Tyndale, William or " Tindale" : 1494 - 1536.

Protesting English of the beginning of XVIe century, it translates the New Testament in its native tongue.

" I defy the pope and all his laws, and if God lends life to me, I will make that in England the boy which pushes the plow knows the Writing better than the pope him-même" . Thus William Tyndale with Cambridge in 1522 was expressed. And it held word. Shining scholar, it spoke Hebrew, the Greek, Latin, Spanish and French, " so that each one of these languages could have been its language maternelle" . Tyndale had met Érasme and discovered its New Testament Greek-Latin and had put itself to translate it into English. Initially, he sought the protection of Tunstall, bishop of London, but when this last learned its intentions, he refused the access to his palate to him.

In 1524, Tyndale leaves its fatherland which it will not re-examine any more. It completes its translation with Hamburg and gives it to a printer. Workmen too talkative inform of it the priest Cochlaeus, who is on the point of putting the hand on the edition. Tyndale precipitates with the workshop, seizes its invaluable manuscripts and carries them with Worms. Its New Testament will appear in 1525 to with it.

Cochlaeus alerts the bishop of London however. Tyndale thus knows that invaluable volumes will be seized on their arrival in England. To thwart the narrow monitoring which is exerted in the ports, the New Wills are hidden in fabric bundles or wine barrels. Many specimens nevertheless are confiscated. Their recipients are compelled to ravel with horse, the face turned towards the tail of the animal, and obviously carrying the defended book; they will have to throw it themselves to fire in front of all, and to make penitence. But the efforts of the bishop of London are dedicated to the failure. Each Londoner wants to take note of the proscribed work and ingénie to be obtained it with the contempt threats. In cause of despair, the bishop of London requests Packington, a trader of the city, to make profitable his commercial relations with the port of Antwerp, to monopolize with the source all the edition of Tyndale. Provided with a money large sum, Packington goes on the continent. The bishop believed " to carry out God by the end of the doigt" , a chronicler of the time writes. But it will not succeed better in this company than in the preceding ones. Packington, friend secret of Tyndale, arrives in the translator:

- " Mr Tyndale, I found you a good purchaser for your books,

- And which thus?

- the bishop of London!

- But, if the bishop wants these books, it can be only to burn them!

- Eh although imports! In one way or another the bishop will burn them. It is better that they are paid to you; that will enable you to print others in their place of them! "

The market is concluded and the edition is brought to England. The bishop of London convenes the population in front of the Saint-Paul cathedral to attend the massive destruction of the books Hérétiques. However, to rough-hew it of the bishop becomes an unhoped-for publicity for the 2nd edition of New Testament Tyndale. Printed this time in small size, to facilitate the dissimulation of volumes and to better escape the searchings, its diffusion is a sharp success.

However the adversaries of the Bible do not disarm. They tighten a trap with Tyndale. Too much trustful, the translator accepts an invitation with a meal in alleged friends; one puts the hand on him and one locks up it with the castle of Vilvoorde (Belgium). In its dungeon, the reforming , having obtained Bible, grammar and Hebrew dictionary, translated, twenty centuries after, a text which made innumerable believers in the Anglo-Saxon countries: epistles of Paul.

Condemned by Charles Quint, Tyndale was strangled and burned on September 6th, 1536. Before undergoing the torment, he shouted of a powerful voice: " Lord, condescends to open the eyes of king d' Angleterre! ".

This ultimate request will be exaucée two years later. Collecting its translation made in prison, the friends of Tyndale supplement it and make it print. It would have been too much dangerous to indicate the name of the translator on the title page; also this edition it is indicated like the " Bible of Matthieu" (Matthew' S Bible), according to the first name of the printer.

In 1538, a specimen of this edition is given to the king Henri VIII. Upset by the beauty of the text and the depth of its message, the monarch who was characterized by his acts from independence with regard to the pope, passes in addition to once again ecclesiastical prohibitions and issues that this Bible must be read " in all the parishes of Angleterre".

Letter of Tyndale addressed to the governor of the town of Vilvoorde, the marquis de Bergen.

" I suffer seriously from the cold, and I am affected by a perpetual catarrhe, which developed much in my wet dungeon. I would need a hotter dress, because that I have is very thin. My coat is completely worn, my shirts are torn; I would also need a thicker overcoat. In the same way, I request your share the permission to have a lamp the evening, because it is tiresome for me to only sit me in darkness during the long winter days before. But what I ask you over all, and what I request of your leniency into very first, it is a Hebraic Bible and a Hebrew dictionary, so that I can spend my time to étudier."

Quotation

• "I saw by experiment that it was impossible to found ordinary people in the truth, unless the Writings are offered to them in their language maternelle."

See too

Internal bonds

External bonds

• William Tyndale, the father of the English Bible

• The friends off William Tyndale
• Article from the Encyclopedia Britannica
• The newe will by William Tyndale, 1526.
• Why Tyndale' S translation was condemned - has Roman Catholic view

• Year Error off Dates?