On December 31, 1384, English scholastic philosopher, theologian, biblical translator, reformer, priest, and Oxford seminary professor John Wycliffe passed away. We believe he died from a massive paralytic stroke on December 31, 1384. As his political influence waned, he turned to those accomplishments for which he is best remembered. The English reformist John Wycliffe (c. 1320-1384) was an important precursor to the Reformation movement, headed by Martin Luther (c. 1483-1546). John Wycliffe preached that the only true authority is the Word of God, and the Word could only be understood by all if the people could read it in their native tongue. As a postscript to his life, it must be noted that Wycliffe died officially orthodox. The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in particular to papal authority, arising from what was perceived to be errors, abuses, and discrepancies by the Catholic Church. John Wycliffe was the morning star of the Reformation. Wycliffe’s published views on the Eucharist, clearly delineated in 1379 and 1380 in his tracts On Apostasy and On the Eucharist, made it plain to ecclesiastical authorities that he had moved into what they considered heresy. His position on the Eucharist was becoming that issue which would sort out his true disciples from mere respectful adherents. Wycliffe had been born in the hinterlands, on a sheep farm 200 miles from London. He complemented this activity with his political treatises on divine and civil dominion (De dominio divino libri tres and Tractatus de civili dominio), in which he argued men exercised “dominion” (the word is used of possession and authority) straight from God and that if they were in a state of mortal sin, then their dominion was in appearance only. The greater part of his life was spent in the University of Oxford. Since little is known of his early life, we can only speculate concerning those events which influenced him. The clergy of his day, even had they desired to use them, had the Scriptures only in the Latin Vulgate, or occasionally the Norman French. This was sustained by the regular services of the church, plus the special dramas of nativity and miracle plays and other festivals associated with the life of Christ and His passion, and the services of vernacular carols at Christmas, Easter and Harvest. Gaunt’s very manner in entering St. Paul’s had already irked the Londoners, who despised him anyway, and soon an open brawl developed. A veritable torrent of writings flowed from his pen. John Wycliffe was taken to trial twice. An embassy was sent to Avignon to Gregory XI in 1373 asking that certain impositions against the English be set aside. Because of the close ties seen later between Gaunt and Wycliffe, it is possible that the two knew one another well before Wycliffe came to national prominence. and by Protestant chroniclers of church history, John Wycliffe may be seen dimly through the mis~s of accu­ mulated centuries as an iconoclastic priest, preaching over a century and a half before the Reformation ~gainst the corruption of the Catholic Church. Finally, in 1428, at papal command, the remains of Wycliffe were dug up, burned, and scattered into the little river Swift. He took up residence at his parish church in Lutterworth. He could afford to lose neither. John Wycliffe was an English scholastic philosopher, theologian, biblical translator, reformer, priest, and a seminary professor at the University of Oxford. From Occam came the idea that there was the need and the justice of an autonomous secular power, while from the Spiritual Franciscans came the exemplification of the evangelical poverty which the Gospels taught. John Wycliffe’s ideology was often concerned with church reform. A look at colonial New England and the theological giant who emerged from it. But his chief target was the doctrine of transubstantiation—that the substance of the bread and wine used in the Eucharist is changed into the body and blood of Christ. He started people thinking in fresh ways about the meaning of Christianity and how it applied to daily life: for the king in his palace, the bishop in … Another man who impressed Wycliffe was Fitzralph, who had been Chancellor of Oxford before his death in 1360. Thus the brook hath conveyed his ashes into Avon; Avon into Severn; Severn into the narrow seas; and they into the main ocean. a tall thin figure, covered with a long light gown of black colour, with a girdle about his body; the head, adorned with a full, flowing beard, exhibiting features keen and sharply cut; the eye clear and penetrating; the lips firmly closed in token of resolution‚Äîthe whole man wearing an aspect of lofty earnestness and replete with dignity and character. There was nothing calculated about the way in which he published his opinions on the Eucharist, and the fact that he was not calculating cost him—in all probability—the support of John of Gaunt and of not a few friends at Oxford. And though he lived long after Wycliffe’s death, Martin Luther, too, felt an obligation to recognize the pioneering reforms of John Wycliffe. In 1342 Wycliffe’s family village and manor came under the lordship of John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster and second son of