BBC: Most Dangerous Man in Tudor England: William Tyndale (60 Mins)

I rather agree with the thesis of the author, to wit, that Tyndale was far more influential than Mr. Cranmer. I want to weight this, but Tyndale and Coverdale were, in my estimation, better, more faithful and more consistent Churchmen. Of course, the historians govern the narrative as talkers. "Governing the narrative" results in the underlings parroting the Governors. But, one must press beyond the talkers to the reality. Challenging the historians. Tyndale's Bible still lives with us daily and even more fully than the BCP.


Anyways, here's a BBC review of that godly sufferer for HM's Word A Psalm 119 man. An Ezra in a day of darkness. But, what do narcissistic and self-absorbed Westerners know of this committed Churchman?

15 Mar 1543: Scottish Parliament Authorizes English Bibles for Churchmen

15 March 1543. The Scottish Parliament on 15th March 1543 declares the English Bible “was made free to all men and women to read the Scriptures in their own language, or in the English language, and so were all Acts made in contrary abolished.”

South of the border, Henry VIII had ordered English Bibles into all 9000 parishes...some 3 years after William Tyndale was murdered. Miles Coverdale and William Whittingham would carry on the work at Geneva resulting in England's influential "Geneva Bible" that ruled for 100 years.

But, “the toothpaste was never going back into that tube again.”

By contrast, the Tridentine Mass of 1570 would ensure Latin services for Latin-illiterate Roman throngs until the 1970s. 

By contrast to Rome and Vaticanaphiliacs, English-speakers would have access to God’s Word in their own tongue.

Here’s John  Knox’s account as told by PCA historians.

The story is told at: http://www.thisday.pcahistory.org/2014/03/march-15-2/

The Gospel, for All Peoples, Everywhere.

We are privileged to have as our guest author this day John Knox . . . yes, that John Knox . . . of sixteenth century Scotland. Writing in chapter 2 of his History of the Reformation of Religion in Scotland, the Protestant and Presbyterian Reformer of Scotland describes for us the beginnings of “the People’s Bible” on pages 37 and following. It was the day when the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments in English were made available to the masses, instead of only been printed in Latin and chained to ancient churches of the realm.  Knox writes:

“Men began to inquire, if it were not as lawful to men that understood no Latin to use the Word of their Salvation in the tongue (i.e. language) they understood, as it was for Latin men to have it in Latin, and Grecians to Hebrews in their languages.  It was answered, that the Kirk had forbidden all kinds of languages but these three, Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. But men demanded when that inhibition was given, and what Council  had ordained it, considering that in the days of Chrysostom, he complained that the people used not the psalms, and other Holy Books, in their own languages? And if you say they were Greeks, and understood the Greek language, we answer that CHRIST JESUS HAS COMMANDED HIS WORD TO BE PREACHED TO ALL NATIONS. Now if it ought to be preached to all nations, it must be preached in the language they understand; and if it be lawful to preach it, and to hear it preached in all languages, why shall it not be lawful to read it, and to hear it read in all languages, to the end that the people may ‘try the spirits,’ according to the commandment of the Apostle?

“(After further discussion) the conclusion was ‘by Act of Parliament (15th March 1543) ‘it was made free to all men and women to read the Scriptures in their own language, or in the English language, and so were all Acts made in contrary abolished.’

“This was no small victory of Christ Jesus, fighting against the conjured enemies of his Verity, no small comfort to such as before were holden in such bondage.

(3-Hr Video): Lamp in the Dark: Untold Story of the Bible

Dr. Daniell's "Bible in English:" (Ch. 15) Plain Style & Bible Reading

Daniell, David. The Bible in English: Its History and Influence. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Bible-English-History-Influence/dp/0300099304/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385668294&sr=8-1&keywords=david+daniell+english+bible

 
Chapter 15—ENGLISH PLAIN STYLE AND BIBLE READING, 248-274

Prof. Daniell moves in a side-direction, to wit, to demonstrate the influence of plain speech and plain speaking mediated through Tyndale’s Biblical influences (and the translational progeny).

He raises several issues: (1) 3 influential plain stylists, (2) influences on Tyndale, (3) Magdalen College Vulgaria, (4) Queen Mary, (5) Bible reading, (6) Bible reading by individuals, (7) Bible reading and a national resurgence, and (8) the arrival of English.

English was a “poor thing” spoken on a tiny island “off the shelf of Europe,” a language unknown in Europe and spoken by over 2 million Englanders (compared to our time…2 billion as the first languagers?). Thomas More, the viciously anti-Reformed Anglo-Italian, claimed that 2/3rds could read English in England. This may have been over-stated in order to fan the hostile flames of De Haeretico Comburendo. We know he was given to over-blown and highly exaggerated language, viciously and murderously so. Even one strongly committed Anglo-Italian ass, Nicholas Harpsfield, operating during Elizabeth’s time, felt More was over-the-top. We'll stick with Tyndale's term, "asses."

But, whatever the literacy rate was in England, Prof. Daniell warms to his theme again: “I argue that the switch was thrown” by the English Bible and Tyndale (248). Prof. Daniell appears to like the metaphor of “switch” or “power switch” for a power-line or turning on the lights on a national level.

England alone.

England was alone in not having a vernacular Bible. Prof. Daniell points to these vernacular Bibles from European presses: 1466—Germany, 1471—Italy, 1474—France, 1477—Dutch, 1478—Catalin, and before 1500—Spain and Portugal. These were not for the “swine” (an Anglo-Italian term of art for the laity) or public use, liturgy or homes. Nevertheless, there were 1000 presses in Europe compared to 3 in England—Caxton, de Worde, and Pynsson. These vernaculars were translated from the Latin text and for use by one licensed by an Italian-based senior ass.

Luther’s German Bible in 1522 was based on Erasmus’ 1516 Greek NT. We previously reviewed the stern, murderous and oppressive policy of the Anglo-Italian asses in England: (1) the Parliamentary Act of 1401, De Haeretico Comburendo, (2) the repressive canons of the 1407 Provincial Council of Oxford, and the (3) works of the Ass-bishop of Canterbury, Lord Arundel, with his 11 deadly Constitutions, adopted in Canterbury, York, Lambeth, Oxford and across the nation. It was directed at Wyclif and his poor preachers. England was alone and under the Anglo-Italian thumb.

But, on Prof. Daniell’s reading, “something was happening in the 1520s-1530s internationally, nationally and locally” (250). The printers in Antwerp were all too happy to collect the profits trading off an English appetite. The hunger was for the English Bible—with more print runs than the Aeneid or Iliad.

“Plain style.” Tyndale made efforts to avoid the “colours of rhetoric.” The Bible was for the “mass of ordinary men and women,” not for the “Neoplatonic courtly poets” of Elizabeth’s period (251).

Prof. Daniell offers several examples of the impact.

1. Thomas Hobbes was constantly defending his plain style (253).

2. Addison continually defended this style. He desired this:

“It was said of Socrates that he brought Philosophy down from Heaven, to inhabit among men; and I shall be ambitious to have it said of me, that I have brought philosophy out of Closets and Libraries, Schools and Colleges, to dwell in Clubs and Assemblies, at Tea-tables and in Coffee-houses” (253).

3. Samuel Johnson, an advocate of heavily-Latinized English, nevertheless concluded this—negatively but illustratively—about Addison:

“Whoever wishes to attain an English style, familiar but not coarse, and elegant but not ostentatious, must give his days and nights to the volumes of Addison” (253).

4. Bishop John Wilkins, a man with a colorful background, wrote of the need for plain style speech in Ecclesiastes or a Discourse concerning the Gift of Preaching, as it falls under the rules of Art: 

“…must be plain and natural, not being darkened with the affections of Scholastical harshness or Rhetorical flourishes. Obscurity in the discourse is an argument of ignorance in the mind. The greatest learning is to be seen in the greatest plainness. The more clearly we understand anything ourselves, the more easily can we expound it to others. When the notion itself is good, the best way to set it off is in the most obvious plain expression. St. Paul does often glory in this” (254).

We would add a few logs to this fire: (1) Cornelius Van Til’s densities will largely die with his few enthusiasts. He never learned to write with clarity. (2) Jean Calvin, Martin Luther, Guido de Bres, Zachary Ursinus, William Tyndale and Thomas Cranmer learned to write with clarity. (3) Hooker "was and is" a thicket so thick as to be virtually in-penetrable. (4) Even Owen, though dense, is understandable. (5) Bishop J.C. Ryle (one of the men we willingly call “Bishop”) observed that many of his colleagues were caught up in the Victorian efforts at rhetorical flourish and flair. As an Eton and Oxford man, he witnessed it. He vowed to do the opposite. The old master of Liverpool is ever-accessible and direct. (6) Or, we would add the Rev. Dr. Prof. Allen C. Gulezo who writes with clarity, wit, scholarship and insight—it communicates. While the scholarship is powerful, it is not lost through obfuscation. (7) Or, who can ever forget the inimitably dense, uncommunicative yet widely hailed brilliance of the former Canterbury, Rowan Williams, talkative but saying nothing notable? Awful stuff. No English fogs from the Channel please, at least not for Tyndale and Cranmer.

But, rather wildly and out-of-the-blue, Prof. Daniell observes that this plain style speech—even in the scientific community—held forth “until the nineteenth and twentieth centuries when Germanic-American obfuscation took over” (256). No evidence, just the claim. We’ll leave that there.

INFLUENCES ON TYNDALE, 256-258

Thomas More offered the jibe that “all England list now to go to school with Tyndale to learn English” (257). There is truth here for “many erstwhile illiterates did indeed go to school with Tyndale” (257).

For example, William Maldon of Chelmsford (about 40 miles to the NE of London, about 2 o'clock as the crow flies) spoke of the Sunday evening gatherings of poor men gathering to hear the “glad tidings” read. This itself led William himself to learn reading. It led him to buy, read, and treasure the NT. It also led to his father beating him and disputes with his mother about the English Bible. Prof. Daniell will have more to say later about Maldon.

Influences?

West Country speech patterns of Gloucestershire? Prof. Daniell thinks so, but believes more academic work is needed on a literary level. Numerous words need evaluation.

Prof. Daniell calls attention to William Langland’s Piers Ploughman written in the 1380s and just a few miles north of Tyndale’s birthplace in Gloucestershire. Yet while Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales was repeatedly published for courtly reading, Langland languished and was never printed…at least until 1550.

Prof. Daniell continues the discussion under his next rubric.

MAGDALEN COLLEGE VULGARIA, 258-263

Apparently, there was a “war of the grammarians.” Do we teach English grammar in English? In Latin? Do we teach Latin with Latin? If so, how? And who? Or, do we teach Latin using English? Tyndale had been at Magdalen Hall for 10 years while experiments and debates were to be had. Varied teaching books survive. The struggle was to translate “neither too high nor too low” (258).

Whatever the impact, Tyndale had a “registry of phrases just above the level of common speech” (258). This much, he was an exploratory connoisseur of words.

Prof. Daniell registers his familiar theme regarding Tyndale, Coverdale and the progeny of translations: “short, punchy Saxon forms,” clear and powerful verbs, and subject-verb-object forms. While Shakespeare never feared a good Latinized line, he often would alternate with a quick, punchy Saxon line in parallelistic clarification.

QUEEN MARY 1, 263-264

No English Bibles were printed during her reign (1553-1558). No surprises there. That was standard English policy from 1401 until Henry’s Great Bible, some 140 plus years. And even with its publication and distribution of the Great Bible with Cranmer's wonderful Preface, there were reversals, e.g. “pay and obey, but don’t read and think” in a few monumentally absurd proclamations by Henry and Parliament. Now, Cardinal Pole, an Anglo-Italian, had been out of country for 34 years. Mary recalled him. He advocated for the revival of the 1401 Act of De Haeretico Comburendo. Close to 300 were burned at the stake.

