A Gallery of Characters and Places
...
 
Sir Thomas More & Henry VIII
A Gallery of Characters in Tyndale’s
Life
Sir Thomas More
One of William Tyndale’s bitterest opponents,
and one of the best-known men in 16th-century England -- for his power,
his intellect and his religious convictions. His was the central character
in the prize-winning play and movie, A Man for All Seasons.
Thomas More was born in London, 6 February 1478,
the son of a judge. He was sent to Oxford for two years, then studied law
and was called to the Bar in 1501. He spent four years at the London Charterhouse
(monastery of the Carthusian monks), hoping to become a priest or monk
or friar. Leaving the Charterhouse, he entered Parliament. His friends
included Desiderius Erasmus and John Colet, and other scholars who desired
moderate reforms in the Church but were set against any break with the
Papacy. Henry VIII, who became king in 1509, recognized More's learning
and integrity, enjoyed his intelligent and cheerful conversation and ready
wit, became his friend, and appointed him to numerous public offices, including
finally that of Lord Chancellor of England.
More was commissioned by the king and the church
to refute William Tyndale’s arguments and to discredit his character. He
wrote nine books against Tyndale, filling more than 1,000 pages with arguments
and invective against the reformer, and always defending the ultimate authority
of the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church. More undertook to show that
Tyndale's translation of the Scriptures was so full of errors that it deserved
to be suppressed. More and Tyndale exchanged several broadsides. Tyndale's
denunciations of the doctrines taught by Rome would have fallen on deaf
ears if they had not in fact described doctrines that many men believed
they had heard from the pulpit, and had found utterly unacceptable.
Henry wrote a book On the Seven Sacraments,
a defense of traditional doctrines against the teachings of Martin Luther.
(The Pope rewarded him with the title, "Defender of the Faith," a title
born to this day by English monarchs.) More, discussing the book with Henry
while it was still in rough draft, said, "I am troubled, because the book
seems to me to give too much honor to the Pope." Henry replied, "There
is no such thing as giving too much honor to the Pope."
For many years, More prospered and enjoyed the
King's favor. Then the political winds changed. Henry declared that his
marriage to Queen Catharine was null and void. He was opposed in this,
by More and by Tyndale, and (less promptly and vigorously) by the Pope.
Henry broke off relations with the Pope, and proceeded to set Catharine
aside and take another wife, Anne Boleyn. More, who by this time was Lord
Chancellor of England, resigned his position and retired to private life,
hoping that he would be allowed to remain silent, neither supporting the
king nor opposing him. But the king required him to take a loyalty oath
which recognized the King as the earthly head of the Church in England.
This Thomas could not do. He refused the oath, and was thrown into the
Tower of London.
Ironically, though More had many people executed
because they denied the Pope’s authority, his immovable commitment to that
authority eventually led to his own death. When King Henry insisted on
getting a divorce contrary to papal proclamations, then went on to declare
that the pope no longer had authority in England, More told the king that
he disagreed and would have to resign his post. Henry could not tolerate
the public humiliation of having his closest advisor visibly questioning
his wisdom, so he had More executed on trumped-up charges.
for more on Sir Thomas More's controversy with Tyndale...
Cuthbert Tunstall
The bishop of London to whom Tyndale went in
1524, seeking patronage for his work of translating the New Testament into
English. As far as the church hierarchy went, Tunstall was a shrewd choice
on Tyndale’s part. Tunstall was a learned man, a language scholar of some
ability himself, and he had declared his affection for some of Erasmus’s
reform oriented ideas.
But Tyndale’s request came at a time when things
done in the name of reform were creating havoc in Europe: violent riots;
overthrows of local authorities; attacks on clergymen... So Tunstall was
leery of anything that smacked of "Lutheranism", and it was Luther’s common-language
German version of the New Testament that figured prominently in the sources
of the havoc. No matter how intelligent or concerned for scholarship he
was, he was at that time unready to support any New Testament translation
work, and so sent the young translator looking elsewhere for patronage.
Later, he can be seen burning Tyndale’s testaments and other pro-reform
literature. Apparently politics had won out.
Miles Coverdale
A translator/scholar who Tyndale befriended at
Oxford, he later helped Tyndale with his always continuing revision work
on the New Testament translation. After Tyndale’s death, it was an entire
English Bible with Coverdale’s name on it that Henry VIII officially approved
to be spread "among all the people".
Miles Coverdale continued Tyndale's work by translating
those portions of the Bible which Tyndale had not lived to translate himself,
and publishing the complete work. In 1537, the "Matthew Bible" (essentially
Tyndale's work under another man's name to spare the government embarrassment)
was published in England with the Royal Permission. Six copies were set
up for public reading in Old St Paul's Church, and throughout the daylight
hours the church was crowded with those who had come to hear it. One man
would stand at the lectern and read until his voice gave out, and then
he would stand down and another would take his place. All English translations
of the Bible from that time to the present century are essentially revisions
of Tyndale's translation.
