The Press Junior THURSDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1936. The English Bible

Press, Volume LXXII, Issue 21908, 8 October 1936, Page 4 (Supplement)

The Press Junior THURSDAY, OCTOBER 8, 1936. The English Bible

To-day every girl and boy who reads " this page can read the Bible in English. Anyone who has no Bible in the house may borrow one from a library or look at One in a shop; there are thousands of. new.copies printed every year to be supplied to readers all over the world. But it has not been like this for all time and indeed not for numbers of centuries. This time 100 years ago il was still the custom for the veiry poor to have no education of any kind. They could neither read nor write. And as the years go. back we find it worse; in Queen Elizabeth’s time the people did not read their Bible at all It Was read to them from the pulpit and was in most places chained to the reading desk so that it might not be carried away. This custom of chaining up the Bible for safety from thieves goes back in England to the time of King Alfred the Great. The priests in the chinches and the mopks in the monasteries alone had the right to touch or read the Bible; and so that others would be prevented from taking it away they chained it and locked it in the chapeL But in any case it would not have been much use to the people; it was written in Latin and during all the years s Up till the beginning of the sixteenth century only those parts that the priests and ministers thought suitable were read to the people. In 1525, how-1 ever, one William Tyndale completed a printed version of the whole of the Bible, both Old and New Testaments. This Bible student was at Cambridge under Erasmus; and later, because he found no encouragement in England. he went to the Continent and did pert of his work at Worms and part at Cologne. It was at Worms that the first English version of the New Testament was printed by Tyndale with his own hands. Immediately this work appeared in language to be read by the few educated pedple as well as by the priests and ministers there was a great outcry. Tyndale was persecuted and imprisoned and was finally md to death on October 6, 1536. SO* death Is now regarded as the death of a martyr. He, had given to the English people a Bible thear could read in their own years later we are •tm indebted to this scholar who aunt a life’s hard work at a teak which, when finished, caused him 10 years’ misery followed Sir shameful death. In 400 yeates* time it Is probable * that pwoue will Still read the words first gave to Engflinmeh to read In their own language ant with their own eyes.