John Rogers was her first victim. Rogers was Tyndale’s friend, collaborator, and maker of the Thomas Matthew’s Bible (again, renamed as a theologico-political screen for Tyndale’s and Coverdale’s works and names). These were picked up by Henry as the Great Bible and it was now awash throughout the land. Rogers was burned at Smithfield on 11 FEB 1555. Prof. Daniell offers this quote:

“…with heroic fortitude. Even Catholic [=Anglo-Italians, not Reformed Catholics] opponents said so. The godly who had gathered wept and prayed God to give him courage to bear the pain and not to recant. Rogers’ ashes were collected, a martyr’s relics, and some seeing birds fly over as he expired thought this a sign of the Holy Ghost” (264).

Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer would be caught in the dragoons’ dragnets in the effort to extinguish God’s Gospel. The Anglo-Italian demons were roiling and raging.

800 Reformed Churchmen sailed the Channel to the Continent as fugitives and exiles for the Biblical faith, including some significant Biblical scholars. Mary’s policy did not extinguish the true faith nor did it advance the Anglo-Italian, Imperial or Roman-Vatican cause. The day of the English Bible had arrived and was to stay.

BIBLE READING, 264-268

Prof. Daniell will give portraits.

Richard Tracy, for example, wrote King Henry VIII in 1544. It is entitled A Supplication to our most Sovereign Lord King Henry VIII.  He argued that the Romanish conventicles [our word for them] had only been able to stand through the suppression of the vernacular Bibles. While the Great Bible was going into the 9000 national churches, Parliament had passed a proclamation warning that the “lower classes” were not to read the Bible” (264). But, the reality was outstripping Anglo-Italian imperialism. The Bible had seeped into the national life and was being read.

We return to the story of William Maldon of Chelmsford. A.W. Pollard, the Cranmer scholar, tells the story:

“…divers poor men of the town of Chelmsford in the county of Essex where my father dwelt and I born and with him brought up, the said poor men bought the New Testament of Jesus Christ and on Sundays did sit reading in the lower end of the church, and many would flock about them to hear their reading, then I came among the said readers to hear their reading of that glad tidings of the gospel, then my father seeing this that I listened to them every Sunday, then came he and sought me among them, and brought me away from the hearing of them and would have me say the Latin matins with him, the which grieved me very much, and thus did fetch me away divers times, then I see I could not be in rest, then I thought, I will learn to read English, and then I will have the New Testament and read thereon myself, and then I had learned of an English primer as far as patris sapientia and then on Sundays I plied my English primer, the Maytide following I and my father’s apprentice Thomas Jeffary laid our money together, and bought the New Testament in English, and hid it in our bedstraw and so exercised it at convenient times” (265).

A few self-evident observations: (1) The NT had surfaced in a parish 40 miles NE of London. (2) Sunday evenings were the occasion for the readings (following Latin-based services). (3) Apparently, many illiterates were gathered, but one amongst them could read. (4) Maldon was an illiterate, but resolved to learn to read English from a primer. (5) From the story, this was a continuing endeavor on his part. Reformed and Confessional Churchman call it the "due and ordinary means of grace." (6) The father was not pleased. (6) He buys a NT himself and “exercises” himself with/in it. Prof. Daniell refers to fights with his mother and father over it.

Prof. Daniell warms again to his frequent theme: many print-runs of the Tyndale, Coverdale Bibles and NTs for the English public, notwithstanding efforts to roll back the movement.

There is evidence for large assemblies doing this, which is, gathering for Bible reading. Some were so large that even Mary did not disrupt the practice: two notable illustrations come from a large parish in Bristol and one in London. It would appear that reading might occur provided there were no theological statements or reflections contrary to Anglo-Italian theology. But, the cat was out of the bag.

Here is one example of an assembly.

“We begin with prayer; after, read some one or two chapters of the Bible, give the sense thereof, and confer upon the same: that done, we lay aside our books, and after solemn prayer by the first speaker, he propoundeth some text out of the Scripture, and prophesieth [=teacheth, speaketh forth] out of the same by space of one hour or three quarters of an hour. After him standeth up a second speaker… [he is followed similarly by] the third, the fourth, the fifth, etc. as the time will give leave. Then the first speaker concludeth with prayer as he began with prayer, with an exhortation to contribution to the poor, which collection being made, is also concluded with a prayer. This morning exercise beginneth at eight of the clock and continueth until twelve of the clock. The like course and exercise is observed in the afternoon from two of the clock unto five or six of the clock. Last of all the business of the government of our church is handled” (267).

Unfortunately, Prof. Daniell does not date this record. This might be what Elizabeth had in mind regarding “prophesyings,” although the evidence for that appeared to be directed at Presbyters doing similarly. This appears to be a Congregationalist affair.

BIBLE REFERENCES BY INDIVIDUALS, 266-267

The Reformation was an “intellectual event” led by university men from the top of the academic food chain. It drew laymen into its orbit and gave them a new liberty. Many “ordinary people were bewildered…from their normal moorings” (267). But all the Reformers “wanted a nation of Bible readers” and for “all of England to be a university” in which “ploughboys and milkmaids sang the Scripture as they worked” (267). The Reformers did maintain the “authority of the Bible and control of its interpretation never more so than the Geneva Bible” (268), a note revealing Prof. Daniell's Dissenter roots.

Prof. Daniell returns to more illustrations of the commoner and the Bible.

1. Rawlins White of Cardiff, an illiterate fisherman, burned at the stake in 1555. Cardiff is about 150 miles from London and about 9 o'clock as the crow flies. The Bible was in a fisherman's home. He sent his son to school to learn to read English; they were Welsh-speakers. The boy read the English Bible at night. This indicates that the English Bible was to be had far outside London. The man became seriously literate—in terms of the readings—and was able to cite “chapter and leaf” (267).

2. John Maundrel was burned at Salisbury. Salisbury is about 90 miles from London at about 8 o'clock as the crow flies. He was illiterate too. But, he bought and owned a pocket-sized Tyndalian NT. He would ask anyone who could read to read to him. He too learned to cite and quote the Bible.

3. Joan Waste was a blind woman in Derby. Derby is about 130 miles from London at about 11 o'clock as the crow flies. She too bought a NT. She had others read it to her. She had sections memorized. She was burned at the stake in 1558.

4. Mrs. Prest of Exeter. Exeter is this scribe's ancestral home on mother's side. It is about 200 miles at about 8 o'clock as the crow flies. She was illiterate too, but attended readings and learned much by it. She was burned at the stake in Exeter in 1558.

5. A.G. Dickens in his English Reformation gives examples of youths who could read, did read, and were put to the stake.

Prof. Daniell again repeats his oft-made statement. Between 1536 (when Tyndale was strangled and roasted in Belgium) and 1549 (when the English Book of Common Prayer and English Bible were required in 9000 churches) was a meagre 13-14 years.

Despite the Anglo-Italian reversals of the 1540s, new forces were at work. Cranmer began studying liturgical example as his library at Lambeth reveals. He was absorbing Continental developments and scholarship. He chaired meetings at Windsor and Chertsey to review “phrasing and many other collects” (274).

To close off the chapter, Prof. Daniell offers two Cranmerian collects to show the force of the Saxon effort, the clear and direct language for use in national prayers:

1. The 21st Sunday After Trinity

“Grant we beseech thee, merciful Lord, to thy faithful people, pardon and peace: that they may be cleansed from all their sins, and serve thee with a quiet mind: through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

We would offer that Prayer Book doctrine and piety makes no room for the rampant noises of modern charismania or the free-wingers in worship. People kneel and beseech the divine mercies.

2. The 4th Sunday after Easter drawn from the 4th century Gelasian Sacramentary

“O Almighty God, who alone canst order the unruly wills and affections of sinful men: Grant unto thy people, that they many love the thing which thou commandest, and desire that which thou dost promise: that so, among the sundry and manifold changes of this world, our hearts may surely there be fixed, where true joys are to be found: through Jesus Christ our Lord.”

There are reasons to be a Reformed Prayer Book Churchman.

Dr. Daniell's "Bible in English:" (Ch 14) Edward VI (1547-1553)

Daniell, David. The Bible in English: Its History and Influence. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Bible-English-History-Influence/dp/0300099304/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385668294&sr=8-1&keywords=david+daniell+english+bible

 
Chapter 14—Toward the Reign of Edward VI, 1547-1553, pages 221-247

Prof. Daniell’s discussion entails the following elements: (1) directions for a reformation brewing since 1528, (2) Anglo-Roman-Italian reversals of reforms, (3) Edward VI, (4) Old Testament kings, (5) Monarchs and the “Two Regiments” (spirituals and temporals), (6) Edward VI as Josiah, (7) the enriching effects of Josiah, (8) those English Bibles again, and (9) contrary to Romanist and Tractarian historians (airbrush artists), the English Reformation was not a failure.

As the discussion develops towards Edward VI, 1547-1553, it should not be forgotten that Tyndale’s NTs, notwithstanding repressive English efforts, were still rolling off Continental presses. Furthermore, there were no further significant translation-tweaks to the Great Bible of 1540 until the efforts on the Geneva Bible, beginning in 1557 and going to the press in 1560, a reproduction with slight annotations. The Geneva Bible (1560, 1576, 1599), notwithstanding historical revisionists (airbrush artists), was an influential Bible in England for 100 years and, then, it reached the “creeks and coastal plains of America” (221); the Geneva Bible was a rich source book for personal and private lives. As said before, the toothpaste was not going back into the tube.

DIRECTIONS THAT THE REFORMATION SHOULD TAKE, c. 1528, pages 221-226

Tyndale was forward-looking. One strong clue comes from Tyndale’s printer, at one moment under the influence of alcohol. Tyndale had Miles Coverdale and the Observant friar William Roy as assistants in translation work. Peter Quesnell, an eminent publisher who would print any respectable volume of any persuasion, including Tyndale, took to too much wine. He had been drinking too much. “Under the influence” Quesnell told Cochlaeus (John Dobneck), a vitriolic and virulent anti-Lutheran in search of heretics...Quesnell revealed “the secret by which England was to be brought over to the side of Luther” (143). That was red-meat; it still is red-meat to Tractarians and even liberals. The Bible and Bible doctrines were vital and Tyndale knew it, like Luther. While Anglo-Italian leaders were fighting brushfires in the 1520s in England (e.g. Bp. John Fisher and Henry VIII), notably in London, Cambridge and Oxford, Tyndale was hovering over, digging in, thinking about, and being controlled by the constant inrush, overflow and immersion in the Biblical text. That begins to shape doctrine, worship and piety. Tyndale was miles beyond the imaginative powers of the majorities of Anglo-Italian leaders. An English Bible in the nation would force far too many--again, far too many--unappreciated, probing, penetrating—and even mocking—questions of the corrupted Anglo-Italian leaders literally “hell-bent” on control and darkness.

Many examples could be cited. A discussion of good and bad kings with applications to Popes, Bishops and Kings could invite unpleasant conflicts. Or, more simply, a little matter: WHAT? Married clergymen like the apostles? 1 Cor. 9.5? As one sheriff in one shire said upon reading that, “What? The Bible is heresy.” These are two, but there are far, far more. The power of the whole Bible, God’s Word, was feared; it still is; that’s why we get “driplet-droplet” theologies of Marcionism, continuing Romanism (masters of the selective quotation system with centuries of practice), liberalism, and modern day evangelicalism (think shallow music, liturgy and more).

