Reformation & Its Important Facts

A Brief Introduction

The Reformation was a movement in the field of religion first as the Renaissance was a movement in the field of art and literature. The Reformation had started as a revolt against the authority of the Pope of Rome. It was in second half of the fourteenth century that the impact of the Reformation as well as of the Renaissance was felt in English. It was the age of Chaucer in English Literature. Both Renaissance and Reformation reached their culmination during the Elizabethan Age.

Important Facts to Remember

1. The English Reformation began at Cambridge and the Combridge movement began with ‘Erasmus’. Other names associated with him are Colet, More, Fisher, Tyndale, Coverdale and Cranmer.

2. In 1517 reformation movement began and it inspired William Tyndale in 1525 to translate the Bible into English.

3. John Wycliff, also called the father of the English Reformation and First Proteslant.

4. With the first production of a complete version of the Bible by Wycliff. After him, William Tyndale’s English New Testament (1525), Coverdale’s Complete English Bible (1535) Cromwell’s Great Bible (1539) deserve special mention.

5. The Authorised Version of the Bible was published in 1611. It was the work of forty-seven scholars, nominated by James I, over whom ‘Bishop Lancelot Andrews’ presided.

6. Among the ‘Caroline’ writers of religious prose Thomas Browne’s Religio Medici is his greatest work.

7. In drama field, among the university Wits, Marlowe was the greatest of them. He paved the way for Shakespeare in drama.

8. In poetry, Chaucer in his ‘Canterbury Tales’ shows revolt against the authority of the Church and similarly William Langland’s ‘Piers the Plowman’ is a satire on clergy.

9. Milton was the greatest product of Puritani which was an integral part of reformates.

10. In Epic work his Paradise Lost’ is a perfect blend of Renaissance and the Reformation. He takes the Biblical theme and justify The Ways of God to Men’. This is the reformation spirit. The deliveation of Satan’s character is in the true renaissance spirit. Thus, there is fine admixture of the Renaissance and the Reformation in the ‘Paradise Lost’.