2 Timothy 3:16 All Scripture is God-breathed, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
John Wycliffe, an Oxford professor, scholar, and theologian, produced the first handwritten English Bible manuscripts in the 1380s AD.
Wycliffe played a pivotal role in making the scriptures accessible by producing a significant number of English-language copies.
Wycliffe died in 1384. The Catholic Pope was so infuriated by his teachings and his translation of the Bible into English that 44 years after Wycliffe had died, he ordered the bones of Wycliffe to be dug up, crushed, and scattered in the river!
Johann Gutenberg invented the printing press in the 1450s,
William Tyndale was the first to print the scriptures in English using Gutenberg’s movable-type press.
In 1526 the Tyndale New Testament became the first printed edition of the scripture in the English language.
The Catholic Church, and later the Church of England, said Tyndale was a heretic, and his Bible was heresy.
God’s Word became accessible to the common man in English, which meant disaster for the Catholic church. They could no longer control access to the scriptures.
If people could read the Bible in their tongue, the church’s income and power would crumble. They could not continue to get away with selling indulgences (the forgiveness of sins) or selling the release of loved ones from Purgatory.
The contradictions between God’s Word and the priests’ teachings would open the public’s eyes, and the truth would set them free from the grip of fear that the heretic church held.
John 8:32 And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.
Salvation through faith, not works or donations, would be understood. The need for priests would vanish. The veneration of church-canonized saints and Mary would not be believed. The scriptures in English were the biggest threat imaginable to the Catholic church.
Tyndale Bibles were burned as soon as the Bishop confiscated them. If caught in possession of Tyndale’s Bible, you would face death by burning.
Bibles flowed into England in bales of cotton and sacks of flour. Tyndale was arrested and convicted of heresy and was strangled and burnt at the stake in the prison yard on Oct. 6, 1536.
Tyndale’s last words were Oh Lord, open the King of England’s eyes. That prayer would be answered three years later, in 1539, when King Henry VIII funded printing an English Bible known as the Great.
Today, only two known copies of Tyndale’s 1526 First Edition are left.
Common people already had a problem affording a Bible, and many could not read it.
Because of its size, the Great Bible, first published in 1539, became the first English Bible authorized for public use. The clergy was encouraged to read this Bible to their people.
Queen Mary, or Bloody Mary, took the throne in the 1550s. She wanted to return England to the Roman Catholic Church, and it again became illegal to print English Bibles.
In January 1555, John Rogers, Bible translator and Protestant preacher, was burnt at the stake with his wife and eleven children, one an infant in the mother’s arms.
“This sad sight,” remarked chronicler John Foxe, “did not move him, but he cheerfully and patiently went on his way to Smithfield, where he was burnt to ashes in the presence of a great number of people. Rogers was the first of many Protestants executed during the reign of Bloody Mary.
In 1582, the Church of Rome knew it was losing its fight to keep the Bible out of the common people’s hands, so it brought out its version. The official Roman Catholic English translation used the Latin Vulgate as the only source text, full of multiple distortions and corruptions.
So what they had accused Tyndale’s English version of being heresy, they had succeeded in making a Bible that was full of heresy, and they were the real heretics.
The Catholic Church threatened to kill anyone who read the scripture in any language other than Latin, though Latin was not an original language of the scriptures.
Elizabeth 1 took the throne in 1588 and died without an heir. The crown passed to James I of Scotland, who promoted and supervised a new biblical translation, the still-used King James Bible of 1611.
Protestants today are largely unaware of the Bible’s history or the people who were murdered so that we can read the Bible today in our language.
Less than half of practicing Christians in the U.S. spend serious time engaging with their Bible, according to the American Bible Society, and the rest of the country is even worse.
The American Bible Society presented evidence gathered from a six-year assessment of the state of the Bible conducted by the Barna Group, which shows that just 18 percent of the American population generally reads the Bible.
John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
John 1:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
Proverbs 2:6 For the Lord giveth wisdom: out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding.
Psalms 119:105 Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.
2 Timothy 3:16 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth.
2 Timothy 3:17 That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.
Matthew 24:35 Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.
John 8:31 Then said Jesus to those Jews which believed on him, If ye continue in my word, then are ye my disciples indeed;
Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is alive, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.
1 Peter 1:22 Seeing ye have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit unto unfeigned love of the brethren, see that ye love one another with a pure heart fervently:
1 Peter 1:23 Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever.
1 Peter 2:2 As newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby.
Colossians 3:16 Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
John 17:17 Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth.
John 12:48 He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.
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