Tyndale (like Cranmer later) saw the “power of the Scripture” (122). Few understand Cranmer's childlike and implicit power in the unvarnished reading of the Scriptures. This point about Cranmer rarely gets mentioned. Luther had the same conviction.

This applied to Kings (and Pope’s) as well, still a revolutionary message...the relationship to the rank-and-file governed by Scripture. One doesn't get the right to abuse Christ's sheep. Here’s Tyndale:

“…the people are God’s, and not theirs: yeah, are Christ’s inheritance and possession, bought with His blood. The most despised person in the realm is the king’s brother and fellow-member with him in the kingdom of God and of Christ” (222).

Hiding, stealing and obfuscating “the Word of God” was a constant theme of all Reformers. Notwithstanding all Thomas More's intemperate chest-pounding in strenuous opposition to English Bibles (and John Fishers and other Anglo-Roman-
Italians), again, from Tyndale:

“Judge whether it be possible that any good come out of their dumb ceremonies and sacraments unto thy soul. Judge their penance, pilgrimages, pardons, purgatory, praying to posts, dumb blessings, dumb absolutions, their dumb pattering, and howling, their dumb strange holy gestures, with all their dumb disguisings, their satisfactions and justifyings” (223).

“Dumb” means Latin throughout.

It’s worth re-reading the quote slowly. Tyndale has the indubitably clear sense that Latin-illiterate throngs faced “dumbness” from the Anglo-Italian imperialists.

“Dumbness” was sought, advocated and defended.

What good comes of that "dumbness" asked Tyndale? Ignorance was the name of the game. It kept the "swine" from "trodding the Gospel underfoot" to quote one Anglo-Roman-Italian.

Forcing such ignorance, dumbness and theft of God’s Word was, to Tyndale, the act of antichrists. His marginal note at 1 John 2.1 indicates such—antichrists. “…even now there are many antichrists come already” as Tyndale translates it. He lays into the money-schemes of Rome including the enormously wealthy English monasteries. Modern ecumenists cannot handle such an idea of an antichrist in religious leadership, or the Devil, or demons or humans in enslaved bondage to them (airbrush Eph. 2.1, John 8.44, Mt. 13 out of the text for example); that is beyond their ken, too rude...too un-Western and too un-advanced. It's not fit for country-club Republicans or modern professors of literature, history and theology. Not so for Tyndale.

The “dumbness” would be cured by English Bibles. Again, Tyndale was immersed in the text.

On the simplest and even more complex levels of Bible reading...rude, probing and awakening questions would indicate greed, pomp, avarice, power-grabbing, arrogance, wealth, theft, anger and more—even architecturally with penance-indulgence funds—dem' big bucks—underwriting construction-artistic developments at (Anti-) St. Peter’s in Rome. The Bible would expose such things (a Wycliffite theme). Rome was running a Ponzi-scheme, Peter's pence and all, like TBN.  Those rude observations by St. Paul about leaders not being covetous for wealth were unwelcomed notes. Calvin would call it "fleecing the sheep." Luther saw it with the indulgence trafficking.

On the simple or more complex reading of the Bible, Tyndale is also scathing about Anglo-Italian liturgical superstitions and power-abuses (still a feature with Tractoes, liturgical martinets and fundamentalists, "righta' lefta' right").

Again, from Tyndale:

“If any of them happen to swallow his spittle, or any of the water wherewith he washeth his mouth, ere he go to mass: or touch the sacrament with his nose: or if the ass [ = Tyndale’s word for priest, emphasis added] forget to breathe on him [Tyndale’s meaning the bread or the chalice], or happen to handle it with any of his fingers which are not anointed, or say Alleluia instead of Laus tibi Domine or Ite missa est instead of Benedictamus Domino or pour too much wine in the chalice, or read the gospel without light, or make not his crosses aright, how trembleth he! How feareth he! What an horrible sin is committed! I cry God mercy, saith he, and you my ghostly father. But to hold an whore, or another man’s wife, to buy a benefice, to set one realm at variance with another, and to cause twenty thousand men to die on one day, is but a trifle and a pastime with them” (224).

Or, on Anglo-Italian arrogance...the desires to inflict ignorance on the people (Latin services on the Latin illiterate throngs), and anti-Pauline theology, again from Tyndale:

“What then saith the pope? What care I for Paul? I command by virtue of obedience to read the gospel in Latin. Let them no pray but in Latin, no, not their Pater noster. If any be sick, go also and say them a gospel, and all in Latin…It is verily as good to preach it to swine as to men if thou preach it in a tongue they understand not. How shall I believe the truth and promises which God hath sworn, while thou tellest them unto me in a tongue which I understand not” (225)?

Or, again, on a simple or complex reading of the entire Bible, a simple person could easily discern world-consuming preoccupations and the unwarranted wealth relative to ministerial duties, again from Tyndale:

“To preach God’s word is too much for half a man: and to minister a temporal kingdom is too much for half a man also. Either other requireth an whole man. One therefore cannot well do both. He that avengeth himself on every trifle is not meet to preach the patience of Christ...He that is overwhelmed with all manner riches and doth but seek more daily not meet to preach poverty…” (226).

There are many themes—including theological ones, like Romans—that Bible reading would confront. Where's purgatory or indulgences?  Tyndale frequently noted: "...the pope sells what Christ gives freely."

Upon a simple or complex reading of Scriptures, one very simple theme was married clerks in collision with the authority of the Anglo-Italians and Continental Papists legislating mandatory celibacy; the Papists still require it. A simple reading must deal with such. It illustrates the continued arrogance of the senior clerk in Rome. Again, from Tyndale on marriage:

“He must have a wife for two causes. One, that it may thereby be known who is meet for the room. He is apt for so chargeable an office, which had never household to rule. Another cause is that chastity is an exceeding seldom gift, and unchastity exceeding perilous for that degree [position], inasmuch as the people look as well unto living as unto the preaching, and are hurt at once if the living disagree, and fall from the faith, and believe not the word” (226).

Married clergy were shockers to (some) Elizabethans. Even Elizabeth, rather un-Reformed on this point, was still in the Romanist grip of her past; she acquiesced for peace, but still did not like married clerks including Mrs. Grindal, the wife of the second Canterbury working for her.

UNDOING REFORMS, 226-229

As the monasteries were being dissolved, Bibles were going into the parishes of England. A “Bishops’ Book” in 1537 was published in great numbers. There were also Anglo-Italian works from the press, e.g. The Institution of Christian Men, expounding the 7 sacraments, Lord’s Prayer, Ave Maria, purgatory, papal authority and Rome’s definition of justification. It was a counter-reformation move. But, these volumes were in English...itself a shift, itself an indication of the need to counter growing sympathies for reform.

The Parliamentary Act, 1539, of "Six Articles" was a “weighty counter-move back to Rome” (227). The Jesuits had formed-up to support the senior clerk in Rome “against heresy.” The Articles were to be enforced “upon pain of death.” 

We ask, quite vigorously, where was Canterbury Cranmer? Was this one of those points where he capitulated? Cranmer hid his wife and kept his position, Latimer resigned his see, and Coverdale fled. 

Robert Barnes burned at Smithfield on 30 JUL 1540.

"The Six Articles" asserted: transubstantiation, communion in one kind, mandatory celibacy, necessity of monastic vows (unbreakable including vows of chastity and allegiance to the senior clerk in Rome), private and propitiatory masses for the departed, and mandatory auricular confession. The Anglo-Italians were on the move and the “power was shifting” (227).

Other Anglo-Italian moves:

1. Publication of the King’s Book

2. Publication of The Necessary Doctrine and Erudition for any Christian Man, both of these volumes supported in 1543 by the Parliament. This volume was for the “advancement of true religion and for the abolishment of the contrary,” making it a crime for any “unlicensed person” to “read the Bible to himself or others” (227). 

It proscribed “the crafty, false and untrue translation of Tyndale” although it was embedded in the Great Bible--a laughable fact. A monumental absurdity.

By 1540, the 1526 NT by Tyndale, the 1534 NT by Tyndale, ½ of the OT by Tyndale, Coverdale’s 1535 of the entire Bible, Coverdale’s minor tweaks of the 1537 Thomas Matthew’s Bible (Coverdale but renamed as a screen) and the Great Bible (again, by incorporation, containing the previous works) was going to 9000 parishes. Henry and the Parliament were acting with monumental absurdity and incoherence.

3. But, these moves were blows to the German Lutherans who had, increasingly, looked to Henry VIII to lead a “united Protestant front” against Anglo-Romanism and Romanism. Cranmer and even Tunstall had entertained 3 German reformer-delegates at Lambeth for 1 year. "The Six Articles" and government's counter-reformation moves ended the effort.

4. Yet, Henry VIII issued his Proclamation to “set up the largest and greatest Bible in every church” with the admonition to “avoid contention and altercation” (228).

5. An effort in 1542 to revise the Great Bible in the direction of greater Latinity came to nothing. For example, the great opponent of the English translations was Stephen Gardiner of Winchester (remember his running interference for the Pope in Paris while Coverdale was working on print-runs); if you couldn’t win on English Bibles, you could blow smoke and obfuscate; old Steve imported 132 odd-ballish words at key points: commilitio, lites, panis propositiones, digragma, ejicere, increpari, zizania, and a 100 more. Or, in the baptism of Christ, this gem for the lay-swine: “…this is my dilect son in whom complacui…” That'll teach em!'

6. Henry VIII issued a Proclamation in 1546 that “no man or woman of what estate, condition, or degree was…to receive, have, take or keep, Tyndale’s or Coverdale’s New Testaments…” Large numbers were collected and burned at St. Paul’s by the Anglo-Italian senior clerk of London, old Bonner. All of this ran against the explicit sense of poor Cranmer’s Preface to the Great Bible.

7. But, as we’ve noted, this was all quite a howler! F.F. Bruce called Henry VIII’s Proclamation a “monumental piece of absurdity” (229). Tyndale and Coverdale were already in the Great Bible now in many parishes. But, we can imagine the “chilling effect” upon the people—the fears. "Pay and obey, but don't read or think."

8. The real issue for the Anglo-Italians: control of the Bible and shielding parishioners from pervasive involvement with the Bible. They were “driplet-droplet theologians,” then like now. Like Jesus' Parable of the Sower, the Devil "stealing" the sown seed.

KING EDWARD VI, 229-230

Henry VIII mercifully and blessedly died--like all mortals--on time in JAN 1547. "The Six Articles" were repealed. Edward VI would accede to the throne on JAN 1547. The availability of Bibles—oh oh--an upswing without Royal opposition. Soon, the 1549 Book of Common Prayer would be put forward, an advance in one sense—English services nationwide and the reversal of the Anglo-Italian policies legislating darkness and ignorance. Martin Bucer would help Cranmer towards the 1552 Book of Common Prayer. The Anglo-Italians did not disappear; they would resurface with a furious and fire-like vengeance and a definite agenda in 1553-1558.

Roman and Tractarian analyses dub the English Reformation a failure. More largely, denial also accrues by means of neglect—a strong force to this day. Academic analyses often engage: politics, selective theological themes, selective focus on some recusant parishes and church wardens’ records, selective figures—and often on the “destructive forces” or the English Reformation as a “destroyer of religion.” It is near-wise always denied that English Bibles was a major factor in the English Reformation.

