Brief Overview of partial English Bible Translations, before the Wycliffe Bible:
* 670 AD First attempt of Bible translation by Cadman. (in English)
* 709 AD Aldhelm. Also first translator of the psalms.
* Bede: Whose most famous book is: “A History of the English church and People.” Between 674-735 He translated the Gospel of John into English.. no trace of this translation still exists.
Written by a close friend of Bedes about the moving circumstances of his death:
All through the day, before Ascension day, 735 Bede had been dictating his translation of the Gospel of John he said, ” I do not want not want my boys, (the monks) to read a lie or work to no purpose after I’m gone”. On the eve of that day, he had one chapter remaining left untranslated. The great scholar knew he was very near death, so early on the morning of Ascension day, his secretary said, “Dear Master, there’s one more chapter left to do”. “Take thy pen and write quickly” said Bede. All through that day, interuppted by saying farewells to the brethren of the monastry he painfully translated on. Just as night came, his sobbing scribe leaned over and whispered to the dying man, “Master, there’s; one more sentence, in the Gospel of John to translate”. And Bede said: ” Write quickly”. The sribe wrote on and he said, “Dear Master, its done now”. Bede said: “yes, it is done now.” And he died.
* King Alfred: Revived the church, defended education. Protected England from the Vikings. Led the king of the vikings to Christ. He translated Augustine out of Latin to English. He translated the ten commandments some of the books of Moses and the Psalter.
* Aldred. the four gospels translated into English, from Latin.
* 1000 Alfreck. Gospels into English with no accompanying Latin text. Later became Archbishop of Canterbury.
* William the Conqueror: Battle of Hastings 1066. He outlawed Anglo Saxon English and enforced Anglo-Norman English. (influenced largely by French) which because people had to learn a new language, as speaking Anglo-Saxon was against the Law, there was a gap of about 150 years before any more English translations of the Bible were produced.
* 1215 Orm. 20,000 lines. (paraphrase) Still in existence in Oxford University. Metrical version of portions of the gospels, acts, to be sung in worship services. He was an Augustinian monk. He also translated Genesis and Exodus.
* 1320 two versions of the Psalms. one by William Shoreham from Kent. the other by Richard roll from Yorks.
* For about a century, the Psalms was about the only book of Scripture that Christian scholars studied in the British Isles. But these two versions of the Psalter, created a thirst here in England for the word of God.
Revival of Biblical Christianity in England in 14th Century.
“The Morning Star”
1329 Wycliffe was born. 1348 The black death hit, wiping out half the human population. He took it as a judgment of God, and never got over it. He accused the papacy of banishing the word of God from churches. The crowds loved to hear him preach particuarly when he was defending English kings against Popish tyranny.
Paragraph from Wycliffe sermon:
“England does not belong to the Pope. The pope is but a man, subject to sin. but Christ is the Lord of Lords in this Kingdom is held directly and solely of Christ alone. The Gospel is the only source of Religion. The Roman pontiff is a mere cut purse and far from having the right to reprimand the whole world he maybe lawfully reproved by his inferiors than even by laymen.”
