John Knox

Rosalind K. Marshall

• Publisher: Birlinn
• Year: 2013
• ISBN:
  9780857905284
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Historical Biographies
• Index: History

A bestselling biography of one of the Reformations' central characters from the author of Mary Queen of Scots: Truth or Lies. Following John Knox's career in Scotland, England, France, Switzerland, and Germany, Rosalind K.Marshall explains in straightforward terms the issues and beliefs which concerned the theologian so deeply. She also focuses on his relationship with the opposite sex, discussing the notorious First Blast of the Trumpet against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, his dealings with Mary, Queen of Scots, and the patient, revealing letters he wrote his mother-in-law. This book untangles truth from mythology in the life of this strange, complex, and determined man and constructs a balanced picture of sixteenth-century Scotland that places Knox clearly within the context of change and reformation which was sweeping the whole of Europe. The result is a richer and more complex portrayal of both Scotland and Knox than any hitherto available, and the first modern paperback of one of the most famous of all Scottish figures. Praise for John Knox and the books of Rosalind K.Marshall "A rare gift to the reading public." — International Review of Scottish Studies "An admirable new biography... a remarkable study, illuminating both a character and an age." —Antonia Fraser, award-winning author of Cromwell, on Mary of Guise "Dr Marshall... uses exactly the right mixture of flowing, readable narrative... to breathe life into the historical dust." —Jack Firth on Bonnie Prince Charlie

1

The Priest

THE MARKET TOWN OF Haddington stands on the banks of the River Tyne in the pleasant, fertile countryside of East Lothian. Close to the river is St Mary’s, the largest parish church in Scotland. The long, grey and red sandstone Gothic building has a square tower ninety feet high which, in the early sixteenth century, was almost certainly surmounted by a crown steeple. A little way from the east end of the church, a stone bridge crosses the Tyne, and on the far side a narrow street called Giffordgate leads to the right, along the river bank. John Knox is believed to have been born in a house in that street, in about 1514. Like so much else in his early life, the date is uncertain.

Tantalisingly little is known of his first thirty years. Historians have argued and speculated about his date of birth, his birthplace, his education and his subsequent career. He himself said many years later that he came from Giffordgate. His father, William Knox, was a merchant or a craftsman in Haddington. His mother’s first name is not known, but she seems to have been one of the Sinclairs of Northrig, perhaps with a sister married to George Ker of Samuelston, three miles south of the town. Knox once mentioned that his father and both his grandfathers had served in the forces of the Earls of Bothwell, who lived a few miles away at Hailes Castle. Some of these relatives had died under the Earls’ standards, he said, but he gave no details.¹

During the years he spent as a small boy in the house in Giffordgate with his parents and his brother William, Knox must often have glanced across the narrow, swift-flowing river to the east end of St Mary’s, heard its bells and watched the many visitors who came to pray there. When he was old enough he was presumably sent to learn to read and write at the local song school, he would certainly have attended services in the church and he might even have sung in the choir. The great pillared nave and the many altars would have been very familiar to him. St Mary’s must have been an important element in his life, giving a pattern and a sense of security, for he lost both his parents at an early age.

We do not know when or how William Knox and his wife died, and we can only assume that relatives came to the rescue of their two small sons. Whoever took them in had reasonable resources, for William was eventually able to set up in business as a successful merchant and it was decided that John should become a priest. When he was about ten John would have gone to Haddington Grammar School to study the Latin vital for an ecclesiastical career, and he must have done well, for he was then sent to university. There was not yet a university in Edinburgh, and so he had to go further afield. Haddington lay within the diocese of St Andrews, and it was to St Andrews University that he went, becoming a student of theology in St Salvator’s College.²

Knox would have been about fifteen when he left home, sailed across the River Forth to Fife and travelled east through a rural landscape, past fields divided into long rigs, past stone, turf and wattle houses with unglazed windows, woods, mill streams and all too often dilapidated churches to Scotland’s ancient ecclesiastical capital. St Andrews might be small by modern standards, but it was one of only six Scottish towns with a population of over 2000, a disproportionately high number of whom were churchmen. Far from being a place of remote and cloistered calm, it was constantly crowded as thousands of pilgrims flocked each year to the cathedral, and the castle was the residence of James Beaton, Archbishop of St Andrews and former Lord Chancellor of Scotland. About a year before Knox’s arrival, in 1528, a young man named Patrick Hamilton had been burned at the stake for heresy, just outside the archway leading in to St Salvator’s College, and, if Knox had not encountered Protestantism before, he must surely have heard all about it now from his fellow students.

