Religion
Religion is a cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, worldviews, sanctified places, ethics, or organizations, that relates humanity to supernatural, transcendental, or spiritual elements. However, there is no scholarly consensus over what constitutes a religion. Different religions may or may not contain various elements ranging from the divine, sacred things, faith, a supernatural being or supernatural beings or "some sort of ultimacy and transcendence that will provide norms and power for the rest of life". Religious practices may include rituals, commemoration or veneration, festivals, trances, funerary services, matrimonial services, prayer, art, public service, or other aspects of human culture. Religions have sacred histories and narratives, which may be preserved in sacred scriptures, symbols and holy places, that aim to give a meaning to life. Religions may contain symbolic stories, which are sometimes said by followers to be true, that have the side purpose of explaining the origin of life, the universe, other things.
Traditionally, faith, in addition to reason, has been considered a source of religious beliefs. There are an estimated 10,000 distinct religions worldwide, but about 84% of the world's population is affiliated with one of the five largest religion groups, namely Christianity, Hinduism, Buddhism or forms of folk religion; the religiously unaffiliated demographic includes those who do not identify with any particular religion and agnostics. While the religiously unaffiliated have grown globally, many of the religiously unaffiliated still have various religious beliefs; the study of religion encompasses a wide variety of academic disciplines, including theology, comparative religion and social scientific studies. Theories of religion offer various explanations for the origins and workings of religion, including the ontological foundations of religious being and belief. Religion is derived from the ultimate origins of which are obscure. One possible interpretation traced to Cicero, connects lego read, i.e. re with lego in the sense of choose, go over again or consider carefully.
The definition of religio by Cicero is cultum deorum, "the proper performance of rites in veneration of the gods." Julius Caesar used religio to mean "obligation of an oath" when discussing captured soldiers making an oath to their captors. The Roman naturalist Pliny the Elder used the term religio on elephants in that they venerate the sun and the moon. Modern scholars such as Tom Harpur and Joseph Campbell favor the derivation from ligare bind, connect from a prefixed re-ligare, i.e. re + ligare or to reconnect, made prominent by St. Augustine, following the interpretation given by Lactantius in Divinae institutiones, IV, 28; the medieval usage alternates with order in designating bonded communities like those of monastic orders: "we hear of the'religion' of the Golden Fleece, of a knight'of the religion of Avys'". In the ancient and medieval world, the etymological Latin root religio was understood as an individual virtue of worship in mundane contexts. In general, religio referred to broad social obligations towards anything including family, neighbors and towards God.
Religio was most used by the ancient Romans not in the context of a relation towards gods, but as a range of general emotions such as hesitation, anxiety, fear. The term was closely related to other terms like scrupulus which meant "very precisely" and some Roman authors related the term superstitio, which meant too much fear or anxiety or shame, to religio at times; when religio came into English around the 1200s as religion, it took the meaning of "life bound by monastic vows" or monastic orders. The compartmentalized concept of religion, where religious things were separated from worldly things, was not used before the 1500s; the concept of religion was first used in the 1500s to distinguish the domain of the church and the domain of civil authorities. In the ancient Greece, the Greek term threskeia was loosely translated into Latin as religio in late antiquity; the term was sparsely used in classical Greece but became more used in the writings of Josephus in the first century CE. It was used in mundane contexts and could mean multiple things from respectful fear to excessive or harmfully distracting practices of others.
It was contrasted with the Greek word deisidaimonia which meant too much fear. The modern concept of religion, as an abstraction that entails distinct sets of beliefs or doctrines, is a recent invention in the English language; such usage began with texts from the 17th century due to events such the splitting of Christendom during the Protestant Reformation and globalization in the age of exploration, which involved contact with numerous foreign cultures with non-European languages. Some argue that regardless of its definition, it is not appropriate to apply the term religion to non-Western cultures. Others argue that using religion on non-western cultures distorts what people believe; the concept of religion was formed in the 16th and 17th centuries, despite the fact that ancient sacred texts like the Bible, the Quran, others did not have a word or a concept of religion in the original languages and neither did the peopl
Incorporeality
Incorporeal or uncarnate means without a physical body, presence or form. It is used in reference to souls and God in many religions including Judaism and Christianity. In ancient philosophy, any attenuated "thin" matter such as air, fire or light was considered incorporeal; the ancient Greeks believed air, as opposed to solid earth, to be incorporeal, in so far as it is less resistant to movement. In modern philosophy, a distinction between the incorporeal and immaterial is not maintained: a body is described as incorporeal if it is not made out of matter. In the problem of universals, universals are separable from any particular embodiment in one sense, while in another, they seem inherent nonetheless. Aristotle offered a hylomorphic account of abstraction in contrast to Plato's world of Forms. Aristotle used the Greek terms hyle; the notion that a causally effective incorporeal body is coherent requires the belief that something can affect what's material, without physically existing at the point of effect.
