William TyndaleWilliam Tyndale gave us our English Bible
Forbidden to work in England, Tyndale translated and printed in English the New Testament and half the Old Testament between 1525 and 1535 in Germany and the Low Countries
He worked from the Greek and Hebrew original texts when knowledge of those languages in England was rare
His pocket-sized Bible translations were smuggled into England, and then ruthlessly sought out by the Church, confiscated and destroyed
Condemned as a heretic, Tyndale was strangled and burned outside Brussels in 1536
His work has survived
Tyndale's English translation of the New Testament was taken almost word for word into the much praised Authorised Version (King James Bible) of 1611, which also reproduces a great deal of his Old Testament
From there his