THIS PROBABLY ACCOUNTS FOR THE TEC, COE, and the ACNA-Tracto efforts at obfuscation, revision and denial. Prof. Daniell’s said new and scholarly efforts are needed in modern times to answer the rages of neglect and denial

Laying blame at the feet of Romanist and Anglo-Italian (Tractarian) historians, Diarmaid MacCulloch wrote in 1999:

“A negative image of Edwardean religion has prevailed since the early nineteenth century, the result of disapproval from both Romans Catholics and (within the Church of English itself) Anglo-Catholics. The distinguished Anglo-Catholic church historian Bishop Walter Frere would speak for many when in 1910 he contemplated the six years after 1547 and dismissed them as the `lowest depths to which the English church has ever sunk’…[recent historians] have echoed that dismissal…as an unmitigated disaster imposed by alien forces, wrecking not just the beauty of the parish church but also the intricate and orderly structure of village life and the financial system which sustained it…In 1957, another prominent Anglo-Catholic, Fr Humphrey Whistler (like Frere, a member of the Community of the Resurrection) produced an engaging little pamphlet on the Reformation which was intended as an exercise in ecumenism between Roman Catholics and Anglicans, picking up the pieces of misunderstanding from the sixteen century…In this we hear one solution to the problem of the Edwardian Reformation, simply to deny it any part in the Church of England story…Fr Whistler was completely silent on the first half-century of the English Reformation” (230).

It’s just bad history-writing, agenda-driven history-writing, replete with hate, denial and hostilities, the Tractarians contribution to the late 19th and 20th centuries that still live.

Again, more from Prof. MacCulloch and the power of the Old Testament fueling Edwardean reforms:

“The rebuilt Church [under Edward] was evangelical in essence. The assignment for evangelicals was a treasure hunt for the evangelion, the good news to be found in the New Testament…Yet spokesmen for the Edwardean revolution were also drawn to the Old Testament, where they could view other kingdoms, battling against great odds to hear the message of God. Henry VIII had already enjoyed posing as one or other of the two great success stories in Israelite politics, David and Solomon. However, in the turbulence of his son’s revolution, other kings of Israel and Judah entered the stage, because they were more urgently scripted to act as a warning or encouragement” (230).

We would add that these images would be taken up by Elizabeth, James, Charles and Royal supremacists including our good friend, Billy-goat Laud of Canterbury—who never saw a sermon he couldn’t shape like a wax nose against anything Reformed.

Englishmen were reading history scripted to the OT. It was the stuff of reform.

Calvin and Luther relied on the magistrates for reforms. So did the divines of the Westminster Assembly. Elijah was a favored story of Ahab and Jezebel and their Baalite priests. Elijah put forth the mocking question, “Why halt ye between two opinions?” (an apposite question for ACNA-Bob). Now, history could read like a “tick-tock” of good and bad rulers—raising uncomfortable questions for kings. Holinshed’s Chronicles and Foxe's Acts and Monuments would be found in many Elizabethan homes—Shakespeare would draw on the former. Oh no! Could there be "bad popes," "bad kings," "bad bishops" or "bad clerks?" Who needs those questions thought the power-brokers, then, like now.

MONARCHS AND “THE TWO REGIMENTS,” 235-238

The “power of the monarch under God” played a large role with the Reformers.

Tyndale’s Obedience (1528), Practice of Prelates (1530), and his Exposition on V, VI, VII Matthew (1533) dealt with the role of the monarch as did Simon Fish’s exhilarating Supplication of Beggars (1529), a volume that charmed Henry VIII.

John Frith, Robert Barnes, John Bale and later Cranmer himself were all loyal Henricians.

There were “two regiments,” the temporals and spirituals. A new force is what we would call the "insofar clause." That is, we obey the temporals "insofar" as they do not require unlawful compliance to unbiblical issues.

Tyndale had given thought to these things.

1. On the one hand, some have seen his Obedience as a profound argument for the control of a nation’s religion by the King, or Caesaro-papism, or Erastianism. Cuius region, cuius religio. That was the order of the day for all nations, not just England.

2. On the other hand, Tyndale in his Exposition on V, VI, VII Matthew (1533) said: “…The clergy have so ruffled the temporal to the spiritual together” and have “made such confusion that no man can know the one from the other…” This had been long in the making, going backwards to Rome’s Unam Sanctum...or to Thomas a Becket's engagements with the English king...or to Charlemagne bowing his head to receive the crown...or to Constantine convoking the Nicene Council.

3. Tyndale did not know how to see them easily distinguished: “…we cannot separate them into two watertight compartments” (237).

4. Yet, for Tyndale and reformers, the King must obey the Scriptures.

5. Even early American legal textbooks abounded with Biblical references; the early New England Puritans did not easily distinguish the lines either; theonomists like the 2-stepping-REC Ray, before his more recent iteration in favor of Tractos, called for the total subjection of the temporals to the OT spirituals including Mosaic Law. Or, even the Presbyterians and the Reformed had to amend their Erastian elements in their confessions. The Covenanter Presbyterians around Pittsburg still assert Christ over crown and the Solemn League and Covenant, but we digress.

EDWARD VI AS JOSIAH AND ENRICHING EFFECTS, 238-243

Edward VI was viewed as:

1. Josiah, 2 Kings 22-23 and 2 Chron. 34-35, a young king with a “burning and growing zeal for the LORD” (239)

2. Josiah, commendably “gathering officials” for reform

3. Josiah, who “swept away corruptions” and “sacrifices to the Canaanite gods” (239).

Prof. Daniell returns and rewarms his constant theme.
 
But, the standard histories on Edward never mention the growing role and force of the English Bible. The historians “slight,” stand “aloof,” or treat the “Bible like an unwelcome relative glimpsed at the far end of a room” (240). Prof. Daniell’s has already identified the Romanists and Anglo-Romanists as culprits; one might wish to see an analysis of the impact of the 19th-20th century liberalism as a co-enabler in the addiction to historical revisionism; mix in some secularism and other modern forces and one gets amnesia in some sectors and denial in others.

The question still survives. The Enlightenment appealed to natural law (whatever that means as identified by fallen sinners).

Yet, having said all that, for years, decades and centuries, in England and worldwide Anglicanism, an infant grew up heard the Book of Common Prayer and the English Bible. He or she heard that throughout their years, even if the cleric was boring holes in the theology of the Bible, Prayer Book or Articles. It still goes on, for example, at King's College, Cambridge.

The question arises: how can the role of the Bible be neglected in standard and modern histories? That’s Prof. Daniell’s probing question. He continues to repeat this point.

Prof. Daniell points to two telling volumes that speak to the issue: Margaret Ashton's England’s Iconclasts, 1: Laws against Images (1988) and The King’s Bedpost (1993). In these two books, she offers historical portraits of the figures around Edward and their “use of the Old Testament kings in European Reformation documents.” She points to Elizabeth’s Book of Homilies which commended the good kings of Judah. She notes that Edward as Josiah was reading the law, restoring the nation, destroying false religion and doing the will of God by rebuilding the nation (241).

Prof. Daniell raises the Roman and Anglo-Roman (within the Church of England) complaints against those who “mourn the destruction of the great monasteries under Henry VIII” and the “cultural disaster” (242). This is the theme of the Johnny-one-notes. They sing this in varied keys. If we've heard it once, we've heard it a few dozen times. The iconclasts painted over wall paintings and put up Bible verses instead.  We get it. Prof. Daniell rightly laments the scattering of Latin manuscripts to the wind; hah, they learned it, however, from the Romanists themselves, skilled in the very invective and animosities of many burnings of Bibles, books...and burnings of people too. Thomas More believed the "burnings" would purge the land. Little mention is made of the “grip of wealth,” the transfer of wealth from England to Rome, or the varied frauds perpetrated on the simple, naïve and gullible, e.g. the “blood of Christ at Hailes Abbey” to mention one. Or, the manipulation of the people through fear of purgatory or the control of the nation from Rome. Or, conversely, the flowering of a Reformation flood of culture, music, art, language, literature and high scholarship—Shakespeare, Spenser, Milton and others.

ENGLISH MONARCHS AS OLD TESTAMENT KINGS, 243-244

Up to the 1660s, the Royals of the time were frequently seen as a David, most notably with Henry VIII, but also James 1 through Charles II. “David, Solomon, and Josiah were united in Edward: but so were Jehoshaphat, Hezekiah, Jehu and Antiochus” (244). One scholar, commenting on the 16th century Reformer John Bale, and the view of 2 Sam. 16 and the cursing of David, said:

“…did not think kings should be seen as immune to the criticism of their subject, at least not the godly ones…allusions are made to Henry VIII’s ideological heritage with a whole series of bad kings from the Old Testament…part of the false church of Antichrist: `with such holy counsellors [sic]…nowadays Ioram, Achab, Ochosias, Ioachim, Zekeikiah and other kings more of Israel and Juda deceived and brought into the great indignation of God’s Writers [sic]l and preachers expected the king and their other readers to back to the Bible and read about the exemplars they mentioned” (244).

The issue is not so easily dismissed. One thinks of the Christian right, middle and left still bringing their moral perspectives to the political arena; the Pope still weighs in on geo-political issues.

ENGLISH BIBLES, 245-246

In an impressive section, Prof. Daniell retells a favorite point: print-runs and the ubiquity of the English Bible. 21 years between Tyndale’s 1526 NT and King Edward VI’s accession in JAN 1547, there were 64 editions (different editions, not fresh printings) of the “whole Bible in English” (245). Yet, in this same period there were no Latin Bibles printed on English presses, although there were 22 across Europe.

This fact is “impressive” given the opposition from Henry VIII and Anglo-Italian clerks (245). The printers had confidence in the “buying public” (245).

A math check. Each print-run = 2000 volumes. That means 120, 000 Bibles printed. One may subtract the 9000 parishes getting an English Bible. That leaves 111, 000 English Bibles for the people.

The nation in this period, on Prof. Daniell’s claim, was about 2.5 million people.

If we assume each family had five people—husband, wife and 3 children—we divide 2.5 million by 5 and get 500, 000 homes. If correct, that’s 1 Bible—roughly—for every 5 familes in the land.

As noted before, ENGLAND WAS AWASH WITH THE ENGLISH BIBLE. That cannot be airbrushed or diminished by historians.

Nailing his point further, Prof. Daniell claims that during Edward VI’s reign, 1547-1553, the whole Bible had 40 print runs at 2,000 per run producing 80, 000 more Bibles. Further, during these 6 years, there were no Latin Bibles produced either.

Or, adding 80,000 and 111, 000, we get 190, 000 English Bibles for 500, 000 homes, about 40% of English homes.

Roman and Anglo-Italian (Tractarian) revisers do not address these issues, given their “driplet-droplet” theologies and earnest wishes to airbrush history. Do Tractarians do exegetical homilies on Romans? Or Pauline theology?

Also, atop all the Bibles, don’t forget the masses singing the metrical Psalters or praying in English Collects and more. Prof. Daniell makes his points.

THE ENGLISH REFORMATION WAS NOT A FAILURE, 246-247

Prof. Daniell draws attention to a quote from the "Calendar of State Papers." The Imperial Ambassador, Van de Delft, during Edward VI’s reign, wrote that he was repeatedly—even unwillingly—impressed by the strong impact of the English Reformation “on the common people” who “turned against tradition religion” because of the “preaching” based on the text and the direct style (247).

An interesting side-note, is undeveloped but is noted by the Professor. Englishmen took Bibles to church to follow the reading and check the sermon references. These days, one never sees an English Bible in the hands of an American Episcopalian although many have a leather-bound 1979 Book of Common Prayer. The RSV is read in driplet-droplet-or-chunkette fashion, but not whole chapters.

In the days of Edward VI, the sermons weren’t 20-minute homilies either.

