During the time before the King James Bible, how did people know what was in the "Bible"?

Question

Also how many people during feudal times in Europe actually went to church?

how was the scriptures in the Catholic Church different (more books, less books?) than the published version in the 1600's?

Answer 1

There were earlier versions of the Bible than the KJV around such as the Jerome Latin Vulgate which St.Jerome translated in 383-390AD, and the Italian Codex which was around 700 AD.

Answer 2

Hi Howard, In Europe during the dark ages and fuedal middle ages almost all people went to church. For one thing it was virtually compulsory, and travelling monks 'made the rounds' as it were to every small hamlet throughout Britain and continental Europe every day. The earlier books called 'The Holy Bible' were collated by the early Roman Catholic Church and the first collected work was put together by the emperor Constantine around 400 a.d. The Bible itself has changed many times over the centuries including the removal of 'the Apophrycal Literatures' that were removed by the R.C. heirarchy when certain passages condracticted others and were no longer tenable. So...there were, originally, many more books in the Bible than there are now. Most people, however, were unable to read, so the 'word' was passed on orally by the clergy and by the orders of monks and nuns. After the disagreement between the Royal family and the Roman Catholic church (principally over the desired 'divorce' by Henry 8th) and the dissolution of the monasteries a new Bible was needed to more closely fit the desires of the non-Roman Catholic beliefs (the Church of England) Hence the King James Bible and its later variations. Once there was a choice of church in England the requirement to attend became less insistant and attendance has fallen. Presently there are not many more than 1 million people attend church each week, from a total population of more than 60 million. Where I now live, in Spain (a Roman Catholic Country) the attendance rate is much higher, from a population approximately half (33 Million) Hope that helps a little, BobSpain

Answer 3

Until the invention of the printing press, not many people owned a Bible, they only heard what their minister's said the Bible said. Plus even if they could get a Bible, it would either be in Latin or Greek, and if they did not understand those languages it'd be a useless effort.

Church attendance varied, some places had mandatory service every day, sometimes twice a day, others just had Sunday service. Sometimes the churches would be so small and the congregations so big, or live so far away, that not every single person would go to church, especially in the isolated areas of the continent.

Answer 4

In Fuedal times people did not attend church as they do now...They were attend to by the local clerics that lived with them. Giving religous guidance and speaking the word of god to those within their village.

In many ways the people then were better off. They learned of God and prayed whenever and wherever they happened to be...not only in a building deemed as a church. It could be in the fields where they worked and toiled or at the table over a meal with the cleric as invited guest.

As for the King James Version of the bible? It's just that, King James Version. Everything that King James did not agree with or like that was orginally in the bible was removed. And remains as such.

Back then there were not as many bibles either. Books were precious and hard to come by as each page was meticulously written and illustrated by individual people rather than off of the assembly line of a publishing company. Sometimes books (the bible for instance) was written and copied by many many different people at the same time. So each recreation took what we would consider as 'forever' to complete.

Answer 5

One cannot have God for his Father, who will not have the Church for his Mother, and likewise, one cannot have the Word of God for his faith who will not have the Church for his teacher. It is the infallible teaching authority of the Church, as promised by Christ, which alone preserves God's Word from erroneous interpretation.

Christ did not say, "Sit down and write Bibles and scatter them over the earth, and let every man read his Bible and judge for himself." If Christ had said that, there would never have been a Christianity on the earth at all, but a Babylon and confusion instead, and never one Church, the union of one body. Hence, Christ never said to His Apostles, "Go and write Bibles and distribute them, and let everyone judge for himself." That injunction was reserved for the Sixteenth Century, and we have seen the result of it. Ever since the Sixteenth Century there have been springing up religion upon religion, and churches upon churches, all fighting and quarreling with one another, and all because of the private interpretation of the Bible.

Read - The New American Bible

This Bible was translated by Catholics and from other faiths. It will have the books which were removed from the Protestant Bible

Answer 6

Church was THE power in feudal Europe....
Jews had the Bible even before KJV, just sans the NT, as the Jewish Bible remains today.
1600s still had the system where the Clergy read what they liked out, as most congregants did not know how to read,... it was easy to make whatever up for them in those days..

Answer 7

People rarely had personal copies of the Bible, it was "interpreted " for them by the clergy and given to the people in sermons. There was none of this quoting of selected scripture to back up a personal prejudice in past times by lay folk as there is today. The Church was firmly in control of how the Bible was presented to the people.

Answer 8

The King actually commanded the peasants to follow the catholic religion during the crusades and it was conform or be killed,Now It is my belief that most of the stories in the bible were carried by word of mouth till someone decided to write them down like the story of John the Baptist Jesus knew he was out there but stories carried along denoted that there was one out there who baptizes in the name of Jesus Christ.Many were confused. I have been in the catholic religion and have never heard of any other books than the one they use on the pulpit in fact when I was taking their test to become part of the congregation and I just couldn't let go of my King James, they looked down upon me,which made me feel as they were being a bit stiff.

Answer 9

Before the average person could read and write, they relied on the clerics to teach them about God and the Bible. There were many religious people during the dark ages and most were extremely religious with no room for error. Jesus didn't mean for us to hate or punish anyone concerning belief. He will take care of that Himself and doesn't need our help. Many preachers in the old days had their own ideas about that and were very wrong in their thinking.

Answer 10

The clergy could read the existing versions and told the gullible people what to believe and that they would burn in hell if they didn't.
The 'extremist' Muslims of the 21st Century didn't start the trend of conversion by fear; they are just following the example set by centuries of Christianity...
Think about it; Jesus and Mohammed are responsible for more deaths on this planet that every dictator put together. Frightening, isn't it?
Religion = the root of all evil.