My Hero: William Tyndale

My public hero is William Tyndale. William Tyndale was born in 1494 and died in 1536. William Tyndale was the first person to translate the bible from Latin to English. Tyndale believed that everyone should be able to read the bible, and not just the Pope, the king or the rich who could afford to learn how to speak and read Latin. “I defy the Pope and all his laws. If God spare my life ere many years, I will cause the boy that drives the plow to know more of the scriptures than you!” -William Tyndale. He printed hundreds of copies of the translated bible. The people of England and the surrounding countries were so eager to read it that they were smuggled into the country in bundles of cloth, and in sacks of flour and other merchandise. At the time, he was mainly viewed as a villain due to the fact that he printed the bible without permission from the Pope or the king. He also disagreed with the Catholic Church's view of Christianity and included comments in his version of the bible that promoted his opinions. He also refused to follow King James' church of England. The leaders of the Catholic Church felt threatened by Tyndale because they believed that if everyone knew how to read the bible, the people of England would not look up to them and they would lose their power. King James eventually sent out men to find Tyndale and kill him, and after many years he was eventually found in Hamburg where he was living in hiding. He was betrayed by his friend Phillips who was working for the King, and after many months he was burnt at the stake. Tyndale's work is said to be as in important to the English language as Shakespeare's. The British library claimed that Tyndale's new testament was "the most important printed book in the English language" and paid more than one million pounds for it. According to an exhibit that was recently co-sponsered by the Library of Congress and the British library William Tyndale's work "was read by ten thousand times as many people as Chaucer." Tyndale is one of my hero's because I have grown up in a religious family, and I believe that I owe a lot to the bible, and if it weren't for William Tyndale's translation and edited version, around 70% of the bible would not be here today.