In 1524, the son of a Parisian printer took over his father’s business at the age of twenty-one. There is nothing particularly unusual about a son taking over the family business, but the previous year, Robert Estienne, had revised the Latin edition of the New Testament. Its subsequent publication was the first occasion of years of controversy that were to follow. The controversy? Estienne had run afoul of the powerful and influential Roman Catholic faculty of the Sorbonne who thought it was a dangerous thing to have the Bible in the hands of ordinary farmers and shopkeepers. Estienne was undeterred and continued to publish editions of the Bible for sale and distribution as well as to speak approvingly of the Reformers theological views that were then being circulated. He even published many of Melanchthon’s works, further antagonizing his opponents. (click)

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