One application on my smartphone gives me access to 59 English translations of the Bible. As staggering as that number is, it only represents 13% of the total number of Bible translations in English. I call that number “staggering” because there was a time when there were none.
The first known, complete translation of the Bible into English was not completed until 1382. The man credited with making it happen died peacefully just two years later, on December 30, 1384. Forty-four years after his death, bishops at the Council of Constance condemned his teachings as heretical and ordered that his bones be exhumed and burned.
His many radical views had indeed challenged the established church. He took on issues like, clerical celibacy, indulgences, praying to the saints and even questioned the legitimacy of the Papacy. That may sound like Martin Luther, but John Wycliffe preceded Luther and the Protestant Reformation by more than 100 years. While many have called him the Morning Star of the Reformation, Wycliffe is best known for that first complete English Bible. The same council that ordered his bones burned, also ordered that his writings be burned. This unfortunately included some of his “unauthorized” English translations of the Bible.
Wycliffe’s Bible translation was viewed as heretical because of the belief that gave it birth. Wycliffe had come to regard the Bible as “the only reliable guide to the truth about God and maintained that all Christians should rely on it” rather than the teachings of the church. His belief that men ought to be able to read God’s Word in their own language led directly to his work of translation. While that view hardly seems radical today, all of Wycliffe’s challenges to the authority of the Roman church sprang from his high view of God’s Word. Those challenges led to burning Bibles and burning bones.
Our Cover-2-Cover reading of the Bible in 2019 has a history that goes right back to John Wycliffe. Many men and women sacrificed for our ease of access to God’s Word … let’s not waste that opportunity.
Side note: A great organization named after John Wycliffe carries forward his belief that all men should have the Bible in their native tongue. Due to their efforts and other like-minded organizations, the entire Bible is now available in 683 different languages, with the New Testament available in 1,534. There’s still much to be done … check out their work at https://wycliffe.bible.
