Rev David McIlveen among buyers of Geneva Bible

A 400-year-old Bible that sold at auction for £20,000 will be used to reach out and reignite interest in the scriptures, its buyer has said.

Retired Free Presbyterian Minister Rev David McIlveen is one of a group who bought the 1615 Bible on Tuesday.

It sold for double its £5,000 to £10,000 valuation, but he said he did not think about it in monetary terms.

“I saw it as a vision in terms of reaching out to schoolchildren and also to libraries as well,” he said.

“Something like this – I would pray – could reactivate that interest in the scriptures.

“I see it not only an artefact but as a message that is so relevant for this generation.”

The Bible, printed in 1615, was taken to what is now the United States by Elizabeth Pole in 1633.

The Geneva Bible was the first mechanically printed, mass-produced Bible available to the public.

It generated considerable interest when it went up for sale at Bloomfield Auctions in east Belfast.

“When I saw it on the BBC website for auction, I was immediately constrained to put an offer in for it,” said the minister.

“There is something very appealing about the fact that this was history – living history that could be used to draw people’s attentions back to the authority of God’s word.”

Even as the bidding rose to more than double the auction estimate, he said, it felt worth it.

“My balance in my own mind was that if this can be of benefit to one person, then the value of that is incalculable.”

He added that the founder of the Free Presbyterian Church and former first minister, the late Dr Ian Paisley, would have recognised the significance.

“If he had been alive today he would have been the first to make the offer for this Bible,” he said.

A number of people had come together to pay for the Bible, he added.

“Enough to give me the comfort of sleeping at ease at night.”

The Geneva Bible was first published in 1560 – half a century before.

It sold as part of a private collection from a gentleman’s residence and was one of 389 lots that went under the hammer.

The Bible was owned by Elizabeth Pole, who travelled with her brother on the Speedwell to the Plymouth Colony.

Originally from Devon, she went on to found the town of Taunton in Massachusetts and is believed to be the first woman to establish a town in North America.

The copy was printed by Robert Baker, printer to Elizabeth I and James I and VI.

It was presented to Elizabeth’s father, Sir William Pole, by the Archbishop of Canterbury in recognition of his services to the Church and the poor of Devon.

When Elizabeth died the Bible was returned to her family in Devon and it remained in the possession of the Pole-Carew family until the mid-20th century when it was sold to a collector from Northern Ireland.