There were three major events which made it possible for the Dark Ages to be shattered by the light of the Bible to shine throughout the European Continent and then spread to England. First, Johan Gensfleisch zum Gutenberg invented moveable type to be used with the printing press.
The second event was the downfall of Constantinople to the Muslims in 1454. The result was that many Greek scholars had to flee to Europe with their precious manuscripts, including their Greek New Testament manuscripts. Many of them took positions in the great European universities and there was a renaissance of ancient learning, including the teaching of the Greek language. When combined with the invention of the moveable type printing press, this multiplied the availability of books.
The third and final event that facilitated releasing the vice grip grasp of the Roman Church on the world was Erasmus Desiderius Roterodamus’ collecting New Testament manuscripts and for the first time ever, publishing all 27 of the New Testament manuscripts in one book in 1516. In one column is the Greek New Testament text accompanied by Erasmus’ own new Latin translation, and then this was followed by Erasmus’ notes, giving his comments on the text. His translation of the Greek into Latin showed just how corrupt that Latin Vulgate really was. Between the years 1516 and 1535 Erasmus published five editions of the Greek New Testament.
It is from Erasmus’ 1522 Greek New Testament that William Tyndale produced the first printed Bible in English.
http://logosresourcepages.org/Articles/bible_history.htm
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The Roman Church intended to rule the secular and sacred world. In order to accomplish that goal, Rome had to consolidate her power. Since knowledge is the vital element of power, the control of knowledge was paramount. Knowledge of the Word of God, leads to freedom. Our Lord said, “ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:32. Therefore, the Bible had to be taken away from the people, if they were to be controlled.
So, “instead of God’s Word, man’s word was set up. Instead of Christ’s Testament, the pope’s testament, that is, Canon law” was ‘substituted’ .....(The Ecclesiastical History: Containing The Acts and Monuments…1641 Edition; by John Foxe, Volume 2, Book 7, p.56).
Gradually, access to biblical knowledge (and secular knowledge for that matter) was withdrawn from the people and wholly held in the greedy, bloody hands of the Roman Catholic establishment..... Slowly but surely the Bible, in the language of the people, was taken away..... The light of the Word of God was virtually extinguished all over the Roman dominated world, including Britain.
Here is but one example of the distressing state of biblical knowledge..... “In 1353, three or four young Irish priests came over to England to study divinity; but were obligated to return home because not a copy of the Bible was to be found at Oxford.” .....(The English Bible: History of the Translation of the Holy Scriptures Into The English Tongue; by H. C. Conant; 1856; p.45).
So, how did the Catholic ecclesiastical establishment view this sad state of affairs? “It has frequently been made the subject of praise to the papal clergy, that they alone were the depositaries of learning, at a period when all other classes of society were sunk into ignorance and barbarism.” (Ibid. p.15)
That is a travesty!.... If the Roman priesthood would have encouraged and facilitated the spreading of Bible and secular knowledge it would have been an age of light! But, instead they hid the light of knowledge within their cloisters, and history now records this period as “The Dark Ages.”
When the Bible was taken away from the common people, “they lost the charter of their rights as men.”. As time went on the people became the mere tools and bond-slaves of the priesthood...... They became “the rabble, the vulgar herd, the mob, to be used or abused without limits or mercy, for the benefit of their masters.”
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