What is the Gutenberg Bible?

The first printed book was the Bible, and was executed in Mentz, Germany, in 1450. it is sometimes called the "Mazarin Bible," because a copy was found last century in the library of the cardinal of that name in Paris. It is also termed "Guttenberg's Bible," because he, with two others whom he took into his confidence, printed it. It is a disputed point with some whether Guttenberg was the inventor of the art of printing in Europe. It was certainly known and practised in China centuries before. This Latin Bible is also known and spoken of as "The forty-two line Bible," because each column contains 42 lines. It was beautifully printed, all things considered. A vellum copy of this interesting Bible was sold for £500 about 56 years ago. Printing was introduced into England by William Caxton in 1474, and into Scotland by Walter Chapman in 1508.

It is a deeply interesting fact to the Christian, that the first complete book which Guttenberg printed with his cut metal types was a folio edition of the Bible in the Latin vulgate, consisting of six hundred and forty-one leaves. Hallam, in his Literary History beautifully observes: "It is a very striking circumstance, that the high minded inventors of the great art tried at the very outset so bold a flight as the printing an entire Bible, and executed it with great success .... We may see in imagination this venerable and splendid volume leading up the crowded myriads of its followers, and imploring, as it were, a blessing on the new art, by dedicating its firstfruits to the service of heaven."*

God was going to recover His truth and give the light of His Word to the people. For this the Scriptures had to be translated from the original Hebrew and Greek tongues, also from the Latin, into the vernacular of the common folk, and means devised for rapid multiplication of the translated Bible. So He raised up men of God who were able to translate the Scriptures, and He so ordered that the art of manufacturing paper was developed in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries and that the art of printing was also invented. The first book to be printed was the Holy Bible, which Gutenberg printed in German around 1456. Now the Word of God was rapidly multiplied and placed in the hands of the people.

Of course, all translations of the Bible, effected during those ages, were made simply from the Vulgate, as it then existed. The Anglo-Saxon version, for instance, which was gradually made during the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries, was only a daughter of the Vulgate; and when, at a much later epoch, viz. 1378, at the very beginning of Richard the Second's reign, John Wickliff published his English Bible, he had no original to appeal to but the Vulgate, as commonly met with, imperfect as it avowedly was. When printing was introduced, in the middle of the fifteenth century, it was first directed to multiply copies of the Vulgate. The first printed book that issued from the press of Gutenberg was the Vulgate, now known as the Mazarin Bible, preserved in the library at Paris. As soon as printing presses were established in the various countries of Europe, they issued copies of the Vulgate, from the MSS. which happened to come to the printers' hands. And it was then that the imperfections of this ancient version became manifest; for these printed Bibles differed in many important respects: which, then, was the true copy, or how could it be regained?

From an early period the mode of printing from blocks of wood had been practised. Sometimes the engravings, or impressions, were accompanied by a few lines of letters cut in the block. Gradually these were extended to a few leaves and called block-books. An ingenious blacksmith, it is said, invented in the eleventh century separate letters made of wood. The celebrated John Guttenberg, who was born at a village near Mentz, in the year 1397, substituted metal for the wooden letters, his associate Schaeffer cut the characters in a matrix, after which the types were cast, and thus completed the art of printing as it now remains.

The First Printed Bible

All historians seem to agree, that Guttenberg, having spent nearly ten years in bringing his experiments to perfection, had so impoverished himself that he found it necessary to invite some capitalist to join him. John Faust, the wealthy goldsmith of Mentz, to whom he made known his secret, agreed to go into partnership with him, and to supply the means for carrying out the design. But it does not appear that Guttenberg and his associates, Schoeffer and Faust, were actuated by any loftier motive in executing this glorious work, than that of realizing a large sum of money by the enterprise. The letters were such an exact imitation of the best copyists, that they intended to pass them off as fine manuscript copies, and thus to obtain the usual high prices. Those employed in the work were bound to the strictest secrecy. The first edition appears to have been sold at manuscript prices without the secret having transpired. A second edition was brought out about 1462, when John Faust went to Paris with a number of copies. He sold one to the king for seven hundred crowns, and another to the archbishop for four hundred crowns. The prelate, delighted with such a beautiful copy at so low a price, showed it to the king. His majesty produced his, for which he had paid nearly double the money; but what was their astonishment on finding they were identical even in the most minute strokes and dots? They became alarmed, and concluded they must be produced by magic, and the capital letters being in red ink, they supposed that it was blood, and no longer doubted that he was in league with the devil and assisted by him in his magical art.

When Constantinople was taken by the Turks in 1453, and the last remnant of ancient civilisation destroyed, many scholars fled to the West of Europe, and brought with them a knowledge of the Greek language, till then almost unknown, at the very time when the dispersion of the Jews from Spain was making public the Hebrew tongue. And contemporaneously with these events, that wonderful discovery of printing was made; putting machinery into the hands of men for the preparation of proper copies of the Bible, which would have been altogether wanting a few generations previously.

When Constantinople was taken by the Turks in 1453, and the last remnant of ancient civilisation destroyed, many scholars fled to the West of Europe, and brought with them a knowledge of the Greek language, till then almost unknown, at the very time when the dispersion of the Jews from Spain was making public the Hebrew tongue. And contemporaneously with these events, that wonderful discovery of printing was made; putting machinery into the hands of men for the preparation of proper copies of the Bible, which would have been altogether wanting a few generations previously.