The Holy Bible - Vol. 5 - The New Testament: as Translated by John Wycliffe (Volume 5)

In the late Fourteenth Century, John Wycliffe and his followers, at great peril to themselves, became the first to translate the complete text of the Bible into English. This "Beggars Bible" became a key event in the subsequent Protestant movement because it allowed, not just Books of Hours and other fragments of the Biblical text, but the entire Bible to be placed into the hands of the common people for the first time. Now persons other than clergy could study the entire scriptures first hand. Unavailable since the late 1800s, this text-only edition of The New Testament is based upon the extremely rare first complete printing of the John Wycliffe Middle English translation of The Holy Bible (Oxford: University Press, 1850). This Volume contains all the Books of the recognized New Testament Canon and includes the rare Apocryphal Letter of St. Paul to the Laodiceans. While Middle English spelling of words has been retained, alphabetic and runic symbols which are no longer in current usage have been replaced by their modern equivalents. This gives the modern reader the opportunity to experience the vigorous and idiomatic language of the first great English-language Bible first-hand, and to discover the sense of wonder its first readers must have felt. Four companion volumes of The Old Testament are also currently available. Each volume is newly and carefully edited with a complete re-setting of all type. These editions are not facsimiles, photocopies or hastily assembled scans.