A ball can directly affect another ball by coming in direct contact with it, is visible because it reflects the light that directly reaches it. An incorporeal field of influence, or immaterial body could not perform these functions because they have no physical construction with which to perform these functions. Following Newton, it became customary to accept action at a distance as brute fact, to overlook the philosophical problems involved in so doing; as early as Xenophanes... we find at least a tendency towards monotheism: "One god, greatest among gods and men, in no way similar to mortals either in body or in thought"... a god, the cause of all: "Always he remains in the same place, moving not at all: nor is it fitting for him to go to different places at different times... but without toil he shakes all things by the thought of his mind"... In Physics VIII,5, speaks favorably of Anaxagoras' Mind in so far as it is "impassive and unmixed "... How can Aristotle have held both that God is immanent and "impassive and unmixed"?
Much of his argument depends on an analogy drawn from geometry. Just as the primary locus of power and influence in a rotating sphere is its central axis, although it moves the other parts of the sphere, remains quite still, so the unmoved mover remains majestically impassive while being the source of the activity of the universe... Aristotle rejects the notion that God might think of something other than himself because this would be to diminish his power; the power that Aristotle is concerned about is the power. So, we must conceive of God's thoughts about himself. Aristotle offers an explanation of how this works: just as our intentions are their external objects less their matter, so God thinks himself in the things that depend on him; the interpretation of Thomas Aquinas would appear to be correct, that it is in thinking of himself that God knows—and controls—all other things... In chapter 10 of De ratione animae, Alcuin defines anima by combining Platonic attributes, including intellect and reason, ceaseless motion and immortality with the Christian tenents of free will and salvation.
As a means of interaction with corporeals such as the human body and incorporeals such as God and the Forms, his definition includes traits pertaining to the soul as an incarnate entity within the natural world. It is one thing to assert that the soul is'incorporeal' insofar as it is distinct from the human body, it is quite another thing to espouse the Platonic notion that the soul is utterly incorporeal, or that it is not a body of any kind. Platonic incorporeals differ from the incorporeals of classical Stoicism, which were thought to participate in a diminished form of existence, from the incorporalia of the grammatical tradition, which were defined on the basis of their imperceptibility to one or more of the five senses... A Platonic incorporeal is imperceptible to all the senses, it does not occupy space. Accordingly, Alcuin writes that the soul is'invisible, without weight, without colour,' although for a reader who shared Alcuin's Platonic understanding of incorporeals, the mention of invisibility and colourlessness was redundant.
Alcuin carefully specifies that the soul is circumscribed but nonetheless whole in every part of the body. In other words, the soul is neither diffused throughout the universe as God is or as a world-soul would be, nor is it distributed throughout a space in such a way that it can be divided. If incorporeality makes the soul imperceptible to the senses, it is more important that incorporeality allows the soul to apprehend other things that are imperceptible to the senses; the idea that like perceives like goes back to the Greek Presocratics, in the medieval Latin iterations, it did not have to carry Platonic connotations. Yet principally from Augustine's early dialogues and De Trinitate and other Carolingian thinkers inherited many rational demonstrations of theological doctrines, worked out according to a method of argumentation that combined Neop
Divine retribution
Divine retribution is supernatural punishment of a person, a group of people, or everyone by a deity in response to some action. Many cultures have a story about how a deity exacted punishment upon previous inhabitants of their land, causing their doom. An example of divine retribution is the story found in many cultures about a great flood destroying all of humanity, as described in the Epic of Gilgamesh, the Hindu Vedas, or Book of Genesis, leaving one principal'chosen' survivor. In the first example, it is Utnapishtim, in the last example Noah. References in the Quran to a man named Nuh, commanded by God to build an ark suggest that one man and his followers were saved in a great flood. Other examples in Hebrew religious literature include the dispersion of the builders of the Tower of Babel, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the Ten Plagues visited upon the ancient Egyptians for persecuting the children of Israel. In Greek mythology, the goddess Hera became enraged when her husband, would impregnate mortal women, would exact divine retribution on the children born of such affairs.
