The Church Really Did Forbid the Bible from LayPeople

[jimmy]

Sacramentalist:

Your referring to the translation made by the heretic John Wycliffe, made in the 1300s. There was no English Bible before him, just certain selections translated.

No, I am refering to before Wycliff.

"This position is supported by many notable and educated English from this time period, for example St. Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England, said in his “Dialogue” (p.138), that:“The whole Bible was long before Wycliff’s day (who lived during the century before Tyndale) by virtuous and well learned men translated into the English tongue and by good and godly people with devotion and soberness, well and reverendly read . . .”

Even Cranner, Henry VIII’s Archbishop of Canterbury, said in the preface of the “Great Bible,” that the. Holy Bible:

“was translated and read in the Saxon tongue, which at that time was the mother tongue, whereof there remaineth yet divers copies. …; and when this language waxed old and out of common use, it was translated into the (English) language, whereof yet also many copies remain and be daily found.”

The famous Protestant *“martyologist” *named Foxe, makes the same acknowledgment:

“If history be well examined we shall find both before the conquest and after, as well before John Wickliffe was born as since, the whole body of the scriptures was by Sundry men translated into our country tongue.” (This was in 1571, in the declaration to Queen Elizabeth, written by Foxe).

catholicapologetics.net

 

[jimmy]

Here is an 8th century translation of the pslams.

http://catholicapologetics.net/images/vespasian_lg.jpg

Among the extensive collection of ancient Biblical manuscripts found at the British Library is the The Vespasian Psalter, a very ancient Catholic translation of the book of Psalms in to a primitive English [Anglo-Saxon]. It is believed that the Vespasian Psalter was produced at St. Augustine’s, Canterbury, in the second quarter of the 8th century. This Catholic English translation was made almost six hundred years before Wycliffe produced his English translation.
The great care that went in to the many ornate hand done illustrations found among its ancient pages clearly show the great love of the scriptures held by the Catholics of that time period.

 

[DeFide]

Sacramentalist:

DeFide:

Read everything else I quoted.

The obvious rejoinder to this is that the Church should have made it a top priority to educate people in the Bible. Yes, I would give every Catholic 3rd grader a Bible, and then teach it to them.

I don’t understand wh ywe Catholics find this so difficult. Protestants do it successfully all the time! If they’re able to teach their children the Bible, why can’t we, while at the same time teaching them the correct interpretation?

I read the rest, and considering the environment of tons of erroneous Scripture being literally forced on common people by reformers and the secular authorities who took their side, it only makes sense that laymen should consult with their pastors regarding how to proceed to get authentic texts.

As to your rejoinder, the Church printed Catholic Bibles before the reformers printed their Bibles… as soon as the press was invented. You weren’t living then, so you need to be a little more understanding. You cannot just wave a wand and make everyone literate overnight. By the way, besides spreading the Gospel, the Church also had to contend with certain reformer-friendly gov’t that were literally warring against Catholic people.

 

[jimmy]

Achbishop Ælfric was a English writer and Benedictine monk. He was one of the the greatest English scholar during the revival of learning fostered by the Benedictine monasteries in the second half of the 10th cent. His aim was to educate the laity as well as the clergy. He wrote in English a series of saints’ lives and homilies—designed for use as sermons by the preachers who were generally unable to read Latin. Ælfric was also the author of a grammar, a glossary, and a colloquy, which were for many years the standard texts for Latin study in English monasteries.

Among his other writings are the Heptateuch, a free English version (Anglo-Saxon) of the first seven books of the Bible. As far as we can judge from the existing manuscripts, most of these early Bible translations were intended for reading in the churches to the people, and their simple expressive terms made them very easily understood. For example, a centurion was a “hundred man” a disciple a " leorning cnight" (learning youth), the man with the dropsy, is translated as “the water-seoc-man” the Sabbath as “*the reste daeg *” (rest day), and the woman who put her mites in the treasury, is said to have cast them into the “gold hoard.”