The massiveness of the revolution of English Bibles and English Books of Common Prayer cannot be missed by neglect, denial or revisionism.

Dr. Daniell's "Bible in English:" (1530s) Anglo-Italian Oppositon Continued

Daniell, David. The Bible in English: Its History and Influence. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Bible-English-History-Influence/dp/0300099304/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385668294&sr=8-1&keywords=david+daniell+english+bible

Prof. Daniell has offered up a review of: (1) the significant influence of Erasmus’ Greek NT in the Continent-wide flood of vernacular Bibles translated from the Greek and brought into visibility, (2) the weighty impact of the English Bible for the English Reformation, and (3) the life of Tyndale and his impact. In chapter 10, he turns the attention to Chapter 10, “After Tyndale.”

One sees a shift from the strict Anglo-Italian view—no vernaculars for the churches towards a more reforming direction. Nevertheless, opposition remains—unsurprisingly given that idols were falling.

Prof Daniell reviews: (1) the changing landscape in the Church of England, (2) the continuing opposition, (3) Thomas Cranmer’s projected but frustrated “Bishop’s Bible, and (4) more continued opposition. 

The theme of the chapter: THE BATTLE CONTINUES IN ENGLAND.

Prof. Daniell, probably to the annoyance of some historians, claims that the “revolution and its permanence” [in England] would not have happened “without Tyndale” (160). For our side, we are inclined to advocate for an adjusted narrative on the English Reformation: Tyndale has been under-rated, under-appreciated and, along with Erasmus, less visible than should be the case; Tyndale may overshadow Cranmer himself…although he played his part when allowed.

Thomas More, the strenuous voice of Anglo-Italianism, saw that by 1529 there was a “demand for the Bible in English” (160). More already evinces a slight shift, perhaps unwillingly, in his Dialogue Concerning Heresies. At this point, Cranmer is ensconced at Cambridge sorting through affairs as a scholar and assessing Mr. (senior Anglo-Italian clerk) John Fisher’s works. Meanwhile, Erasmus’ NT is in several editions and Continental vernaculars are afoot.

Tyndale’s editions have entered the nation. More argues that certain books or parts of certain books be screened and translated; it still is an argument against the entire Bible in the vernacular; it still shows More’s fear of the whole Bible.

Anglo-Italian Fears of the Bible in England:

1. The evil heretics, as they were called, by-passed the Latin Vulgate, used Erasmus’ Greek NT, used the Hebrew, and “disobeyed” the Church (161).

2. The evil heretics put forward 66 books (and apocrypha); horrors! They might read Romans and the Pauline epistles!

3. Furthermore, these evil heretics put the Bible into the “vernacular.” This meant that anyone, any man, any woman or even any child or youth might read the Bible themselves, if literate. Or, it might mean that anyone—irrespective of age or gender—might have the Bible read to them, if not literate. Or, it might mean anyone “within earshot” could hear the Bible (161). And, to the Anglo-Italians, God forbid that Bible-reading in the vernacular would be had in the 9000 parishes of England! Horrors no! The Bible was too sacred, defended, dangerous, complex and difficult—it was beyond understanding. No one could interpret it without the mediation of the controlling hierarchy; they feared a “free-for-all,” a very “present hell of heretics destroying the Christian heritage…full of heresy and seething sedition” (161). That fear was certainly not Chrysostom’s view of advocacy for Biblical literacy...nor a host of other Churchmen.

4. The evil heretics allowed for the “principle of self-interpretation to operate” (161). But quite notably, Catholic (= not Roman, but Reformed and Reformational) Churchmen never denied Biblical “dark places,” e.g. Geneva notes. Who would deny that Revelation has its manifold challenges? Or, that certain biblical texts had numerous challenges? Or, that certain poetical sections presented more challenges?

But, the Bible was, on the whole and in the main, perspicuous.

One is well-reminded by the sage statements of The Westminster Confession of Faith, albeit later, Chap. 1, para 7, 8.

“1.7. All things in Scripture are not alike plain in themselves, nor alike clear unto all; yet those things which are necessary to be known, believed, and observed, for salvation, are so clearly propounded and opened in some place of Scripture or other, that not only the learned, but the unlearned, in a due use of the ordinary means, may attain unto a sufficient understanding of them.

“1.8. The Old Testament in Hebrew (which was the native language of the people of God of old), and the New Testament in Greek (which at the time of the writing of it was most generally known to the nations), being immediately inspired by God, and by his singular care and providence kept pure in all ages, are therefore authentical; so as in all controversies of religion the Church is finally to appeal unto them. But because these original tongues are not known to all the people of God who have right unto, and interest in, the Scriptures, and are commanded, in the fear of God, to read and search them, therefore they are to be translated into the vulgar language of every nation unto which they come, that the Word of God dwelling plentifully in all, they may worship him in an acceptable manner, and, through patience and comfort of the Scriptures, may have hope.

This was flatly denied by Rome and Anglo-Italians in England before Tyndale.

Of course, this would and did unleash varieties of understandings. Prof. Daniell notes: “Worse, as with Shakespeare, readers can find in the volume whatever they want” (161). But, when read, the Bible is both challenging yet simple too.

Prof. Daniell does a service by repeatedly returning to attempts to get the arms around the issue of print-runs and editions published. In the 16th century alone, the figures “are grand enough” he tells us (162). In the 18th-19th centuries, there were 1200 editions of the Bible, largely KJV; put differently, assuming even-ness over 200 years, we would do the math. That means over the 18th and 19th centuries, that 60 editions published per year.

By the 19th century, Pope Pee-on-us, or Pope Pee-on-everybody, Pee-on-the-people, or officially named Pope Pius IX, was declaiming and railing against vernacular Bibles in the 1864 Syllabus of Errors; the difference between Protestant England (minus the neo-Anglo-Italian Tractarians) and Romanism could not be starker. It would not be until Vatican II (1962-65) that Romanism would begin putting English services and English lections before English-speaking Romanists still under the Italian thumb.

As an aside, this explains a Roman priest assaulting this scribe and confiscating his English Bible in the narthex of a synagogue of darkness in/about 1960. We’ve covered that story elsewhere.

Continuing Prof. Daniell’s astute item of print-runs, he states it is “impossible to calculate the numbers running into the millions” of English Bibles.

In America, between 1777 and 1850, there were 1400 editions of the English Bible (162). Let us do the math. Again, assuming evenness per annum, that is 19.1 editions published each year. Prof. Daniell notes that 34 editions were printed in 1850 alone. Yes, millions of Bibles came from the Protestant presses.

By 1880, English Bibles were an “essential item in the furnishing of the American home.” It has been a “phenomenon beyond calculation.”

CONTINUED OPPOSITION IN THE 16TH CENTURY, 163—165

Tyndale continued to be a bogey-man in England--the pestiferous and poisonous heretic to use Ango-Italian terms of art. Henry VIII’s 1526 Preface in his famous letter denounced Luther as a man “who fell in device with one or two lewd person born in this our realm [= Tyndale and Roy]…for translating of the New Testament into English.” Henry promised, based on Prelatical counsel, to “burn Tyndale’s book and sharply punish its readers” (163). These were “false and erroneous translations and corruptions.” Never mind that 83% of Tyndale would be taken up into the KJV by 1611. This 1526 letter by Henry VIII would earn Henry the approval of the senior priest in Rome. Henry, defending his Anglo-Italian policy of supporting Italianism, would be called by the Pope Fidei Defensor, or “F.D.,” still on all British coins to this day. History has entirely turned over the Anglo-Italian and Italian policy, entirely.

Henry VIII’s moves tally with Thomas More's sustained vituperations. Henry convened an Assembly of divines on 24 MAY 1530. Tunstall, Gardiner, More and Canterbury Warham, all staunch Anglo-Italians were on hand; Latimer was there too and we are not sure of his reformist development at this point although some reports put him inside the circle of the White Horse Inn. Nevertheless, the conclusion of the Assembly was that “the people had no right to demand vernacular Scripture; it was not necessary for Christian men to have it; it could only work harm and the prelates do well in refusing it.”

Oh how obtuse and stupid were these Anglo-Italians.

In JUN 1530, old Harry issued a “Proclamation,” to wit:

1. “Damning erroneous books and heresies”

2. “Prohibiting the having of holy scripture [sic] translated into the vernacular tongues of English, French or Duche" [= German]

3. Five books are forbidden—by John Frith (later burned in 1533), Simon Fish, and Tyndale (including Wicked Mammon and Obedience)

CRANMER’S PROJECTED BISHOPS’ BIBLE, 1534, 165-167

Cranmer becomes Canterbury on 30 MAR 1533. ABC  Warham had departed to the next world. On Cranmer's part, a “fresh attempt” for a vernacular is made. A Convocation of Canterbury occurs in autumn, 1533. Significant attention is focused on “heresy” and “English books flooding in from overseas” (165).

On 19 DEC 1534, the Upper House directed Cranmer in these directions:

1. Approach the King seeking him to “order people” to turn in the Bibles and books within 3 months.

2. Ask the King to authorized learned men to translate the Holy Scriptures into English and deliver the Bibles for instruction from it. This sounds like an advance or shift; it also reflects a response to growing demand notable in England but also the Continent.

3. Ask the King to issue “an order” curbing the “presumption of laymen to dispute on faith or Scripture” (165). There was no freedom of religion and freedom of speech as we know it. On the other hand, this reflects realities on the ground and fears within the Anglo-Italian circles of leadership.

Cranmer proposed a “Bishops’ Bible” be brought forward by the Bishops. He partitions the Bible into 10 parts “to revise and correct” Tyndale. This clearly indicates that Cranmer was aware of Tyndale’s operations, achievements and views. Bp. Gardiner, ever hostile to the idea of an English Bible, did his part, finishing Luke and John. But, here is Bp. Stokesley’s response (as captured by Ralph Morice, the secretary to Cranmer):

“It chanced that the Acts of the Apostles were [sic] sent to bishop Stokesley to oversee and correct, then Bishop of London. When the day came, every man had sent to Lambeth [London] their parts correct: only Stokesley’s portion wanted. My lord Canterbury [= Cranmer] wrote to the Bishop letters for his part, requiring to deliver them the bringer thereof, his secretary [=Morice]. Bishop Stokesley being at Fullham received the letters, unto which he made this answer; I marvel what my lord of Canterbury meaneth that thus abuseth the people in giving them liberty to read the scriptures, which doth nothing but infect them with heresies. I have bestowed never an hour upon my portion, nor never will. And therefore my lord shall have his book again, for I will never be guilty to bring the simple people into error.
"My lord of Canterbury’s servant [= Morice] took the book [=Acts], and brought the same to Lambeth unto my lord, declaring my lord of London’s [Stokesley's] answer. When my lord [= Cranmer] had perceived that the Bishop had done nothing therein, I [= Cranmer] marvel, quod my lord of Canterbury, that my lord of London is so forward, that he will not do as other men do. Mr. Lowney stood by, hearing my lord speak so much of the Bishop’s untowardness, said:

"I [= Lowney] can tell your grace why my lord of London will not bestow any labour or pain this way. Your Grace knoweth well (quod Lowney) that his portion is a piece of the New Testament. And then he being persuaded that Christ had bequeathed him nothing in his testament thought it mere madness to bestow any labour or pain where no gain was to be gotten. And besides this, it is the Acts of the Apostles, which were simple poor fellows, and therefore my lord of London disdained to have to do with any of their acts" [emphasis added, 170]

A few evident observations on Stokesley’s worldview: (1) a vernacular Bible abuses the people, (2) the vernacular Bible infects the people with heresy, (3) based on these two things, he will not, he believes, lead the people into error, and (4) Lowney, being more practical, sees Stokesley as interested in gain and disinterested in apostles, those “simple poor fellows.” This--Stokesley--from the senior priest in the Anglo-Italian diocese of London in 1535; this view prevailed well in the 1970s for Romanists.

