![]() When Mary died, her sister Elizabeth I came to power and reversed her sister’s anti-Protestant policies. This was the Bible that the Pilgrims brought with them to the New World. There, they produced another English translation, the Geneva Bible, which contained explanatory notes that promoted Calvinism. Many English Reformers and Bible scholars found a home in Geneva, the city of John Calvin. However, the Great Bible was left in the churches. She executed several people associated with English Bible translations, including John Rogers. Upon Edward’s death, his sister Mary I (“ Bloody Mary”) ascended to the throne and reversed her brother’s policies. ![]() Tyndale’s and Coverdale’s Bibles were reprinted, and several other translations of minor significance became available, as well. When Henry’s son Edward came to the throne, this trend was reversed. Toward the end of Henry’s reign, there was a strong reaction against the Reformation, and Coverdale’s and Tyndale’s translations were forbidden and burned however, the Great Bible was still available in churches. It became known as the Great Bible because of its large size (16½ inches by 11 inches). In 1534, Miles Coverdale was asked to supervise a new, formally sanctioned translation of the Bible to be placed in every church in England. (John Rogers took on the name Thomas Matthew, so his translation is known as the Matthew Bible.) Both the Coverdale Bible and the Matthew Bible were well-received in England and officially made legal. He was an associate of Tyndale who, like Coverdale, used Tyndale’s work as the basis for his translation. John Rogers also translated the Bible into English. The dedication, as well as the idea that an English translation of the Bible would help to permanently separate the Church of England from the power of Rome, seems to have been an answer to William Tyndale’s prayer at the stake, and Henry VIII embraced the idea. Coverdale finished his translation work and dedicated it to the king. Henry VIII soon broke from the Catholic Church for personal and political (not religious or spiritual) reasons and declared himself to be head of the Church of England. In exile, Coverdale continued the work of Tyndale by revising his existing work and finishing the Old Testament. Miles Coverdale (1488-1569) was a Reformer who had to flee England when Henry VIII was still sympathetic to the Roman Catholic Church. His last words were “Lord, open the King of England’s eyes.” Eventually, Tyndale was condemned and burned at the stake. This effort was radical enough, but Tyndale also included marginal notes that were often very critical of church practices. ![]() William Tyndale (1494-1536), spurred by the Reformation, translated the New Testament from Greek manuscripts and began work on the Old Testament from Hebrew. Protestant scholars saw the benefit of working from the original languages instead of Latin. The printing press became commercially available. At the Council of Constance (1414-1418), Jan Hus, one of Wycliffe’s followers, was condemned as a heretic and martyred Wycliffe was also condemned posthumously, and his bones were exhumed and burned.ĭuring the next 100 years, the English Bible saw tremendous advances, as scholars gained access to Hebrew and Greek versions of the Bible and the Protestant Reformation began. After Wycliffe’s death, some of his associates revised the translation and were condemned by the church and burned at the stake for their efforts. His Middle English translation was of the Latin Vulgate, the official Bible of the church. He also spoke out against corruption in the church, drew the ire of Rome, and was forced from his post. ![]() A scholar as well as a pastor, he saw the need for people to be able to read the Bible in their own language. Wycliffe was educated at Oxford and became a lecturer there. John Wycliffe (1329-1384) was the first person to oversee a translation of the entire Bible into English (NT in 1380, OT in 1382). Latin was the language of the church, and the few whole Bibles that did exist were handwritten in Latin and would have been inaccessible to the average person, even if he could read. For the next 1,000 years, missionaries and teachers translated bits and pieces of the Bible into the language of the people for teaching purposes, but there was no concerted effort to translate the whole Bible. There is evidence of Christianity in the British Isles as early as the late second century. ![]()
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