Your Bible in
English is a privilege. How much we value having it, is a different matter.
We have it in every format, whether book, app, digital, in Internet, and
practically in all the languages in the world and many dialects. It is
available to those who want to read it, and for free. The question is
whether it is read, if it is studied, if we learn from it as the Word of God
for daily life, faith and our relationship with God, if it is preached and
taught. To read the Bible cleans and reforms false beliefs and false
theology that we may have, receiving God’s message first hand. The Bible
itself in Psalm 32:8 tells us what God offers to us when we learn from Him:
“I will instruct thee and
teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye.”
, and we know that the wisdom is not taught in universities, but it can be
learned putting into practice the Message of Jesus Christ – Yahshua. But, do
we value the Bible, do we know its origin and do we know its connection with
the Protestant Reformation, fruit of which we have the Bible in the
different languages of the different countries?
YOUR BIBLE IN ENGLISH – FRUIT OF THE PROTESTANT
REFORMATION
To have the Bible
today, many martyrs were persecuted, burned, tortured and dead, whether by
the Inquisition or by radicals of other religions the matter is that many
gave their lives so that today we can have the Bible in our language. Still
today many are still persecuted for having or teaching the Bible in
fundamentalist countries, even in Catholic countries, evangelicals are
persecuted for having or teaching the Bible, and not only by radicals of
religions but by laicism radicals in the Europe and the United States of the
XXI century.
The King James Bible
as well as the one of Casiodoro de Reina, first complete Bible in Spanish
from the original Texts, Hebrew and Aramaic of the Old Testament and Greek
of the New Testament, was going to be printed in Geneva and the spies of the
“holy” Inquisition would not manage to stop it and was finally printed in
Basel in 1569.
But wasn’t there any
Bible or portion in English until then. Yes, John Wycliffe translation and
other portions existed, but they were not very accurate and were done from
the Latin version Vulgate. It would not be until King James Version, the
English Bible was not translated from the original Texts, both Hebrew and
Greek, at this time this Bible and other books began the great works of
English language.
The Dead Sea
Scrolls, like other scrolls from Qumran, after thousands of years, have
confirmed the authenticity of this translation work of the Bible, which has
taken many lives to Christ, including your servant, on my case with the
Spanish Bible Reina-Valera. If you would like to read about the Canon of the
Bible, you will be interested in these links:
http://www.yahshua.net/Canon.htm
The promise of Jesus
Christ of being always by our side and help us take His Word to the world in
the Great Commission, is proven by the intervention of the Holy Spirit,
since Jesus ascended, as He said it would happen. Truly, as we see the
fidelity of the Texts, the translations, their conservation, the Dead Sea
Scrolls, and how much suffering there has been to have the Bible in English
(like in all the other vernacular languages) we cannot but read it, learn
it, spread it, preach it, teach it and live it.
HAS A PROPHECY OF CYPRIAN DE VALERA FULFILLED IN THE
MONASTRY OF SAINT ISIDORO DEL CAMPO IN OCTOBER 2017?
In this Monastery,
emblematic place of the beginnings of the Spanish Protestantism, now that we
celebrate the V Century 1517-2017, it has seen in its interior the delivery
of the first diplomas of Biblical Theological Studies to students of the Al-Ándalus
Theological Seminary – Grace School of Theology, and ABRE Foundation-
amongst whom I have the privilege and the blessing of being. And coinciding
with the celebrations of the V Centenary of the Reformation, the past 7th
of October 2017 we offered a concert of Biblical music and Christian hymns
of the Renascence to our days, with brothers and friends from Málaga of
“Ensemble de la Reforma”. Cyprian de Valera left wrote some words that the
president of the Seminary reminded me of, that today, by delivering our
diplomas in Theological Studies could well be or announce the answer to that
prayer and the fulfilment of a prophecy, which say like this:
“If God one day
were to do mercy to Seville, it would be reason that this monastery of Saint
Isidoro will convert into a university, where in first place Theology is
professed... Such great and greater things than these God has done in our
times.”
CYPRIAN DE VALERA
(“Two Treatises”.
London, 1588)
The monastery can be
visited with guides, under the rule of the Junta de Andalucía. The
commemoration of the 500 Anniversary of the Protestant Reformation takes as
initiating date the 31st of October of 1517 with the act of the
monk Martin Luther, when he nailed his famous 95 Theses on the door of the
church of the Castle of Wittenberg, Germany, as protest against the sale of
indulgencies that the Vatican use to do for their enrichment. Luther would
become transformed by the Bible, for its translation into German from the
original Texts, in the same way as it would be William Tyndale and the
translators of the King James Bible, and like Casiodoro de Reina or Cipriano
de Valera amongst many others. The printer came at the time and permitted
the massive distribution of the Sacred Scripture to the people. The Bible
would be the first book that the people would read and with which millions
of people would learn to read.
CONCLUSION
Monk Casiodoro, as
he was referred to by the historians of the Inquisition, preached the
original Bible amongst his colleagues, which produced the conversion of all
the monks at the monastery of Saint Isidoro del Campo, out of the walls of
Seville, next to Italica, like many non religious neighbours from Seville,
where he spread the Biblical Christian faith (interrogatory of the
Inquisition under torture to the young martyr María Bohórquez, whom they
burned afterwards for believing and teaching the Bible).
Therefore the Bible
was reserved to the erudite for over 1.500 years, reading it prohibited if
not submitted to the clergy, maintained in Latin or Greek, but since the
Protestant Reformation though under great persecution of those who wanted to
have the people under ignorance to be able to continue to exercise their
deceiving power over them, churches and monarchies and over all since two
centuries in some places and since 70 year in most countries, and above all
in this XXI century, in times of Internet, the Bible can be read by any
person in the world partially or totally in almost 2.500 tongs and
languages.
I conclude asking
the reader: Do you know the Bible and its message? Do you know how Jesus
Christ – Yahshua teaches and interprets it? Have you thought on studying it
daily and applying it to your life? If you are a Christian preach it in your
daily life. We must all pray and between brethren realize how important it
is to teach the Bible, to teach that it is the current (vigente) Word of
God, which does not change with the passing of centuries because it
originates from the eternal mind of God, and because through it we learn the
Christian life and that which allows to teach the answer the ultimate
question: Do you know Jesus Christ – Yahshua?
You can read other
studies about the Protestant Reformation in this web in the following links:
http://www.yahshua.net/Protestant-Reform.htm
http://www.yahshua.net/The-unity-of-the-Church.htm
http://www.yahshua.net/Reform-unconcluded.htm
http://www.yahshua.net/Reform-changed-the-world.htm