In some versions of the myth, Medusa was turned into her monstrous form as divine retribution for her vanity. The Bible refers to divine retribution as, in most cases, being delayed or "treasured up" to a future time. Sight of God's supernatural works and retribution would militate against faith in God's Word. William Lane Craig says, in Paul’s view, God’s properties, his eternal power and deity, are revealed in creation, so that people who fail to believe in an eternal, powerful creator of the world are without excuse. Indeed, Paul says that they do know that God exists, but they suppress this truth because of their unrighteousness; some religions or philosophical positions have no concept of divine retribution, nor posit a God being capable of or willing to express such human sentiments as jealousy, vengeance, or wrath. For example, in Deism and Pandeism, the creator does not intervene in our Universe at all, either for good or for ill, therefore exhibits no such behavior. In Pantheism, God is the Universe and encompasses everything within it, so has no need for retribution, as all things against which retribution might be taken are within God.
This view is reflected in some pandeistic forms of Hinduism, as well. The concept of divine retribution is resolutely denied in Buddhism. Gautama Buddha did not endorse belief in a creator deity, refused to express any views on creation and stated that questions on the origin of the world are worthless; the non-adherence to the notion of an omnipotent creator deity or a prime mover is seen by many as a key distinction between Buddhism and other religions. But Buddhists do accept the existence of beings in higher realms, known as devas, but they, like humans, are said to be suffering in samsara, are not wiser than us; the Buddha is portrayed as a teacher of the gods, superior to them. Despite this, there are believed to be enlightened, but since there may be unenlightened devas, there may be godlike beings who engage in retributive acts, but if they do so they do so out of their own ignorance of a greater truth. Despite this nontheism, Buddhism fully accepts the theory of karma, which posts punishment-like effects, such as rebirths in realms of torment, as an invariable consequence of wrongful actions.
Unlike in most Abrahamic monotheistic religions, these effects are not eternal, though they can last for a long time. Theistic religions do not see such effects as "punishment" imposed by a higher authority, rather than natural consequences of wrongful action. Divine retribution is portrayed in the Torah or first five books of the Bible. Major examples of divine retribution in the Torah include: "The wrath of God", an anthropomorphic expression for the attitude which some believe God has towards sin, is mentioned many times in the Christian Bible. Leaving aside the references to divine wrath in the Old Testament, where it is used of God not only when punishing the wicked but when sending trials to the just, as in Job 14:13, it is mentioned in at least twenty verses of the New Testament. Examples are: John 3:36 --. Romans 1:18 – For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. Romans 5:9 – Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God.
Romans 12:19 – Beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to the wrath of God, for it is written, "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, says the Lord." Ephesians 5:6 – Let no one deceive you with empty words, for because of these things the wrath of God comes upon the sons of disobedience. Revelation 6:17 – For the great day of his wrath has come, and, able to withstand? Revelation 14:19 – So the angel swung his sickle across the earth and gathered the grape harvest of the earth and threw it into the great winepress of the wrath of God. Revelation 15:1 – Then I saw another sign in heaven and marvelous: seven angels having the seven last plagues, for in them the wrath of God was finished. Revelation 19:15 –- From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, he will rule them with a rod of iron, he will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. The New Testament associates
Deity
A deity is a supernatural being considered divine or sacred. The Oxford Dictionary of English defines deity as "a god or goddess". C. Scott Littleton defines a deity as "a being with powers greater than those of ordinary humans, but who interacts with humans, positively or negatively, in ways that carry humans to new levels of consciousness, beyond the grounded preoccupations of ordinary life". In the English language, a male deity is referred to as a god, while a female deity is referred to as a goddess. Religions can be categorized by. Monotheistic religions accept only one deity, polytheistic religions accept multiple deities. Henotheistic religions accept one supreme deity without denying other deities, considering them as aspects of the same divine principle. Although most monotheistic religions traditionally envision their God as omnipotent, omniscient and eternal, none of these qualities are essential to the definition of a "deity" and various cultures conceptualized their deities differently.
