The present writer has found great difficulty in establishing the facts of Wycliffe’s life with any certainty. It has therefore been thought advisable at this stage to offer some aspects of Wycliffe’s life rather than attempt a comprehensive biography.
The aspect of Wycliffe’s life to be high-lighted in this article is, his work as a protester.
It is perhaps worth remembering that the spirit of protest was not altogether alien to the general atmosphere of the fourteenth century. The French peasant revolt occurred in 1320, to be followed nearer the end of the century by the revolt led by Wat Tyler in England. There was also an awakening sense of national independence. This was expressed in Switzerland by the patriotic movement led by William Tell. While Wycliffe was a student at Oxford, England, too, began to show her prowess on the battlefield. Cressy was won in 1346, and Poitiers ten years later. Of course the war with France must be seen in the light of England’s relationship with the Pope.
Since 1213, England had been officially the possession of the Pope, King John having surrendered his kingdom to the papal legate in that year. Now, in the middle of the fourteenth century, the English Parliament began to seek escape from this papal domination, and statutes were passed with this in view.
For a time, it might have seemed that the Pope was turning a blind eye to England’s protest. In 1366, however, Pope Urban V renewed the claim for homage and tribute, summoning the king to answer for his long default. Edward III called on Parliament to discuss the summons, and their answer was unequivocal. They maintained that King John had no power whatever to give his people into the Pope’s hands. They therefore resolved that, should the Pope now attempt anything against the king by process, “the king and all his subjects should with all their force and power resist the same.”
There has been some debate as to exactly what part Wycliffe had in these proceedings. That he had some part in framing the finding of Parliament seems certain, for shortly afterwards an anonymous monk produced a tractate which called on Wycliffe to justify Parliament’s refusal. In his reply, Wycliffe outlined the various arguments which had been stated by different barons in the course of the debate. Actually, this may have been a way of expressing his own views, rather than the views of others. Certainly, as one who was now an expert student of civil and ecclesiastical law, Wycliffe was well able to defend parliament’s constitutional action.
Concern was now spreading in England about how the country’s wealth was being drained by the various spiritual tricks of the Pope. In 1373, a commission was appointed to meet the Pope at Avignon. The Pope’s answers, however, were seen by Parliament to be worthless, and a second commission was sent to Bruges, to meet papal delegates there. Dr John Wycliffe was appointed to this commission. This experience must have proved a real, though indirect benefit to Wycliffe. The concessions gained from the church were slight, but during this time Wycliffe’s eyes were opened to see how degraded the Roman Catholic church really was. He returned to England disappointed, but a wiser man. Now he knew that the Pope was Antichrist; there could be no compromise with him.
First of all Wycliffe protested against the abuses of the Papacy.
First of all Wycliffe protested against the abuses of the Papacy. There was ample scope for protest, as Wycliffe well knew. “… Certes though our realm had a huge hill of gold, and never other man took thereof, but only this proud worldly priest’s collector, by process of time this hill must be spendeth; for he taketh every money out of our land, and sendeth naught again but God’s curse for his simony”.
Turning to attack the Pope’s servants, Wycliffe did not spare the monks.
Turning to attack the Pope’s servants, Wycliffe did not spare the monks. He felt that they were of no benefit whatever to the various communities in which they stayed. Rather, they set examples of laziness and greed. Wycliffe’s charges against the monks are substantiated in the fact that, in the wealthier monastic houses, paid servants outnumbered the monks themselves. Their standard of living was incomparably superior to that of the ordinary people.
But his strongest invective was drawn out of him by the Friars.
But his strongest invective was drawn out of him by the Friars. “If a friar blesses a cask in a cellar he turns it into accidents without substance”. There are metaphysical and theological overtures here, but we are concerned with the main satirical thrust of his remark. In this, Wycliffe was absolutely accurate, for wining and dining were the main aims of most Friars. The Friars professed to be a special sect of the church, having a unique allegiance to the Pope, and living by what they could beg from others. Wycliffe, for one, was not taken in by these gestures of poverty, nor was he awed by any authority which derived from the Pope. For him, the friars were ‘cursed of God Almighty’.
Another facet of Wycliffe’s work as a protester is seen in his attacks on the carnal worship of the Medieval church.
Another facet of Wycliffe’s work as a protester is seen in his attacks on the carnal worship of the Medieval church. We find him lamenting, “would that such ceremonies and rituals were not multiplied in our Church . . . they do not lift the spirit to the love of the Lord Jesus Christ”. The meaningless chanting and intoning of the day Wycliffe dismissed as, “grete cryinge and blowyng of mannus vois”.
