THE OXFORD REFORMERS

PART THE FIRST

HISTORICAL

AN OPEN BIBLE

THE history of the long struggle on the part of the people of England for an open Bible, and for the solution of the question, Who are the proper keepers of Holy Writ, the clergy alone or the congregation at large? can never lack interest with an English Churchman.

In gaining for the people the use of a free Bible, Oxford took the lead in a remarkable way. The University has been true to its well-known emblem and striking motto, an open Bible, on the pages of which we read "The Lord is my light," while the city motto reveals the power, "Strong is Truth."

We are so used to an open Bible that we are scarcely able to realize the fact that for 150 years men were burned alive

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for reading the Word of God in English; that Sir Thomas More, esteemed a gentle and amiable as well as a learned man, argued that Bible readers or distributors might lawfully be burned; that a short time before the close of that 150 years Cardinal Wolsey and the Bishop of London burnt Bibles in St. Paul's Churchyard, after which from burning books they proceeded to burn men, women, and children for the crime of reading them.

The two great leaders in this holy war for the release of a captive Bible were Oxford men-Wycliffe, whose written Bible prepared the way, and Tyndale, who with the aid of printing multiplied the copies a thousandfold.

These good men not only discovered the remedy for the abounding evils in the possession of "an open Bible," but they attacked energetically the sacramental system of Popery which, like an iron chain, had bound the minds of men in the bondage of ignorance.

The early Church in Britain had an open Bible up to the time of Bede and beyond it. Bede, who died in A.D. 735, tells us that in his time there were five languages-that is, of the English (Anglo-Saxon), Britons, Scots, Picts, and Latins-" yet the Latin tongue is by the study of the Scripture become common to all." Thus it is evident that the Scriptures were in the hands of the people. No stern laws forbidding them had been passed; but already superstition was fast increasing among the semi-evangelized tribes. Transubstantiation, image and relic worship grew apace as the ignorance of Scripture prevailed. The result of this was disastrous. Earnest men looked to the Church of Rome, and unhappily Rome encouraged those medieval corruptions which strengthened their absolute power and undisputed authority.

A complete system of theological teaching was laid down in the name of the Church, which may conveniently be called the Sacramental System of the Dark Ages, inconsistent with Bible teaching, but the most effective agent of human tyranny. The fatal error and strength of this system was the assertion that the efficacy of the Sacraments lay in the

administration, and not in the spiritual state of mind and heart of the receiver; and in order to meet objections, gives to the priests, as divinely authorized, power to direct the conscience and convey pardon to the sinner by means of the so-called Sacraments of Orders, Confirmation, Penance, and Extreme Unction.

Thus, the Romish notion of Baptismal Regeneration deludes people with the idea that the parish register is their passport to the heavenly life, and they heed not St. Peter's words: "Being born again not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever."

As for Justification, the Church of England, with every orthodox Protestant Church in the world, teaches there is only one way, and that is Justification by Faith only, which the Church of England terms "a most wholesome doctrine," and of which one of the greatest lights of the Reformation remarked: "Let but the Papists yield us up this safe and entire, and we will not think the rest worth contending for." The venerable Latimer, in his usual energetic way, asks: "What is this Regeneration ?" "It is not to be christened in water and nothing else, as these firebrands expound it;" and of Justification he remarked: "It is no more but believe and have."

The dangerous character of these errors may clearly be seen even in the pages of the New Testament. Long before the institution of the Two Sacraments our Lord Himself warned Nicodemus not to rest in the outward form, saying, "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth: 80 is every one that is born of the Spirit,;" and, again, when He said, "Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, dwelleth in Me, and I in him;" and when His hearers could not rise to the spiritual meaning, He added these significant words: "It is the Spirit that quickeneth ; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life.”

Some twenty-five years after the Ascension of our Lord we

for reading the Word of God in English; that Sir Thomas More, esteemed a gentle and amiable as well as a learned man, argued that Bible readers or distributors might lawfully be burned; that a short time before the close of that 150 years Cardinal Wolsey and the Bishop of London burnt Bibles in St. Paul's Churchyard, after which from burning books they proceeded to burn men, women, and children for the crime of reading them.

The two great leaders in this holy war for the release of a captive Bible were Oxford men-Wycliffe, whose written Bible prepared the way, and Tyndale, who with the aid of printing multiplied the copies a thousandfold.

These good men not only discovered the remedy for the abounding evils in the possession of "an open Bible," but they attacked energetically the sacramental system of Popery which, like an iron chain, had bound the minds of men in the bondage of ignorance.

The early Church in Britain had an open Bible up to the time of Bede and beyond it. Bede, who died in A.D. 735, tells us that in his time there were five languages-that is, of the English (Anglo-Saxon), Britons, Scots, Picts, and Latins-" yet the Latin tongue is by the study of the Scripture become common to all." Thus it is evident that the Scriptures were in the hands of the people. No stern laws forbidding them had been passed; but already superstition was fast increasing among the semi-evangelized tribes. Transubstantiation, image and relic worship grew apace as the ignorance of Scripture prevailed. The result of this was disastrous. Earnest men looked to the Church of Rome, and unhappily Rome encouraged those medieval corruptions which strengthened their absolute power and undisputed authority.

A complete system of theological teaching was laid down in the name of the Church, which may conveniently be called the Sacramental System of the Dark Ages, inconsistent with Bible teaching, but the most effective agent of human tyranny. The fatal error and strength of this system was the assertion that the efficacy of the Sacraments lay in the

administration, and not in the spiritual state of mind and heart of the receiver; and in order to meet objections, gives to the priests, as divinely authorized, power to direct the conscience and convey pardon to the sinner by means of the so-called Sacraments of Orders, Confirmation, Penance, and Extreme Unction.

Thus, the Romish notion of Baptismal Regeneration deludes people with the idea that the parish register is their passport to the heavenly life, and they heed not St. Peter's words: "Being born again not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever."

As for Justification, the Church of England, with every orthodox Protestant Church in the world, teaches there is only one way, and that is Justification by Faith only, which the Church of England terms " a most wholesome doctrine," and of which one of the greatest lights of the Reformation remarked: "Let but the Papists yield us up this safe and entire, and we will not think the rest worth contending for." The venerable Latimer, in his usual energetic way, asks: "What is this Regeneration ?" "It is not to be christened in water and nothing else, as these firebrands expound it;" and of Justification he remarked: "It is no more but believe and have."

The dangerous character of these errors may clearly be seen even in the pages of the New Testament. Long before the institution of the Two Sacraments our Lord Himself warned Nicodemus not to rest in the outward form, saying, "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit," and, again, when He said, "Whoso eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, dwelleth in Me, and I in him;" and when His hearers could not rise to the spiritual meaning, He added these significant words: "It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are spirit and they are life.”

Some twenty-five years after the Ascension of our Lord we