In this dark day, it pleased God to raise up a courageous witness against the prevailing corruptions. In 1324, in the manor house of the parish of Wicliff-on-Tees, in the North Riding of Yorkshire, John Wycliffe was born. At sixteen years of age, he went to Oxford. A revival of learning was then in progress, and there were thirty thousand students at Oxford when Wycliffe entered it. Among the learned teachers there at this time was a certain Bradwardine, who, though the leading mathematician and astronomer of his day, was also a devout student of the Word of God. Going directly to the Scriptures, he learned the truth for himself and passed on what he had learned to his students. The fame of his lectures spread far and wide, and his evangelical views were diffused by his scholars. From him, doubtless, Wycliffe received his earliest impressions of truths which were to operate powerfully in his soul and then affect so many others.
In those days, the study of the Bible was not held in high repute. Most studied the theologians, whose teachings were leavened with “philosophy and vain deceit” (Col. 2:88Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ. (Colossians 2:8)). Thus, instead of building on the impregnable rock of Holy Scripture, scholars built on the quicksands of human teaching and became blind followers of blind leaders.
While Wycliffe was a young man of twenty-five, the awful specter of the Black Death suddenly appeared. Like the rider on the pale horse in Revelation, it traversed the earth, taking an appalling toll of human life. In common with many of his fellow men and women, Wycliffe found himself standing on the brink of the pit, for every day hundreds were passing into eternity, and none knew whether he might not be the next. He felt, he says, how awful it would be to go down into the eternal night. Doubtless the Word of God henceforth meant more to him than ever before, but little is recorded of his inward exercises at this time. However, he bore the features of a truly Christian man. His life has been described as holy, humility and modesty appear to have marked him, and no enemy has ever questioned his moral character. About 1360 he became Master of Balliol. Later he took his degree in theology and gave public lectures on the books of Scripture.
In 1365 the Pope suddenly demanded the annual tribute of one thousand marks, the payment of which had been intermitted by England for some thirty-five years. The demand included all arrears. A long struggle against these papal extortions had been going on since the days of the Magna Carta. Edward III laid the matter before Parliament in 1366, and Parliament gave its verdict in an unequivocal “No!”
The Pope’s claims were upheld by a monk whose name history does not record. The Pope, said he, as the vicar of Christ, was the lord paramount of all kings, and all sovereigns owe him obedience and tribute. Then, singling out Wycliffe by name, he challenged him to refute it. This Wycliffe did, basing his answer on the natural rights of men, the laws of the realm of England, and the precepts of Scripture. After this Wycliffe took his degree as Doctor of Divinity, a rather uncommon distinction in those days, and having now the chair of theology, his teachings naturally became more influential than ever. It was as a doctor of the University rather than as a clergyman that Wycliffe began to spread the truth as he understood it. Wycliffe’s conscience compelled him to protest against the universal corruption he found all around, and in 1360, when he was still but thirty-six years old, he began, in his public lectures at Oxford, to expose the wickedness of the clergy. As time went on, he saw more and more clearly how far the Church of Rome had departed from the truth of Christianity. The friars had by this time become a veritable plague. The rise of these orders has already been referred to. They attacked the laws and privileges of the University, and everywhere sought to secure control for themselves. Young men were inveigled into their orders, and this became such a scandal that parents feared to send their sons to the University, with the result that attendance fell to a very low ebb. By means of their wealth, they cornered the learned books and deposited them in their own convents.
Against the friars Wycliffe directed his pen and incidentally brought out many a sorely needed truth. “There is no greater error,” wrote Wycliffe, “than for a man to believe that he is absolved from his sins if he give money.” In this Wycliffe anticipated Luther’s attack on indulgences many years later. “Many think,” said he, “if they give a penny to the pardoner they shall be forgiven the breaking of all the commandments of God, and therefore they take no heed how they keep them. But I say this for certain, though thou have priests and friars to sing for thee, though thou each day hear many masses and found churches and colleges, though thou go on pilgrimages all thy life, and though thou give all thy goods to pardoners, this will not bring thy soul to heaven.”
“May God of His endless mercy destroy the pride, covetousness, hypocrisy and heresy of their feigned pardoning and make men busy to keep His commandments and to set fully their trust in Jesus Christ.”