Ælfric is considered the chief prose stylist of the period. His later writings were strongly influenced by the balance, alliteration, and rhythm of Latin prose. This Catholic English translation was made almost four hundred years before Wycliffe produced his English translation.

The great care that went in to the many ornate hand done illustrations found among its ancient pages clearly show the great love of the scriptures held by the Catholics of that time period.

L'apologie chrétienne dans les jeux vidéos - On les appelle les easter eggs et ils sont partout, même dans les jeux PS4 is a photograph of Archbishop Aeifric’s Anglo-Saxon Bible. It is taken from a beautiful copy in the Cottonian Library It contains many curious miniatures as for example the Creation of Eve who is represented as being drawn out of an opening amongst Adam’s ribs. The miniature which we reproduce represents the expulsion of Adam and Eve from Paradise and their being taught by an angel to till the ground. Below it is photographed a verse from a later page (Gen. iv. 9, io). It is interesting to notice in this passage that almost every word of its Anglo-Saxon is still represented in our present English:

 

[Sacramentalist]

What of all the Papal decrees saying that laypeople could not read the Bible unless they received permission from the Pope?

And this through the 1800s!

 

[jimmy]

---

WAS TYNDALE’S BIBLE THE FIRST ENGLISH BIBLE ?

By David Goldstein LL.D**,** 1943. A Jewish convert to Catholicism.
Named a “Knight of St. Gregory” by Pope Pius XII in 1955.

I am writing against absolutely false Protestant claim that “Tyndale died for your right to read the Bible*;*” and thet “Tyndale’s was the first Bible translated in to English,” which it was not.

In the first place bear this in mind, the Catholic Church was the originator of that Divine Library, which she designated The Bible. Secondly, the Catholic Church made the Bible accessible to the populace, through St. Jerome’s translation of it from the Hebrew and Greek into Latin, over eleven centuries before your disreputable Bible hero was born. The very name of that fourth century translation, “The Vulgate,” signifies the issuance of it in the language of the populace.

You tellers of false Bible history disregard the fact, or know not that Latin was a world language at the time the vulgate translation was made; and even during the lifetime of Tyndale, when most people who could read at all, read Latin. Therefore Macau-lay could say, in his Essay on Bacon, that “at the time of Henry the Eighth and Edward the Sixth, a person who did not read Greek or Latin could read nothing or next to nothing. It was the language of the courts as of the schools. It was the language of diplomacy; it was the language of theological and political controversy,” etc., etc. The universality of Latin, the language in which the Catholic Church made it possible for the people to read the Bible as early as the fourth century, was seen in our country in which Yale College required ability to read that language, in order that students be admitted. It was not until the year 1790 that Harvard College substituted ability to translate Latin for speaking that language, in order that students be admitted. Students in the schools and colleges of New England studied the Latin, and not the English language Bibles.

The circulation of Bibles among the populace was not possible until the invention of printing; thanks to the Catholic Gutenberg, the struggling inventor who was enabled to carry on his work through the generosity of the Catholic Archbishop of Mayence. This took place before the 16th century Lutheran Deformation divided the Christian world. This invention was followed by the publication of forty editions of the Bible by the Catholic Church, in eleven languages, between the years 1450-1520.

Your assertion that Tyndale was the “Bible’s first English translator” is without any foundation in historic fact. The Venerable Bede, Doctor of the Church, who lived during the years 672-735 A.D., translated nearly the whole Bible into the English of his day. The Encyclopedia Britannica declares that:

“(In) Eadwine’s Psalterium triplex,(A.D. 1180)which contained the Latin version accompanied by Anglo-Norman and Anglo-Saxon renderings, appeared… By 1361 a translation of most of Scripture in this dialect (Anglo-Norman) had been executed.”(© 1999-2000 Britannica)

This was 20 years before Wycliffe “translated” his version

“From August 1380 until the summer of 1381, Wycliffe was in his rooms at Queen’s College, busy with his plans for a translation of the Bible” (© 1999-2000 Britannica)

​

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[jimmy]

St. Thomas More, Lord Chancellor of England, said in his “Dialogue” (p.138), that:

“the whole Bible was long before Wycliff’s day (who lived during the century before Tyndale) by virtuous and well learned men translated into the English tongue and by good and godly people with devotion and soberness, well and reverendly read . . .”