As Professor of Theology at Oxford, and as Rector of the parish of Lutterworth, Wycliffe was losing no opportunity to oppose the Pope. Soon the Papal party began to show alarm. At the beginning of the year 1376, the Bishop of London charged Wycliffe with heresy, and cited him to appear to answer for his views at St Paul’s. On the 17th of February, Wycliffe did appear at St Paul’s in the company of Lord Percy, Marshal of England, and the Duke of Lancaster. But the huge building was full and overflowing with the citizens of London, who had been incited against Wycliffe by the Bishop’s party. There seemed at first no possible way of access but in the end Lord Percy pushed through a crowd whose hands were raised in threatening gesture. When Wycliffe’s party did eventually press to the front, they found Bishop Courtenay ready to judge the case of heresy. The case, however, was never tried. Lord Percy invited Wycliffe to sit down and rest, at which the infuriated Bishop exclaimed, “He must not sit down; criminals stand before their judges.” This was the beginning of exchanges which became increasingly heated, and Wycliffe alone, who had no reputation for restraint, kept calm. In the end, the trial degenerated into a common brawl, and all that came of the proceedings was that Wycliffe was formally forbidden to preach his heresies.
Six months later Wycliffe was again in London, having been summoned to appear at Lambeth chapel. This time he walked alone; there was no Lord Percy before him and no Lancaster behind. By this time, however, Wycliffe had more supporters among the common people. But his support was not limited to commoners, for the Archbishop had hardly opened the meeting when in strode Sir Lois Clifford. In the name of the Queen Mother, he forbade the court to proceed against the reformer. The bishops had to obey; in fact they were terrified. “They bent their heads”, we are told, “like a reed before the wind”.
In the spring of the next year occurred the Papal Schism. This meant that there were now two men who claimed to be Christ’s supreme representative on earth. Each Pope now promised Heaven to all who would support his claims, and threatened with Hell all who would oppose him. We mention this for two reasons. Firstly, Wycliffe was now left in some peace to pursue his work, as the Popes were somewhat preoccupied with cursing one another. Secondly, this ghastly spectacle of churchmen so evidently ruled by carnal motives gave him full scope to fulfil his calling to protest. And so he did: “God would no longer suffer the fiend to reign in only one such priest, but made division among two, so that men, in Christ’s name, may the more easily overcome them both.”
While Popes were quarrelling, as Wycliffe said, like dogs over a bone, his own thoughts turned to the subject of the Lord’s Supper. He studied the views of Berengare of Tours, but especially he brought the light of scripture to bear on the doctrine of Transubstantiation. His mature view of the Roman Catholic doctrine was that it was wholly unscriptural, and he set himself as professor and preacher to make this known. Wycliffe may or may not have realised it, but in attacking the doctrine of Transubstantiation he was drawing towards himself the fiercest outburst of the wrath of Rome. And while the wrath of his enemies grew warm, the love of his friends grew cold. The Duke of Lancaster visited Oxford in an effort to dissuade the Professor of Theology from stirring up this hornet’s nest. Thus Wycliffe’s enemies condemned him, and his friends pled with him to hold his tongue. For a time he was silent, but not for long. Was he going to retract? All that Wycliffe knew about the act of retracting can be gauged from the following words. “How canst thou, O priest, who art but a man, make thy Maker? What! the thing that groweth in the fields—that ear which thou pluckest today, shall be God tomorrow! As you cannot make the works which he made, how shall ye make Him who made the works? Woe to the adulterous generation that believeth the testimony of Innocent rather than of the gospel!”
Turning with dignity to face the storm of opposition which his views stirred up, Wycliffe called on his opponents to refute his views if they could. They replied by threatening him with imprisonment, and Wycliffe promptly appealed to the king. His views, or a perversion of them, were tried at a Synod in London, and the king gave authority “to confine in the prisons of the state any who should maintain the condemned propositions”. But Wycliffe was not a man to be easily subdued. In November 1382 he appealed to Parliament for support; pleading for the liberation of the church from servitude to Rome. Parliament heeded Wycliffe’s pleas, and demanded the reversal of the king’s ruling. But Courtenay, now Archbishop of Canterbury, was in no mood to take the advice of Parliament. He was determined to silence Wycliffe, and he felt the stage was all but set for the final scene. Before the end of the month he had gathered a great number of Roman Catholic apologists and supporters into Oxford, and summoned Wycliffe to appear before them all. What a different aspect this meeting in Oxford bore from many which Wycliffe had previously attended! He had faced many audiences who had lauded him as the finest logician of his day, but this meeting was different. More recently, he had been meeting in the company of Hereford, Repingdon and Ashford to translate and distribute the scriptures, but now they had succumbed to the Archbishop, and Wycliffe stood alone. And yet he was not alone, for the Lord was with him. This was perhaps his most terrifying hour, and yet it was probably his most sublime. The Archbishop demanded that Wycliffe recant, but he refused. Warming to his subject, he turned the charge of heresy against themselves. Why, he demanded, did they dare to spread their errors?—Why but to make merchandise of the grace of God. Rising to a climax which froze his enemies to the spot, so that he strode from the chamber free, Wycliffe said:
“With whom, think you, are ye contending? With an old man on the brink of the grave? NO! with Truth—Truth which is stronger than you, and will overthrow you. The Truth shall prevail.”
J.T.