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Smith's Bible Dictionary
which proves the common Peshito not to exhibit a text of extreme antiquity equally proves the
early origin of this.
Versions, Authorized
•WYCLIFFE.—The
New Testament was translated by Wycliffe himself The Old Testament was
undertaken by Nicholas Deuteronomy Hereford, but was interrupted, and ends abruptly (following
so far the order of the Vulgate) in the middle of Baruch. The version was based entirely upon the
Vulgate. The following characteristics may be noticed as distinguishing this version: (1) The
general homeliness of its style. (2) The substitution in many cases, of English equivalents for
quasitechnical words. (3) The extreme literalness with which in some instances, even at the cost
of being unintelligible, the Vulgate text is followed, as in (2 Corinthians 1:17-19)
•TYNDAL.—The work of Wycliffe stands by itself. Whatever power it exercised in preparing the
way for the Reformation of the sixteenth century, it had no perceptible influence on later
translations. With Tyndal we enter on a continuous succession. He is the patriarch, in no remote
ancestry, of the Authorized Version. More than Cranmer or Ridley he is the true hero of the English
Reformation. “Ere many years, he said at the age of thirty-six (A.D. 1520), he would cause “a boy
that driveth the plough” to know more of Scripture than the great body of the clergy then knew.
He prepared himself for the work by long years of labor in Greek and Hebrew. First the Gospels
of St. Matthew and St. Mark were published tentatively. In 1525 the whole of the New Testament
was printed in quarto at Cologne, and in small octave at Worms. In England it was received with
denunciations. Tonstal, bishop of London, preaching at Paul’s Cross, asserted that there were at
least two thousand errors in it, and ordered all copies of it to be bought up and burnt. An act of
Parliament (35 Hen. VIII. cap. 1) forbade the use of all copies of Tyndal’s “false translation.” The
treatment which it received from professed friends was hardly less annoying. In the mean time
the work went on. Editions were printed one after another. The last appeared in 1535, just before
his death. To Tyndal belongs the honor of having given the first example of a translation based
on true principles, and the excellence of later versions has been almost in exact proportion as they
followed his. All the exquisite grace and simplicity which have endeared the Authorized Version
to men of the most opposite tempers and contrasted opinions is due mainly to his clear-sighted
truthfulness.
•COVERDALE.—A complete translation of the Bible, different from Tyndal’s, bearing the name
of Miles Coverdale, printed probably at Zurich, appeared in 1535. The undertaking itself and the
choice of Coverdale as the translator were probably due to Cromwell. He was content to make the
translation at second hand “out of the Douche (Luther’s German Version) and the Latine.” Fresh
editions of his Bible were published, keeping their ground in spite of rivals, in 1537, 1539, 1550,
1553. He was called in at a still later period to assist in the Geneva Version.
•MATTHEW.—In the year 1537, a large folio Bible appeared as edited and dedicated to the king
by Thomas Matthew. No one of that name appears at all prominently in the religious history of
Henry VIII., and this suggests inference that the name was adopted to conceal the real translator.
The tradition which connects this Matthew with John Rogers, the proto-martyr of the Marian
persecution, is all but undisputed. Matthew’s Bible reproduces Tyndal’s work, in the New Testament
entirely, in the Old Testament as far as 2 Chron., the rest being taken with occasional modifications
from Coverdale. A copy was ordered, by royal proclamation, to be set up in every church, the cost
being divided between the clergy and the parishioners. This was, therefore, the first Authorized
Version.
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William Smith