Upshot: Cranmer’s “Bishops’ Bible,” with excellent intentions, was frustrated (167). Cramner is always credited as being a man of patience; he had no other choice; either that or to the flames you go.

Two years later, 1537, Cranmer wrote Thomas Cromwell praising Matthew’s Bible [= Tyndale’s with a different title page] and begging that the King might license it until such time that “we bishops shall set forth a better translation, which I think will not be til a day after doomsday” (167).

A few self-evident observations on Cranmer in this letter to Cromwell: (1) Cranmer is aware of obstructionism, (2) Anglo-Italianism prevails amongst many bishops, (3) Cranmer endorsed a vernacular Bible, (4) if Tyndale was unacceptable, a revised Bible was needed, and (5) Cranmer is willing to employ sarcasm for bishops. Hah, bishops still deserve correction although they don't often respond to much of it...even when legitimate.

On 16 NOV 1538, the Anglo-Italian policy continued. Henry tried to stop the “import of naughty books from abroad” (169). Books from abroad were to be examined. No imports to England from abroad could be vernacular Bibles and no annotations.

In 1543, Parliament forbad “all translations bearing the name of Tyndale.”

Parliament further directed that all existing translations have the marginal notes and prologues be obliterated. The Bible Society holds 1 copy of the 1537 Matthew’s Bible with its prologues and notes—they were manually “inked over” in an act response to Parliament. The same Parliament decreed:

“At the same time it was enacted that no women (except noble or gentle women) no artificers, apprentices, journeymen, serving-men, husbandmen, or labourers should read to themselves or to others, publicly or privately, any part of the Bible under pain of imprisonment."

There years later (1546) the king repeated the prohibition against Tyndale’s books with many others…Thus the Great Bible alone remained unforbidden” (170).

The Great Bible had been ordered up for all 9000 parishes. However, no one could read it, privately or publicly. Hands off! It appears that the ground has shifted and this, a stop-gap, was a response to a growing readership. Fear was gripping the Anglo-Italian leaders amongst some Royals, Parliamentarians, and clerks.

But, God had other plans and no King of England could stay the Divine Hand.

Also, more proof that a nation and churches can be staffed by fools. Like then, like now.

Dr. Daniell's "Bible in English:" (9) Tyndale v. Anglo-Italian Inquisition, 1536

Daniell, David.  The Bible in English: Its History and Influence. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003. http://www.amazon.com/The-Bible-English-History-Influence/dp/0300099304/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1385668294&sr=8-1&keywords=david+daniell+english+bible

PU Chapter 9, William Tyndale, 1494—1536, pages 133-159

Again, this is long, but should be digested and memorialized.  One saying is worth memorializing from Tyndale:  Rome is afraid of the Bible and the Bible will pull down the Pope (whom we call the Italian head-priest in Rome).

Prof. Daniell’s’ book is divided in “pre-printing” and “post-printing” periods in England.  In the pre-print period: (1) Bible in Britain to AD 850, (2) the Anglo-Saxon Bibles and glosses, (3) Wyclif and Lollards, and (4) the 14^th-15^th centuries of severe Parliamentary, Canterburian, and Anglo-Italian repressions of the English Bible. In the “post-print” period, Prof Daniel’s discussed: (1) Erasmus’ Greek NT, 1516, with the Continent-wide explosion of vernacular Bibles, (2) the effects in the English Reformation and, now, chapter 9, (3) William Tyndale, AD 1494-1536.

By way of introduction, Prof. Daniell covers the: (1) significance of the printed Bible in England, (2) Tyndale’s early years, (3) Tyndale in Gloucestershire, (4) Tyndale in London, (5) Tyndale in Cologne, AD 1525, (6) Tyndale’s 1526 Worms NT, (7) Tyndale’s Parable of Wicked Mammon and The Obedience of the Christian Man, (8) Tyndale’s Pentateuch, (9) Tyndale, More and The Practice of Prelates, (9) Tyndale NT expositions, (10) Tyndale’s 1534 NT, (11) Tyndale and Frith, (12) Tyndale’s arrest and imprisonment, (13) the Inquisition (of the Italian agents = Popes and facilitators), (14) Tyndale’s Martyrdom, and (15) Tyndale’s legacy.

SIGNIFICANCE OF PRINTED BIBLE IN BRITAIN, 134-139.

The story of the Tudor Bibles used to be told as sacred history. But, in 20^th century scholarship, for some, the Bible was “the foundation of monarchial authority…the textbook of morality and social subordination” (134).  (Hill, Christopher.  The English Bible and the Seventeenth Century Revolution. New York: Penguin Books, 1995, 5  Available at: http://www.amazon.com/The-English-Bible-Seventeenth-Century-Revolution/dp/0140159908/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1386629716&sr=8-1&keywords=christopher+hill+the+english+bible.) We would add that there is truth here, especially with the Goateed-Goat of Canterbury, Billy-goat Laud; old Billy-goat could never preach a sermon without extolling Royal Absolutism; he never saw a communion table that he didn’t idolize like an idolater, unfortunately, the constant impulse to power has always been an uncorrected and ugly proclivity in Anglican DNA. On the other hand, the Bible was also the handbook for challenging monarchial absolutism. As Horace Greely would say centuries later, “It is impossible to subjugate a Bible-reading people.”  Add in the martyrs of the 2^nd and 3^rd centuries, loyal to their governors, but not willing to yield on the sovereignty of the Risen Redeemer.  Hear! Hear!

In the late 20^th century, the latest twist is the denial of the Bible’s role.  The Anglo-Italians, or English-Italian types, have argued that there was no Reformation except for the “high-powered destroyers” (135).  The English Reformation was a “failure.” 

Christopher Haigh is one such chap.  Haigh, Christopher. English Reformations: Religion, Politics, and Society under the Tudors. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1993.  Amazon.com offers the following: “`English Reformations’ is the new approach to the study of the Reformation in England. Christopher Haigh's reportedly disproves the facile assumption that the triumph of Protestantism was inevitable, and goes beyond the surface of official political policy to explore the religious views and practices of ordinary English people. With the benefit of hindsight, other historians have traced the course of the Reformation as a series of events inescapably culminating in the creation of the English Protestant establishment. Haigh sets out to recreate the sixteenth century as a time of excitement and insecurity, with each new policy or ruler causing the reversal of earlier religious changes. This is a scholarly and stimulating book, which challenges traditional ideas about the Reformation and offers a powerful and convincing alternative analysis.”  Available at: http://www.amazon.com/English-Reformations-Religion-Politics-Society/dp/0198221622/ref=pd_cp_b_2.  Talk about facile.  On Haigh’s view, the English Reformation was “wished on a reluctant nation by a faction at the Tudor courts” (135), those Protestant guerillas and bullies.  It avoids Patrick Collinson’s governing and wider question:  how did such a ruthlessly and abusively Anglo-Italian country become so strongly, enduringly and permanently Anglo-Protestant (until the Anglo-Italianate Tractarians)?

Parishes, throughout the land, did buy the Bible [Great Bible] and it was read too. The Bible was seeping into English life. Up to 1539, 50,000 copies of Tyndale’s and Coverdale’s NT were printed abroad and were for sale in London” (137). In 1535-38, Thomas Swynnerton, in his handbook on rhetoric noted, “Every man hath a New Testament in his hand.” While overstated, we feel, it caught a new mood and sense of the role of the Bible in London—in vernacular, notwithstanding the Anglo-Italian hostilities for “that pestiferous book.”  As Tyndale repeatedly said: “Rome is afraid of the Bible.”

In the 1530s, English speakers were an unregarded minority, unlike today with the globalization of English. What Tyndale bought “in blood and ashes” would one day be international, but little could he or any other Englishman, King or otherwise, have foreseen that.  While Tyndale was on the Continent in Germany translating his Bible, a young man in Norwich was burned alive for having a “piece of paper” on which was written “the Lord’s Prayer.”

Bishop Westcott, 1868, noted that Tyndale’s “popular rather than literary” and “simple dialect” endowed the Bible with “permanence” (136).  Four fifths (4/5s) of the KJV is Tyndale, 85 years later when “Shakespeare was at his peak” (136).

While Latin was the language of government, the professions and Anglo-Italians, Tyndale was giving a “strong direct prose line,” a “Saxon vocabulary and “Saxon subject-verb-object” word order, with “clarity and simplicity” (146).  Tyndale understood the “real source of power in the English language…verbs at the center of verbal power.”  After all, he was a Master of eight languages (unlike any senior clerks in the ACNA), walking in the fear of the LORD and with humility, who didn’t impugn ploughboys as “swine.” 

WILLIAM TYNDALE—EARLY YEARS, 140-141.

Tyndale was probably born in 1494 in Gloucestershire.  His family was prosperous and spread over Northamptonshire, Essex and Norfolk. He was well-connected.  Prof. Daniell notes that Tyndale was—our word, Daniell talks of prosperity and connectedness—better bred than other Anglo-Italians such as Tunstall, Wolsey, Stokesley and even More. He took his BA at Magdalen Hall, Oxford in 4 JUL 1512. He took his MA on 2 JUL 1515. He began to read theology, but was appalled that this did not include the Bible. He and some friends began reading and discussing the Bible.  It is to be noted that Magdalen Hall had been home to Erasmus.  Also, Erasmus, the international scholar, had been the Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, 1509.  In March 1516, Erasmus was in Basle and his Novum Instrumentum with explosive Preface was printed—the volume that motored the Continent-wide flood of vernaculars shortly thereafter.

WILLIAM TYNDALE—GLOUCESTERSHIRE AGAIN, 141-142.

Tyndale became a tutor to the children of Sir John and Lady Walsh at the Little Sodbury Manor. He may have started his translation activity at this point. For the family and to their growth toward reform themselves, Tyndale translated Erasmus’ Encchiridion militas christiani.  It became a matter of family discussion. He came to be in popular demand, preaching at St. Mary’s in Bristol. Bristol was a center for Lollardy with a strong commitment to the Bible. Tyndale was accused of heresy and was brought before the chancellor of the senior Anglo-Italian priest. Several accounts of the meeting survive, including Tyndale’s. Tyndale recalls the incident in his Prologue to Genesis, 1530:  Tyndale said he was “threatened grievously…reviled…and he treated me as a dog” (141).  Other accounts survive. Even Thomas More in London heard about it. There was “a lot of shouting,” but little else appears to have developed insofar as documentation. One man in Bristol told Tyndale that “the pope is the very antichrist” and “if you continued preaching the Scriptures it will cost you your life” (141).  Well…the old man had it right…he understood official policy…it was the policy of the King, Parliament, and the Anglo-Italians in Canterbury, York, Norfolk, London and other sees rooted in Parliamentary and Church law—no preaching with or from English vernacular “pestiferous” Bibles. Furthermore, not even possession of vernacular Scriptures.