In June 1372, Wycliffe was appointed to the service of the Crown. In 1374 he was chosen, with several others, to meet the papal delegates at Bruges with respect to long-standing complaints of the appointment by the Pope of foreign ecclesiastics to lucrative benefices in England. There he spent two years and doubtless learned firsthand something of the character of the papal hierarchy. Following this, he was granted the living of Lutterworth, which he held till his death. In his public lectures he now spoke of the Pope as Antichrist, “the proud, worldly priest of Rome, and the most cursed of clippers and purse-kervers.” With understandable indignation he says, “They [that is, the Pope’s agents] draw out of our land poor men’s livelihoods and many thousand marks by year of the King’s money for sacraments and spiritual things that is the cursed heresy of simony and maketh all Christendom assent to and maintain his heresy.”
The indignation aroused against Wycliffe at the papal court can well be imagined. Three bulls, one to the clergy, one to the University and one to the King, were issued in 1377, demanding that Wycliffe be dealt with without delay. The clergy, however, had already instituted proceedings. Wycliffe was summoned to appear before the Bishop of London. While he was standing before his judges, the Duke of Lancaster and Lord Percy appeared. An altercation between them and the judges was followed by a riotous outbreak on the part of the crowd of Londoners who were waiting without. The session broke up and Wycliffe went home.
This same year Edward III died, and the first Parliament called by his successor was very hostile to the Pope and turned to Wycliffe for moral support in its case against the papal extortions. They asked Wycliffe’s opinion as to the papal rights. In reply he asked, “Who gave the Pope this temporal supremacy? I cannot find it in the Bible. Peter possessed no temporal lordship, and neither Peter nor any of the apostles ever imposed a tax on Christians. They were supported by the free-will offerings of those they served.”
A year had passed since the abortive trial, and Wycliffe was now summoned to appear before a court of bishops at Lambeth Palace. Wycliffe’s prestige and popularity had grown meantime, and though no dukes or lords were now at his side, he was not afraid. To the formidable list of charges he replied with a still bolder attack. Among other things, he said the Pope had no political dominion; he might fall into sin like other men and ought to be reproved; absolution by the priest benefited no one unless accompanied by the pardon of God, nor would excommunication hurt anyone unless he has exposed himself to the anger of the great Judge. Once again God delivered His servant. A friendly throng of Londoners crowded into the court, but ere they could be removed, a gentleman entered with a message from the Queen Mother commanding them to suspend the trial. Once again Wycliffe was delivered.
Wycliffe had learned direct from the Word of God, and he saw that the entire ecclesiastical system was unscriptural. He wished to lay the axe to the root of the tree. He envisaged nothing less than that the Church should surrender all her wealth, return to the simplicity of her early days, and depend on the free-will offerings of the people as did the apostles and first preachers of the gospel. In those days this appeared to be very extreme, but it shows that Wycliffe was concerned with what was right and not with what was merely expedient. He also drew attention to the fact that there were only two orders in the Church in New Testament days, namely elders and deacons, and in consequence the whole super-incumbent hierarchy of Christendom was unscriptural.
During this time the great schism was in progress and two popes were struggling for the mastery. In their attacks on one another, Wycliffe was, for the time being, left alone. The hand of Providence can be seen in all this. Wycliffe now commenced the great work always associated with his memory — the translation of the Bible. The Bible had been his own guide and charter, and he saw the immense benefit that would accrue to his countrymen if they had the Holy Scriptures in their own tongue. It appears that he did not undertake the actual work of translation himself. Nicholas of Hereford and several others did the work. The first attempt was a rather literal translation from the Latin, and the English, therefore, was not good. Wycliffe, however, had translated large portions of the New Testament for the use of his preachers, which are models of contemporary English prose. Towards the end of his life, he encouraged one of his devoted followers, John Purvey, to revise the translation, translating sentence for sentence and not word for word. The work was not completed till after Wycliffe’s death.
“The translation of the Bible and the publication of English tracts formed part of a larger purpose. Before either had been commenced, Wycliffe had devised another means for spreading his teaching. ... Wycliffe sent out as early probably as the years 1377 ... his order of ‘Poor Priests’ or ‘itinerant preachers’ who in the highways and byways and by the village greens and graveyards, sometimes even in churches, should denounce abuses, proclaim the true doctrine of the Eucharist and teach the right thinking from which, as he deemed, right living would follow. It was for these ‘Poor Priests’ that Wycliffe prepared his tracts and skeletons of sermons and undertook his paraphrase of the Bible.”
