Bible Preservation - Early English Translations

New Testament completed in 1380
Entire Bible completed in 1382
Supposedly made translation from the Latin Vulgate. Some have argued in recent years that his translation was made from the Old Latin Vulgate and was very close to the Received Text. These same people argue that Richard Purvey, who revised Wycliffe’s translation in 1388, is the man who conformed it to Jerome’s Latin Vulgate.
Translated into the Middle English of Chaucer and cannot be understood by modern readers without language study

Printing was not invented in Europe until about 1450 by Gutenberg
Wycliffe’s translation had to be circulated in hand-written copies that took about 10 months to complete
Some, who could not buy it, would pay to be able to read it for one hour a day. Other stories exist about those who would give a wagon load of hay for a few pages of it.
Wycliffe’s Bible had a great influence on the Lollard movement in England during the late 14th and early 15th centuries. This movement, which denied papal authority and transubstantiation (among other things) was brutally stamped out by the Roman Catholic authorities. Yet, a few remained to take part in the separation from Rome in the early 16th century.
About 170 copies of Wycliffe’s translation exist today

Forty years after his death, the Catholics dug up Wycliffe’s bones, burned them and scattered the ashes in the River Swift
The Convocation at Oxford in 1408 condemned Wycliffe and forbade “upon pain of the greater excommunication the unauthorized translation of any text of the Scriptures into English or any other tongue by way of a book, pamphlet, treatise or the reading of such.”

Studied Greek at Cambridge under Erasmus
Major life goal was to put an English translation, not of the Vulgate but of the original Greek and Hebrew Scriptures, into the hands of his countrymen
He said, “If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth a plough to know more of the Scriptures than the Pope
Left England in 1524 and joined Reformers on the European Continent
Betrayed, put in prison for a year and a half, and finally strangled and then burned at the stake in 1536
This last words were, “Lord, open the King of England’s eyes!”

Printed his English New Testament in 1526
At least 15,000 copies were printed and secretly imported into England in bales of cotton, sacks of flour, etc.
Became the first New Testament printed in English
Very few copies remain because of the opposition
Tyndale also translated the Pentateuch and Jonah into English but did not finish the Old Testament
The New Testament of the King James Bible has been said to be essentially Tyndale’s

Translated entirely by Miles Coverdale
Printed in 1535
The first entire Bible printed in English
The first English Bible to make a separation between the Old Testament books and the Apocrypha

Translated by John Rogers (also called Thomas Matthew) who was burned at the stake under Queen Mary
Printed in 1537 and dedicated to the king
Used much of Tyndale’s work
Became the basis for later translations

Official translation during the reign of Henry VIII
Printed in 1539
A copy was ordered to be printed for every church, the cost to be paid half by the pastor and half by the members
Called the “Great bible” because it measured 15 inches long and 9 inches wide

“Chained Bible” – because it was chained to the desks of churches for safe keeping
“Treacle Bible” – because Jeremiah 8:22 was translated “Is there no treacle in Gilead?”
“Bug Bible” – because the 1549 edition translated Psalm 91:5 “Thou shall not nede to be afrayed for eny bugges by night”

The 1542 Convocation of the Church of England attempted to Latinize the English Version making it essentially a Roman Catholic Version. They failed.
In 1551, Sir Robert Stephens divided the New Testament into verses in his Greek New Testament

Translated and printed in Geneva by English reformers who had fled from Queen Mary
John Calvin wrote an introductory epistle for the New Testament which was issued in 1557
The entire Bible was completed in 1560
Sometimes called the “Breeches Bible” because of the translation of Genesis 3:7 – “They sewed fig leaves together and made themselves breeches.”

David Reagan

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