Let’s try to refute this article one by one (you can help and correct me if you wish)
The fascinating story of how we got the Bible in its present form actually starts thousands of years ago, as briefly outlined in our Timeline of Bible Translation History. As a background study, we recommend that you first review our discussion of the Pre-Reformation History of the Bible from 1,400 B.C. to 1,400 A.D., which covers the transmission of the scripture through the original languages of Hebrew and Greek, and the 1,000 years of the Dark & Middle Ages when the Word was trapped in only Latin. Our starting point in this discussion of Bible history, however, is the advent of the scripture in the English language with the “Morning Star of the Reformation”, John Wycliffe.
Oooh, a foreshadowing start. Where has the first centuries gone?
Since the 7th Century, translations and paraphrases of some parts of the Bible were already being made in English.
At least before the time of Wycliffe, if we take the testimonies of St. Thomas More, Cranmer, and even Foxe the Martyrologist, there were already translations of large portions of the Bible.
The first hand-written English language Bible manuscripts were produced in the 1380’s AD by John Wycliffe, an Oxford professor, scholar, and theologian. Wycliffe, (also spelled “Wycliff” & “Wyclif”), was well-known throughout Europe for his opposition to the teaching of the organized Church, which he believed to be contrary to the Bible. With the help of his followers, called the Lollards, and his assistant Purvey, and many other faithful scribes, Wycliffe produced dozens of English language manuscript copies of the scriptures. They were translated out of the Latin Vulgate, which was the only source text available to Wycliffe. The Pope was so infuriated by his teachings and his translation of the Bible into English, that 44 years after Wycliffe had died, he ordered the bones to be dug-up, crushed, and scattered in the river!
At least Wycliffe was the first to translate the whole Bible into English. And yes, it was translated out of the Vulgate.]
Wycliffe was NOT condemned because of his act of translation, he was condemned because of the prologue he inserted in his Bible, which is full of Lollard heresy.
I did not know that the Pope, Martin V, threw Wycliffe’s bones into the river because of his translating the Bible into English.
Such an evil, evil pope…
What the author fails to mention is that after Wycliffe’s death, many English Catholics still used his Bible, only they took out the heretical prologue.
One of Wycliffe’s followers, John Hus, actively promoted Wycliffe’s ideas: that people should be permitted to read the Bible in their own language, and they should oppose the tyranny of the Roman church that threatened anyone possessing a non-Latin Bible with execution.
Oh, there goes the old myth again.
Hus was burned at the stake in 1415, with Wycliffe’s manuscript Bibles used as kindling for the fire. The last words of John Hus were that, “in 100 years, God will raise up a man whose calls for reform cannot be suppressed.”
Where did he get this, especially the part where Wycliffe’s Bible were used to kindle the fire? Hus was burned in Bohemia, right? So what is an English Bible doing in a Czech country?
Almost exactly 100 years later, in 1517, Martin Luther nailed his famous 95 Theses of Contention (a list of 95 issues of heretical theology and crimes of the Roman Catholic Church) into the church door at Wittenberg. The prophecy of Hus had come true!
The ‘great hero’ makes his ‘honorable’ entrance.
Martin Luther went on to be the first man to print the Bible in the German language.
Um, nope. German translations of the Bible were being made in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and a complete German translation was done by the fifteenth. 14 complete editions of the Scriptures still exist that date from prior to 1522, when Luther translated his New Testament.
[Above taken from
http://www.turrisfortis.com/bible.html”]
http://www.turrisfortis.com/bible.html]
Foxe’s Book of Martyrs records that in that same year, 1517, seven people were burned at the stake by the Roman Catholic Church for the crime of teaching their children to say the Lord’s Prayer in English rather than Latin.
Why does he quote a biased source about the History of the Bible? That’s like quoting The Da Vinci Code about Early Christianity.
To be continued…
This was because only the priests were educated to understand Latin, and this gave the church ultimate power