1,000 mourners turn out for ‘Living Bible’ publisher

By Jack Komperda

Daily Herald Staff Writer
Posted Thursday, June 16, 2005

It was only fitting that Kenneth Taylor’s last words to his family and friends would include a Bible passage meant to bring them closer to God.

The simple, single sentence from the Book of Psalms read: “Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his faithful ones.�

And Taylor made sure it would be his voice reading and explaining the meaning of that passage to mourners during a memorial service for him Wednesday morning on the Wheaton College campus.

“I know this is very unusual, (hearing) the voice of the dead, so to speak,� Taylor said in a video recording he made nearly two years ago and shown at the service. “Yes, it is a happy time for him. … He’s welcoming us to his heavenly home.�

Taylor spent most of his life bringing millions closer to God.

He became one of the world’s best-known and most successful Christian publishers when “The Living Bible� sold millions.

Taylor died Friday at his Wheaton home after years of declining health. He was 88.

“The Living Bible,� which he started writing humbly in his home decades ago, became the cornerstone of Tyndale House Publishers, a Christian publishing empire based in Carol Stream that Taylor began as a way to teach his own children about God.

Many of the 1,000 mourners in attendance Wednesday silently wept as Taylor’s video ran.

It had been kept secret from much of his company’s staff, as well as family and friends.

“It (Taylor’s message) was a challenge to each of us to serve God in our remaining years,� Tyndale publicist Mavis Sanders said through tears. “It’s a reminder of what he considered important.�

Much of the service was planned by Taylor well in advance, with specific instructions in the program for the congregation to “sing heartily, and at a strong tempo.�

Taylor’s dozens of grandchildren served as the church chorus.

“His life was full and focused from the moment he entered� school, said Kent Hughes, Taylor’s pastor at College Church in Wheaton.

Hughes spent the service recalling a lifetime of accomplishments: from Taylor’s marriage to his wife, Margaret, to the circumstances that brought about the creation of “The Living Bible� and Tyndale House.

Taylor, who had 10 children, 28 grandchildren and 22 great-grandchildren, began putting the Bible into everyday language in the 1950s after he found his children had difficulty understanding the traditional King James version.

Unable to find a publisher, he self-published the first 2,000 copies of paraphrased copies of the New Testament epistles through the help of a friend. Later endorsements by the Rev. Billy Graham helped bring attention to his work.

By the time Taylor released the complete “Living Bible� in 1971, he received widespread publicity from both the secular and Christian press.

“He was never aware of not believing,� Hughes said. “And amidst all this is that Ken Taylor thought little of himself.�

Taylor’s vision was sometimes lost on his family, as his son Mark, now Tyndale’s president, explained.

Several years ago, Mark’s father pushed to create a version of the Bible that rearranged passages so that for each day in a year, a reader would have a variety of passages grouped together.

Aptly titled the “One Year Bible,� Mark Taylor said the “dumb� idea was resisted by several colleagues.

His father quietly insisted on seeing the idea through to publication.

“Over the years since then,� Mark Taylor said, “that dumb idea went on to sell millions of copies.�

Greek New Testament is added. English and Malay(or Indonesian) interlinears of the Greek New Testament will be added in the future. You can read it here Novum Testamentum Graece .

English translation of the New Testament in Syriac Peshitto by James P. Murdock (1852 edition) is added. You can read it here:

James Murdock

James Murdock was born in Westbrook, Connecticut on 16 February, 1776 and died in Columbus, Mississippi on 10 August, 1856. He graduated at Yale in 1797, and became successively preceptor of Hopkins grammar-school at New Haven, and of Oneida academy (now Hamilton college), New York He studied theology under Timothy Dwight, and was licensed to preach as a Congregational minister in January, 1801, and settled as pastor of the church at Princeton, Massachusetts, in June, 1802, where he remained for thirteen years. In 1815 he became professor of ancient languages in the University of Vermont, and from 1819 till 1828 he was professor of sacred rhetoric and ecclesiastical history in Andover theological seminary. In 1829 he moved to New Haven and devoted the rest of his life to study, principally that of ecclesiastical history, the oriental languages, and philosophy. He was president of the Connecticut academy of arts and sciences, vice-president of the philological society of Connecticut, and one of the founders of the American oriental society. He received the degree of D. D. from Harvard in 1819.

You can find more about James Murdock at http://www.famousamericans.net/jamesmurdock/

Georgia Press reprinted the 1893 edition of Murdock’s translation of the Peshitto in 2001 with a foreword by George Anton Kiraz, and historical introduction by Horace L. Hastings.

Description
Full Title: “The New Testament; Or, The Book of the Holy Gospel of Our Lord And Our God, Jesus the Messiah. A Literal Translation from the Syriac Peshitto Version.”

The Syriac version of the New Testament known as the Peshitto is one of the earliest wittnisses to the early New Testament text. The Peshitto has been, and still is, the official text of a multitude of Aramaic-speaking Churches: the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Assyrian Church of the East and the Ancient Church of the East, the Syriac Maronite Church, the Chaldean Church, the Syriac Catholic Church, and seven established Churches in India including the Syro-Malankara Church, Syro-Malabar Church, and Mar Thoma Church.

Contents
New Foreword by George A. Kiraz
Historical Introduction by Horace L. Hastings
The New Testament
Bibliographical Appendix by Isaac H. Hall

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