The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1911-06-17
THE CHURCH AND THE BIBLE

l
underwent revision at Louvain by
Catholic divines, and passed through
fifty editions down to the year 100.
In 1471 two versions of the Bible in
Italian were printed at Venice; eleven
full editions, with imprimatur of the
Holy Office, are counted previous to
1867. Of the Bohemian and other out
lying versions I will only make men,
ton. But may add that printer of
Nuremberg had set up warehouse
in London for the sale of the Latin
Vulgate in 1880. Cations Golden
Legend" 1883, contained nearly the
whole of the Pentateuch and large
portion of the Gospels. Yet no Eng
lish Bible was printed until the New
Testament of William Tyndale made
it's appearance in 1926. Why was this?
And how came there to be such an
exception to the rule which elsewhere
provoked Churchmen to scatter the
Bible broadcast?
Why No English Printed Bible?
We may give the answer in one
word, and that word "Wycliffe. A
hundred years before Luther was born
the English nation had been fever
stricken by a great movement towards
anarchy and communism, of which the
Oxford graduate, Wycliffe, had ex-
pounded the principles, drawing them,
as he said, from Holy Scripture itself.
London had fallen into the hands of
a mob of fanatics; the Archbishop of
Canterbury was murdered; and public
order seemed to be on the brink of
dissolution. The Bible in English
translated by these "Lollards" was
thus made an apology for sedition,
theft, and slaughter; it was wickedly
wrested from it's true meaning to be-
come the Great Charter of crime. We
cannot marvel, then, if a few years
later, in a convocation held at Oxford
(14O8), Archbishop Arundel enacted
that mo man should hereafter by his
town authority translate any text of the
Scripture into English; and that none
should read the versions "lately COM
posed in the time of John Wycliffe or
since," until the said translation 'was
vincial Council
Old English Bibles.
On this subject the latest comment
. will be found in the new Encyclopae-
dia Britannica, The writer, Canon
Hensley Henson, stands at the op-
posite pole to Catholicism; but he is
thoroughly well-informed; and he
says: 'It would appear, however, as
if at first at all events the persecution
was directed not SO much against the
Biblical text itself as against the Lol.
lard interpretations, which accom-,
panied it." And again, TT must be
allowed that an enactment of this
kind" meaning Archbishop Arundels
decree, "was not without justification
The Lollards, for instance, did not
hesitate to introduce into certain cop
les of the pious and orthodox Com
mentary on the Psalms by the hermit
of Hampole Orchard Rolle) interpola
, tions of their own of the most vir
ulently controversial kind, and al
though the text of their Biblical yer
, sions was faithful and true, the Gen
; eral Prologue of the Later Version was
interlarded with controversial mat
,, ter" Nevertheless, Canon Hensley
Henson goes on to remark: "Fol
all this, manuscripts, of Purvey's Revi
sion were copied. and recopied during
this (the fifteenth) century, the tex
itself being evidently approved by the
, ecclesiastical authorities, when in the
hands of the right people and if un
!. accompanied by controversial mat
> ter" 1t is certain that manuscript
. copies of an English Bible were il
/ possession of such orthodox Catholics
. as Thomas of Woodstock, Henry vi
: Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, anl
. the Brigittine nuns of Syon House
. English Bibles were bequeathed b!
: will, and given to churches or con
q vents.
e From these things it has bee1
O argued, as above by Canon Henson
v that authority tolerated the use of
# version made by Lollards-and no ex
v tant Bibles do, in fact, show heretica
=. taints in their text-or else, as by Ah
= bot Gasquet, that there was an &C
If knowledged Catholic translation. w
4 are bound, at all events, to accept tn
D. remarkable witness of Sir Thoma
IS More in his Dialogue Il myself hav
y seen and can show you," says tn
a. martyr, Bibles fair and old written il
;e English, which have been known an
e seen by the Bishop of the Diocese
W and left in the hands of lay men an
women whom he knew to be good an
Catholic people, More himself wa
decidedly in favor of vernacular tran!
Of lations; but ''the New Testament new
re ly-forged by Tyndale, altered, an
e. changed in matters of great weight,
n deserved, in his opinion, to be PR
w hibited. Cranmer and Foxe, the ma
at tyro1ogist, both allude to translation
s of the whole body of Scripture, "a
erl Continued on Page a