Thou Shalt Not Kill

“He wanted to kill, that’s what first came to my mind,” Ndikumana told WKRN .

David Shariatmadari

It’s ‘Thou shalt commit adultery’, according to one ill-fated edition. Misprints and mistranslations are the source of much babble in the good book


The so-called Wicked Bible, with the word ‘not’ omitted from the seventh commandment.

“The things that you’re liable to read in the Bible, it ain’t necessarily so”. So sings Sportin’ Life, a shady character in Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess. He could’ve been talking about the edition brought out by Robert Barker and Martin Lucas in 1631, which contained typos so egregious they ruined Barker’s life. He was stripped of his printing licence, fined and died behind bars 15 years later.

Devil’s in the details … some suggest the error was an act of sabotage by rivals.

Extremely rare Wicked Bible goes on sale

Most copies of this version, sometimes known as the Sinner’s Bible, were destroyed, but some survive, collectors items, with one for sale in London next month likely to fetch more than £10,000. The very worst mistake, of course, is the instruction to commit adultery, a typographical disaster that could have been averted by three simple letters: n-o-t. The passage in question – the 10 Commandments – is so crucial that some reckon it was a case of sabotage rather than slip-up. Nevertheless, Barker’s fate will elicit a sympathetic cringe from anyone involved in publishing (the Guardian, thankfully, barely knows the embarrassment of the inopportune literal, as printing errors are called in the trade. Everyone is familiar with the drill: any story with the word “public” in it must be read by at least four different editors.)

The Bible is generally read with more care than newspapers, which means that even relatively harmless blunders have been assured a place in typographical history. But because the source materials are thousands of years old, and in foreign languages, mistranslations are as much of a problem as misprints. Here are some of the more memorable (the furnished several of these examples).

‘Sin on more’

A 1716 edition of the 17th-century King James version (known as the Party Bible – OK, no it isn’t) replaces “Sin no more” from Jeremiah 31:34 with “Sin on more”. There were 8,000 copies printed before anyone noticed.

‘Let the children first be killed’

This is very awkward. It’s Mark 7:27 and it’s supposed to be: “Let the children first be filled.” A 1795 edition of the King James version.

‘If the latter husband ate her’

Known as the Cannibal’s Bible (yes really), a 1682 printing alters this passage from Deuteronomy 24:3, which is meant to read: “If the latter husband hate her.”

We need to invent a term for this phenomenon: when words that are intended as advice inveigle themselves into the text. There is a rumour that one Guardian comment piece was published with the jaunty conclusion: “Please consider the environment before printing this email.” And in an 1805 Bible, a proof-reader’s mark responding to the question of whether a comma should be deleted ended up as part of Galatians 4:29. “But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit to remain, even so it is now.” Some of you will remember a more recent instance of this, in which “strong message here” during a speech. So, a Corbynesque?

‘Owl husband’

A damaged piece of type in a 1944 edition of the King James version changed the depressing commandment “Wives, in the same way submit yourselves to your own husbands” to the far more exciting “in the same way submit yourselves to your owl husbands”, raising the prospect of a whole new world of ornithological encounters.

‘Holy ghost’

This tricky word illustrates some of the pitfalls of biblical translation. The Greek word pneuma means breath or spirit (think ‘pneumatic’), but in the King James version it is mistranslated as “ghost” (although one sense of “ghost” is of course spirit, it was used to mean “supernatural being” from as early as the 14th century, and would have been an appropriate translation for the Greek word phantasma). Not only does this make the concept of the holy spirit a bit confusing. It also gives us the bizarre phrase “he gave up the ghost” (Luke 23:46) which would be better translated as “he breathed his last”.

‘Peace on Earth and good will toward men’

A lovely, all-encompassing sentiment for Christmas, this is what an angel said to the shepherds on a hill near Bethlehem, according to the King James version. Except that a more accurate translation of the Greek is “peace on Earth to people he favours”, he being God. So if you like peace, you’d better be in his good books.

‘Out of thy lions’

There lots of loins in the Bible. As in “fruit of” – ie children. An 1804 edition offers a zoological twist on reproduction, though, with “Thy son that shall come forth out of thy lions.” The printer was probably just a cub.

‘Jesus’

Joshua, more like. Yes, the English name is a transliteration of the Greek Iesous, which comes from the Hebrew Yeshua, a version of Joshua. This fact is likely to catch on among dinner party bores, but probably not 2 billion Christians – who are kind of used to the status quo – or people who swear.

‘Printers have persecuted me’

A Freudian finale to our list, this error, in a Bible of 1612, blames our inky-fingered friends instead of “princes”. Entirely justified, you might think. Except that, in the age of the internet, we only have ourselves to blame. Please consider the environment before printing this email.