The Literary Guide to the Bible

The Literary Guide to the Bible (Robert Alter, Frank Kermode, editors. Cambridge MA: Belknap Press, Harvard University, 1987/1990) contains some interesting comments about the Bible in general and the Authorized or King James Bible in particular. The editors Alter and Kermode, the contributors, and the Harvard University Press are hardly “King James Onlyists.” Not even close. Nevertheless, they can speak with much more complimentary feeling about the King James Bible than most “King James Version Neverists” can ever muster in all their strength. Here are some excerpts from The Literary Guide to the Bible. I will just lay them here.

“The purpose of the book will now, we hope, be clear. We no longer live in the age when literate persons had a daily intimacy with the Bible on the basis of shared belief; individuals must now attune themselves to the book, which is today rarely assimilated in early youth. To help them do so is our main object.” p. 6

“We have as a rule used the King James Version in translation, and our reasons for doing so must be obvious: it is the version most English readers associate with the literary qualities of the Bible, and it is still arguably the version that best preserves the literary effects of the original languages.” p. 7

“Behind the joke ‘If the Authorized Version was good enough for St. Paul then it’s good enough for me’ lies the recognition of a real resistance to the idea that our Bible is a translation; betrayed by the increasingly common slip which gives the Authorized Version’s alternative title as the St. James Bible.” pp. 649-650

“Nonetheless, it is notable that in this respect [i.e, verbal equivalence, rlv] the Authorized Version is the most conservative of the Renaissance translations.” p. 653

In their opinion, concerning Isaiah 3:18-23, “...the New English Bible’s scholarship will stand up to close scrutiny...” even allowing that the rendering of the individual items “are likely to be far more reliable than the Authorized Version’s.” On the other hand, The Literary Guide resolves:

“More important than the translation of words is the translation of syntax. Consider the way the Authorized Version and the New English Bible cope with Isaiah’s spectacular list of wanton fripperies (3:18-23)...By suppressing the Hebrew syntax the New English Bible translators have made theirs virtually unreadable. It is nothing but a list, and its context, that of an articulated prophecy, is entirely lost. The Authorized Version translators have taken care to reproduce the syntactic details of the original.” p. 656

After citing four translations of Exodus 9:7, The Literary Guide concludes:

“By heavy use of coordinating clauses the Authorized Version leaves its narrative structures open to the widest possible range of meanings, for such coordination imposes upon events only a relatively weak impression of sequentiality. More sophisticated syntactic structures, using all kinds of subordination, are more interpretative and insist upon such things as cause and effect, motive, and specific temporal relations upon events.” p. 660

“At its best, which means often, the Authorized Version has the kind of transparency which makes it possible for the reader to see the original clearly. It lacks the narrow interpretative bias of modern versions, and is the stronger for it.” p. 664

“...replacing the Authorized Version’s splendidly literal translation ‘him that pisseth against the wall,’ with ‘every mother’s son’ (New English Bible) or ‘every last male’ (New International Version) abandons any real attempt to reproduce its [the original Hebrew’s, rlv] register and tone.” p. 664

“For a similar contrast in the New Testament between the Authorized Version’s reproduction of the original’s expressive syntax and the New English Bible’s suppression of it, see their rendering of 2 Corinthians 6:4-10.” p. 666, fn 14.