Review Essay in Praise of Language

RELIGION and the ARTS Religion and the Arts 17 (2013) 576–587 brill.com/rart

Review Essay In Praise of Language

Rebecca Munro Belmont Abbey College

Alter, Robert. Pen of Iron: American Prose and the King James Bible. Prince- ton NJ and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2010. Pp. 198. $49.95 cloth.

Bloom, Harold. The Shadow of a Great Rock: A Literary Appreciation of the King James Bible. New Haven CT and London: Yale University Press, 2011. Pp. vi + 311. $28.00 cloth.

Moore, Helen, and Julian Reid, eds. Manifold Greatness: The Making of the King James Bible. Foreword Sarah E. Thomas and Stephen Ennis. Oxford and Chicago: Bodleian Library. Distributed by University of Chicago Press, 2011. Pp. 208 + 78 illustrations + frontispiece. $35.00 paper.

* he King James Bible (KJB) retains an honored place in literary and cul- tural history. Though it may not be as well known today as in the past Tdue to the bewildering array of more modern (and less aesthetic) translations, along with the lack of biblical literacy among many, it is nonetheless ingrained in the history, if not the psyche, of the English-speaking world: in the books we have and still read, the films we see, and the prayers we pray. No one who speaks English knows any other versions of “The Twenty-third Psalm” or “The Lord’s Prayer” as well as those found in the King James Bible. These three texts, Manifold Greatness: The Making of the King James Bible, edited by Helen Moore and Julian Reid; Pen of Iron: American Prose and the King James Bible by Robert Alter; and Harold Bloom’s The Shadow of a Great Rock: A Literary Appreciation of the King James Bible, present an interestingly well-rounded account of the significance and influence of the

KJB. In chapter-essays by a variety of scholars and specialists, Manifold Greatness gives a detailed history of the making of the KJB translation, sum- marizing the history of prior translations from Old through Middle English and discussing the KJB’s importance in England as well as America. Robert Alter in Pen of Iron demonstrates the influence of the KJB on American prose fiction, provides literary and historical examples, and, as he engages in precise and illuminating stylistic analysis himself, puts forward a defense of style and stylistic analysis in general. Harold Bloom offers an aesthetic appreciation of the KJB in Shadow of a Great Rock, examining its literary qualities and comparing the KJB to its forerunners—Tyndale, Coverdale, the Geneva translators—and to the Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible. Bloom comments on the varied biblical authors; analyzes character, style, and theme; and, sometimes caustically, comments on attributes of the Old Testament Yahweh and New Testament Christianity. What these three authors share in large part is their homage to the con- summate style of the King James Bible: its lasting stylistic influence on the English language, the sublimity of its expression, its simplicity as well as its baroque elements, its syntactic power, and the sheer beauty in general of its stylistic elements, unrivalled in the English language except in the case of Shakespeare. The King James Bible advanced a Protestant agenda, but those who worked on the translation project not only were steeped in ancient languages and vastly well-read in theology, history, and a multi- tude of subjects, but they also were well versed in the great literature of the western tradition. Manifold Greatness describes the “riches” to which the translators had access: “Bibles, concordances, grammars, and commentar- ies rabbinic, patristic, and contemporary”; but in their impressive libraries, the translators also possessed and made use of works of classical literature, “the poets, historians, and philosophers of classical antiquity: Homer and Pindar; Xenophon, Thucydides and Polybius; Aristotle and Plato” (102). Some of the translators, such as Lancelot Andrewes, were men of “literary brilliance” (108). Evidence of the often subtle changes made in the KJB translation in comparison to its predecessors demonstrates the time and thought these scholars brought to stylistic matters. No group quite like this one, educated and prepared as individual members were, has ever come together, before or since, for such a grand and ambitious project: “As an enterprise, the translation was grounded in the linguistic and textual skills nurtured in the Elizabethan schools and universities, whilst drawing at the same time on the encyclopaedic knowledge possessed by the translators in areas such as natural history and classical literature” (108). The translators