Some have tried to depreciate the value of this work, pointing out that many could not read, but those who could not read could be read to. Education was, however, increasing and a large enough proportion of the population could read to make the translation a really potent means for disseminating the truth. When the work was done, there was an immediate and widespread demand, and many labored to supply the copies needed. The complaint of Henry de Knighton, Canon of Leicester, shows that the work was effective and its results feared by the Church. “This Master Wycliffe,” he said, “translated it out of Latin into English, and thus laid it more open to the laity and to women who could read than it had formerly been to the most learned of the clergy, even to those of them who had the best understanding. And in this way the gospel pearl is cast abroad and trodden under foot of swine, and that which was before precious to both clergy and laity is rendered, as it were, common jest to both.”
Having begun by denouncing the iniquity of the papal encroachments and its exactions, Wycliffe came to be more and more occupied with the truth itself, and in these last years of his life, the powerful friends who had supported him for political reasons were no longer at his side. In the spring of 1381 he made a bold attack on the doctrine of transubstantiation. He posted up at Oxford twelve propositions, refuting this dogma. The first of these read: “The consecrated Host which we see upon the Altar is neither Christ, nor any part of Him, but an efficacious sign of Him.” This step caused great commotion, and the cry of heresy was raised. His opinions were officially condemned and silence enjoined on him on this matter. He appealed to the King and Parliament. Meanwhile he retired to Lutterworth. Fresh dangers now threatened him, for at this time Wat Tyler’s rebellion broke out, and his enemies linked it with his teachings. Wycliffe, however, continued boldly to publish his views in various pamphlets. Once more he was called upon to appear before an ecclesiastical court. The newly-installed primate convoked a council at the Monastery of Blackfriars in London, on May 17, 1382. Eight prelates, fourteen doctors of canon and civil law, six bachelors of divinity, four monks and fifteen mendicant friars were assembled to deliberate on the heresies of Wycliffe. Scarcely had they sat down than the whole of London was shaken by an earthquake. Some demanded an adjournment, but the Archbishop succeeded in allaying their fears and even persuading them that the earthquake was a good omen.
When Parliament met on November 19 that year, Wycliffe presented a daring appeal. It was arranged under four heads and demanded:
That monasticism should be abolished — that men should be released from their unnatural and immoral confinement and should leave the gloomy walls of the convent to lead normal lives.
That the priesthood should be subjected to the State.
That tithes and offerings should be limited to what was sufficient to keep the clergy but not to minister to their pride. He complained that worldly priests were living lives of ostentation and luxury, while the wives and children of their neighbors were dying of hunger.
That the true doctrine of the Eucharist as taught by Christ and His apostles should be taught throughout England.
The Commons were sympathetic and actually repealed the persecuting edict which had gone forth against him. The primate now turned to Convocation for support. Once again, Wycliffe was on trial, this time at Oxford. The issue was the dogma of transubstantiation. Did he affirm or deny it? Some have said that he modified his language before this court. It appears he defended himself in the subtle language of the Schools, but his closing words were, “With whom think you ye are contending? With an old man on the brink of the grave? No! With truth — truth which is stronger than you and will overcome you.” With these words he turned and left the court and no one forbade him.
He was summoned to Rome, there to face the pontiff himself. But his health would not allow it. Instead, he wrote in terms which, if the Pope and his cardinals had had any conscience, must have smitten them sore, for he drew the portrait of Him whom they professed to serve and then challenged them as to how far they conformed to it. “Is this your likeness? Is this the poverty in which you live? Is this the humility which you cultivate?”
In spite of these conflicts, he went steadily on with his work, and beside his great work of instigating the translation of the Bible and his many tracts, he had organized a body of preachers who preached in the open air in cities, towns and villages, so that the truths for which he had so long fought and the Scriptures he had made available in the English tongue were disseminated far and wide. It was admitted by an enemy that “you could not meet two men on the highway but one of them was a Wycliffite.”
But his life’s labors were coming to a close. On the last Sunday in 1384, while administering the Communion in the parish church at Lutterworth, a stroke laid him low, and he died on December 31 in that year. He was, if the date of his birth has been accurately recorded, but sixty years of age.
The full results of his labors are known only in heaven, but a large body of followers remained behind to continue the testimony in a dark and cloudy day in England’s history. Of these we must now speak.