CREEDE HINSHAW: Finding inspiration in the British Library

What would you visit if you had only two nights and one full day in London? This was a question My wife and I faced this question on a recent two-week trip to the United Kingdom and France.

Our day had many memorable occasions, including navigating around London on the tube. One of the high moments of that day was the time we spent in the Archives and Documents Room of the British Library.

Here we found interactive displays, including works of hundreds upon hundreds of musicians, poets, novelists, composers, cartographers and artists. It seemed as if the British had collected, catalogued and displayed the works of practically every creative genius who ever lived.

We saw handwritten musical scores by Mozart, Elgar, Chopin, Debussy, Handel and others. An original manuscript of Thomas Hardy, one of my favorite authors, was there. We read lyrics written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, looked at rough drafts of Ian Fleming’s 007 novels and saw Bernie Taupin’s handwritten lyrics for “Candle in the Wind” (sung at Lady Diana’s funeral).

I was especially inspired by the ancient and rare documents that held deep religious significance for the world, including:

— The Lindesfarne Gospel, a famous, illuminated gospel produced somewhere around 700 A.D. off the northern coast of Britain.

— First editions of Bibles printed by John Wycliff in 1400 and William Tyndale in 1525. These men faced persecution, imprisonment and great suffering because they dared to publish the Bible in the common, emerging English language. Wycliffe was declared a heretic, his body exhumed and burned and his ashes discarded. The 42-year-old Tyndale was strangled to death at the stake and his body then burned.

— The Gutenberg Bible of 1454-55, Martin Luther’s gift to the German people, coming at a time when the printing press had just been invented.

— The King James Bible of 1611, a translation that many people find to be the most beautiful translation of the Bible ever undertaken. Many people still consider this the only “true” Bible.

— Fragments from the 3rd century of the Gospel according to John.

The library also contained and displayed sacred writings from the Islam, Hindu and Buddhist faith traditions and many ancient Jewish books, including a 15th century Jewish prayer book that had been “approved” by Christian censors who were careful to suppress what they thought were heretical or objectionable passages.

Tischendorf’s Codex Siniaticus, the earliest existing manuscript of the New Testament in Greek, is on display in that room, as is one of the only four remaining copies (1215 A.D.) of the Magna Carta, the legal document giving the English people their earliest civil rights.

Proving that the church all too often aligned itself with powerful interests, next to the Magna Carta hung a Papal Bull dated Aug. 24, 1215, in which Pope Innocent III revoked the document, ruling the Magna Carta “null and void of all validity forever.”

On your next trip to London, skip some of the iconic, overcrowded sights and visit the British Library. After your visit, you can eat lunch inside the Library, sitting alongside King George III’s magnificent personal 78,000-volume book collection. The time you spend will be both rewarding and highly inspirational.

Email columnist Creede Hinshaw, a retired Methodist minister, at [email protected].