ISBN-13: 978-0349123226 Kindle Edition. 5 stars
Brain Moynahan’s book is subtitled ‘William Tyndale, Thomas More and the Bloody Birth of the English Bible’ and I read it in the Kindle version. As far I can see the book is now ‘out of print’ other than for Kindle readers but second hand copies are available.
William Tyndale is my hero and David Daniell’s book ‘William Tyndale: a biography’ might have thought to have been the definitive work. Moynahan’s book relies heavily on Daniell but brings a thrilling pace to the personal conflict between Thomas More and William Tyndale. Moynahan is more than sympathetic to Tyndale and clearly hostile to More but the dynamic between the two men, who never met, is brought out in a very vivid manner.
I am very familiar with the storyline of these events but Moynahan really seems to get into the character of the two men who provide a fascinating contrast to each other. This book also reveals how a ‘committee’ of the King James Version were able to produce such masterpiece of style and accuracy; they lifted over 80% of Tyndale’s New Testament for their new translation!
Moynahan's writing has been described as being, "mercifully free of the sludge that often clogs academic treatises”. This book however is not a novel but a carefully researched and documented history written with the skill of an accomplished communicator. He has produced that rarest of books… a historical page turner. The book captures the continual threat of arrest and execution that was the background to the whole translation process and makes the reader conscious of the enormous debt of gratitude that we owe to such men as William Tyndale.
Warmly recommended and a ‘must read’ for anyone interested in the romance of Bible translation. 5 stars.
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