P049 The Authorized Version:

P049 The Authorized Version:

Among the bishops, deans, ecclesiastical lawyers and learned divines assembled to harmonize the divisions in the Church was Dr. John Reynolds,(1) President of Corpus Christi College, Oxford, one of the most learned men of his time, and a recognized leader among the Puritan party in the Church.

During the second day, the conversation having turned on some disputed passage in the Apocrypha, Reynolds suggested to the king that there ought to be a new translation of the Bible, because of the errors in existing translations. The suggestion did not meet with any special notice from those present, and the subject was soon dropped; but it had entered deeply into the thoughts of the king, who was fond of theological matters, and the result was that in a few months the monarch had matured his plans for the work.

He appointed fifty-four of the most learned men of the realm to make the revision, among whom, very properly, was Dr. Reynolds. The names of only forty-seven of these are now known. They were to meet in various companies in Westminster, Oxford, and Cambridge, under the presidency of the Dean of Westminster and the two Hebrew professors of the universities.

Three years, however, passed before the translators began their work. The precise cause of this delay is not known. In the interval some changes in the list were made necessary by death and other causes. The translators were divided into six companies, two of which met at each of the above-named places. To the first company at Westminster (ten in number) were assigned the Old Testament as far as 2 Kings; the second company (seven in number) had the Epistles. The first company at Cambridge (numbering eight) had 2 Chronicles to Ecclesiastes; the second company (numbering seven) had the Apocryphal books. To the first Oxford company (seven in number) were assigned the prophetical books, from Isaiah to Malachi; to the second (eight in number) were given the four Gospels, the Acts, and the Apocalypse.

We notice a few of the principal men among these learned translators:—

------------ (FN1)Variously spelled Rainolds, Reinolds, Raynolds.

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