Light Shed on Biblical Beauty, Politics and Heresy

On Friday 19 November, a free public exhibition opens in the City Library. Let There Be Light showcases a feast of treasures from the Reed Bible Collection - tracing the beautiful, political and sometimes heretical journey of translating the Bible into English.
Sir Alfred Hamish Reed (1875–1975), expressed his desire for such an exhibition to be hosted by the Dunedin Public Library. Forty-four years on, the 400th anniversary of the King James Bible in 2011, provides a fitting moment for the Reed Gallery to honour Sir Alfred’s wishes.
The Reed Bible Collection is one of the most comprehensive in the Southern Hemisphere. On display are more than thirty examples, beginning with Biblical texts in Latin, Greek and Hebrew. These include a thirteenth-century Latin Vulgate, a leaf from the Gutenberg Bible and the Greek Textus Receptus of Robert Estienne, printed in 1550.
Partial English translations began in the eighth century, as is shown in a facsimile of the Lindisfarne Gospels. The text, written and beautifully illuminated in Latin, includes the efforts of a tenth-century monk to convert the writings into old English. A treasured manuscript of the Wycliffe-Purvey Gospels from the early fifteenth century showcases the earliest attempt at giving the ‘common man’ a complete Bible in his own tongue.
Other treasures include the ‘heretical’ English translation of William Tyndale, printed in a diglot New Testament from 1538 and an early edition of the Great Bible, authorised during the reign of Henry VIII. These sixteenth-century translations culminate with the King James Version, displayed in its first edition.
The exhibition concludes with a first edition of the Bassandyne Bible, the first complete Bible printed in Scotland, the beautiful Baskerville and Doves Bibles; and Bibles once owned by African explorer and missionary, David Livingstone, Donald McNaughton Stuart, first minister of Knox Church, Dunedin; and William Hewer, close friend of Samuel Pepys.