Martin Luther's translation of the Bible cast a long shadow over rival attempts in the early modern period to produce German-language versions of Scripture. Widely admired for its accuracy and elegance, Luther's Bible wielded an authority unmatched by any other translation in the years from the Reformation to the revolutionary age of the late eighteenth century. Nevertheless, significant efforts were made, particularly by members of the Reformed churches, who laboured tirelessly to produce scholarly and usable Bibles that would meet theological and pastoral needs. In truth, however, the German Bibles that emerged from Zurich, Heidelberg and Herborn, for all their fidelity to the ancient languages and humanist techniques, reached only relatively small and disparate audiences, and failed to capture the imagination of broader Protestantism. The fragile and fractious world of the German-speaking Reformed churches was not congenial to the emergence of one Bible to match Luther and his heirs. The Reformed churches in the Empire were dwarfed by a Lutheran majority and gravely endangered by the Thirty Years War, in which they lost their stronghold in Heidelberg and numerous libraries. The Swiss, in turn, remained as divided as ever, unable to agree on an authoritative Bible. In the Protestant lands of the eastern part of the Confederation, as well as in the major churches of Basel and Berne, Luther's translation was preferred by many to the so-called Zurich Bible. This tendency was also strong within the Empire, where the Calvinist churches remained inclined to Luther's translation until the end of the sixteenth century: the one major attempt to produce a Reformed German translation proved a failure.

Zurich

During the early 1520s Luther's Bible translations flowed from the presses of Adam Petri and Thomas Wolff in the Swiss city of Basel, the intellectual and commercial heart of the Confederation. In the brief period between September 1522 and 1524, Petri and Wolff accounted for ten editions of Luther's New Testament. The three volumes of the Wittenberg Old Testament were reprinted by Petri in Basel, though the language was adapted for an Upper Rhine audience and Konrad Pellikan added a considerable number of philological and theological glosses, particularly for the Pentateuch.