Stained with Blood

By January 1530, Tyndale had moved beyond the New Testament by printing his first Old Testament books - the Pentateuch and the book of Jonah. I have to believe these translators felt they were in a race to translate as much as possible before they were silenced. Thomas More, the famous Catholic theologian, condemned Tyndale as, ‘worse than Luther,’ in his Dialogue Concerning Heresies. Tyndale's criticisms no doubt came from his marginal notes, 132 throughout the Pentateuch. Many of them vilified the Pope. One of the more famous marginal notes comes from Exodus 32:35 which describes God's punishment for making the golden calf. Tyndale wrote in his notes,
“The Pope's bull slayeth more than Aaron's calf”

A clear reference to Rome's Papal Bulls, which were official decrees from the Pope, many of which were declarations of heresy and public burnings. How ever many God slew in the golden calf incident were insignificant to the murderous actions of a Papal Bull!
In all, Tyndale would translate 15 of the 39 books, Genesis through the book of Kings plus Jonah, before his untimely death in 1536. Since these were the larger Old Testament books, they amounted to over 50%. Most of Tyndale's translation work found its way into the first licensed English Bible - the Coverdale Bible. Still more of his translations were discovered and placed within the text of the second licensed Bible - the Matthews Bible, then ultimately into our King James Bible. A computer-based comparison was done when 18 portions of the Bible were sampled, and it was found that 83% of Tyndale’s New Testament had survived into the King James Bible, with 76% of his Old Testament. His brilliance in translating sense into scriptures is easily seen when comparing Wycliffe’s English translation to Tyndale's 1530 rendition of Genesis 1:1-2:

“In the first made God of nought Heaven and Earth.
The earth was vain within and void
and darknesses were upon the face of the sea.
And the Spirit of God was borne upon the waters.
And God said, be made light and made is light.”
Wycliffe's Genesis 1:1-2

Tyndale’s translation in 1530 from the Hebrew:

“In the beginning God created Heaven and Earth.
The earth was void and empty
and darkness was upon the deep
and the spirit of God moved upon the water.
Then God said: let there be light and there was light.”

William Tyndale was a hunted man who escaped death by hiding in Europe from the Catholic pursuers. What was his heresy? Wanting to place into the hands of all Englanders a Bible written in their native tongue. He was successful for the most part. He was befriended by Henry Phillips, the Judas of his time, betrayed and imprisoned in Vilvorde Castle, outside the city of Brussels. The greatest enemy to the Catholic Church, public enemy number one, had been captured. The soldiers of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor noted, “they pitied to see his simplicity.” For sixteen months, he was unable to finish the one thing he believed God had called him into. Alone, with no lamp to break the darkness and no man with whom to speak his beloved English, the master of the English language remained silent. A letter he wrote has survived the centuries as one of the great documents of the English Reformation. Tyndale writes to the keeper, the lord of the castle his guard. He begs him to send some items:

“ My overcoat is worn, my shirts are worn out,
please send me a warmer night cap
and leggings of thicker cloth to put on,
but most of all I beg your clemency to be urgent
with a commissary that he will kindly permit me to have,
the Hebrew Bible, Hebrew grammar, and a Hebrew dictionary,
that I may pass the time in that of study.”

Here a man has sat in prison for 500 days, no hope of release, and for what does he ask? warmer garments, protection for his legs from the leggings, the Hebrew dictionary, the Hebrew Bible, so he could continue his work of translating the Bible into English. Tyndale never received those things. Perhaps this was the greater tragedy, this brilliant mind being kept from completing his gifted translation work. Though his pen was silenced, his tongue continued to speak. John Foxe writes that he led to salvation his keeper, his keeper’s daughter, and others of his household. He was brought to the gallows on October 6, 1536 where he was shown some decency, some respect for his genius. Even his most hated inquisitor, Dufief the procurer general, had positive words to say about him, “. . . learned, godly, and good.” Tyndale's famous last words were prophetic to say the least.

“Lord! Open the King of England's eyes.”

They also are tragic. In less than twelve months Tyndale's words were fulfilled when Henry VIII gives his approval to the first ever complete Bible – The Coverdale Bible. Had Henry Phillips not found and deceived him and he had lived, Tyndale would have finished his Old Testament and had the first complete Bible from the original languages. That didn't happen!

Before his body was burned at the stake, William Tyndale was garroted, in a strange way an act of kindness. Once his death was confirmed they lit the faggots that surrounded him, consuming the body of England’s great Apostle. For the past 500 years, William Tyndale has been England’s greatest single gift to the modern world. A portrait of William Tyndale hangs in Hertford College, Oxford. He points to his English translation of the New Testament. The inscription reads:

“To scatter Roman darkness by this light,
the loss of land and life I’ll reckon slight”

Over eighty percent of Tyndale’s New Testament made its way into the King James Bible, with another seventy-six percent into the Old Testament. Tyndale also took Hebrew words with no English equivalency and gave them English permanency: Jehovah, Passover, Scapegoat, and Pondered. The Hebrew word for passover means to skip or hop. That would have sounded funny if the Jews celebrated the 'hop-over.' It was Tyndale who created the “passover.” Below are some of the reasons why William Tyndale has been called, “The Father of the English Bible.”