Even Cranner, Henry Viii’s Archbishop of Canterbury, said in the preface of the “Great Bible,” that the. Holy Bible:

“was translated and read in the Saxon tongue, which at that time was the mother tongue, whereof there remaineth yet divers copies. …; and when this language waxed old and out of common use, it was translated into the (English) language, whereof yet also many copies remain and be daily found.”

The very Preface of the 1611 Authorized Version says:

“Bede by Cister- tiensis, to have turned a great part of them (the books of scripure) into Saxon: Efnard by Trithemius, to have abridged the French Psalter, as Beded had done the Hebrew, about the year 800: King Alfred by the said Cistertien- sis, to have turned the Psalter into Saxon: [Polydor. Virg. 5 histor.] …even in our King Richard the second’s days , John Trevisa translated them into English, and many English Bibles in written hand are yet to be seen with divers, translated as it is very probable, in that age”.

Even Foxe, the martyologist, makes the same acknowledgment:

“If history be well examined we shall find both before the conquest and after, as well before John Wickliffe was born as since, the whole body of the scriptures was by Sundry men translated into our country tongue.” (This was in 1571, in the declaration to Queen Elizabeth, written by Foxe).

For more examples of this point [please see the appendix](L'apologie chrétienne dans les jeux vidéos - On les appelle les easter eggs et ils sont partout, même dans les jeux PS4 APPENDIX)

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[jimmy]

It is love of the God-inspired books in the Bible that caused the Catholic Church to protect the people from counterfeit translations as ardently as the State endeavors to protect the people from counterfeit currency. The “right to read the Bible,” which is a moral right, does not include imbibing such a blasphemous and distorted translation as came from the contemptible ex-Catholic pen of Tyndale. His translation was ordered to be destroyed, not because it appeared in the English language, as you assume, but because it was a faulty, corrupted translation, which was a deliberate profanation of the Sacred Text.

St. Thomas More commented that searching for errors in the Tyndale Bible was similar to searching for water in the sea. Even King Henry VIII in 1531 condemned the Tyndale Bible as a corruption of Scripture. In the words of King Henry’s advisors: “the translation of the Scripture corrupted by William Tyndale should be utterly expelled, rejected, and put away out of the hands of the people, and not be suffered to go abroad among his subjects.” (Where We Got The Bible 1977 p. 128-130.)

Protestant Bishop Tunstall of London declared that there were upwards of 2,000 errors in Tyndale’s Bible. Tyndale translated the term baptism into “washing;” Scripture into “writing;” Holy Ghost into “Holy Wind,” Bishop into “Overseer,” Priest into “Elder,” Deacon into “Minister;” heresy into “choice;” martyr into “witness;” evangelist into “bearer of good news;” etc., etc. Many of his footnotes were vicious. For instance, Tyndale referred to the occupant of the Chair of Peter, as “that great idol, the whore of Babylon, the anti-Christ of Rome.”

Tyndale was a religious Benedict Arnold, a violator of solemn vows made to Almighty God, at the time of his ordination in the Franciscan Order. He, like all such excommunicated creatures, set up his perverse concept of things Christian, against those who speak with Divine authority in the Church that Christ established; the Church that made it possible for the world to have a Christian Bible.

Tyndale died not for the right to read the Bible, as you arrogantly claim. He was put to death by the civil judges of the father of the English Protestant Deformation, for doctrines subversive of law and order, which Dr. James Gardiner, Protestant, said “was intended to produce an ecclesiastical and social revolution of a most dangerous character. . .”

