Almighty God, who didst plant in the heart of thy servants William Tyndale and Miles Coverdale a consuming passion to bring the Scriptures to people in their native tongue, and didst endow them with the gift of powerful and graceful expression and with strength to persevere against all obstacles: Reveal to us, we pray thee, thy saving Word, as we read and study the Scriptures, and hear them calling us to repentance and life; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
Don’t forget, it’s also the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi.
Pax et bonum!
Good to see that the Anglican church is commemorating William Tyndale, one of the mightiest saints to walk this earth.
Tyndale commenced his bible study groups at Cambridge before anyone outside of Wittenberg had heard of Luther. He may well have been influenced by Lollards who were active throughout England but covertly, given the terrible consequences of questioning the Church.
Whatever, Tyndale’s burning zeal to put a copy of the scripture into the hand of every ploughboy laid the groundwork for the reform of the Church in England. He was the forerunner of many other translators and missionaries, and he cheerfully accepted the terrible risks he ran, in crossing both Henry VIII and the church. He is now with glory, and an example to us all.
Isn’t Tyndale on the 6th?
Has nobody heard of S. Bede? Was he not “the” forerunner?
Any claim that Tyndale was a pioneer must surely take Wycliffe’s prior claim into consideration.
CPKS,
In fairness, I don’t think Bede would count as a translator of scripture, although he was a marvellous historian, whose methodology puts many modern historians to shame.
And granted re “forerunner”, I was too hyperbolic! I think translations attributed to Wyclif are the earliest examples of the bible in English that we know of. They also were widely disseminated – I read a few months ago that the bible of Richard III is now thought to have been a Lollard bible. Because Lollardy was suppressed, we don’t know how widespread it was.
However, Wyclif translated Jerome’s Vulgate into English, whereas Tyndale translated direct from Greek and Hebrew manuscripts of scripture. Arguably, much of the Authorised Version is based (without attribution) on Tyndale’s translation, so on that basis he would be one of the most influential bible translators in history, rivalling Jerome himself.
While he didn’t produce an [i]entire[/i] bible, I don’t think it’s fair [i]not[/i] to consider Bede as a translator of scripture into English. According to an [url=http://christchurchwindsor.ca/2009/05/27/saint-bede-the-venerable/]eyewitness account[/url], he died just after completing a vernacular translation of the Gospel of S. John. Bede learned Greek and Hebrew to assist his scriptural studies (he produced many commentaries on sacred scripture).
Agreed about influence: some reckon 85% of the AV is Tyndale’s; whatever the percentage, he was most influential. Also agreed that Tyndale showed himself a man of principle.
However, both Wyclif[fe] and Tyndale held a non-orthodox view of the Sacrament of the Mass; in Wyclif’s case it seems to be derived from his philosophical grounding, which had somewhat parted company from the Aristotelian framework underpinning the doctrine of transubstantiation; but it seems that he would have wished to affirm that the eucharistic bread was still bread after consecration, without (somehow) denying some form of real presence. Tyndale on the other hand seems to have denied the real presence fairly forthrightly. To put it simply, there are [at least] three responses to Our Saviour’s words: “This is my body”:
a) It’s also bread.
b) It’s bread.
c) Amen.
They aren’t synonymous!
CPKS,
Thank you for that, its a very good point. Its interesting that Bede felt the need to translate one gospel into Anglo-Saxon (Old English). It seems to have been a departure from the practice of the British (Celtic) church, and it was British missionaries (or their Anglo-Saxon proselytes like Cedd and Wilfrid) who had converted most of England shortly prior to Bede’s time. So far as I know the Celtic church always used Latin scriptures. This may have arisen simply because the language was familiar to a large proportion of British laity in the early “Dark Ages”. That would not have applied to the Anglo-Saxons.
Whatever the reason, it seems to have been the Anglo-Saxons who provided the impetus for vernacular translations of scripture: as well as Bede’s translation, we also have a translation of the psalms into Old English from the mid-8th century, and Alfred the Great’s translations of several parts of scripture a couple of centuries later. But these efforts seem to have petered out.
You wrote:
[blockquote] “However, both Wyclif[fe] and Tyndale held a non-orthodox view of the Sacrament of the Mass;” [/blockquote]
Some might see it that way, but from an Anglican perspective, their views were fully orthodox!
You also wrote:
[blockquote] “it seems that he would have wished to affirm that the eucharistic bread was still bread after consecration, without (somehow) denying some form of real presence”. [/blockquote]
Indeed, which is the position held by the Lutheran, Anglican and the Reformed churches today. From Wyclif’s perspective, the medieval doctrine of transubstantiation was not orthodox, but was a philosophical speculation that departed from common sense, and from scripture.
As for Tyndale’s early thoughts on this issue, the problem is that we don’t know how much he was influenced by Lollardy. Although one of Wyclif’s contemporaries in the 14th century had complained that “every second person you meet is a Lollard”, the persecutions of the 15th century had driven the movement underground. Tyndale may have been a Lollard for all we know (his family antecedents were in East Anglia). He commenced his unauthorised bible studies at least two years before Luther nailed his theses to the door and his theological views appear to have remained stable during his lifetime, so he may have always held a protestant view of the nature of the eucharist, even before “Protestantism” existed.
Well, I don’t know whether S. Bede “felt the need” exactly, but he must have had a more than casual motivation for such a task!
We should also remember [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aldred_the_Scribe]Aldred[/urll], who glossed a vernacular translation into the Lindisfarne Gospels. It is my guess (very much a guess) that – books being then so very rare, and these things being among the few earliest records of early English writing – early translations would have been much more a matter of oral tradition than of written record.