WILLIAM TYNDALE—LONDON, 142—143

Tyndale sought but was denied permission to begin a vernacular translation after the fashion of Erasmus’ recommendations in the explosive Preface.  Explosive as an idea—vernacular Bibles.  Cuthbert Tunstall had been supportive of Erasmus. But, he didn’t support Erasmus on this—no “pestiferous” vernaculars. This part of Erasmus’ regime for renewal was not in the Anglo-Italian’s program, however. He met with the Anglo-Italian in London about spring of 1523. Letters of recommendation were sent from Sir John Walsh, but a response indicated that “…there is no room in my lord of London’s palace to translate the new testament [sic]” (141).  No room in a bishop’s “palace” to translate the NT?  Sound like “no room in the Bethlehem Inn for the birth of the Incarnate Word. Who the hell believes that crock of brewing and juicy crap in the crockpot of this Anglo-Italian?  Remember, Luther’s fame was widespread by this point and his German “September Bible” had rolled off the presses in 1522. Tyndale was a master of eight languages: Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Italian, Spanish, English, French and German.  No room in the palace?  Yet, the Anglo-Italian had room at his palace for horses and carriages.  Room for a bunch of horses, but not enough room for a translator of the Greek NT to English.  Welcome to Cuthbert Tunstall of later fame as a burner of human beings.  Welcome to the Anglo-Italian Church of England in 1523.

Tunstall was preoccupied with Parliament in 1523, the occasion of its first meeting in 8 years.  Meanwhile, Tyndale was preaching at and making connections with St. Dunstan’s-in-the-West on Fleet Street, London.  The church hosted numerous prosperous merchants in the textile business, including Humphrey Monmouth, who gave residence to Tyndale.  Tyndale “studied most of the day and most of the night at his book” (143). Tyndale realized that translating the Greek NT into the vernacular would not be allowed in London or anywhere in England.  The only option was the Continent in some haven of safety and greater liberty…away from the hostile Anglo-Italianate policy of the Church of England, Canterbury and London.  In early 1524, Tyndale left for Germany with support from Monmouth.  Monmouth himself would later run afoul of the Anglo-Italians in London in 1528.

WILLIAM TYNDALE—COLOGNE, 143-144.

1516—Erasmus’ Greek NT is printed with several print-reruns afterwards. By 1517, Luther is opposing the senior clerk in Rome. In 1522, Luther’s “September Bible” was hot off the press. By 1525, Tyndale is in Cologne, Germany.  By this time, Tyndale has been accused of being an “arch-heretic Lutheran” (143). Mozley believes Tyndale met Luther. (Mozley, J.F. Coverdale and His Bibles.  James Clarke and Co., 2004. http://www.amazon.com/Coverdale-his-Bibles-J-Mozley/dp/0227172388/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1386639887&sr=8-1&keywords=mozley+coverdale+and+his+bibles and William Tyndale. London: Society for the Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1937.  http://www.amazon.com/William-Tyndale-J-F-Mozley/dp/B0010K2T4O/ref=sr_1_4?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1386640490&sr=1-4). Prof. Daniell is not convinced, however.  Tyndale did have Miles Coverdale and the Observant friar William Roy as assistants.  He may have been joined by John Frith. Peter Quesnell, an eminent publisher who would print any respectable volume of any persuasion, including Tyndale, took to too much wine.  “Under the influence” Quesnell told Cochlaeus (John Dobneck), a vitriolic and virulent anti-Lutheran, “the secret by which England was to be brought over to the side of Luther” (143).  Palace intrigue inside the Anglo-Italian house, as it were. The print shop was raided by Imperialists. Tyndale and Roy escaped up the Rhine to a safe-city, Worms, Germany, home and center for famous rabbinic studies and Hebrew Bibles.  Cochlaeus reported that the print-run of 3,000—6,000 volumes had happened.  Matthew 1—22 made it into England, including the Prologue to Matthew, largely (about 2/3s) a translation of Luther with Tyndalian flourishes.

WILLIAM TYNDALE—THE 1526 WORMS NT, 144-146.

In late 1525, both Tyndale and Roy were in the Lutheran-safe city of Worms. The NT was completed in 1526, an “octavo pocket-size” and handy edition without prologues or marginal notes. These published editions were smuggled down the Rhine and into English and Scottish ports. This “alarmed English authorities” (144).  Our Anglo-Italian friend, the senior clerk in London (called a bishop), Tyndale’s friend who had no room in his palace for a NT translator or translation…old Cuthbert Tunstall…issued his infamous proclamation in October 1526.  It was a “prohibition of the book,” Tyndale’s book, a book “in the English [sic] tongue that pestiferous and most pernicious poyson [sic] dispersed through all of our dioces [sic] of London in great number [sic]” (144).  Booksellers were warned. As a public gesture of his serious intent, by the deities of Rome, on 27 Oct 1526, he held a book-burning with a sermon, including the imputation of over 2000 errors to Tyndale’s work (not surprising since Tyndale was working from the Greek, not Latin).  Of course, “errors” was Tunstall’s term. One consequence was that Tunstall put forward money to buy the 1526 NTs from the printer in Antwerp.  Tunstall had a chaplain in the Low Countries who reported that many had been burned “both heir [sic] and beyond the see” (144). In coordination and concurrence with the anti-Tyndale-policy, the Anglo-Italian clerk of Canterbury, William Warham, wrote all the diocesans of England to send money in order to buy up Tyndale’s NT.  Richard Nix, the senior cleric of Norwich, on 14 JUN 1527, sent 10 marks, promising more money, and congratulating the Archbishop for “the blessed deed” (144).  In NOV 1527, Wolsey arrested the Cambridge scholar, Thomas Bilney.  A new onslaught was at hand.  Things tightened up. “Records of depositions of many of the arrested people” reveals they had been reading Tyndale’s NT.  Englishmen knew of Advent, Christmas, Lent, Easter and Whitsuntide by “fractions” of the Bible—and that in Latin—but had never had exposure to the Bible, especially Paul’s epistles. The Anglo-Italian Church of England had permitted “Gospel Harmonies” to circulate, but many words of Jesus and all the epistles were largely excluded.  What was entirely new also—this was the first time England had a translation directly from the Greek. The complete letters of St. Paul—new. Romans and justification by faith alone was new. And—“most of parts of the country had groups of people meeting to read and hear the Word so newly arrived” (145).  Edward Hall’s Chronicle tells of Cuthbert Tunstall, London’s Inquisitor, in Antwerp with the design to buy up and burn Tyndale’s NT. “Parkington, the printer, had the thanks and money.  Tunstall had the books. Tyndale had his cut on the profits” for another print re-run. Let’s say that “demand was high” and Tyndale’s popularity and unpopularity was on the rise.

Parable of Wicked Mammon and The Obedience of the Christian Man, 146—149.

Tyndale was probably living in or near Antwerp.  On 8 MAY 1528—you guessed it.  The Parable of Wicked Mammon was printed in the customary small octavo, pocket-sized edition.  Handy. Stealthy.  Easily hidden. And dangerous since the Anglo-Italian Empire feared exposure of the corruptions and abuses—de fide (doctrine), worship and practice. The interrogations, however, by the Anglo-Italian Inquisitors in England, Prof. Daniell tells us, were “much-sharpened” (146). It was officially banned—again—as “heretical” on 24 MAY 1530. The Devils were screeching in dioceses.

The most influential was The Obedience of the Christian Man, published on 20 OCT 1528. The enemies of Tyndale and other English Reformers were howling “sedition,” “heresy” and “treason.”  Tyndale was wont to make two points typically: (1) the supreme authority of the Bible in the church and (2) the supreme authority of the King in the state.  A usual refrain for Tyndale was that, from the Pope down to the friar, the “church was selling for money what Christ gave freely.” Tyndale takes the time to attack the “dueling” and “competing” schools of metaphysics.  It was widely read. The senior clerics (called bishops) imputed “fifty-four articles of heresy” to Tyndale (146).  These matters, Prof. Daniell tells us, emerges in the interrogations of “humble people.” Ann Boleyn read the publication. Henry VIII read it too, saying, “This is a book for me and all kings to read” (146).  So much for the Anglo-Italian bishops in their Roman armor—the King of England put a dent in the armor.

THE PENTATEUCH, 147—149.

Rabbinic schools flourished in Europe, notably at Worms. Tyndale may have learned his Hebrew or more fully developed it there.  Worms was “the main centre of Jewish learning” (147). There were only 2 Hebrew scholars at Cambridge and they were not interested in translation activity—hah, it would have violated church and state law.  In JAN 1530, the English version of “The First Book of Moses Called Genesis” with a Prologue was off the press; it also included Exodus to Deuteronomy.  Incidentally, Tyndale was aged 36 and Cranmer was 47, laboring away quietly in his Cambridge home while Tyndale was a fugitive. The Prologue spoke of the need to “read day and night” but not just to “read and talk,” but to “desire God day and night instantly to open our eyes” (148).  Tyndale constantly warned about “disputers and brawlers about vain words…ever gnawing upon the bitter bark” (148).  He again opposes “barren scholastic metaphysics” (148).  This volume had 6 marginal notes for Genesis compared to Luther’s 72 for his German vernacular edition; there 132 marginal notes for the Pentateuch; the senior priest in Rome, the Pope, got 24 mentions; “The Pope’s bull slayeth more than Aaron’s calf at Ex. 32.”

TYNDALE, MORE AND THE PRACTICE OF PRELATES, 149—150.

By 1528, Thomas More—as well as the Anglo-Italian bishop, John Fisher—was a seasoned enemy of Luther.  Cranmer was still digesting Fisher’s works.

By way of digression.

Fisher, John. The English Works of John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester (1469–1535): Sermons and other Writings, 1520–1535, edited by Cecilia A. Hatt, Oxford University Press, 2002.  It’s a bit pricey, but we believe it will give insights.  Mr. Fisher was an international scholar.  He was vigorously combatting Luther and Oecolampadius in the 1520s.  Where was Cranmer? Available at:  http://www.amazon.com/English-Fisher-Bishop-Rochester-1469-1535/dp/0198270119/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1376193120&sr=8-1&keywords=english+works+of+john+fisher  Another edition that Ms. Hatt’s is available online:  http://www.amazon.com/English-Fisher-Bishop-Rochester-1469-1535/dp/0198270119/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1376193120&sr=8-1&keywords=english+works+of+john+fisher  Also, available online, an 1877 edition of Fisher’s works, at: http://books.google.com/books?id=qV4Yv8RxRkEC&printsec=frontcover&dq=bishop+john+fisher&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3GUmUtj0GtC4sASb4oCYBg&ved=0CE4Q6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=bishop%20john%20fisher&f=false

By 1528, the Anglo-Italian bishop of London, Cuthbert Tunstall “permitted” More to read “heretical books” in order to attack Tyndale.  And attack he did.  More, along with Tunstall, was “determined to crush heretics if need be by fire” (149).  In JUN 1529, More published More’s Dialogue Concerning Heresy.  In Book 3, Tyndale’s NT was “demolished as heresy.” Tyndale was “worse than Luther” (149).  Tyndale’s offenses: “senior” for “priest,” “congregation” for “church,” “love” for “charity,” and “repent” for “do penance.” Tyndale issued a rejoinder in 1531 with An Answer unto sir Thomas More’s Dialogue; he condemns the church for perversions of the Scriptures and its corruptions, subjects upon which Tyndale notes More was silent.  Then, in 1532, More launches the attack with his massive salvo—Confutation of Tyndale’s Answer.  It was 10 books in length with 2000 pages and over 500, 000 words.  Book V impales Robert Barnes (who’ll later go to the flames).  The other 9 books impale Tyndale.  Bottom-line: GAME ON!

Even Nicholas Harpsfield, an Anglo-Italian cleric, felt More was “disordered” (148).

A brief digression on Harpsfield. 