Monotheistic religions refer to God in masculine terms, while other religions refer to their deities in a variety of ways – masculine, feminine and without gender. Many ancient cultures – including the ancient Mesopotamians, Greeks and Norsemen– personified natural phenomena, variously as either deliberate causes or effects; some Avestan and Vedic deities were viewed as ethical concepts. In Indian religions, deities were envisioned as manifesting within the temple of every living being's body, as sensory organs and mind. Deities were envisioned as a form of existence after rebirth, for human beings who gain merit through an ethical life, where they become guardian deities and live blissfully in heaven, but are subject to death when their merit is lost; the English language word "deity" derives from Old French deité, the Latin deitatem or "divine nature", coined by Augustine of Hippo from deus. Deus is related through a common Proto-Indo-European origin to *deiwos; this root yields the ancient Indian word Deva meaning "to gleam, a shining one", from *div- "to shine", as well as Greek dios "divine" and Zeus.
Deva is masculine, the related feminine equivalent is devi. Etymologically, the cognates of Devi are Greek thea. In Old Persian, daiva- means "demon, evil god", while in Sanskrit it means the opposite, referring to the "heavenly, terrestrial things of high excellence, shining ones"; the linked term "god" refers to "supreme being, deity", according to Douglas Harper, is derived from Proto-Germanic *guthan, from PIE *ghut-, which means "that, invoked". Guth in the Irish language means "voice"; the term *ghut- is the source of Old Church Slavonic zovo, Sanskrit huta-, from the root *gheu-,An alternate etymology for the term "god" comes from the Proto-Germanic Gaut, which traces it to the PIE root *ghu-to-, derived from the root *gheu-. The term *gheu- is the source of the Greek khein "to pour"; the German root was a neuter noun. The gender of the monotheistic God shifted to masculine under the influence of Christianity. In contrast, all ancient Indo-European cultures and mythologies recognized both masculine and feminine deities.
There is no universally accepted consensus on what a deity is, concepts of deities vary across cultures. Huw Owen states that the term "deity or god or its equivalent in other languages" has a bewildering range of meanings and significance, it has ranged from "infinite transcendent being who created and lords over the universe", to a "finite entity or experience, with special significance or which evokes a special feeling", to "a concept in religious or philosophical context that relates to nature or magnified beings or a supra-mundane realm", to "numerous other usages". A deity is conceptualized as a supernatural or divine concept, manifesting in ideas and knowledge, in a form that combines excellence in some or all aspects, wrestling with weakness and questions in other aspects, heroic in outlook and actions, yet tied up with emotions and desires. In other cases, the deity is a principle or reality such as the idea of "soul"; the Upanishads of Hinduism, for example, characterize Atman as deva, thereby asserting that the deva and eternal supreme principle is part of every living creature, that this soul is spiritual and divine, that to realize self-knowledge is to know the supreme.
Theism is the belief in the existence of one or more deities. Polytheism is the belief in and worship of multiple deities, which are assembled into a pantheon of gods and goddesses, with accompanying rituals. In most polytheistic religions, the different gods and goddesses are representations of forces of nature or ancestral principles, can be viewed either as autonomous or as aspects or emanations of a creator God or transcendental absolute principle, which manifests immanently in nature. Henotheism accepts the existence of more than one deity, but considers all deities as equivalent representations or aspects of the same divine principle, the highest. Monolatry is the belief that many deities exist, but that only one of these deities may be validly worshipped. Monotheism is the belief. A monotheistic deity, known as "God", is u
Theodicy
Theodicy, in its most common form, is an attempt to answer the question of why a good God permits the manifestation of evil, thus resolving the issue of the problem of evil. Some theodicies address the evidential problem of evil by attempting "to make the existence of an all-knowing, all-powerful and all-good or omnibenevolent God consistent with the existence of evil or suffering in the world." Unlike a defense, which tries to demonstrate that God's existence is logically possible in the light of evil, a theodicy attempts to provide a framework wherein God's existence is plausible. The German mathematician and philosopher Gottfried Leibniz coined the term "theodicy" in 1710 in his work Théodicée, though various responses to the problem of evil had been proposed; the British philosopher John Hick traced the history of moral theodicy in his 1966 work and the God of Love, identifying three major traditions: the Plotinian theodicy, named after Plotinus the Augustinian theodicy, which Hick based on the writings of Augustine of Hippo the Irenaean theodicy, which Hick developed, based on the thinking of St. IrenaeusThe problem was analyzed by pre-modern theologians and philosophers in the Islamic world.