These Protestaint claims about Tyndale is an offense. It is a perversion of historic truth. The Protestaint defense of Tyndale’s blasphemy and treason is very likely due to Protestaints being ignorant of Bible history; having a bigoted concept of the Christ-established Catholic Church.

May your darkness be turned into the Divine Light, that shines in and through the Catholic Church.

Catholicapologetics.net

 

[DeFide]

Sacramentalist:

What of all the Papal decrees saying that laypeople could not read the Bible unless they received permission from the Pope?
…

Um, that’s not what your link says.

 

[jimmy]

Sacramentalist:

What of all the Papal decrees saying that laypeople could not read the Bible unless they received permission from the Pope?

And this through the 1800s!

Pius VI said this,

“At a time when a great many books which grossly attack the Catholic religion are being circulated even among the unlearned, to the great destruction of souls, you judge exceedingly well that the faithful should be urged to read the Holy Scriptures; for they are the most abundant sources which ought to be left open to everyone, to draw from them purity of morals and of doctrine, and to eradicate the errors which are so widely spread in these corrupt times.”

Pius VII said this,

“to encourage their people to read the Holy Scriptures; for nothing can be more useful, more consoling, and more animating, inasmuch as they serve to confirm the faith, support the hope, and influence the charity of the true Christian.”

 

[jimmy]

I advise you to read this, it gives some quotes from Catholics that supported lay people reading the bible

members.aol.com/johnprh/reading.html

 

[Sacramentalist]

jimmy:

Pius VI said this,

“At a time when a great many books which grossly attack the Catholic religion are being circulated even among the unlearned, to the great destruction of souls, you judge exceedingly well that the faithful should be urged to read the Holy Scriptures; for they are the most abundant sources which ought to be left open to everyone, to draw from them purity of morals and of doctrine, and to eradicate the errors which are so widely spread in these corrupt times.”

Pius VII said this,

“to encourage their people to read the Holy Scriptures; for nothing can be more useful, more consoling, and more animating, inasmuch as they serve to confirm the faith, support the hope, and influence the charity of the true Christian.”

Documentation, please?

 

[Sacramentalist]

DeFide:

Um, that’s not what your link says.

Read again:

1. “It is only in the beginning of the last five hundred years that we meet with a general law of the Church concerning the reading of the Bible in the vernacular. On 24 March, 1564, Pius IV promulgated in his Constitution, “Dominici gregis”, the Index of Prohibited Books. According to the third rule, the Old Testament may be read in the vernacular by pious and learned men, according to the judgment of the bishop, as a help to the better understanding of the Vulgate. The fourth rule places in the hands of the bishop or the inquisitor the power of allowing the reading of the New Testament in the vernacular to laymen who according to the judgment of their confessor or their pastor can profit by this practice.”

This says that, according to Pius IV, laity may not so much as read a vernacular Bible unless they have the approval of their confessor/pastor, and even then not until they have approval of the bishop or inquisitor.

1. Sixtus V reserved this power to himself or the Sacred Congregation of the Index, and Clement VIII added this restriction to the fourth rule of the Index, by way of appendix.

Self-explanatory; laity must receive approval from the Pope himself, of from the Congregation of the Index, to read the vernacular Bible.

Benedict XIV required that the vernacular version read by laymen should be either approved by the Holy See or provided with notes taken from the writings of the Fathers or of learned and pious authors. It then became an open question whether this order of Benedict XIV was intended to supersede the former legislation or to further restrict it. This doubt was not removed by the next three documents: the condemnation of certain errors of the Jansenist Quesnel as to the necessity of reading the Bible, by the Bull “Unigenitus” issued by Clement XI on 8 Sept., 1713 (cf. Denzinger, “Enchir.”, nn. 1294-1300); the condemnation of the same teaching maintained in the Synod of Pistoia, by the Bull “Auctorem fidei” issued on 28 Aug., 1794, by Pius VI; the warning against allowing the laity indiscriminately to read the Scriptures in the vernacular, addressed to the Bishop of Mohileff by Pius VII, on 3 Sept., 1816.

