Bibles

Versions (in the order of their first date of publication of the complete Bible)

• King James Version (KJV) -1611 (complete Bible) / 1769 (complete Bible, revised) [book review and other relevant links at http://www.bibletexts.com/kjv-tr.htm]

• Young's Bible Translation - 1862 (New Testament) / 1898 (complete Bible)

• Revised Version (RV) - 1881 (New Testament) / 1885 (complete Bible)

• Rotherham's Emphasized Bible - 1872 (New Testament) / 1902 (complete Bible) [You can read a book review and explore links to Christian Science Journal articles advocating or quoting it at http://www.bibletexts.com/reviews/bibles/rotherham.htm .]

• American Standard Version (ASV, then known as Standard American Edition of the Revised Version of the Bible) - 1901 (complete Bible)

In addition to the KJV, the RV, ASV, and Young's were officially used for all or part of the Bible texts of the Bible Lesson read in The Mother Church and branch churches at various times during Mrs. Eddy's lifetime. Rotherham's was also used and quoted by Mrs. Eddy and widely used and advocated by Christian Scientists of her time. To explore a history of the non-KJV English Bible versions officially used in the Christian Science Quarterly Bible Lessons and still used on the Cross and Crown "Seal of Christian Science" and on the Editorial Page of The Christian Science Monitor, browse http://www.bibletexts.com/bl-ver.htm.

Text-only Bibles

Reference Bibles, many types with various combinations of the following:

• Account of the Holy Land, its inhabitants, history, social conditions, manners and customs, etc. *
• Chronological tables *
• Classification and summary of the books of the Bible *
• Concordances *
• Cross-references *
• Dictionaries of the Bible *
• Handy Helps
• Harmonies of the gospels *
• History of the period between the Old an New Testaments *
• Indices: patented Oxford Index, and other subject indices *
• Maps *
• Modern discoveries relating to the Old Testament *
• Oxford helps to the Study of the Bible *
• Self-pronunciation *

  * The Oxford Teachers' Bible included all the features noted with * above. This seems to be the predecessor of the current Oxford Annotated Bible, which is sold in Reading Rooms today.

Special editions: Combined Bibles

• KJV & RV - bound together

• KJV & RV - verse-by-verse parallel texts

• KJV, RV, & ASV - verse-by-verse parallel texts

Special editions: One volume with just a part of the Bible

• Book of Psalms

• Book of Proverbs

• Old Testament Apocrypha

• Four gospels in one volume

• New Testament

• New Testament & Psalms

• Apocryphal New Testament

  This included various apocryphal gospels, letters, and other writings that today may be found in such works as New Testament Apocrypha, Volumes I and II (edited by Wilhelm Schneemelcher, John Knox Press, 1991) and The Complete Gospels (edited by Robert J. Miller, Harper Collins, 1994)

Bible Dictionaries

• Smith's Pronouncing Bible Dictionary

Robert Peel (Mary Baker Eddy, The Years of Discovery, New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston, 1966, pages 222-223) describes Mrs. Eddy's introduction to Smith's Bible Dictionary as follows:

Back on May 30 [1868], while she was still at the Webster house, Mrs. [Mary Baker] Glover had received a telegram summoning her to Manchester to help a friend of the Websters, Mrs. Mary M. Gale, who was critically ill with pneumonia. She had gone and healed her immediately, and Mrs. Gale's subsequent letters poured out her gratitude for the healing. But while she was there, Mrs. Glover had noticed a small child in the house playing with a book, and when she picked up the book she read with delight the title A Dictionary of the Bible, edited by William Smith and published only the year before in Hartford, Connecticut. Mrs. Gale ordered a copy for her and it arrived while she was at Miss Bagley's.

Up to that time she had to carry on her writing without concordances or any of the normal aids to biblical study. Now she at least had one reference work to abet her, and her direct and indirect references to Smith's Dictionary even in the last edition of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures show that she valued its aid. She was especially pleased to find the text of Genesis 6:3, "And the Lord said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh," rendered, "And Jehovah said, My spirit shall not forever rule [or be humbled] in men, seeing that they are [or, in their error they are] but flesh." Here was the very language of Science.

BibleTexts.com note: Mrs. Eddy quotes this reference from Smith's Bible Dictionary in S&H 320:8-17. She also quotes from Smith's in '00 13:24. Peel implies that there are also other S&H references to Smith's Bible Dictionary that do not mention Smith's as the source. To explore other biblical resources Mrs. Eddy used, browse http://www.bibletexts.com/terms/biblical-criticism.htm#mbebiblicalresources.

• Smith-Peloubet's Dictionary of the Bible

• Hastings Dictionary of the Bible

Bible Concordances

• Cruden's Complete Concordance

• Young's Analytical Concordance

Bible Commentary

• The Journeys of Jesus by Dr. Addison Darre Crabtre

  "A chronological, geographical and topographical history of the Journeys of Jesus and the Twelve Disciples in Palestine. Founded on the gospels and the latest surveys in the Holy Land with correct maps and beautiful illustrations by Dr. Addison Darre Crabtre."

SOURCES: The sources of the listing of the above books were (1) the The Mary Baker Eddy Library for the Betterment of Humanity, and (2) the Christian Science Reading Room Catalogs up to 1910. The descriptions of those books came from various sources.