Fourth, leaders of England's Reformation Church, from Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer in the 16th century onward, aimed to create a Christian commonwealth of the English language by means of what Cranmer called “concrete ethical demands” – moral scripturalism and daily ethical intercourse expressed in biblical metaphors and poetic rhetoric.
That commonwealth lasted, the U of T's Ephraim Radner says, until the end of the 19th century, when new biblical translations sought supposedly greater access to scripture at the expense of the beauty, mystery and majesty of KJV language, a major shift, Prof. Freeman says, that moved religion from the cathedral to humbler surroundings.
But in making prayer sound like people talking to their buddies, she says, the churches forgot to keep asking “why does language itself make us feel like we're hearing the word of God, why poetry [is needed] to express certain things. You need language that's powerful.”
Abraham Lincoln's speeches were drawn from the KJV, which is still used to a great degree by African-American churches. “I have a dream,” said Martin Luther King Jr., whose speeches were drawn from it.
And for its 400th anniversary?
The Queen, who still holds the copyright, mentioned the KJV in her Christmas address. The Anglican bishop of Manchester has launched a project to have the entire Bible recorded on YouTube. (He also has read some of it on Coronation Street.) Britain's Royal Mint will issue a commemorative coin. The Bath Literature Festival is looking for volunteers to read all 800,000 words aloud over five days in March. Cambridge University and the University of Toronto have exhibits of historic Bibles.
Curated by Pearce Carefoote, the exhibit at the U of T's Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library opens on Monday with a prized first edition of the KJV (as well as the famed Wicked Bible, which seems to advocate adultery). It was donated by Louis Melzack, founder of Classic Books, the chain bought out by W.H. Smith in 1985, and was once owned by George Stephen, the Montreal financier who became the first president of the Canadian Pacific Railway.
Today, English girdles the globe. All who speak it do so in the shadow of the KJV, which has been pushed out of most churches as too fustian – a word Tyndale never would have used.
