Books : God's Bestseller: William Tyndale, Thomas More, and the Writing of the English Bible---A Story of Martyrdom and Betrayal
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Type of bind: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 270.6092
EAN num: 9780312314866
ISBN number: 0312314868
Label: St. Martin's Press
Manufacturer: St. Martin's Press
Quantity: 1
Page Count: 416
Printing Date: August 23, 2003
Publishing house: St. Martin's Press
Sale Popularity Level: 144253
Studio: St. Martin's Press
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The English Bible---the mot familiar book in our language---is the product of a man who was exiled, vilified, betrayed, then strangled, then burnt.
William Tyndale left England in 1524 to translate the word of God into English. This was heresy, punishable by death. Sir Thomas More, hailed as a saint and a man for all seasons, considered it his divine duty to pursue Tyndale. He did so with an obsessive ferocity that, in all probability, led to Tyndale's capture and death.
The words that Tyndale wrote during his desperate exile have a beauty and familiarity that still resonate across the English-speaking world: 'Death, where is thy sting?...eat, drink, and be merry...our Father which art in heaven.'
His New Testament, which he translated, edited, financed, printed, and smuggled into England in 1526, passed with few changes into subsequent versions of the Bible. So did those books of the Old Testament that he lived to finish.
Brian Moynahan's lucid and meticulously researched biography illuminates Tyndale's life, from his childhood in England, to his death outside Brussels. It chronicles the birth pangs of the Reformation, the wrath of Henry VIII, the sympathy of Anne Boleyn, and the consuming malice of Thomas More. Above all, it reveals the English Bible as a labor of love, for which a man in an age more spiritual than our own willingly gave his life.
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Rated by buyers 
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Moynahan weaves a tale of political intrigue, outlining the passion and courage of the small group of English Reformers, most notably, William Tyndale. Tyndale, a skilled translator, is finally getting his due, primarily through the efforts of David Daniell, and the Tyndale Society. This book, along with Daniell's well-written biography of Tyndale, paints a clear picture of this good man's work.
On the other hand, Moynahan fails to complete a clear link between Tyndale's betrayer, Phillips, and Thomas More. While More clearly has much to answer for with his hate and personal involvement in the torture of English Reformers, he cannot, without doubt, be clearly charged with the martyrdom of Tyndale.
Moynahan's book is well-researched, with a sizable appendix on his sources. It would be an improvement to add clearer, specific references.
Other than that, well-done.
Rated by buyers -
Perhaps it's hard to imagine, in this culture that seems so often frivolous and egocentric, caring enough about anything to put one's life at stake in service to it.
That's exactly what William Tyndale did in his long, rebellious quest to contribute to the translation, publication, and wider dissemination of the Bible, arguably the most important, influential text ever published.
Tyndale's is an oft-told tale, but it's told with verve and sparkling style here. This is one of those fine books that reminds the reader that true stories really are sometimes better than fiction! I recommend this experience to all who love a good yarn with plenty of intrigue, twists and turns.
--Robert McDowell, The Poetry Mentor (www.robertmcdowell.net), author of POETRY AS SPIRITUAL PRACTICE, July 15th, 2008, Free Press
Rated by buyers 
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Moynahan's book is informative, well-written and well-produced (except for sources rather than footnotes). Despite some reviewers strained concerns, the book represents no threat to people of faith. In fact it celebrates them. It depicts the struggles and underlying genius of a gifted translator and polemicist, William Tyndale and is as exciting as a thriller. Cleverly and informatively interweaving the emergence of the new printing industry - Moynahan presents a Europe that is surprisingly cosmopolitan. Tyndale wanders from Antwerp to Cologne to Maintz to Hamburg, pursued by Wolsey's spies, ambassadors and priests. Tyndale managed because he was a polyglot - English, German, French, Dutch, Greek, Latin and Hebrew - and he had many supporters especially among the men and women of business and industry.
In celebrating Tyndale's accomplishments, Moynahan does a number on the much and overly celebrated Thomas More. I am a practicing Catholic and Englishman too boot, brought up on the presumed saintliness of Thomas More. Stimulated by C. J. Sansom's 16th Century murder mystery - Dissolution, I have read in quick order biographies of Wolsey, Cromwell and now Tyndale. I no longer think of More as "blessed". True, More stood by his principles and was erudite - but he appears fanatical, twisted and sadistic and demonstrated little belief in the sanctity of human life. After reading Moynahan's description of More's pursuit of Tyndale and other evangelicals, I defy anyone to see More's Utopia as a pleasant place.
Moynahan effectively brings to life the leading characters of this troubled, violent, vicious and generally un-Christian period. The work and genius of Master William Tyndale - who appears to have been more saintly than Thomas More - have been largely submerged in the blood and fire of the times: Blood and fire in large measure shed and stoked in the name of us Catholics. While much of the Reformation was driven by avarice, greed and geo-politics, the reality is that the Church had become wedded to form over substance, and the Rome of the Medicii Popes was closer to today's Hollywood than to Heaven. It is stunning to see the attitude of the Catholic Church towards the Bible and the laity. Great things were at stake just as they are today, but the manner in which those great things were championed and protected was intolerant, immoral and deeply un-Christian.
