Happy Birthday KJV!

Today marks the 400th anniversary of the first publishing of the King James Bible.

Who was King James, anyway? King James VI of Scotland (crowned 1567) went on also to become King James I of England and Ireland (crowned 1603). He assumed the throne in Scotland at the tender age of 13 months after the forced abdication of his mother, Mary, Queen of Scots.

Later, he inherited the the throne of England following the death of his mother's unmarried and childless cousin, Queen Elizabeth. So, as James VI of Scotland and James I of England, he was the first king to rule over both countries.

James, a very learned individual and a published author, authorized the production and provided the funding for the Bible that we know as the KJV. The very popular English translation remains one of the most printed books in the history of the world.

Just recently, a tiny church in an English village discovered that a Bible that had been sitting in the church for many, many years was in fact an original King James Bible...one of a few hundred that survive from that original printing hundreds of years ago. Talk about hiding in plain sight!

It's nice to be able to pull from a variety of translations when attempting to better understand various passages. But to me, there's nothing as beautiful as verses from the KJV.

Happy Birthday!

King James died in 1625 and is buried in Westminster Abbey in London.