King Edward III. From Marsiglio of Padua came the concept that the Church should limit herself to her own province. Particularly through the efforts of Bishop Courtenay the Wycliffe movement was effectively suppressed in England. The early years of his studies were marked by the general dislocation of university life caused by the epidemics of the Black Death between 1349 and 1353. In 1382 he suffered the first of two strokes which left him partially paralyzed, and for this reason he was unable to answer a citation to appear in Rome. Courtenay asked for the judgment of the Blackfriars Synod on twenty-four of Wycliffe’s conclusions. JOHN WYCLIFFE WAS BORN around 1330 of a family which held property near Richmond and the village of Wycliffe-upon-Tees in the North Riding of Yorkshire in England. Basic to his thinking, which was to be used in the English stand against papal encroachments, were such statements as these by Wycliffe: “If through transgression a man forfeited his divine privileges, then of necessity his temporal possessions were also lost.” and “Men held whatever they had received from God as stewards, and if found faithless could justly be deprived of it.”. Working from the year 1330, we find Wycliffe leaving for Oxford in 1346, being but a teenager, yet this is the common age for entry into university. Be on the lookout for your Britannica newsletter to get trusted stories delivered right to your inbox. In 1377 Parliament consulted him on the lawfulness of withholding English treasure from Rome. From these premises he moved verbally against such practices in the Church as the selling of indulgences, and stressed the need for renewed spiritual life through the teachings of Christ in the Bible. Updates? John Wycliffe has been called “The Morning Star of the Reformation.”. JOHN WYCLIFFE, LUTHER’S MODEL FOR THE REFORMATION In 1427 AD, the church dug up the remains of John Wycliffe. Omissions? In these bulls some eighteen errors were cited from Wycliffe’s On Civil Dominion. The points of error, significantly, concerned ecclesiastical authority and organization rather than basic creedal beliefs. They were sent to the Archbishop of Canterbury, to the king, and to Oxford. John Wycliffe lived in the fourteenth century, dying in 1384. Ring in the new year with a Britannica Membership, https://www.britannica.com/biography/John-Wycliffe, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Biography of John Wyclif, History Today - John Wycliffe condemned as a heretic, John Wycliffe - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). The morning star is not actually a star, but the planet Venus, which appears before the sun rises and while darkness still dominates the horizon. This “Great Schism ” in the church in 1378 provided a critical turning point for Wycliffe. Such disendowment was, in his view, to be carried out by the state, and particularly by the king. In 1382 the now Archbishop Courtenay summoned a special committee to Blackfriars to examine Wycliffe’s teachings. . Author of. After the death of Wycliffe there would not appear another Reformer before the Reformation until John Hus (1369 - 1415) In 1414 the Papacy attempted to put an end to the approaching schism by calling the council of Constance where Hus was condemned (and executed on July 6 1415) and Wycliffe again (though long dead) was reviled. Certainly, John Wycliffe was revolutionary in his time for the authority he placed in the Bible, elevating it higher than the edicts of the pope or the church. He was one of the forerunners of the Protestant Reformation. The receipt of the Doctorate of Divinity in 1372 marked sixteen years of incessant preparation, and to this point no open conflict with Rome had arisen. John Wycliffe has often been called “the Morning Star of the Reformation.” Jan Hus, another pre-Reformation reformer, felt obliged to express his supreme debt to Wycliffe. He was born in the 1320s and died in 1384 and, for much of his life, he was a theologian, lecturer and academic at Oxford University. Only fragments of the Bible could be found in English, and these scarcely accessible to the masses of people. After his death he had been tried and found guilty of heresy, leading to … Your donations support the continuation of this ministry, Containing today’s events, devotional, quote and stories, © Copyright 2021. Yet most scholars agree that Wycliffe was a virtuous man. English philosopher/professor John Wycliffe at Oxford University in England, Girolamo Savonarola, the charismatic priest at Florence, Italy and 1 For a description ofhig lig ts this ref rmatorym vement see MatthewSpinka, ed. Thus, in 1377 Wycliffe was summoned to London to answer charges of heresy. his followers continued his work and carried the Scriptures to the people. In the last seven years of his life, Wycliffe was increasingly withdrawn from public affairs in England. He was a protestant and a reformer more than a century before Martin Luther ignited the Protestant Reformation in 1517. Wycliffe defended the action on the ground that the king’s servants might lawfully invade sanctuaries to bring criminals to justice. By now it was becoming obvious to the politically-astute John of Gaunt, that Wycliffe’s value in the political