Hi Juantoo —
I can't help but wonder if this thread was begun as a subtle commentary on having the Bible available in vernacular?
Not directly — Someone at work pointed out the news item, so I thought I'd post it ...
Just because one could write the Bible in Pig Latin doesn't mean it should be.
My thoughts too. I think the difference lies between 'is there a need' and 'is there a buck to be made here' ...
At the time of the earliest English translations a part of the impetus was the desire to throw off the oppressive shackles suppressing the laity.
An idealistic part, perhaps, but (having not researched it) I don't buy it. I am inclined to think that's more a propaganda whitewash after the event. In my view, the common people were no better off after the Reformation, and in some aspects worse.
Does having the Bible in the vernacular set the people free? I'm not sold on that one. That a reforms were needed, I do not argue. That publishing the Bible in the vernacular would achieve that, I don't see how.
No doubt there was political currency gained when Henry VIII started his own church, but the Protestant drive to throw off the highbrow oppressors predated even that. I mean consider: the Mass and other religious ceremony was conducted in Latin, which only royalty, priesthood and extremely wealthy could afford to be educated in to understand. Which meant that the uneducated masses were at the mercy of the upper crust and priesthood to tell it to them straight...a privilege shown time again to have been abused.
I think it's pretty well proven that the reformation in England was all about the king getting a divorce — it was not about introducing Protestant ideas (Henry was an opponent of that).
At his death, the emerging aristocracy saw their chance and, the Duke of Northumberland, acting as Regent, set about a series of Protestant reforms that upset a lot of people, including Parliament (he amassed considerable personal wealth via 'the Dissolution of the Monasteries'). He tried to engineer a declaration of illegitimacy against Mary and Elizabeth, to favour Lady Jane Grey as queen, to whom he had married his son, when it was clear Edward had contracted TB. Mary beat him to it, and Northumberland lost his head.
Really, religion was a distraction to mask the political intent of the main players ... it was a sideshow to deflect blame and recrimination ...
So the Protestant masses desired a Bible in the vernacular in order to be able to read it for themselves...
I really don't think they did? I think people like to insist they did, but I'm really not sure. Remember the 'Protestant masses' were 'Catholic masses' before they were told they were Protestants by those who came to power. The people never had the choice, for example, to say which side they would favour.
And history also shows they did not embrace the new Protestant theologies with any great love.
and thus conclude that certain "Papal additions" were indeed not Biblically founded. An example would be the practice of indulgences.
Whilst I agree the system of indulgences was open to abuse, and was abused, the practice of praying for the dead is biblically founded, and indeed is part of Jewish Tradition, as it was part of the Christian.
A 'proof' is not in Scripture, but in the interpretation of Scripture ... that's my point. The Protestant Reformers proclaimed
sola scriptura in the face of tradition, but that did not mean, nor allow, personal interpretation. They replaced one tradition of authority with their own.
My point being, having a Bible available in a language suitable for study is one thing...it opens the way to have the beautiful lessons within come alive on a very real and personal level. But if the purpose is just another translation for fun and financial profit, I am inclined to believe the motivation is amiss.
Agreed.
Thomas
I think I would like a Devon/Cornish Bible... I might have to work on it myself though :s that would take some time lol..... 