Rated by buyers 
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IT IS SO EASY TO ATTACK THE ANGLICANS, LUTHERANS , AND EPISCOPALIANS FOR THEIR HERESY THAT IT IS SELF-EVIDENT, BUT MR.MOYNAHAN'S OBSSESSIVE HATRED OF MORE IS CAUSE FOR CONCERN OVER HIS REAL IQ REGARDING THE WHOLE ISSUES OF THE SO-CALLED "REFORMATION"[ BUT MORE ACCURATELY TO BE TERMED THE PROTESTANT'S WAR ON THE ONE AND TRUE CHURCH ]PERHAPS MR.MOYNAHAN IS IGNORANT OVER THE SEVERE FRACTURING OF THE EPISCOPALIAN CHURCH IN THE USA -PERHAPS EVIDENCE THAT IT WAS HERESY AND THIS OF COURSE WILL LEAD BACK TO CANTERBURY EVENTUALLY. ACCUSATIONS ARE MADE AGAINST THE CATHOLIC THROUGH BLIND AND STUPID STORIES[ AS IF PEOPLE LEARN THEIR THEOLOGY FROM HELLISH HOLLYWOOD ] MORE IS STILL WELL KNOWN 572 YEARS AFTER HIS DEATH AND IN FACT, IS OFTEN REFERRED TO AS "A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS." TYNDALE IS A CURIOUS ANSWER TO A TRIVIA QUESTION. DR. JOHNSON EVEN MENTIONED MORE IN GLOWING PRAISE. THIS BOOK IS A PIECE OF PROPAGANDA GARBAGE - BURN IT LIKE MORE BURNED THE HERETICS TRYING TO KILL THE CHURCH. WANT PEOPLE TO HAVE NO GUIDANCE AND DETERMINE THEIR OWN MEAN numINGS FROM THEIR VERNACULAR?AS TYNDALE WANTED [ AS MOYNAHAN DEFENDS ] THIS IS THE KORAN....
Rated by buyers -
God's Bestseller is the second biography of Tyndale I have read this year and one of only a few produced in recent decades. Written by Brian Moynahan, the subtitle provides a glimpse of the author's emphases: "William Tyndale, Thomas More, and the Writing of the English Bible--A Story of Martyrdom and Betrayal." Less-scholarly than David Daniell's William Tyndale: A Biography, God's Bestseller is also more readable, as evidenced by the Mail on Sunday's endorsement which suggests it is "almost worthy of LeCarre."
Though William Tyndale died almost 500 years ago, we continue to read and enjoy his Bible. The very first man to translate Scripture into English, much of Tyndale's language and vocabulary continue to used commonly within the church and without. He coined words and phrases such as My brother's keeper, passover and scapegoat. Other commonly used phrases include let there be light, the powers that be, my brother's keeper, the salt of the earth and a law unto themselves. His mastery of English, though the language was still in its infancy, was unparalleled in his age. "In the begynnynge was the worde, and the worde was with God: the the word was God. The same was in the begynnynge with God. All thinges were made by it and with out it was made nothinge that was made. In it was lyfe and the lyfe was the lyght of men. And the light shyneth in the darknes but the darknes comprehended it not." Those verses passed into the King James and subsequent translations almost untouched.
Tyndale's mastery of the language is evident in passages of Scripture he was able to translate only in part before his untimely death. Read aloud these passages from Song of Solomon as they were written by Tyndale and then by the writers of the King James. "Up and haste my love, my dove, my bewtifull and come away..." The King James renders this same passage with far less skill, "Rise up, my love, my fair one, and come away." Tyndale writes, "For now is wynter gone and the rayne departed and past." The King James bumbles, "For lo, the winter is past, the rain is over, and gone." The cadence, the use of language, is unmatched. We can only imagine how Tyndale would have rendered the Psalms, Job and other poetic books had he been granted long life.
But as we know, Tyndale was not able to complete his translation of the Old Testament. He did not write his own epitaph as was the custom at the time. But as Moynahan points out, a passage he left from 1 Corinthians seems to serve well: "'And though I gave my body even that I burned, and yet had no love, it profiteth me nothing.' That used love and not charity was technical evidence of his heresy, of course, and the prime reason why More wanted him brunt. But Tyndale did not die for charity; he died for love, for the love of God's words and of their readers, and the most familiar work in the English language is thereby given the added grace of being a labour of love." We see this love evident in his reply to Henry VIII when offered safe passage to his native England. Were Henry to grant even a bare text of Scripture to the common people, Tyndale promised, "I shall immediately make faithful promise never to write more, nor abide two days in these parts after the same: but immediately to repair unto his realm, and there most humbly submit myself at the feet of his royal majesty, offering my body to suffer what pain or torture, yea, what death his grace will, so this be obtained. And till that time, I will abide the asperity of all chances, whatsoever shall come, and endure my life in as many pains as it is able to bear and suffer." The king would never submit to so audacious a demand and soon decreed that Tyndale be hunted down and killed. Though agents of Henry were never able to find Tyndale, he did eventually fall into the hands of the church authorities and was put to death. His last words, soon to be a rallying cry for English Protestants, were near-prophetic. "Oh Lord, open the King of England's eyes," he cried. Only a few short years later, Henry authorized an English translation of the Bible and, ironically, one based largely on the work of Tyndale.
Tyndale's name may not be widely known, but his influence is still felt. "Tyndale's traces are everywhere, of course. 'That old tongue, with its clang and its flavour,' as the critic Edmund Wilson wrote of the Bible, 'that we have been living with all our lives,' is Tyndale's tongue. Its cadence, its rolling and happy phrases, its consolations and the elegance of its solace, are his."
Despite his influence and his importance to the development of the English language, Tyndale is relatively unknown to both Christians and non-Christians. It is to our detriment that we forget about this great man of faith who gave his life for his conviction that the Word of God must go forth and must be made available in the common tongue. Moynahan's biography is an excellent introduction to Tyndale's ... Read More
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