In 1553, Mary Tudor ascended the throne of England and set about to stamp out the Reformation, ordering the burning of all copies of the Bible in the English tongue and causing more than three hundred reformers to be burned at the stake. Bloody Marys vicious crusade drove scores of English reformers to Geneva, including some of the finest biblical scholars in history. Together, these men produced a new English Bible based on the original languages and not beholden to any king or prelate the Geneva Bible

The Geneva Bible is the Bible of firsts: It was the first Bible to qualify as a study Bible, providing readers with copious notes, cross-references, and commentary about the original manuscripts. It was the first Bible to be printed in a portable and affordable edition. And it was the first Bible to assign chapter and verse numbers, facilitating the location of passages, memorization, and recitation and the nurture of a nation of Bible readers.

The Geneva Bible inspired those who championed self-government and civic virtue. Its mighty influence was manifest in the lives of Knox, Cromwell, and Shakespeare. And it was the 1599 Geneva Bible that the Pilgrimsread as they arrived in the New World in 1620, deriving principles from its pages that helped lay the foundation-stones of liberty in the western hemisphere.