King Richard ll in 1377 only ten years old but was intimidated by Pope Gregory to denounce Wycliffe as a heretic and treat him as an outlaw. Preachers evangelized in the remotest part of Britain..commonly called Lollards. These men were Wycliffeites. Dutch route of the word (Lollard)to sing. (psalm) Latin route. Latin…tares in the wheat. A law was passed to arrest Lollards. After creating the Lollards Wycliffe desired to translate the Bible into English. Between 1380-1384 Wycliffe completed his translation. It caused revival. Someone from the time wrote these words: “You could not meet two persons on the highway but one of them was Wycliffe’s disciple.” Revival about 50% of the population. Reformed in doctrine. The clergy opposed it and attempts were made to confiscate and destroy. Wycliffe studied his bible and from that time on he became more and more reformed in doctrine and he attacked transubstantiate as blasphemous and Idolatrous. the papacy wanted to silence him. He stood all alone as everyone deserted him out of fear. In the the middle of may that year at two o’clock pm. The council was about to pronounce sentence on Wycliffe and an earthquake shook the whole city of London and the council adjourned the meeting. fearing it was God talking. Time and time again, he was rescued by divine providence. Pope Gregory suddenly died as he was harassing him. He was summoned to be silenced but always dismissed. (several times) His doctrines were condemned. He grew older, and more fragile in health. In 1382 he presented a petition to the houses of parliament. “Since Jesus Christ shed his blood to free his church, I demand its freedom. I demand that everyone may leave those gloomy walls of the monasteries within which a tyrannical law prevails and embrace a simple and peaceful life under the open vault of heaven. I demand that the poor inhabitants of our towns and villages be not constrained to furnish a worldly priest, often a vicious man and a heretic with the means of often satisfying his ostentation, gluttony and his licentiousness, of buying a showy horse, costly saddles, bridles, tinkling bells, rich garaments and soft furs, while they see their wives, children and neighbors dying of hunger.” An assembly called him before them to answer for these views. By this time, he was aged, and weakened by a life of hard work and much persecution, but even so, he powerfully defended what he believed, and finished with: “The Truth shall prevail” Wycliffe spoke these words to his enemies who were out for his blood, and when he had said it, he just walked from the court and not one of the assembly who longed for his blood, dared raise there hands against him.
He was summoned by the pope while seriously ill. Too ill to obey the summons. Providence prevailed by causing a dispute in the catholic church by raising two popes who had dispute with each other. Clement 7th had the support of France and scotland, part of spain and Germany. And Urban 6th who had the support of Italy, England, Germany, Sweden Poland and hungary. They both considered themselves head of the church and took to commonly abusing and excommunicating each other. And while this went on, the summons of Wycliffe was over-looked and he went on peaceably preaching the Gospel. He continued to preach in his church in Lutterworth, until Dec 29 1384 where in the midst of his flock he suddenly became paralyzed and 48 hours later, he died. He was buried in Lutterworth church cemetery. But two councils of the Catholic church declared he was a heretic in 1413 and stated he was the leader of Heresy. So in 1415, his body was exhumed, burned, and his ashes discarded in the River swift. And along with his ashes as they flowed from river to river and finally to the ocean, the word of God went with them.
The word as Wycliffe translated it, was removed from the church. One of the boldest witnesses to the truth. The seriousness of his language, the holiness of his life, and the energy of his faith, had intimidated the papacy.
He died a faithful witness and he his legacy made way for the English Reformation.
Some of Wycliffes Doctrines:
* Salvation by Faith Alone
* Justification by Faith Alone
* Conversion comes from God alone. And the system which says it partly from God and partly from man, is worse than Pelagianism.
* Christ is everything in Christianity.
* Faith is a gift of God.
* The Lord’s supper is communion with Christ in the spiritual life.
* Let Christians not submit to the word of a priest but to the word of God.
* Should men compel us to recognize as our head, a devil of hell?
It was the doctrine of the apostles, and two hundred years later would be preached and taught and fought for, again in the Reformation.
The early Lollards. continued till 1401 presenting tracts and pamphlets to evangelize. But under threat of martyrdom many of them turned away.
Later lollards 1400 and 1500’s were brave men. They kept the truth being heard. Despite threats of torture and persecution many of them which were. The first English martyr to be burned at the stake 1403.
Henry lV authorises the burning of heretics..and Henry fifty sixth nd seventh continued. Henry eight repealed it. But despite the persecution Wycliffe’s later lollard continued to spread the word of God and many people were converted. Lollards built schools, and just being a lollard was a capital crime. in 1450 a Papist bishop wrote a book in English to refute Wycliffe because they felt so threatened.
As late as 1521 Lollards still existed The reformation in England started and was built on the foundation of Wycliffe’s legacy although he had then been dead for two hundred years.
God’s Word Will Prevail!!
