Alberto Tierra Martín. Group 2.
From William Tyndale, Prologue to the New Testament (Cologne, 1525).
This is a fragment taken from the prologue of a translation of the New Testament made by
William Tyndale, an English scholar who was a key figure in the Protestant Reformation. The
document, which was published clandestinely at Cologne (Germany) in 1525, outlines the
fundamental elements of the Protestant doctrine, including the necessity of saving faith, the
existence of God and the inherent sinfulness of human nature. Tyndale’s translation, which
placed a strong emphasis on the one and only authority of God, was of vital importance to the
process of the reformation of the Church and the establishment of Anglicanism in England.
The relationship between monarchs and the Church had always been tense, but it reached its
peak during the 16th century, under the reign of Henry VIII. Since the ecclesiastical hierarchy
was corrupt and had too many privileges and wealth, the rise of a centralised modern state
limited the power of the Church. And not only that, but society in general demanded some
changes as well. Thus, in 1517, the monk and theologian Martin Luther contended that the
Bible was the primary source of doctrine on Earth, and not the traditions, the Pope or the
councils of the Church. These ideas led to a translation of the Bible, since it was crucial that
all Christians have access to the Bible, which was still written in Latin and could not be read
by most people. It was during that time when William Tyndale, an English protestant who
had studied theology at Oxford, translated the New Testament and parts of the Old into
English. Even though his translation was illegal because the Bishop of London did not allow
it, he secretly published his translation in 1525 at Cologne and then a new edition in 1526.
However, some copies were smuggled into Britain and the Catholic Church began to
persecute him. Tyndale started to relocate from city to city to escape from the persecution,
but finally he was arrested in Antwerp, Belgium in 1535, imprisoned in the castle of
Vilvoorde, and executed for heresy in 1536.
The main idea of the text is how the author explained that from the womb of our mother we
are doomed to commit sins and also how he defended the ideas of Protestantism.
In the first paragraph of the text, Tyndale introduces the sin of Adan and Eve into Paradise
referring to the Old Testament. Basically, the principal idea is that everybody is naturally
sinful since their birth (“we have our fellowship with the damned evils (…) while er are yet
in our mothers’ wombs”, lines 1-4). Tyndale insist on the idea that our nature is to commit
sins, and, to reinforce that, he makes some comparisons between humans and a serpent (lines
7-13). Tyndale says that serpent’s nature is to sting because serpents are full of poison.
Nevertheless, it does not make humans evil or guilty, because that is humans’ nature, like
serpent’s is sting people, but they are not evil since stinging people is their nature. The author
also compares humans with other animals, such as an adder or a toad all of them poisonous
animals, line 10). He even compares the humans with the Tree of the knowledge of good and
evil (biblical reference: Genesis 2:3, lines 13-15), just to conclude that, even though our
actions make us evil, we are not evil, but we are punished by God because of our sinfulness
anyway (lines 15-19).
In the second and last paragraph, the author explains the doctrine of salvation by God from
the point of view of Protestantism. Using metaphors and examples, Tyndale explains the
message of the Bible “by grace (…) we are plucked out of Adam”. He thinks that in order to
be saved by God from our sinfulness, everything we must do is believe on God and read the
Holy Gospel, because God put on us the knowledge of him and gave us a second opportunity
to be saved by grace (lines 20-29). Here, Tyndale is clearly questioning the authority of the
Church because our salvation does not depend on a priest anymore, so we have here the three
doctrine points: Solo scriptura, because this is an English translation; Solo gratia, because
our salvation depends on God; and Solo Christo, because Chris is the only mediator and
redeemer.
To conclude, this text shows the ideas that Protestantism defended during the English
Reformation, although England suffered several drastic changes during these years. While
Tyndale was in exile, Henry VIII sought divorce from his wife Katherine of Aragon, so he
broke ties with Catholicism, although the Reformation was initially supposed to be political
and not religious. Henry approved Tyndale’s translation of the Bible, and then Miles
Coverdale completed it after his execution in 1536.
