Christian History Institute

“I will make them conform themselves, or I will harry them out of the land.” (spoken in 1604)

King James I of England, VI of Scotland

It is a winter day in January 1604 but King James, his closest advisors (the Privy Council), nine bishops and deans, and four Puritans keep reasonably warm, gathered in the luxurious palace at Hampton built almost a century earlier by Cardinal Wolsey. They are here at the request of the Puritans, who had presented James with a petition for the purifying of the church the previous year as he rode from Scotland to London to claim his throne. Because 1,000 Puritan clergymen signed the petition, James cannot well ignore it, although he has made abundantly clear he does not consider their “alleged” concerns to be valid. He had even barred the Puritans from attending the first day’s sessions.

Today, the four Puritans are admitted, all of them moderate men. Their most prominent member is Dr. John Reynolds, head of Corpus Christi College. He will be their spokesman—and come close to derailing the conference at the outset.

James has been reared in Presbyterian Scotland. Under the Presbyterian system rule is placed in the hands of many elders, unlike the English church which is governed by a few bishops. James’ run-ins with Scottish religious leaders have left him little liking for the Presbyterian form of church government.

John Reynolds, speaking in behalf of his Puritan brethren, jabs the king in a sore spot. Reynolds wants to diffuse the authority of the English church among more leaders. “Why shouldn’t the bishops govern jointly with a presbytery of their brethren, the pastors and ministers of the Church?” he asks.

It is poor phrasing at best. At the word “presbytery” James bristles. “If you aim at a Scots Presbytery, it agrees as well with monarchy as God and the devil! Then Jack, and Tom, and Will, and Dick shall meet and censure me and my council.” The implication appears plain to him: “No bishop, no King!” In other words, if you dilute the authority of the bishops, you dilute the king’s authority, and he does not intend to have his authority and actions questioned, as they would be in an open society.

According to Puritan sources, Reynolds then receives a stern warning from his monarch: “If this is all your party has to say, I will make them conform themselves, or else I will harry them out of the land, or else do worse!” Something of this sort was probably said; the sentiments are similar to those expressed by the monarch in a letter written to Henry Howard, the Earl of Northampton about that time.

What makes James words so significant is the outcome: because he does in fact make life so hard for Puritans, many flee overseas—first to Holland and then to the New World where they found Massachusetts.

As a by-product of the Hampton Court conference, England got its most notable Bible translation; the same Reynolds who unintentionally almost derailed the conference suggests that a new translation of the Bible into English is needed, and James, who detests the margin notes in the popular Geneva Bible, and who is always interested in religious and scholarly issues, is quick to agree. He appoints a committee to do the work and establishes a system by which to proceed with it. The result will be the beloved “King James” or “Authorized” version.

—Dan Graves

Dig a Little Deeper

• Bruce, F. F. History of the Bible in English. New York: Oxford University, 1978.
• Curtis, Kenneth. “How the King James Bible Was Born.” Christian History, Jan 2011: 4.
• “James I.” Dictionary of National Biography. Edited by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee. London: Oxford University Press, 1921 – 1996.
• Lee, Maurice. Great Britain’s Solomon; James VI and I in His Three Kingdoms. Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois, 1990.
• McGrath, Alister E. In the Beginning: the Story of the King James Bible and How it Changed a Nation, a Language, and a Culture. New York: Anchor Books, 2002.