A century and a half earlier, persecuted followers of the English reformer, John Wycliffe, fled north and settled in Kyle, Ayrshire. Ever since then, there had been sporadic but increasing criticism of the Roman Catholic Church. In part, this took the form of theological argument. Did the bread and wine really become Christ’s physical body and blood at the Mass? Could people confidently assure their future in the next world by endowing Masses, going on pilgrimages and purchasing papal indulgences? Was there any point in venerating the supposed relics of saints? Must all services be in Latin, with the priest as the necessary intermediary between God and man? There was also serious criticism of the behaviour of ecclesiastics, for everyone had heard about the illegitimate sons of kings and noblemen, given positions in the Church simply as a means of providing them with financial support. Most people had first-hand knowledge of uneducated monks and nuns living in idleness, parish priests who never preached and church dignitaries with luxurious residences, bastard children and worldly preoccupations.³

Wycliffe had openly attacked these abuses, issuing pamphlets in English instead of Latin, urging people to read the Bible for themselves and even arguing that wicked rulers, by their sins, forfeited their right to rule. His followers were scathingly known as Lollards, from a Dutch word meaning ‘mumblers’, and the church authorities did their best to stamp out the movement, in Scotland as well as in England. A Lollard named James Resby was burned as a heretic in Perth in 1407, and in 1433 Paul Crawar, a Bohemian studying at St Andrews University, was arrested and burned at the stake because he was a follower of John Huss, a Bohemian reformer influenced by Wycliffe. Even so, Lollardy persisted in the west of Scotland and several Lollards narrowly escaped execution in 1494.⁴

Twenty-three years after that, Martin Luther, a German priest, pinned to the church door at Wittenberg his famous ninety-five theses, criticising the abuses of the Roman Catholic Church, and Lutheranism spread rapidly throughout Germany and beyond. Printed pamphlets criticising the Church were smuggled into Scotland from the Low Countries, on ships sailing to Leith, Dundee and other east coast ports and soon Scots were able to obtain copies of William Tyndale’s English translation of the Bible, published on the continent.⁵

Patrick Hamilton had been a member of a younger branch of the powerful Hamilton family and was a distant relative of King James V. He had first encountered Lutheran doctrines while studying in Paris and Louvain, and had later sought out Martin Luther, Philip Melancthon and other leading reformers, openly discussing his controversial views when he returned to Scotland. However influential his connections, the Roman Catholic Church was not going to tolerate his activities, and he was suddenly arrested, tried and burned at the stake on 29 February 1528. Far from quenching heresy, however, his death made him a martyr and Protestant doctrines spread rapidly, especially at St Andrews University.⁶

Knox was not one of those who adopted the new religion. It is almost certain that he studied theology with the internationally famous scholar John Mair, a native of East Lothian, graduate of Cambridge and Paris, and much-admired Professor at the Sorbonne. Although Mair was a leading exponent of the old-fashioned scholastic theology with its all too often complicated and arid arguments, he held surprisingly up-to-date views on contemporary affairs. He criticised the abuses of the church and the idle pomp of many of the ecclesiastics living in Rome and he even turned his attention to recently discovered America, arguing that people there had the right to depose any colonial ruler who abused his position. Monarchs were chosen by God, he said, but ultimately their authority derived from the people they governed. In a society which saw the world in strictly hierarchical terms, these were startling views indeed.⁷

If Knox was excited by these new ideas, he showed no sign of deviating from his chosen career, but he could not have failed to observe the abuses of the Church which were just as prevalent in his own small country as they were elsewhere. Wealth and power lay not only with the monarch and the nobility but with the Scottish Church. Indeed, by the 1560s the Church’s yearly revenues would be in the region of £400,000 compared with the crown’s income of around £40,000 per annum.

