Churches, cathedrals and Christian groups across England are marking the 500th anniversary of the first printed English New Testament. This is the story …
Quincentenary
This year marks the quincentenary, or 500th anniversary, of William Tyndale’s New Testament, which was published in 1526. Not only was it the first time that the New Testament had been translated into English from Greek, but it was also the first time that the New Testament had been printed in English.
Up to that point, there was an old fourteenth-century New Testament which had been translated from Latin by Wycliffe and his followers, but it had to be laboriously copied by hand. English had changed so much since it was made about 150 years before that comparing Wycliffe’s translation to Tyndale’s is akin to comparing the English of Chaucer with the English of Shakespeare.
Five hundred years ago, in 1526, England was very different. Henry VIII was on the throne and the Catholic Church held sway. Church services were in Latin, and the Bible in English was illegal. It is hard for us to imagine today, when you can walk into most bookstores and buy a copy of the Bible, but owning an English New Testament was dangerous, and copies had to be smuggled in.
The Reformation
William Tyndale was born in southern Gloucestershire, in the west of England, probably in 1490 or 1491, and studied at Oxford University. He graduated aged 24 and was ordained as a priest in 1515, just before the Reformation began.
Meanwhile, in Europe, Erasmus was collecting and collating Greek manuscripts, and in 1516 he published his Greek New Testament alongside a fresh translation into Latin, which highlighted some of the issues with the standard Latin Vulgate text.
The following year, in 1517, a German Augustinian monk called Martin Luther pinned his protests against the Catholic Church onto the castle church door in Wittenberg. The printing presses copied them and disseminated them across the Holy Roman Empire, and they chimed with so many people that they triggered the Reformation.
Then, using Erasmus’s Greek text, Luther was able to translate the New Testament directly from Greek into German, which was published in 1522. Jacques Lefèvre d’Étaples then did the same, translating the New Testament from Greek into French, which was published in 1524.
Tyndale’s New Testament
Somewhere around this time, Tyndale got a copy of Erasmus’s Greek New Testament and Luther’s German New Testament and decided England also needed a translation into her language.
He did not like the ignorance which the common people, and even the priests, had of the Bible. They often practised a religion which was more ceremony, tradition and superstition than faith, but many did not know the difference.
According to John Foxe, Tyndale pledged to a priest, “I will cause the boy who driveth the plough to know more of the Scriptures than thou dost.” He dreamt of a time when ordinary people would engage with the Bible in their own language, and he set out to achieve it.
Tyndale in London
There was an old law in England dating from 1407, which was a reaction to the Peasants’ Revolt, stating that a person needed the permission of a bishop to translate the Bible into English.
For Tyndale, the bishop who seemed like the obvious man to ask was Cuthbert Tunstall, Bishop of London, who was a friend of Erasmus and had helped him with his printed Greek New Testament.
Tyndale left Little Sodbury in southern Gloucestershire, where he had been living and where he had likely already started to translate. With a letter of introduction, he went to London and asked the bishop.
Perhaps recalling the Peasants’ Revolt which followed Wycliffe’s translation and observing events in Germany, the bishop was reluctant to give permission. However, without his permission, which never came, no printer in London would print the translation, which would be considered illegal without it.
Tyndale Continues in Europe
So Tyndale left London aboard a merchant’s ship for Hamburg, and thence up the River Elbe to Wittenberg, where he likely studied Greek and Hebrew under Philipp Melanchthon and was inspired by Luther.
In 1525, he headed to Cologne, where friends helped him to print the completed English New Testament, which was modelled on Luther’s. His plan was discovered by less sympathetic authorities, and he escaped and travelled further up the River Rhine to Worms, where he started again.
The First English New Testament
In 1526, Tyndale published the first New Testament in English, which he called The Newe Testamente, such were the spellings then.
Copies were smuggled into England by traders of the Hanseatic League. Copies were confiscated and burnt in London, and today only three copies of this original 1526 New Testament are known to exist.
There is a copy at the British Library, which they bought for over a million pounds in 1994. The only pristine copy is in the State Library in Stuttgart, and there is a nearly complete copy in St Paul’s Cathedral.
Impact
The language in Tyndale’s translation has influenced the way we speak, and the words and phrases he coined and first put into print are now part of everyday language.
His translation of the New Testament, in a slightly edited form, ended up in the King James Version and, in modernised and updated forms, is still recognisable in the Revised Standard Version, the New King James Version, the New Revised Standard Version, and the English Standard Version, which very much preserve Tyndale’s phraseology and terminology.
Exhibitions
The British Library copy was on display recently in its Treasures room, the St Paul’s copy is currently on display at an exhibition at the Cathedral, and the Stuttgart copy is going on loan back to Worms, where it was printed, for an exhibition there starting in September.
There are currently other exhibitions at Tewkesbury Abbey and Scarborough, with others planned at Oxford and the Faith Museum in Bishop Auckland. Some conferences are also going to mark the anniversary.
The Tyndale Society has its own conference at Oxford in October.
Events
Churches, cathedrals and other groups are slowly catching the vision of the 500th anniversary, which gives an opportunity to tell the story of the English Bible, reflect on our history, and remind ourselves that there are still places where the Bible does not exist in the local language and still places where it is smuggled in.
There have been events all over the country, with more to come. Many churches are holding special services or having talks at church groups.
At the forefront of these events has been the Tyndale Society, which was founded in 1995 and kicked off the 500th anniversary event with a conference in Antwerp in 2025.
The Tyndale Society has supplied speakers, helped organise, or advertised many events, which are listed on the website.
Walks and Trails
With the growing popularity of pilgrimages - no longer to obtain time off in Purgatory, but redeemed by Protestants as walking in the footsteps of history - you can now walk in the footsteps of Tyndale on the Gloucestershire Tyndale Trail, the London Tyndale Trail, or the Stinchcombe Heritage Walk.
For those with energy, you can even walk or cycle down the River Rhine from Cologne to Worms.
Website
The Tyndale Society holds a monthly online “Tyndale Talk” about Tyndale and his impact, which can be found on Eventbrite and which are posted to the “Tyndale Talks” YouTube channel.
To find out more, for facts and information, to see if there is an event near you, or to get help holding an event, see the Tyndale Society website or join the Facebook page.
