Tyndale, William

tin'dal, William (1484-1536), an English reformer. He was educated for the priesthood at Oxford and Cambridge, and was for a time chaplain to a nobleman in his native Gloucestershire. He went to London and thence to the continent to secure freedom to bring out an English translation of the New Testament. He came into sympathy with the German reformation and visited Luther at Wittenberg. He began to print at Cologne but was driven out. He then took refuge at Worms and translated the New Testament and the books of Moses from the Greek into English. The details of his life are known imperfectly, but he is known to have lived at Antwerp. Finally he was arrested at Brussels, tried for heresy, strangled, and burned at the stake. A fragment of the Cologne edition of Tyndale's Testament is preserved in the British Museum. The Baptist college at Bristol, England, preserves an entire copy of the Worms edition. Copies of later editions issued at Antwerp are literary treasures. Tyndale's translation was used as far as it went in the preparation of the King James Bible, the authorized or common version. Tyndale's object in life is expressed by his reply to an abusive clergyman: "If God spare my life, ere many years, I will cause a boy that driveth the plowshare to know more of the Scriptures than thou dost." See Bible; Wyclif