Exhibit looks at the King James Version's role in the American Revolution

In an age when the fires of revolution are spread through cyberspace, it's hard to imagine that the leather-bound volumes resting in display cases at Old Christ Church once had the same incendiary effect.

But the Authorized King James Edition of the Bible, translated into English 400 years ago from Latin and Greek with the aid of earlier versions, was nothing short of a radical text whose populist ethos sowed the seeds of the American Revolution.

"It was the colonists' belief - which they discovered in Scripture, in English - that humankind is free because freedom is an inalienable right endowed by their divine maker," the Rev. Timothy Safford said Tuesday.

It is "justly famous for its beautiful language," he said. "But it also has an American story - and a Philadelphia story."

A first-edition King James "pulpit Bible," printed in 1611, is among 19 historic Bibles on exhibit through the end of May at the church, on North Second Street in Old City.

Most of the well-worn tomes have been in the church's collection for centuries. Chances are, many of the nation's founders - the likes of Benjamin Franklin, George Washington, James Madison, and Benjamin Rush - sat in the painted pews and heard the Holy Writ read from some of them.

On Thursday only, an even rarer treasure will be put on display: an "Aitken's" Bible, on brief loan from the Library Company of Philadelphia.

That Bible, Safford said, represented a "second Declaration of Independence."

In 1782, the Continental Congress decided not to use the Bible authorized by the crown, and cast about for a citizen of the colonies to authorize an American version. Local printer Robert Aitken was commissioned to publish a King James edition, true to the original but expressly printed for the new nation. It was turned over to the Rev. William White, rector of Christ Church and chaplain to Congress, to declare it authoritative.

Historians at the church speculate that White simply proofread Aitken's pages as they came off the presses, comparing them with his own texts and pronouncing them accurate.

"The King James Version may be 400 years old," said Safford, "but it's also the Bible of the Revolution."

Also on display at the church is a massive, lavishly illustrated "Vinegar Bible" of 1717. Its nickname derives from its many typographical errors, the most famous of which is its reference to the "Parable of the Vineyard" as the "Parable of the Vinegar."