV}}</ref> "And Lot also ''which'' went with Abram, had flocks and heards, & tents"{{sfn|Barber|1997|p=212}} although ''who(m)'' is also found.{{efn|e.g. at {{bibleref|Genesis|3:12|KJV}}: "The woman ''whom'' thou gavest to be with mee" }}

The Authorized Version is notably more [[Latin]]ate than previous English versions,{{sfn|Daniell|2003|p=440}} especially the Geneva Bible. This results in part from the academic stylistic preferences of a number of the translators—several of whom admitted to being more comfortable writing in Latin than in English—but was also, in part, a consequence of the royal proscription against explanatory notes.{{sfn|Bobrick|2001|p=229}} Hence, where the Geneva Bible might use a common English word, and gloss its particular application in a marginal note, the Authorized Version tends rather to prefer a technical term, frequently in Anglicized Latin. Consequently, although the King had instructed the translators to use the Bishops' Bible as a base text, the New Testament in particular owes much stylistically to the Catholic [[Douay–Rheims Bible|Rheims]] New Testament, whose translators had also been concerned to find English equivalents for Latin terminology.{{sfn|Bobrick|2001|p=252}} In addition, the translators of the New Testament books transliterate names found in the Old Testament in their Greek forms rather than in the forms closer to the Old Testament Hebrew (e.g. "Elias" and "Noe" for "Elijah" and "Noah", respectively).

While the Authorized Version remains among the most widely sold, modern critical New Testament translations differ substantially from it in a number of passages, primarily because they rely on source manuscripts not then accessible to (or not then highly regarded by) early-17th-century Biblical scholarship.{{sfn|Daniell|2003|p=5}} In the Old Testament, there are also many differences from modern translations that are based not on manuscript differences, but on a different understanding of Ancient Hebrew [[vocabulary]] or [[grammar]] by the translators. For example, in modern translations it is clear that Job 28:1–11<ref>{{bibleref|Job|28:1–11|KJV}}</ref> is referring throughout to mining operations, which is not at all apparent from the text of the Authorized Version.{{sfn|Bruce|2002|p=145}}

===Mistranslations===
The King James Version contains several alleged mistranslations, especially in the Old Testament where the knowledge of Hebrew and cognate languages was uncertain at the time.<ref name="Errors in the King James Version?">{{cite web| url=http://www.dbts.edu/journals/1999/combs.pdf| title=Errors in the King James Version? by William W. Combs| access-date=25 April 2015| date=1999| publisher=DBSJ| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150923212958/http://www.dbts.edu/journals/1999/combs.pdf| archive-date=23 September 2015| url-status=dead}}</ref> Among the most commonly cited errors is in the Hebrew of Job and Deuteronomy, where {{langx|he|רְאֵם|[[Re'em]]}} with the probable meaning of "wild-ox, [[aurochs]]", is translated in the KJV as "[[unicorn]]"; following in this the Vulgate ''unicornis'' and several medieval rabbinic commentators. The translators of the KJV note the alternative rendering, "rhinocerots"{{Sic}} in the margin at Isaiah 34:7. On a similar note Martin Luther's German translation had also relied on the Latin Vulgate on this point, consistently translating רְאֵם using the German word for unicorn, ''Einhorn''.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=Einhorn&qs_version=LUTH1545|title=BibleGateway – : Einhorn|website=biblegateway.com}}</ref> Otherwise, the translators are accused on several occasions of having mistakenly interpreted a Hebrew descriptive phrase as a proper name (or vice versa); as at 2 Samuel 1:18 where 'the [[Book of Jasher (biblical references)|Book of Jasher]]' {{langx|he|סֵפֶר הַיׇּשׇׁר|sepher ha-yasher}} properly refers not to a work by an author of that name, but should rather be rendered as "the Book of the Upright" (which was proposed as an alternative reading in a marginal note to the KJV text).