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James Edward McGoldrick, Luther's English Connection : The Reformation Thought of Robert Barnes and William Tyndale, Milwaukee : Northwestern Publishing House, 1979. vi + 232 pp., 8 illustrations. US $ 7.50.
Appearing between the 1973 publication of More's Confutation of Tyndale's Answer and the 1981 publication of his Dialogue Concerning Heresies, l Professor James E. McGoldrick 's study is a very useful exposition of the major themes in the theology of two English Reformers with whom More engaged in controversy. The title and the organization of his book show, however, that McGoldrick is less concerned with assessing their relationship to More than to Luther. After two introductory chapters, he explicates the positions of Barnes and Tyndale on the great Reformation principles : sola scriptura, sola gratia and sola fides. He follows these with an examination of their teachings on church and state, institutions which were then distinct but not separate. Even though Tyndale (d. 1536) was martyred before Barnes (d. 1540) and ultimately made a greater religious contribution through his scriptural translations, McGoldrick gives Barnes primacy of place. This arrangement seems to be based on Barnes' more thorough agreement with Luther in that they both temporarily doubted the canonicity of the Epistle of St. James...