Do you know the extraordinary high cost that was paid so that you and I – the ordinary lay-person could read the Bible in the English language? Well, if you don’t (and I didn’t until a very short while ago despite having gone to church for 20+ years and never heard a single sermon or expose on it), it was down to one very – very brave man – William Tyndale.
William Tyndale had a dream to translate the existing bible from Hebrew to Greek so that as he put it; “John Plowman” would be able to read the Bible in his own language. Most young and ‘modern’ evangelical Christians have no idea, that at that time it was illegal for the common layman to own a copy of the scriptures period. Can you believe that?! I know I had to re-read this when I first discovered it. And not only that, the punishment for possessing a copy of the holy scriptures was death.
Searching for Truth will make your life hard
Of course the next question I immediately asked was; who was it that forbade the owning or reading or preaching publicly these holy and healing words from The Bible? Good question – and I won’t tell you know, suffice to say I hope that same question has come to your mind and that you seek out diligently the truth in this matter as for me – forbidding the ordinary man ‘access’ to God is exceedingly evil – even if it is dressed up as; “protecting the common man from making errors about faith” – what baloney! If that was the case – then these powers that denied the people access to the scriptures should have been the ones translating it for the common man (which they did later of course – producing their own modified version once the cat was out of the bag and The king James Bible was about to be unleashed on the evil in the world. And the burning of Tyndale and people like him was proof that was never their intention.
Of course we are safe from evil (proving we earnestly seek truth), even without scriptures as we have the Holy Spirit but those that denied the reading of the scriptures clearly underestimated the power of God’s spirit of whom it says; “The Holy Spirit with teach you all things” this making this futile attempt to suppress truth laughable)
Back to the story – Tyndale unflinchingly took on the challenge, standing up to darkness to translate the scriptures so you and I could read them! He was fluent in eight languages including Greek and Hebrew, and painstakingly translated the scriptures from Hebrew and Greek into English.
For his efforts to ‘un-suppress’ the truth he was hunted like an animal for years all across England and Europe by the English authorities and the church as if he were a criminal and yet his only crime?.. was to desire to bring light into a darkened world full of dark people and authorities principalities and powers.
Speaking the Truth will get you killed
iI the end and predictably, Tyndale was finally caught by the powers that be, convicted and executed in the most disgusting way imaginable to try to prevent others from uncovering the dark deeds of others by being tied to a post, strangled and burnt to ashes and his ashes scattered. It has been said that he ‘revived’ after being strangled and suffered the pain of fire. The great irony is that 90% of our current English Bibles have been written using Tyndale’s translations! This man was surely a man of God, a man that wanted truth over comfort and we need more people like this today in these times of luke-warm’coffee morning’ churches that are more akin to social clubs sandwiched by rock concerts at either end.
Read more about this story here.
I love God, Christ, The Bible. art, painting, playing music, improvising music, guitar (first instrument), drumming (not very good at it:), and anything musical or art related. Quick note – my articles are usually spun off in minutes so forgive any errors – hopefully you get the essence of the article and I’ll pick up mistakes later. If you want to write of 101ChristianMagazine and inspire and edify Christians with articles on faith, general news, hobbies or anything that interests you email me at: epgb101@gmail.com:)