German philosopher Max Weber saw theodicy as a social problem, based on the human need to explain puzzling aspects of the world. Sociologist Peter L. Berger argued that religion arose out of a need for social order, an “implicit theodicy of all social order” developed to sustain it. Following the Holocaust, a number of Jewish theologians developed a new response to the problem of evil, sometimes called anti-theodicy, which maintains that God cannot be meaningfully justified; as an alternative to theodicy, a defense has been proposed by the American philosopher Alvin Plantinga, focused on showing the logical possibility of God's existence. Plantinga's version of the free will defence argued that the coexistence of God and evil is not logically impossible, that free will further explains the existence of evil without threatening the existence of God. Similar to a theodicy, a cosmodicy attempts to justify the fundamental goodness of the universe, an anthropodicy attempts to justify the goodness of humanity.
As defined by Alvin Plantinga, theodicy is the "answer to the question of why God permits evil". Theodicy is defined as a theological construct that attempts to vindicate God in response to the evidential problem of evil that seems inconsistent with the existence of an omnipotent and omnibenevolent deity. Another definition of theodicy is the vindication of divine goodness and providence in view of the existence of evil; the word theodicy derives from the Greek words Θεός Τheos and δίκη dikē. Theos is translated "God" and dikē can be translated as either "trial" or "judgement". Thus, theodicy means "justifying God". In the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Nick Trakakis proposed an additional three requirements which must be contained within a theodicy: Common sense views of the world Widely held historical and scientific opinion Plausible moral principlesAs a response to the problem of evil, a theodicy is distinct from a defence. A defence attempts to demonstrate that the occurrence of evil does not contradict God's existence, but it does not propose that rational beings are able to understand why God permits evil.
A theodicy seeks to show that it is reasonable to believe in God despite evidence of evil in the world and offers a framework which can account for why evil exists. A theodicy is based on a prior natural theology, which attempts to prove the existence of God, seeks to demonstrate that God's existence remains probable after the problem of evil is posed by giving a justification for God's permitting evil to happen. Defenses propose solutions to the logical problem of evil, while theodicies attempt to answer the evidential problem. "It is important to note that there are at least two concepts of evil: a broad concept and a narrow concept. The broad concept picks out any bad state of affairs... has been divided into two categories: natural evil and moral evil. Natural evils are bad states of affairs which do not result from the intentions or negligence of moral agents. Hurricanes and toothaches are examples of natural evils. By contrast, moral evils do result from the intentions or negligence of moral agents.
Murder and lying are examples of moral evils. Evil in the broad sense, which includes all natural and moral evils, tends to be the sort of evil referenced in theological contexts... he narrow concept of evil picks out only the most morally despicable... involves moral condemnation, is appropriately ascribed only to moral agents and their actions." Philosopher says "a crime against humanity is something for which we have procedures... can be... fit into the rest of our experience. To call an action evil is to suggest that it cannot..."Marxism, "selectively elaborating Hegel," defines evil in terms of its effect. Philosopher John Kekes says the effect of evil must include actual harm "that'interferes with the functioning of a person as a full-fledged agent.'." Christian philosophers and theologians such as Richard Swinburne and N. T. Wright define evil in terms of effect saying an "...act is objectively good if it is good in its consequences". Hinduism defines evil in terms of its effect saying "the evils that afflict people in the present life are the effects of wrongs committed in a previous life".
