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The First Printed New Testament in English, AD 1525

 Despite the invention of printing in the mid-15th century, there was still no printed version of the Bible in English at the beginning of the 16th century (although Caxton had included some translated passages from the Vulgate in his Golden Legend of 1483). This lack disturbed William Tyndale, who had studied at both Oxford and Cambridge and who was keenly aware of the new currents of thought. In argument with other scholars and church officials, he hotly declared: “If God spare my life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plough shall know more scripture than thou dost.”

Tyndale went to London to seek from the church or from the King money and support for a new translation. However, as he later wrote, he came to “understand at the last, Tyndale New Testament - 1551 - from the Arrowsmith Librarynot only that there was no room in my Lord [the Bishop] of London’s palace to translate the New Testament, but also that there was no place to do it in all England.” In 1524, he went to Germany, and the printing of his translation of the New Testament began in Cologne. This was dangerous work, and he was soon forced to flee up the Rhine to Worms, where two editions of his New Testament were printed in 1525. Early the next year, copies were smuggled into England in bags of grain, cloth and furs. Immediately, both the King (Henry VIII) and the church authorities prohibited its use, and the church authorities bought up all they could find and burnt them. They objected less to Tyndale’s translation into English than to his annotations to the text, which were very critical of some Catholic teachings.

Meanwhile, Tyndale was working on the Old Testament, with the financial support of some English merchants. Finally, in 1535, he was betrayed, and was imprisoned for sixteen months in Vilvorde Castle in Belgium. He begged his friends to send him a warm coat, his Hebrew Bible, Grammar and Dictionary, and also a candle, so that he could continue with his work. He never completed it, however. Found guilty of heresy, William Tyndale was strangled and burnt near Brussels on October 6, 1536.

Tyndale’s translation strongly influenced all subsequent translations into English until recent times; indeed, much of the Old Testament and most of the New Testament in the Authorised Version (King James Bible) is closely based on his work.

View Matthew 6.9-13 (Lord's Prayer) Tyndale's version 1534

If you would like to know more about Tyndale visit www.williamtyndale.com or visit the British Library and search for Tyndale.

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The Making of the Old Testament

The First Translations, mid-3rd century BC

The Making of the New Testament, AD 40-150

Translating the Bible into Latin, AD 383-410

The Earliest English Translations, AD 735

The First English Bible, AD 1383

The First Printed Bible, AD 1456

Luther and the German Bible, AD 1522-34

The First Printed New Testament in English, AD 1525

The First Complete Printed Bible in English, AD 1535

Translations from AD 1537 - today

The influence of the Bible