Through the early 1800s it’s an open question whether or not the earlier restrictions are still into effect.

But the Decree issued by the Sacred Congregation of the Index on 7 Jan., 1836, seems to

render it clear that henceforth the laity may read vernacular versions of the Scriptures, if they be either approved by the Holy See, or provided with notes taken from the writings of the Fathers or of learned Catholic authors. The same regulation was repeated by Gregory XVI in his Encyclical of 8 May, 1844.

As of the early 1900s, when this article was written, still an open question.

 

[jimmy]

Sacramentalist:

Documentation, please?

I am not sure what you are attempting to do here. Here is some information on the above quotes.

The letter Pope Pius VI sent to the Archbishop of Florence in April of 1778, wherein he urges Catholics to read the Bible. He writes:

“At a time when a great many books which grossly attack the Catholic religion are being circulated even among the unlearned, to the great destruction of souls, you judge exceedingly well that the faithful should be urged to read the Holy Scriptures; for they are the most abundant sources which ought to be left open to everyone, to draw from them purity of morals and of doctrine, and to eradicate the errors which are so widely spread in these corrupt times.”

Pius VII a few years later wrote in the same strain to the English Vicars_Apostolic, asking them,

“to encourage their people to read the Holy Scriptures; for nothing can be more useful, more consoling, and more animating, inasmuch as they serve to confirm the faith, support the hope, and influence the charity of the true Christian.”

Q. Do not Catholic Bishops and Popes discourage the reading of the Scriptures?

A. No; the Catholic clergy are bound to read the Scripture for nearly an hour every day; the Catholic Bishops of Great Britain publicly declared, in 1826, that the circulation of authentic copies of Scripture was never discouraged by the Church; Pope Plus VII., in a rescript, April 18, 1820, addressed to the English Bishops, tells them “to encourage their people to read the Holy Scriptures, because nothing can be more useful more consoling, more animating. They serve to confirm the faith, to support the hope, and to inflame the charity of the true Christian.”

biblelight.net/keenan.htm

 

[RobbyS]

piety101:

Heavens no. The church alone had some copies of the scriptures in some churches, but even those were rare. The printing press was non existent for some 1200 years, so people recited Psalms,creeds, prayers that were passed down from generation to generation. A great deal of learning came from art work or mosaics. A great many of the common people could not even read. Educational skills were not like it is in our time.

                            Martin Luther was the first to translate the Latin bible into German and he had copies made and distributed to the people. This started the ball rolling. Before this, copies of the scriptures were housed in church buildings. 

                             Martin Luther had good intentions, but after the scriptures became copied by others succeeding him, heretical interpretations came from reading those printed copies and so denominational-ism was born. In other words Martin Luther gave birth to a Frankenstein. It was no longer sola scriptura, but rather sola interpretation by anyone who thought their ideas were right. :(

Actually, Bibles as we know them began to be quite numerous in the 13th Century with the publication of the Vulgate in the Paris Bible. Thousands were in circulation. The book was the right size to be put in the pocket of a friar’s gown, so they carried them around as they went from place to place preaching. Almost every literate person, therefore, had access to the Bible. Bibles in the vernacular, however, were another matter. If you could not read Latin you were cut off from scholarship and left to interpret a very difficult book on your own.

 

[DeFide]

Sacramentalist:

Read again:

This says that, according to Pius IV, laity may not so much as read a vernacular Bible unless they have the approval of their confessor/pastor, and even then not until they have approval of the bishop or inquisitor.

Self-explanatory; laity must receive approval from the Pope himself, of from the Congregation of the Index, to read the vernacular Bible.