John Frith
One of Tyndale’s closest friends, and like Tyndale,
one of England’s ablest scholars, also educated at both Oxford and Cambridge.
Three or four years younger than Tyndale, Frith probably sat at Tyndale’s
feet in the reform-oriented Bible studies that Tyndale led at Oxford, then
later Frith was, like Tyndale, pursued around England and Europe for his
reformation and translation efforts. A priest who married, Frith was captured
and martyred some three years before Tyndale. One of Tyndale’s Scripture-filled
letters to the imprisoned Frith includes the encouragement that Frith’s
wife was "well content with the will of God, and would not for her sake
have the glory of God hindered".
Anne Boleyn
This French-trained English beauty was indirectly
a friend to William Tyndale, though unfortunately for both her and Tyndale,
she was could not remain in the good graces of her husband the king. This
lady-in-waiting probably first came to Henry’s attention about 1527, after
his repeated attempts to conceive and raise up a healthy son with Catharine
had aged her and frustrated him. So while he pursued getting a divorce
from Catharine, he was also pursuing the affections of Anne. She teased
him, but would not give herself to him until he had the divorce and married
her. This done, she became queen. During her brief reign as queen (1533-36),
she managed to lay hands on an ornate copy of Tyndale’s 1534 edition of
the English New Testament, as well as a copy of his "heretical" The Obedience
of a Christian Man that she showed to Henry.
The king loved it, and for a time wanted Tyndale
to be his court propagandist. But in the meantime, Anne was unable, like
Catharine before her, to produce a healthy male heir. Plus, her prima donna
attitude alienated many in the court, and some of them told the king of
her sexual philandering with other men. Already disappointed in her, the
incensed Henry had her quickly executed and the marriage declared void.
Anyway, he had already set his eye upon Jane Seymour, and with Anne out
of the way she soon became Henry’s third wife.
Thomas Wolsey
This power-hungry son of an English butcher became
chaplain to the Archbishop of Canterbury at age 30, and chaplain to Henry
VII at 34. Under Henry VIII’s sovereignty, at age 44 he rose to Cardinal,
and at 54 became the pope’s personal representative in England. The corruption
in his heart apparently went deep; he accumulated property and fineries
that were exceeded in luxury only by King Henry’s, and was well-known for
having at least one "wife" and two or more illegitimate children. He became
the king’s right-hand man in several arenas, but especially in negotiating
with the pope to get the king’s way. Opposing and persecuting refomers
was just another way to keep both king and pope happy and united against
a common enemy. Unfortunately for Wolsey, he was unable to secure papal
permission for Henry’s divorce from Catharine quickly enough, and so was
sentenced by the king to die "for treason." Just past 61 years of age,
he died of fright and heart failure en route to his execution.
Bishop Stokesley
The bishop of London after Cuthbert Tunstall,
he became infamous as one of the cruelest opponents of Protestantism to
ever hold church office in England. He was responsible for the martyrdoms
of even more Protestants than Sir Thomas More, and was very likely the
one who financed Henry Phillips, the man who searched Tyndale out and betrayed
him.
The Poyntzes
The English couple who took Tyndale in, when
he was fleeing various agents of the king and the church, and gave him
quarters at the English merchants’ lodgings in Antwerp. Thomas Poyntz was
related to Lady Anne Walsh. During Tyndale’s stay with them, the Poyntzes
encouraged him, gave him a place to study, guarded his secrecy, and warned
him of their fears about Henry Phillips. After Phillips betrayed Tyndale,
Thomas worked diligently trying to secure Tyndale’s release, and himself
was imprisoned for his persistence and his pro-reformation sympathies.
Humphrey Monmouth
Monmouth was the London businessman who took
young Tyndale in and briefly gave him lodging, before the translator abandoned
hope of translating the New Testament in England and headed for Europe.
Apparently a good-hearted Catholic who only briefly flirted with Protestantism,
he later suffered appreciably for that flirtation; he was brought to trial
by the church for harboring the "heretic".
Sir John and Anne Walsh
John and Lady Anne Walsh were the masters of
Little Sodbury, the estate where Tyndale worked briefly after leaving Cambridge,
probably as a tutor to their two young sons. They were known in the region
for their hospitality to both nobility and clergy; it was at their table
that Tyndale challenged a visiting cleric, "If God grant me life, ere many
years pass I will see that the boy behind his plow knows more of the Scriptures
than thou dost!" Exposed to reformation thinking by Tyndale, the Walshes
gave him money to support himself in Europe, and later made efforts to
get him released from Vilvoorde prison.
Thomas Cromwell
He succeeded Sir Thomas More as chancellor to
the king, and tried to be a friend to Tyndale when the reformer was sitting
in prison. He is best-known for carrying out King Henry’s order to suppress
the monasteries in England, then for being executed by the king soon after
the last monastery had surrendered. A man of Protestant sympathies, he
attempted to get Tyndale set free from Vilvoorde prison by contacting the
governor of the prison. He was obviously not successful, but he was successful
in convincing the king to approve distribution of the English Bible translated
by Tyndale and Coverdale.
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