Some contemporary philosophers argue a focus on the effects of evil is inadequate as a definition since evil can observe without causing the harm, it is still evil. Pseudo-Dionysus defines evil by those aspects that show an absence of
God in Christianity
God in Christianity is the eternal being who created and preserves all things. Christians believe God to be both immanent. Christian teachings of the immanence and involvement of God and his love for humanity exclude the belief that God is of the same substance as the created universe but accept that God's divine Nature was hypostatically united to human nature in the person of Jesus Christ, in an event known as the Incarnation. Early Christian views of God were expressed in the Pauline Epistles and the early creeds, which proclaimed one God and the divinity of Jesus in the same breath as in 1 Corinthians: "For if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth, yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live. "Although the Judeo-Christian sect of the Ebionites protested against this apotheosis of Jesus, the great mass of Gentile Christians accepted it." This began to differentiate the Gentile Christian views of God from traditional Jewish teachings of the time.
The theology of the attributes and nature of God has been discussed since the earliest days of Christianity, with Irenaeus writing in the 2nd century: "His greatness lacks nothing, but contains all things". In the 8th century, John of Damascus listed eighteen attributes which remain accepted; as time passed, theologians developed systematic lists of these attributes, some based on statements in the Bible, others based on theological reasoning. The Kingdom of God is a prominent phrase in the Synoptic Gospels and while there is near unanimous agreement among scholars that it represents a key element of the teachings of Jesus, there is little scholarly agreement on its exact interpretation. Although the New Testament does not have a formal doctrine of the Trinity as such, "it does speak of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit... in such a way as to compel a Trinitarian understanding of God." This never becomes a tritheism. Around the year 200, Tertullian formulated a version of the doctrine of the Trinity which affirmed the divinity of Jesus and came close to the definitive form produced by the Ecumenical Council of 381.
The doctrine of the Trinity can be summed up as: "The One God exists in Three Persons and One Substance, as God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit." Trinitarians, who form the large majority of Christians, hold it as a core tenet of their faith. Nontrinitarian denominations define the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit in a number of different ways. Early Christian views of God are reflected in Apostle Paul's statement in 1 Corinthians, written ca. AD 53-54, i.e. about twenty years after the crucifixion of Jesus: for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live. Apart from asserting that there is but one God, Paul's statement includes a number of other significant elements: he distinguishes Christian belief from the Jewish background of the time by referring to Jesus and the Father in the same breath, by conferring on Jesus the title of divine honor "Lord", as well as calling him Christ. In the Acts during the Areopagus sermon given by Paul, he further characterizes the early Christian understanding: The God that made the world and all things therein, he, being Lord of heaven and earth and reflects on the relationship between God and Christians: that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after him and find him, though he is not far from each one of us for in him we live.
The Pauline Epistles include a number of references to the Holy Spirit, with the theme which appears in 1 Thessalonians "…God, the God who gives you his Holy Spirit" appearing throughout his epistles. In John 14:26 Jesus refers to "the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name". By the end of the 1st century, Clement of Rome had referred to the Father and Holy Spirit, linked the Father to creation, 1 Clement 19.2 stating: "let us look steadfastly to the Father and creator of the universe". By the middle of the 2nd century, in Against Heresies Irenaeus had emphasized that the Creator is the "one and only God" and the "maker of heaven and earth"; these preceded the formal presentation of the concept of Trinity by Tertullian early in the 3rd century. The period from the late 2nd century to the beginning of the 4th century is called the "epoch of the Great Church" and the Ante-Nicene Period and witnessed significant theological development, the consolidation and formalization of a number of Christian teachings.
