Later on, the church condemned Waldo and his followers as heretics, and monks burned the translations he had commissioned. From then on, the church resisted every effort to put the Word of God into the hands of the common people.

The church made its strategy clear in 1211 by burning Bibles in the city of Metz, in the east of France. In 1229 the Council of Toulouse expressly forbade the use by the laity of vernacular Bibles in any language. This was followed in 1234 by the Council of Tarragona, Spain, which forbade possession of Bibles in any Romance language (language derived from Latin), even by the clergy.

A Perilous Fight

In France some brave printers, like Étienne Dolet in 1546, were burned at the stake for printing the Bible. The Council of Trent, in 1546, reaffirmed the “authenticity” of the Vulgate, despite its errors, and from then on the church took an increasingly firm position against vernacular translations. In 1612 the Spanish Inquisition embarked on a fierce campaign to eradicate vernacular Bibles.

Persecution at times led to ingenious innovations. “Chignon,” or “bun,” Bibles were produced, which were small enough to be hidden in the bun of a woman’s hair. And in 1754, extracts of the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures were printed in a book measuring only one and one quarter inches by two inches [3 x 5 cm].

The Catholic Church resisted any change in its tactics, but it was fighting a losing battle. Throughout the 19th century, popes issued a series of decrees relentlessly opposing vernacular Bibles. As late as 1897, Pope Leo XIII reaffirmed that “all versions of the Holy Books made by any non-Catholic writer whatsoever and in any common language are prohibited, especially those published by Bible societies, which have been condemned by the Pontiff of Rome on several occasions.”