By Hattie Williams

Church Times

THE Archbishop of Canterbury has received the specially commissioned King James Bible that will be presented to King Charles III during the Coronation on May 6, Lambeth Palace announced.

During the service in Westminster Abbey, the Coronation Bible will be presented to the King, who will place his hand on it when he takes the Coronation Oath.

A Bible is known to have been presented to each monarch in this way since the joint coronation of William III and Mary II in 1689. The earliest specially produced Coronation Bible in the Royal Collection is from the coronation of George III in 1761.

Welby commissioned Oxford University Press to produce the Bible, which is hand-bound in leather and decorated in gold leaf by London bookbinders Shepherds, Sangorski & Sutcliffe, who also produced the Bible for Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation. It features typesetting based on the Quatercentenary Edition of the King James Authorized Version, published by OUP to mark the 400th anniversary in 2011.

“The coronation will be a service of Christian worship, deeply rooted in the wisdom we find in Scripture. The Bible which will be presented to His Majesty the King is a reminder that Scripture is not just at the heart of the responsibilities he undertakes at the coronation, but at the heart of Christian life,” Welby said.

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