From the 2nd century onward, western creeds started with an affirmation of belief in "God the Father" and the primary reference of this phrase was to "God in his capacity as Father and creator of the universe". This did not exclude either the fact the "eternal father of the universe was the Father of Jesus the Christ" or that he had "vouchsafed to adopt as his son by grace". Eastern creeds began with an affirmation of faith in "one God" and always expanded this by adding "the Father Almighty, Maker of all things visible and invisible" or words to that effect; as time passed and philosophers developed more precise understandin
King James Version
The King James Version known as the King James Bible or the Authorized Version, is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, begun in 1604 and completed as well as published in 1611 under the sponsorship of James VI and I. The books of the King James Version include the 39 books of the Old Testament, an intertestamental section containing 14 books of the Apocrypha, the 27 books of the New Testament; the translation is noted for its "majesty of style", has been described as one of the most important books in English culture and a driving force in the shaping of the English-speaking world. It was first printed by Robert Barker, the King's Printer, was the third translation into English approved by the English Church authorities: The first had been the Great Bible, commissioned in the reign of King Henry VIII, the second had been the Bishops' Bible, commissioned in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I. On the European continent, the first generation of Calvinists had produced the Geneva Bible of 1560 from the original Hebrew and Greek Scriptures, influential in the writing of the Authorized King James Version.
In January 1604, King James convened the Hampton Court Conference, where a new English version was conceived in response to the problems of the earlier translations perceived by the Puritans, a faction of the Church of England. James gave the translators instructions intended to ensure that the new version would conform to the ecclesiology of, reflect the episcopal structure of, the Church of England and its belief in an ordained clergy; the translation was done by 47 scholars. In common with most other translations of the period, the New Testament was translated from Greek, the Old Testament from Hebrew and Aramaic, the Apocrypha from Greek and Latin. In the Book of Common Prayer, the text of the Authorized Version replaced the text of the Great Bible for Epistle and Gospel readings, as such was authorised by Act of Parliament. By the first half of the 18th century, the Authorized Version had become unchallenged as the English translation used in Anglican and English Protestant churches, except for the Psalms and some short passages in the Book of Common Prayer of the Church of England.
Over the course of the 18th century, the Authorized Version supplanted the Latin Vulgate as the standard version of scripture for English-speaking scholars. With the development of stereotype printing at the beginning of the 19th century, this version of the Bible became the most printed book in history all such printings presenting the standard text of 1769 extensively re-edited by Benjamin Blayney at Oxford, nearly always omitting the books of the Apocrypha. Today the unqualified title "King James Version" indicates this Oxford standard text; the title of the first edition of the translation, in Early Modern English, was "THE HOLY BIBLE, Conteyning the Old Teſtament, AND THE NEW: Newly Tranſlated out of the Originall tongues: & with the former Tranſlations diligently compared and reuiſed, by his Maiesties ſpeciall Comandement". The title page carries the words "Appointed to be read in Churches", F. F. Bruce suggests it was "probably authorised by order in council" but no record of the authorisation survives "because the Privy Council registers from 1600 to 1613 were destroyed by fire in January 1618/19".
For many years it was common not to give the translation any specific name. In his Leviathan of 1651, Thomas Hobbes referred to it as the English Translation made in the beginning of the Reign of King James. A 1761 "Brief Account of the various Translations of the Bible into English" refers to the 1611 version as a new and more accurate Translation, despite referring to the Great Bible by its name, despite using the name "Rhemish Testament" for the Douay-Rheims Bible version. A "History of England", whose fifth edition was published in 1775, writes that new translation of the Bible, viz. that now in Use, was begun in 1607, published in 1611. King James's Bible is used as the name for the 1611 translation in Charles Butler's Horae Biblicae. Other works from the early 19th century confirm the widespread use of this name on both sides of the Atlantic: it is found both in a "Historical sketch of the English translations of the Bible" published in Massachusetts in 1815, in an English publication from 1818, which explicitly states that the 1611 version is "generally known by the name of King James's Bible".
This name was found as King James' Bible: for example in a book review from 1811. The phrase "King James's Bible" is used as far back as 1715, although in this case it is not clear whether this is a name or a description; the use of Authorized Version and used as a name, is found as early as 1814. For some time before this, descriptive phrases such as "our present, only publicly authorised version", "our Authorized version", "the authorized version" are found; the Oxford English Dictionary records a usage in 1824. In Britain, the 1611 translation is known as the "Authorized Version" today; as early as 1814, we find King James' Version, evidently a descriptive phrase, being used. "The King James Version" is found, unequivocally used as a name, in a letter from 1855. The next year King James Bible, with no possessive, appears as a name in a Scottish source. In the United States, the "1611 translation" is generally