Benedict XIV required that the vernacular version read by laymen should be either approved by the Holy See or provided with notes taken from the writings of the Fathers or of learned and pious authors. It then became an open question whether this order of Benedict XIV was intended to supersede the former legislation or to further restrict it. This doubt was not removed by the next three documents: the condemnation of certain errors of the Jansenist Quesnel as to the necessity of reading the Bible, by the Bull “Unigenitus” issued by Clement XI on 8 Sept., 1713 (cf. Denzinger, “Enchir.”, nn. 1294-1300); the condemnation of the same teaching maintained in the Synod of Pistoia, by the Bull “Auctorem fidei” issued on 28 Aug., 1794, by Pius VI; the warning against allowing the laity indiscriminately to read the Scriptures in the vernacular, addressed to the Bishop of Mohileff by Pius VII, on 3 Sept., 1816.

Through the early 1800s it’s an open question whether or not the earlier restrictions are still into effect.

But the Decree issued by the Sacred Congregation of the Index on 7 Jan., 1836, seems to

render it clear that henceforth the laity may read vernacular versions of the Scriptures, if they be either approved by the Holy See, or provided with notes taken from the writings of the Fathers or of learned Catholic authors. The same regulation was repeated by Gregory XVI in his Encyclical of 8 May, 1844.

As of the early 1900s, when this article was written, still an open question.

You’re mis-reading it. Nowhere does it say that people are prohibited from reading non-heretical books, even in the vernacular. Do you know what the Index is?

 

[DeFide]

Sacramentalist:

Read again:

This says that, according to Pius IV, laity may not so much as read a vernacular Bible unless they have the approval of their confessor/pastor, and even then not until they have approval of the bishop or inquisitor.

Self-explanatory; laity must receive approval from the Pope himself, of from the Congregation of the Index, to read the vernacular Bible.

uote]Benedict XIV required that the vernacular version read by laymen should be either approved by the Holy See or provided with notes taken from the writings of the Fathers or of learned and pious authors. It then became an open question whether this order of Benedict XIV was intended to supersede the former legislation or to further restrict it. This doubt was not removed by the next three documents: the condemnation of certain errors of the Jansenist Quesnel as to the necessity of reading the Bible, by the Bull “Unigenitus” issued by Clement XI on 8 Sept., 1713 (cf. Denzinger, “Enchir.”, nn. 1294-1300); the condemnation of the same teaching maintained in the Synod of Pistoia, by the Bull “Auctorem fidei” issued on 28 Aug., 1794, by Pius VI; the warning against allowing the laity indiscriminately to read the Scriptures in the vernacular, addressed to the Bishop of Mohileff by Pius VII, on 3 Sept., 1816.[uote]

Through the early 1800s it’s an open question whether or not the earlier restrictions are still into effect.

uote]But the Decree issued by the Sacred Congregation of the Index on 7 Jan., 1836, seems to render it clear that henceforth the laity may read vernacular versions of the Scriptures, if they be either approved by the Holy See, or provided with notes taken from the writings of the Fathers or of learned Catholic authors. The same regulation was repeated by Gregory XVI in his Encyclical of 8 May, 1844.uote]

As of the early 1900s, when this article was written, still an open question.

You’re mis-reading it. Nowhere does it say that people are prohibited from reading non-heretical books, even in the vernacular. Do you know what the Index is?

Getting a Bible that’s approved by the Church does not mean that you have to go to the Pope himself.

 

[Scalia]

Sacramentalist: You seem ticked off!!! Like a raging bull full of anger. What are you reading that made you like this?

I think your premise is wrong. For the first 300 years after
Christ’s death - THERE WAS NO BIBLE. In even asking this question, especially in this ticked off manner, you are elevating the Bible over the Church. Do you think the Bible is greater than the Church?

 

[JimG]

ALL books, including the bible, are a relatively recent innovation. For the first 1500 years of Christianity, asking if someone owned “a” bible would be like someone asking you if you owned a copy of the Library of Congress.

 

[tom.wineman]

When I was in 5th grade at a Catholic school,
which was shortly after the earth’s crust cooled, I was presented one and encouraged to read it.