During the Reformation, the Bible in one's vernacular language became a point of faith

for Protestants. For how could you believe what you could not understand? And you're

not imagining it, I do have a rather weak voice today, but there with me, I hope it's

not too painful for you to hear. Never mind that a literal seed was high and many people

could not read, though always people who could read for you or you could learn.

And yet in England, those opposed to putting the Bible in English were just as deeply

entrenched as those who believed it should be. Indeed in the first third of the 16th century,

an English Bible was an illegal, heretical notion. To explore the creation of England's first

printed Bible in English, the theology it embodied and the circumstances in which it came

about, I'm delighted to be joined today by Professor Alec Riery.

Alec Riery is Professor of the History of Christianity at Durham University and Professor

of Divinity at Gresham College London. A fellow of the British Academy, Professor Riery

works on the history of the Reformation and Protestantism more generally. He's the author

of numerous journal articles and chapters and eight books including Protestants, the

radicals who made the modern world, the English Reformation, a very brief history and the

age of reformation, the Tudor and Stuart realms.

Professor Riery, thank you so much for joining me. I am really looking forward to talking to

you. You've been a great influence on my career. Your work is so important in the field

that I think anybody who works from the 16th century looks up to you and admires your work.

That's very kind of you, Susanna, it's lovely to be with you.

So today we're talking about the first printed Bible in English and as I was thinking about

this, I realised that I didn't know when it came into being. At some point in the

...