Faithful Heroes: William Tyndale
William Tyndale the first person to directly translate the English Bible directly from Hebrew and Greek.
He was born around 1494 in Gloucestershire, England as William Hychyns.
As a young man he entered Oxford University earning a Bachelors and then Master of Arts degree. He became a gifted linguist and fluent in seven additional languages to his native English.
He began to preach widely and eventually traveled to Europe to preach and begin translating the Bible. His New Testament Translation was printed during this time.
Tyndale opposed King Henry VIII annulment to Catherine of Aragon. Tyndale wrote his rebuttal in An Answer unto Sir Thomas More’s Dialogue.
He was eventually betrayed, charged with heresy and condemned to be burned to death. Tyndale “was strangled to death while tied at the stake, and then his dead body was burned”.
His final words, spoken “at the stake with a fervent zeal, and a loud voice”, were reported as “Lord! Open the King of England’s eyes.”
He died sometime in early October 1536 {traditionally commemorated on the 6th}.
Within four years, four English translations of the Bible were published in England under King Henry VIII’s orders. All four were based upon Tyndale’s work.
{Note: This was 75 years before the King James Version of the Bible was published.}
83% of the King James Version New Testament is William Tyndale. His language was clear, simple, with a majority of mono-syllable words, He said that Greek translates for more readily into English than Latin does. The mostly illiterate ploughboy could understand the language used and Tyndale coined many phrases which are still used today, nearly five hundred years later..! But it was his determination to follow the conviction he had to translate the Scriptures into his native tongue, even to the costing him of his liberty and life – that conviction wrought in him by God himself – which must attract our greatest attention, for this is receiving a knowledge of the will of God and falling under it: something counted vital in determining whether one is a true disciple of the Lord Jesus, or just in presumption. Matthew 7:21.