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6 October:
William Tyndale, Translator of the Scriptures, Reformation Martyr, 1536:
William Tyndale was born about 1495 at Slymbridge near the Welsh
border. He received his degrees from Magdalen College, Oxford, and
also studied at Cambridge. He was ordained to the priesthood in
1521, and soon began to speak of his desire, which eventually became
his life's obsession, to translate the Scriptures into English. It
is reported that, in the course of a dispute with a promminent
clergyman who disparaged this proposal, he said, "If God spare my
life, ere many years I will cause a boy that driveth the plow to
know more of the Scriptures than thou dost." The remainder of his
life was devoted to keeping that vow, or boast. Finding that the
King, Henry VIII, was firmly set against any English version of the
Scriptures, he fled to Germany (visiting Martin Luther in 1525), and
there travelled from city to city, in exile, poverty, persecution,
and constant danger. Tyndale understood the commonly received
doctrine -- the popular theology -- of his time to imply that men
earn their salvation by good behavior and by penance. He wrote
eloquently in favor of the view that salvation is a gift of God,
freely bestowed, and not a response to any good act on the part of
the receiver. His views are expressed in numerous pamphlets, and in
the introductions to and commentaries on various books of the Bible
that accompanied his translations. He completed his translation of
the New Testament in 1525, and it was printed at Worms and smuggled
into England. Of 18,000 copies, only two survive. In 1534, he
produced a revised version, and began work on the Old Testament. In
the next two years he completed and published the Pentateuch and
Jonah, and translated the books from Joshua through Second
Chronicles, but then he was captured (betrayed by one he had
befriended), tried for heresy, and put to death. He was burned at
the stake, but, as was often done, the officer strangled him before
lighting the fire. His last words were, "Lord, open the King of
England's eyes."
Miles Coverdale continued Tyndale's work by translating those portions of the Bible (including the Apocrypha) which Tyndale had not lived to translate himself, and publishing the complete work. In 1537, the "Matthew Bible" (essentially the Tyndale-Coverdale Bible under another man's name to spare the government embarrassment) was published in England with the Royal Permission. Six copies were set up for public reading in Old St Paul's Church, and throughout the daylight hours the church was crowded with those who had come to hear it. One man would stand at the lectern and read until his voice gave out, and then he would stand down and another would take his place. All English translations of the Bible from that time to the present century are essentially revisions of the Tyndale-Coverdale work.
The best summary I know of Tyndale's writings on grace is found in C S Lewis's ENGLISH LITERATURE IN THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY, EXCLUDING DRAMA (Oxford UP, 1954), pp 187-191. I will go out on a limb and say that any Christian who reads English and is interested in the theological questions of the Reformation ought to read large portions of this work. In particular, I recommend pages 32-44, 157-221 (or at least 157-165 and 177-192), and 438-463.