The book that the famed British Library once called the most significant in the English language was nearly destroyed before it was even printed. That book was William Tyndale’s 1526 English New Testament, whose 500th anniversary is being commemorated this year.
Not only was the book banned and burned when it was smuggled into England from Germany, where Tyndale was living a fugitive life, but before that, when the first printing had reached Matthew 22, the print shop in Cologne was raided by Catholic sympathizers. Tyndale barely escaped with his unpublished manuscript in hand.
Tyndale’s translation of the New Testament from the original Greek became the foundation of all English Bible translation until the middle of the 20th century (when dynamic equivalence introduced an alternative to Tyndale’s philosophy of translation). When Tyndale’s smuggled book infiltrated English society, people were converted and the doctrines of the Reformation were established.
But Tyndale also effected a revolution in the English language. The common saying “no Tyndale, no Shakespeare” has become a byword among scholars of the English language. The flowering of English at the end of the 16th century would have been impossible without the linguistic wheels that Tyndale set in motion at the beginning of the century.
Less acknowledged is how much Tyndale’s mastery of English resulted from his work translating the Bible. It’s impossible to imagine anglophone culture today without Tyndale and his monumental translation project. His story evidences another example of the Bible transforming our world.
Rapidly Evolving Language
In the preface to his 1526 New Testament, Tyndale apologized for “the rudeness of the work” being offered to the public. He even expressed the hope that his translation would not “offend” his readers.
But many of the deficiencies about which Tyndale worried weren’t his fault. He was acknowledging that the English language was in transition from Middle English to Modern English. Spelling, grammar, and punctuation were chaotic rather than standardized. Tyndale’s own name was spelled four different ways.
Tyndale’s translation of the New Testament from the original Greek became the foundation of all English Bible translation until the middle of the 20th century.
To catch the flavor of how deficient the English language was at the beginning of Tyndale’s century, all we need to do is dip into his prologue again. He wrote, “In time to come (if God have appointed us thereunto) we will give it his full shape, and put out, if ought be added superfluously, and add to, if ought be overseen through negligence.” Those lines are hard to comprehend, even when the spelling is modernized.
Just 35 years later, in a similar document, the preface to the Puritans’ Geneva translation of the Bible praised Scripture in flowing and accomplished prose. For example, it explains that the Bible is “the light to our paths, the key of the kingdom of heaven, our comfort in affliction, our shield and sword against Satan, the school of all wisdom, . . . the only food and nourishment of our souls.” The difference in the English language is striking.
That’s not because the Geneva Bible translators were more accomplished linguists than Tyndale was. In fact, Tyndale’s language skills were unmatched. In addition to his native English, he spoke and wrote in many languages—Latin, Hebrew, Greek, German, Italian, Spanish, and French. One of Tyndale’s contemporaries claimed that “whichever he spoke, you would suppose it his native tongue.”
Instead, the fluency of the Geneva preface is the result of the linguistic revolution that began with Tyndale’s New Testament. Renaissance-era historian John Strype provides a vivid picture of the popularity of Tyndale’s Bible and indirectly shows the means by which Tyndale managed to transform the language of a whole nation:
It was wonderful to see with what joy this Book of God was received . . . all England over, among all the . . . common People; and with what greediness God’s Word was read, and what resort to Places where the reading of it was. Every body that could, bought the Book. . . . And even little Boys flocked among the rest to hear Portions of the Holy Scripture read. (emphasis original)
Tyndale’s translation of the Bible remade the English language even as it was instrumental in making people new.
Work in Progress
Yet the work of translation also made Tyndale who he was. His fluency with the emerging language known as Modern English was unleashed as he translated the Bible. Thankfully, he saved his best efforts for Scripture itself.
If we compare Tyndale’s style in his religious treatises with his translation of the Bible, it’s the difference between night and day. Here is a specimen of Tyndale’s English prose outside his translation of the Bible, taken from the preface to his 1526 translation of the New Testament: “Them that are learned christianly I beseech, forasmuch as I am sure, and my conscience beareth me record, that of a pure intent, singly and faithfully, I have interpreted it.”
By contrast, when we turn to Tyndale’s New Testament, we read this: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth” (Matt. 5:3–5). And this: “But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, and a peculiar people, that ye should show the virtues of him that called you out of darkness into this marvelous light” (1 Pet. 2:9).
Tyndale himself hinted that the Bible produced his triumphs of English when he wrote that “the manner of speaking” in the original texts of the Bible is so compatible with English that “in a thousand places you need only translate it into English, word for word” to achieve “grace and sweetness, . . . sense and pure understanding.”
Better than Shakespeare
The familiar motto “no Tyndale, no Shakespeare” has made Tyndale seem to be a forerunner and expediter only. This distorts the facts. Shakespeare added to Tyndale’s contribution, but he didn’t replace it. By way of parallel, the King James New Testament didn’t only benefit from Tyndale’s mastery of translation and the English language—it retained over 80 percent of the wording of Tyndale’s New Testament.
Tyndale’s translation of the Bible remade the English language even as it was instrumental in making people new.
Similarly, while Shakespeare added 1,700 new words to the English language, so Tyndale added a large number as well. He is cited thousands of times in the Oxford English Dictionary as one of the earliest uses of a word or phrase. It’s Tyndale who gave us the words “intercession,” “beautiful,” and “brokenhearted.” In our storehouse of familiar sayings today, we’re more likely to be quoting from Tyndale than from Shakespeare. Examples are “the signs of the times,” “a law unto themselves,” and “the salt of the earth.”
With both Tyndale and Shakespeare, the greatness of the words isn’t secondary but essential. The brilliance of the words launches the greatness of the content. I’m reminded of a television interview of a Shakespearean actress who said, “You need more than a role to play—you need the words.” The words of Shakespeare are words of truth and beauty, and so are the words of Tyndale’s New Testament being commemorated during this anniversary year. But the words of Tyndale’s New Testament are more than true and beautiful; they’re the words of eternal life.
Read more from Leland Ryken in his new book, William Tyndale’s New Testament: A Biography of the Book That Changed Our World (Christian Publishing House, 2026).