There is ample evidence of a non-orthodox understanding of the Eucharist among the Lollards, and I suspect that this, coupled with their anti-authoritarian stance vis a vis the clergy, was the reason for the condemnations that followed: the availability of vernacular scriptures was mixed up with a dispute about authority. It was, after all, an era when books were incredibly scarce and when literacy was of about as much general utility as the ability to fly a space-ship.
It may be true that the Lollards’ understanding of the Eucharist was and is considered “orthodox” by some Anglicans. But what Anglicans mean by “orthodox” is to me not yet clear – guidance for the perplexed would be much appreciated. I haven’t yet been able to get a good grasp on a “reformed” understanding of the Eucharist, although I am aware of a plurality of mutually incompatible philosophical expressions of such. Is there such a thing, really, as a “reformed orthodoxy” on this point?
In any case, I don’t think that (for example) anyone would seriously claim that the doctrine of consubstantiation passes the “semper, ubique, ab omnibus” test any more than transubstantiation does; both were (so far as I am aware) philosophical explanations based on philosophical conceptual schemes whose internal coherence and adequacy to reality we should perhaps leave as a separate issue! – As to which is to be preferred, I’ve heard philosophical arguments, but have never alas encountered any scripturally-based ones – are there such? I’d be fascinated and most grateful for any leads here. I’ve heard plenty of argument to the effect that the doctrine of transubstantiation is not “warranted by” scripture; and of course that’s perfectly true. It’s a philosophical explanation which endeavours to give expression to the church’s understanding of the tradition (and let’s not forget that the liturgy of the church itself represents a goodly proportion of that tradition. It is only because of the vagaries of how things were collected and written down that today we make any sharp distinction between the scriptures and the liturgy). No philosophical/theological formulation can ever be adequate to reality, and this was a fact well understood by the schoolmen; but to deny a doctrine is a vastly different matter from saying that it is an imperfect human attempt to describe a transcendent reality.
Sorry for the xxx-ed up URL.
CPKS,
Good points. There are probably even a few more examples of Anglo-Saxon vernacular manuscripts that could be pulled up. I don’t know that the expense of producing manuscripts was a great factor in their rarity – after all, the British or “Irish” managed to produce a great many manuscripts of scripture in Latin. Its remarkable how many survive today, given their attractiveness to Viking raiders who were inclined to rip off the jewelled covers and toss the rest overboard (at least till they tumbled to the idea of ransoming them back to their former owners!).
You made the comment:
[blockquote] “but it seems that he would have wished to affirm that the eucharistic bread was still bread after consecration, without (somehow) denying some form of real presence.” [/blockquote]
I think that is a pretty good summary of Wyclif’s (and Tyndale’s) doctrine, although obviously not made from an Anglican perspective, which is fair enough. The Anglican Articles of Religion reflect the same two points of doctrine:
[blockquote] Article XXVIII
Of the Lord’s Supper
The Supper of the Lord is not only a sign of the love that Christians ought to have among themselves one to another; but rather it is a Sacrament of our Redemption by Christ’s death: insomuch that to such as rightly, worthily, and with faith, receive the same, the Bread which we break is a partaking of the Body of Christ; and likewise the Cup of Blessing is a partaking of the Blood of Christ.
Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of Bread and Wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by holy Writ; but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.
The Body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten, in the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the Body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper is Faith.
The Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper was not by Christ’s ordinance reserved, carried about, lifted up, or worshipped. [/blockquote]
Anglicanism is a broad church, but I think it would be fair to say that the vast majority of the 70 Million Anglicans in the world hold the position that the bread and the wine do not stop being bread and wine, even though Christ is truly (or really) present therein. We don’t have a problem with that, although I appreciate that some other groups (e.g. Roman Catholics) might.
As an interesting comparison, the puritan Westminster Confession of 1646 sets out the same two points of doctrine, albeit in typically more ponderous language:
[blockquote] V. The outward elements in this sacrament, duly set apart to the uses ordained by Christ, have such relation to Him crucified, as that, truly, yet sacramentally only, they are sometimes called by the name of the things they represent, to wit, the body and blood of Christ; albeit, in substance and nature, they still remain truly and only bread and wine, as they were before.
VI. That doctrine which maintains a change of the substance of bread and wine, into the substance of Christ’s body and blood (commonly called transubstantiation) by consecration of a priest, or by any other way, is repugnant, not to Scripture alone, but even to common sense, and reason; overthrows the nature of the sacrament, and has been, and is, the cause of manifold superstitions; yes, of gross idolatries.
VII. Worthy receivers, outwardly partaking of the visible elements, in this sacrament, do then also, inwardly by faith, really and indeed, yet not carnally and corporally but spiritually, receive and feed upon, Christ crucified, and all benefits of His death: the body and blood of Christ being then, not corporally or carnally, in, with, or under the bread and wine; yet, as really, but spiritually, present to the faith of believers in that ordinance, as the elements themselves are to their outward senses. [/blockquote]
The Savoy Declaration of the Congregational churches (1658) and the Baptist confession of 1689 are in identical terms to the Westminster Confession, on this issue.
So, essentially all the original protestant church doctrinal statements follow Wyclif’s thought on these two points of doctrine.
Whether the modern descendants of those churches follow their own doctrine is another matter. These days, its hard enough to find leaders of any church who believe Scripture or doctrine of any kind means anything. Or, perhaps even more troubling, one finds church leaders who are somehow able to believe everything!
I hope this is some help in clarifying an aspect of Anglican and Reformed doctrine.