realm had been gradually diminishing. ”. John Wycliffe, the scholar and lay preacher of the 14th century who was later dubbed "The Morning Star of the Reformation", risked his life and freedom to criticize the Church for its abuses of power and its false teachings. He became a bachelor of divinity about 1369 and a doctor of divinity in 1372. By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. By 1371 he was recognized as the leading theologian and philosopher of the age at Oxford, thus second to none in Europe, for Oxford had, for a brief time, eclipsed Paris in academic leadership. Although anticlerical feeling existed (the clergy, one fiftieth of the population, accounted for one-third of the nation’s landed wealth), there was yet a flourishing piety at the popular level. He did agree to appear at Lambeth, and in 1378 faced the bishops there. . At the click of a few computer buttons, the Internet will offer you 1,250,000 references to an Englishman who is often called the “Morning Star of the Reformation.” Even so, we aren’t sure exactly when Wycliffe was born. John Wycliffe lived almost 200 years before the Reformation, but his beliefs and teachings closely match those of Luther, Calvin and other reformers. In 1415 the Council of Constance burned John Hus at the stake, and also condemned John Wycliffe on 260 different counts. John Wycliffe was born in the village of Hipswell, Yorkshire in 1324 and little is known of his early childhood and adolescence. His attacks, when reviewed, reveal traces of ideas from several great thinkers before him. The Colloquy at Marburg was called in hopes of reconciling the two centers of the German Reformation—Zurich and Wittenburg, but conflict over the Lord’s Supper split their common cause. The very factors which had cut him off from an active public life were also those factors which served to bring John Wycliffe to his greatest accomplishment, the translation of the English Bible from the Vulgate. With 1378 we come to a milestone in Wycliffe’s career. placed before the Mass upon the alter remain after consecration both as sacrament and as the Lord’s Body.” Wycliffe interpreted this to mean that the bread remained bread even after the consecration. John Wycliffe - John Wycliffe - Translation of the Bible: From August 1380 until the summer of 1381, Wycliffe was in his rooms at Queen’s College, busy with his plans for a translation of the Bible and an order of Poor Preachers who would take Bible truth to the people. Wycliffe became an influential dissident within the Roman Catholic priesthood during the 14th century and is considered an important predecessor to Protestantism.Wycliffe advocated translation of the Bible into the common … The convocation had scarcely arranged itself (There was an immediate argument as to whether Wycliffe should stand or be seated), when recriminations and personal villification filled the air. John Wycliffe helped the movement that sent Lollards around England as poor preachers, sharing the simple message of the Bible. He was a part of that declining system which had attempted to reconcile the dogmas of faith with the dictates of reason. Serving as the inspiration of the activity, Wycliffe lived to see the first complete English translation of the Bible. He received his Bachelor of Divinity in 1369 and his doctorate in 1372. Wycliffe also directed a translation of the Bible into English. In his 1378 book, On the Truth of Holy Scripture , he asserted that the Bible contained everything necessary for salvation, without the church's additions of prayers to saints, fasting , pilgrimages, indulgences, or the Mass. It was in 1370, while still engaged in his doctoral studies, that Wycliffe first put forward a debatable doctrine of the Eucharist. The call went unanswered, and Oxford refused to condemn its outstanding scholar. A Yorkshire man, living in a secluded area, he probably was educated by a village priest. As history has revealed, Wycliffe’s bones were much more easily dispersed than his teachings, for out of a sea of controversy and angry disputation rose his greatest contribution—the English Bible. Wycliffe was also cited to appear at Rome, but in the hectic year of 1378, events precluded such an appearance, even had Wycliffe been so inclined to heed the summons. There was also in Yorkshire in Wycliffe’s childhood an unusual interest in the writing and study of English preaching manuals, and a spirituality among the people reflected in the career and influence of Richard Rolle. And thus the ashes of Wycliffe are the emblem of his doctrine which now is dispersed the world over.”, [Christian History originally published this article in Christian History Issue #3 in 1983]. A message from the Queen Mother and the presence of friendly London citizenry were some of the factors which convinced the Commissioners of the futility of continuing the trial. He returned to Lutterworth and, from the seclusion of his study, began a systematic attack on the beliefs and practices of the church. This first article features John Wycliffe (also commonly spelled Wyclif), who is sometimes called the Morning Star of the Reformation. This statement: “The same bread and wine . 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