Word Alive!

I was looking up an on this day webpage and it stated that on this day (May 6th) in 1536 King Henry VIII ordered that English language Bibles be placed in every church.

Wow!

That was such a revolutionary move at the time.

A radical move, and a departure from what the church at that time was allowing.

And despite the fact that the Great Bible of King Henry VIII wasn’t printed until 1539, it was still a dangerous and revolutionary idea to hold.

King Henry VIII was inspired by the work of William Tyndale who had been working on a translation of the New Testament into English from the original Greek and Aramaic texts. This was such a dangerous thing for the established church of the time that they had Tyndal tried and executed on charges of heresy.

The threat that the established church felt from Tyndale’s Bible can best be summed up by his own avowed reason for creating his translation in the first place. Tyndale wanted to “[cause a boy that driveth the plough to know more scripture] than the clergy of the day.” It was an issue of power.  The church would no-longer be the sole interpreters of scripture, and would no-longer be the sole mediators between the people and God.

Tyndale’s last words as he was dying are quoted in Foxe’s Book of Martyrs as being “Lord! Open the King of England’s eyes.”

His prayer was swiftly answered.

Though the printing of this Bible was not totally due to a spiritual awakening by King Henry VIII methinks.

King Henry VIII had requested that the Pope permit him to divorce his wife and marry his mistress. The Pope obviously refused and King Henry responded by marrying his mistress anyway, and thumbing his nose at the Pope by renouncing Roman Catholicism, taking England out from under Rome’s religious control, and declaring himself as the reigning head of State to also be the new head of the Church in England.