Harpsfield, Nicholas.  The Pretended Divorce Between Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon. No location: Hardpress Publishing, 2013.  It should be noted that Mr. Harpsfield was also a Marian and Papal apologist, who wrote several volumes.  During Mary 1’s reign (1553—1558) he supervised 100s of criminal trials against Reformed Churchmen.  Foxe says he was “pitiless.”  He also replaced Mr. Cranmer’s brother as the Archdeacon of Canterbury.  He also wrote The Six Dialogues.  Mr. Harpsfield did brig time under Ms. (Queen) Elizabeth 1. The Pretended Divorce is available at: http://www.amazon.com/Treatise-Pretended-Divorce-Between-Catharine/dp/131452285X/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1374952856&sr=1-2-fkmr0&keywords=nicholas+harpsfield+the+pretended+divorce+of+catherine+of+aragon It is also available online at:  http://books.google.com/books?id=z_gIAAAAIAAJ&dq=nicholas+harpsfield+the+pretended+divorce+of+catherine+of+aragon&source=gbs_book_similarbooks

Even Harpsfield felt More’s diatribes were over-the-top. Tyndale was, according to Prof. Daniell, “intemperately pilloried on every page” (148).  One example suffices to illustrate the 2000 pages. Tyndale was a “hell-hound in the kennel of the devil…discharging a filthy foam of blasphemies out of his brutish beastly mouth.” And on and on. More does follow-ons with Apology and Debellation of Salem and Bizance,” both produced in 1533.

Tyndale put out The Practice of Prelates in 1530.  The word “practice” in Tyndale’s time meant “trickery” (149). The Pope’s conspiracy was“ivy strangling the nation’s tree.”  By the way, he also opposed Henry’s divorce to Catherine, something that would not augur well with a Tudor despot.  Tyndale was 36 years old.  Cranmer was 47.

Where was Cranmer?  The Reformation narrative may need adjustment giving a great role to Tyndale and the Bible. We’ll ponder it.

NEW TESTAMENT EXPOSITIONS, 150—151.

In 1530, Tyndale also expanded his 1525 Cologne Fragment and turned it into a book: A Pathway to the Holy Scriptures. It was a guide to reading the NT.  Again, his NT has already landed in English and Scottish ports. He also expounds on Paul’s Romans, ever a dangerous volume to the Romanists.

In SEPT 1531, he writes An Exposition upon the First Epistle of John warning the reader of St. John’s injunction, “Little children, beware of images…” Tyndale extends mockery to saint-worship and statutes.  Perhaps, Tyndale was thinking of More’s intemperance, hostility and the burnings that had occurred. The Devil wasn’t showing any love on English soil or in the souls of English diocesans, notably, Canterbury and London.

In 1533, he wrote An Exposition upon the V, VI, VII Chapters of Matthew.  He comments on works that arise from faith as well as corrupt church practices. 

The Brief Declaration of the Sacraments was published posthumously in 1548 equating “eating” with “inner faith,” a position for which Frith died earlier.  A position that remains, in terms of the Articles, the official position of the Church of England 450 years later (amidst the other apostasies in fact).  Tyndale notes that he was “saved by the merits of Christ and not by works, saints or masses” (149).

TYNDALE’S 1534 NEW TESTAMENT, 151—152.

There were 4 re-issues of the 1526 Worms NT from Antwerp’s publisher, VanEndhoven.  It is fair to say that the Continent assisted and helped in the purging England of the Anglo-Italians…over time.  The “demand was high in England” (151), persecutors notwithstanding. The 1534 edition has a prologue for every book but Acts and Revelation.  Of interest, he translates Luther’s Prologue to Romans.  One of these editions went to Ann Boleyn, the 3-year adulteress with Henry and the mother of an illegitimate child, the future Queen of England, Elizabeth 1.

83% of the KJV NT will be the 1534 edition, 77 years later.

TYNDALE AND FRITH, 152.

Tyndale probably knew Frith in England. Frith and his family (married, a novelty for English Reformers) were definitely with Tyndale in the Low Countries.  Foxe will print 2 letters from Tyndale to Frith in 1531 who, back in the Anglo-Italian diocese of London, is in jail.  Tyndale’s letters are full of Scripture, exhorting him to fidelity in the face of impending martyrdom (where’s old Tom Cranmer?). He tells Frith to quote the Bible when the sacraments are discussed.  Frith gets a letter back to Tyndale saying “he [Tyndale] was more worthy than all the bishops in England [hint, hint including Cranmer, we must infer]…for his faithful, clear and innocent heart” (152).

This brief digression from Wikipedia on John Frith:

“Trial and death

“Frith was tried before many examiners and bishops, and produced his own writings as evidence for his views that were deemed as heresy. He was sentenced to death by fire and offered a pardon if he answered positively to two questions: Do you believe in purgatory, and do you believe in transubstantiation? He replied that neither purgatory nor transubstantiation could be proven by Holy Scriptures, and thus was condemned as a heretic and was transferred to the secular arm for his execution on 23 June 1533. He was burned at the stake on 4 July 1533 at Smithfield, London for, he was told, his soul's salvation. (King Henry VIII was excommunicated one week later.)

“Aftermath

“Thomas Cranmer would later subscribe to Frith's views on purgatory, and published the 42 articles which explicitly denied purgatory. Frith's works were posthumously published in 1573 by John Foxe.

We would add that Wikipedia failed to add that Tom Cranmer also died for denying the corporal presence in the Supper, that is, cannibalism. Eating was spiritual and by faith.  All that's been muddied by the neo-Anglo-Italians these days.

TYNDALE’S ARREST AND IMPRISONMENT, 153—154

Tyndale was safe in the house of Thomas Poyntz and his wife. John Rogers had been the chaplain for English merchants since late 1534. He was near finishing the OT. In spring 1535, a certain Henry Phillips, a reported bully and ne’er-do-well, insinuated himself into Tyndale’s circle, including Poyntz.  The Anglo-Italian diocesan, Stokesley, was the alleged orchestrator-in-the-background.  Phillips, having squandered an inheritance, was “for hire.” On 21 May 1531, imperial officers seized Tyndale.  Poyntz’s home was raided and Tyndale’s books and papers were confiscated.  Fortunately, John Rogers had the OT papers.  Tyndale, however, was imprisoned in the Castle of Vilvoorde, outside Brussels. He was in jail for 16 months.  There was political-back-and-forth over diplomatic privileges.  But the Emperor, Charles V, at court in Brussels, was not in much of a favorable mood following Henry’s disgraces and disrespects to his aunt, Catherine of Aragon…not only a divorce, but a most serious insult.  (The Pope would excommunicate old Henry but who cares about some senior priest’s revilings in Rome?)

INQUISITION, 154—156

Tyndale was subjected to long exams.  The procurer-general, the Inquisitor’s office, was Pierre Dufief, a man known “for cruelty” (154).  He was known as a “heresy hunter.” He was driven “by large fees and getting a portion of confiscated properties” (154). Tyndale’s crime was “Lutheranism.” Tyndale was a “great catch;” his downfall “would remove heresy from England” (154).  He faced 17 commissioners and 3 chief accusers.  He declined counsel and represented himself.  One of the accusers was Jacobus Latomus, another great “heresy hunter” from the new Romanist University of Leuven/Louvain.  Latomus had been a long-time opponent of Erasmus as well as Luther. Tyndale defended himself, quoting Scriptures.  Latomus wrote a “detailed record” published in 1550.

We capture something of Latomus here: 

http://reformationanglicanism.blogspot.com/2013/12/inquisitor-jacobus-latomus-imperial.html . 

Some further info on Latomus here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacobus_Latomus and some Latin works here: http://books.google.com/books?id=1b8wMwEACAAJ&dq=jacobus+latomus&hl=en&sa=X&ei=E0ylUtHLF4zqkQey0IGoCQ&ved=0CEkQ6AEwBA

and here:

 http://books.google.com/books?id=YLpbAAAAQAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=jacobus+latomus&hl=en&sa=X&ei=PU2lUuadNJPQkQfu3YDQDA&ved=0CFkQ6AEwCDgK#v=onepage&q=jacobus%20latomus&f=false

Tyndale wrote his defense in a book Sola Fides Justificat Apud Deum, “justified by faith alone before God.” Latomus was not trying to convict him of heresy; that had already been decided; rather, the effort was to reclaim him to Italian theology.  According to Prof. Daniell, Latomus was polite and courteous to the 42-year old translator and fairly representing Tyndale’s views.  Commendable, gentility and politeness just before the Inquisitors gather the brush, the logs and the wood for the heretic’s stake.

During the imprisonment, Tyndale asked for warmer clothes and some light for the evenings.  He also asked for the Hebrew Bible, a grammar, and dictionary (Reuchlin’s German dictionary).  The responses to the requests are unknown.  The jail-keeper, his daughter and her family were converted from Italian to Reformed theology.

Even the generally hostile procurer-general, Pierre Dufief, said, “Tyndale was a homo doctus, pietus et bonus, a “learned, godly (reverent) and good.” (155).

Tyndale gave England 2 NTs, a Pentateuch, other OT books, and pocket-sized books.

The Anglo-Italian senior clerk of London, Tunstall, was replaced by Stokesley who “restarted the policy of burning heretics, not just their books” (156).  The Devils were acting on both sides of the English Channel.

Even before Tyndale was arrested, he had no assurances that his work was making progress.  A heavy-curtain kept intel from him. He was always in hiding. At times, he was always shifting.  He was a marked man.  He had no idea that 1000s of versions would, in time, go around the globe.  English as a language was that of an unregarded minority…in one sense.  It was not the majority-language of the Continent. He lived in the dank cell.  He walked by faith alone by God’s grace and might alone.

TYNDALE—MARTYRDOM, 156—157

He was condemned in 1536. He probably, like Cranmer and his fellow clerks when they went to the stake, was publically and ceremonially degraded from the priesthood—with the standard rituals.  A great assembly gathered on 6 OCT 1536.  The stake, the brushwood, and the logs of wood were gathered.  As a scholar, he was strangled first.  Then, he was burned.  Before death, he is said to have prayed: “LORD, open the King of England’s eyes.”

John Rogers assembled all of Tyndale’s translations.  They were—once again—printed by Matthew Crom in Antwerp. Since Tyndale was a “heretic” Rogers retitled the title page with “Thomas and Matthew” (for two disciples). 1500 copies of “Matthew’s Bible” were imported to England and “sold out” (157). Within 2 months of Tyndale’s martyrdom, the English Bible (2/3rds by Tyndale) was “licensed by Henry VIII and was circulating” in England (157).  In time, the Geneva Bible (1560, 1576, 1599), ever popular, would come to the English revisers for James 1, 1607-1611, producing the KJV

WILLIAM TYNDALE: LEGACY, 157-158

Besides the NT, Pentateuch and the entire Bible in time, 3 volumes really put the squeeze on the Anglo-Italians: Wicked Mammon, Obedience, and his exposition of Romans.  Tyndale’s importance cannot be overstated.  We are inclined to think that Tyndale was the chief architect of the Reformation, not the waffled senior clerk in Canterbury, Tom Cranmer.  But, that’s under review. What England had had with “fractions” and “tidbits” of the Bible, Latin-saturated services for Latin-illiterate throngs, they now had with an “entire Bible.”

On 22 JUN 1530, Henry VIII, in good "high Anglo-Italian fashion" served as a loud ventriloquist for the senior priest in Rome.  Henry said that Tyndale had “produced pestiferous English books, printed in other regions…to pervert…the people…to stir and incense them to sedition” (159).

As Tyndale frequently said, “Rome is afraid of the Scripture… which will pull down papal authority” (160).  Luther had said the same thing repeatedly.

But, by and by, the English Bible was unleashed in England. Henry and everyone else died and went to the next world for further adjudication. 

The Word of God standeth forever.  It's still here.