Journal index

In the year 1859 the French Alphonse Esquiros made this remark in his itinerary: “Holland is one of the most religious countries of the earth; the Bible is really popular there.” In my lecture I outline the history of the personal and family reading of the Bible in the Netherlands during the last 5 centuries, including the current situation.Notable new research showed that in the Late Middle Ages in urban regions, in Holland as well, the Bible was spread in the national languages in wide circles of the society and was read among literate laymen. The Reformation built on this broadly recognisable interest or even hunger for the knowledge of the Bible. With the help of the newly discovered technique of printing and school teaching, and due to the fundamental reorientation of religious life through the Reformation – the Christian faith having only one source: the Bible – an intensive personal and family reading of the Bible began.