“God is not man’s imagination; but that only which he saith of himself...God is that only which he testifieth of himself; and to imagine any other thing of God than that, is damnable idolatry. Therefore saith the hundred and eighteenth psalm, ‘Happy are they which search the testimonies of the Lord;’ that is to say, that which God testifieth and witnesseth unto us.
“But how shall I that do, when ye will not let me have his testimonies, or witnesses, in a tongue which I understand? Will ye resist God? Will ye forbid him to give his Spirit unto the lay as well as unto you? Hath he not made the English tongue? Why forbid ye him to speak in the English tongue then, as well as in the Latin?” -- William Tyndale, “The Obedience of a Christian Man,” in Doctrinal Treatises and Introductions to Different Portions of the Holy Scriptures, 1528, Henry Walter, editor. Cambridge: The University Press, 1848, pp. 160-161
“Now will I exhort thee (whosoever thou be that readest scripture) if thou find ought therein that thou understandest not, or that appeareth to be repugnant, give no temeritous nor hasty judgment thereof: but ascribe it to thine own ignorance.” -- Miles Coverdale Bible Preface, 1535
“Have mercy on me, Lord, for I am weak; remember, Lord, how short my time is; remember that I am but flesh, a wind that passeth away, and cometh not again. My days are as grass, as a flower of the field; for the wind goeth over me, and I am gone, and my place shall know me no more.” -- Lancelot Andrewes (KJV translator)
“The Spirit of God speaking in the Scriptures, certifieth the conscience of the unlearned, that the Scriptures in the English tongue are the Scriptures.” -- Francis Dillingham (KJV translator)
“There is not in the world, any fit meanes to come to the right sence of Scripture, which our men doe not frequent. They seeke into the Original tonges, wherin the booke of God was writen. They conferre translations of all sortes: they lay one text with another, & expound the harder by that which is lesse difficult: they compare circumstances of Antecedents and Consequents: they looke to the Analogy of faith prescribed in the Creede of the Apostles. They search what the first Councels did establish: they seeke what was the opinions of the Fathers concerning textes in question, and refuse not therein to cope with you about the highest points, as the Primacy of your Pope, Transubstantiation or any other whatsoever. Yea they looke over the interpretations of your writers, to knowe if anie thinge there occurre worthy observation: they conferre one learned man with another: they praye to the blessed Trinitie to open and lighten their understanding, and in a worde they omitte no meanes, which either Saint Augustine or anie other good writer, doth or can prescribe vnto them.” -- George Abbot (1562-1633) in The Reasons which Doctour Hill hath brought, for the Vpholding of Papistry, which is falselie termed the Catholike religion: vnmasked and shewed to be very weake, and vpon examination most insufficient for that purpose, Oxford: 1604. Abbot was one of King James’s translators, working in the Second Oxford Company on the Gospels, Acts, and the book of Revelation.
“It were good in translations, that the interpreter would observe this rule, to let the words stand in as large and broad a sense as they will bear, for so if need be they may be restrained by other places; but if they be rendred in too narrow or strict a sense, as here, pro or contra, for or against, the ignorant will take occasion to wrest them...” -- Lancelot Andrewes, The Pattern of Catechistical Doctrine at Large, London: M.G., 1675, p. 496
“It may be turned two ways, it will bear both; for my part I wish no word ever narrowed by a translation, but as much as might be left in the latitude of the original tongue...The best way is, where there are two to take in both, so we shall be sure, to leave out neither.” -- Lancelot Andrewes, “A Sermon Preached Before the Kings Majesty (December 25, 1619), at Whitehall,” Ninety-Six Sermons, Vol. I, Oxford: John Henry Parker, 1841, p. 228)
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