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KEY Commentary Side Textual Bibliographic Scriptural
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sofre him to be wiser then we / we shuld make none article
of the faith of this or that. And agayne / if the soules be
in heuen / tell me whi they be not in as good case as the
angelles be? And then what cause is there of the resurreccion?
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M. Item no man shall praye to sayntes. T. when
ye speake with
saintes that be departed / it is not euell to
put them in remembraunce
to praye for you. M. whi doo they not heare vs?
T. if they loue you
so feruently and be so greate with god / whi
certifie they you not /
that they so doo? M. so they doo in that we
fele oure peticions
graunted. T. God saued the old Idolatres with
worldly saluacion and gaue them their peticions / which
they yet axed of their Idoles / as ye se thorow out al the
old testament. God heareth the crowes / foules / beestes
and wormes of the erth / as the texte saith / men and beestes doeth god saue / which bestes yet praye not to god. The Iewes and turkes doeth god saue in this worlde and geueth them their
worldly peticions. Which yet worshepe not god / as his
godly nature is to be worsheped but aftir their awne
imaginacion: not in the spirite with faith hope and loue /
but with bodyly seruice as the pope doeth. As the popish
serue S. Appoline for the toth ache and ar healed: euen so
the Iewes and turkes be healed and pray not to hir / but serue god aftir a nother maner for the same disease. So that God
doeth saue in this worlde all that kepe the worldely lawes
worldly / that is to
wite / outwarde in the body for bodyly rewarde and not in
the herte of loue that springeth out of the mercy that God
hath geuen vs in christe which same / though they be turkes
/ if they breake the worldly lawes / he rebuketh them / as
the ni
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no man . . .
sayntes. Cf. CWM 6/1.355/1.
God . . . old
testament. Here Tyndale offers the opinion that the prayers
pagans addressed to their idols were answered by Yahweh. The general
attitude of the Old Testament towards idol worship is negative. Cf.
"They that make them [idols] are like vnto them [i.e., dumb, blind, deaf
etc.]: so is euery one that trusteth in them"
(Ps. 115.8). However, Yahweh is dramatized as addressing Cyrus the
Persian, who in 538 BC allowed the Jews to leave Babylon and return to
Palestine to rebuild the Temple: "For Jacob my seruants sake, and Israel
mine elect, I have euen called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee,
though thou hast not knowen me" (Isa. 45.4 KJV).
men . . .
saue. Cf. Ps. 36.6 in KJV.
Which . . .
spirite. Cf. John 4.22–24.
S. Appoline.
During the persecution of Decius (AD 250–51),
executioners knocked out the teeth of
Apollonia (GL 1.268–69). Erasmus' Enchiridion of
1503 mocks the quasi-pagan custom of assigning particular
functions to particular saints, such as Apollonia's power to relieve
toothaches (Holborn 66/10–11; CWE 66.64). For illustrations of
Apollonia, cf. Duffy (Plates 60, 73).
mercy . . .
christe. Cf. 1 Cor. 1.4.
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