Errors In Early Printings Of The King James Bible
ERRORS IN EARLY PRINTINGS OF THE KING JAMES BIBLE
The early printings of the King James Bible included many errors. Many of these arose from weaknesses in the book production processes of the period. Proofing was often a haphazard business. From what we know of the book production methods of this period, it seems that the greatest effort was put into the process of typesetting. The compositor would take considerable care in setting the text, presumably on the assumption that accuracy was of the greatest importance at this critical stage. Most printers had only one or two presses at their disposal, and were reluctant to waste too much time by checking for typographical errors. It seems that the first printed sheet to be “pulled” from the press was checked for such errors, while printing continued.
Contemporary sources suggest that a “reading-boy” would then read the proof copy aloud to the compositor, who would check it against the original copy. Errors could arise in all kinds of ways—such as homophones (words that are pronounced identically, yet have different meanings and are spelled differently—such as “there” and “their”). It is thus little cause for surprise that Bibles should contain at least some errors, despite the best standards of the day being employed in an attempt to eliminate them.
A further factor contributing to the large number of errors in English Bibles was the constant pressure to reduce their production costs. The annual “privilege” enjoyed by the King's Printer was bought at a considerable price, and had to be recouped somehow. Cost savings introduced in the later phase of Barker's career included the reduction of the number of proofreaders used to check the text for errors. It is known that the four proofreaders employed by Barker in the 1630s were so fed up with the constant pressure to reduce their wages—or get rid of them altogether—that they appealed to the then-archbishop of Canterbury, William Laud, to intervene on their behalf.
Many around this time preferred Dutch-printed Bibles, which were much more accurate, and generally printed on better quality paper. A number of late-seventeenth-century anecdotes pillory the textual inaccuracies of the English Bibles of this period. The story is told of a bishop who, having been invited to preach around 1675 on a certain biblical text in St. Paul's Cathedral—then being rebuilt following the great fire of London—went into a nearby London stationer's to buy a London-printed Bible so that he could study the text. On turning to the appropriate page, he found that the verse had been left out altogether.
The first printing of the King James Bible in 1611 included a number of printing errors. For example, a small slip in the typesetting of the description of the interior of the tabernacle led to the following reading (Exodus 28:11).
But there were probably few who noticed, let alone cared, that the pillars really bore hooks, not hoops. This error was corrected in the 1613 reprint.
A further difference between the 1611 printing of the work and the 1613 reprint is of interest. Their variant translations of Ruth 3:15 led to the earlier printing being known as the “Great He Bible” (1611) and the later one as the “Great She Bible” (1613) respectively. The passage in question describes how Boaz measured out “six measures of barley,” and gave it to Ruth. The “Great He Bible” then has Boaz going off to a nearby city whereas the “Great She Bible” reports that it is Ruth who made this journey. The “Great She Bible” also caused bewilderment to some of its readers by confusing Jesus and Judas at one point (Matthew 26:36).
Some errors in the early printings of the King James Bible caused considerable distress and concern at the time. Part of the problem was that the production of the King James Bible was privately financed. Pressure to cut production costs meant that the “formes” were not left intact after they had been printed, so that printing errors could be corrected easily for future printings. A huge amount of type would be necessary if every forme was to be retained in this way. As far as can be ascertained, each forme was broken up after it had served its purpose, and the type was then used to set another forme. If an error was not spotted on the first printed sheet, it was impossible to correct at a later stage in production.
Yet these printing errors were regarded as scandalous by some. William Kilburne issued a vigorous denunciation of these in 1659, when he published his Dangerous Errors in Several Late Printed Bibles to the Great Scandal and Corruption of Sound and True Religion. Kilburne claimed to have identified as many as twenty thousand errors in various recent printings. Some of these errors were bizarre.
For example, a warning to the Israelites about the devious ways of the Midianites took an unusual turn, thanks to an amusing misprint in one edition (Numbers 25:17–18): “Vex the Midianites, and smite them: For they vex you with their wives.” The possibilities suggested by this passage are immense and intriguing, to say the least. Yet “wives” was merely a misprint for “wiles.”
More serious was the misprint in an edition of 1631, which rendered Exodus 20:14 as follows: “Thou shalt commit adultery.” The omission of the word “not” was speedily corrected, but not before this had caused some consternation among the Bible's readers. Robert Barker and Martin Lucas, the printers of this “Wicked Bible”—as it came to be known—were fined severely for this unfortunate lapse.
The first edition of the King James Bible to be published by Oxford University Press appeared in 1675; this was followed in 1682 by a sumptuous edition prepared by the Oxford printer John Baskett. The value of the edition was greatly reduced by its many printing errors. For example, it made reference to the “Parable of the Vinegar” instead of the “Parable of the Vineyard”—an error which led it to being nicknamed the “Vinegar Bible.” Its amused critics panned it as “a Bastkett-full of Printer's Errors.” Such printing errors were perhaps inevitable, given both the complexity of the text being produced, and the generally poor quality of English printing and proofing methods during the seventeenth century.
Other corrections to the text were introduced later to avoid possible misunderstandings. For example, the original printing of Acts 24:24 in 1611 referred to Drusilla, the wife of the Roman governor Felix, as a Jew; in 1629, this was altered to “Jewess.” The original translation of Mark 10:18 read thus: “there is no man good, but one, that is, God.” This could be misunderstood as implying that God was a human being. A small alteration was introduced in 1638, avoiding this implication: the text now read “there is none good but one, that is, God.”
We have considered some of the problems that the King's Printer faced in producing the work. But what of the issues faced by those charged with making the translation in the first place?