There was nothing wrong with a well-endowed and fully-staffed ecclesiastical organisation, of course, but it was obvious to every one that the money was not being used in the way in which the donors intended. Most of it went to religious houses, cathedrals and universities rather than being used locally. As a result the parish churches were all too often dilapidated and the vicars poorly paid, while monks idled away their time in their own comfortable chambers. The heads of the monasteries and abbeys were frequently laymen, the sons of noblemen, given the office of commendator to sustain them financially. No fewer than six of King James V’s illegitimate sons would become commendators of abbeys and, to make matters worse, such men were often able to pass their benefices from one generation of their family to the next. Moreover, although Canon Law forbade the sale of ecclesiastical lands, more and more churchmen were feuing their property to ambitious laymen.⁸

A number of leading Roman Catholics were anxious to improve matters from within the church, but in the face of strong vested interests it was no easy task. It was, however, perfectly possible to acknowledge the Church’s failings without espousing the reformed doctrines and Knox may have looked at the problem from this point of view during his university days. His relatives had given him the opportunity of making his way in the world by sending him to St Andrews and there is little doubt that he was a diligent and successful student. He was not going to risk his future by becoming involved with a vocal and rebellious minority group. According to Theodore Beza, the friend and successor of the famous reformer John Calvin, Knox had a distinguished academic career.⁹ No written evidence of it has survived, and there is no record of his graduation, but when he left the University he became a priest and in later life was always known as ‘Mr Knox’, the implication being that he had a degree.

He was not, however, appointed to a parish. Scotland was a small country with a population of some 300,000. There were probably about 3,000 priests, too many for the available parishes. Like other newly ordained men, he had to look elsewhere for a means of earning his living. His activities during the late 1530s are unknown, but by 1540 he had managed to find a position as a notary apostolic in East Lothian. This meant that he had become a country lawyer. He may or may not have had some legal training. John Weddell, several times Rector of St Andrews University and later a judge, probably taught law as well as arts at St Andrews. As he was also the official of Lothian responsible for the training of notaries, he may have found Knox the position.¹⁰

Notaries apostolic were actually appointed on papal authority and represented their clients in the church courts. Much of their work, however, was done in private houses, drawing up title deeds, marriage contracts and wills, and sorting out minor financial disputes. By nature an energetic man with a keen sense of responsibility for others, Knox at this time must have learned to listen to people’s troubles and settle their quarrels with a firm hand. He did not do this work in Haddington itself, but he was based at Samuelston, very likely living with his mother’s relatives, the Kers.

On 13 December 1540, Knox enters the written records at last. He appeared that day at Haddington market cross on behalf of James Ker of Samuelston and two years later he and Ker were umpires in a minor financial dispute. In 1543 he was acting for Ker’s niece, Elizabeth Home, Lady Hamilton of Samuelston, the divorced wife of James, 1^st Earl of Arran. When he next features in the records, he was definitely living in Ker’s house, and was apparently acting as tutor to a boy named William Brounefield, and possibly to Ker’s own sons as well. Like so many other aspects of Knox’s early life, the timing of his career change is hidden from us. There is no personal correspondence, no notebook or memorandum, no hint in his later writings to tell us when exactly he abandoned the law in favour of teaching. The reason for this shift is obvious, however. He had become a Protestant.¹¹

He does not seem to have undergone a sudden conversion, or if he did he never mentions it. It is more probable that, disgusted with what he saw of the corruption of the church, he spent long hours studying the Bible, particularly the Old Testament, and managed to obtain copies of some of the new Protestant tracts, not just Lutheran writings but some of those produced by the Swiss reformers. He may have wrestled with his conscience for some time. Indeed, he would later sympathise deeply with those who experienced dreadful doubts about adopting the reformed religion. Some time in 1543 his decision was finally made, not least because it was suddenly safe to admit to being a Protestant.

In December of the previous year, King James V had died. Throughout his reign he had remained firm in his allegiance to the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church. Even when his uncle, Henry VIII of England, had broken with Rome and urged him to do likewise, he had refused. Instead, James strengthened Scotland’s traditional alliance with Roman Catholic France by marrying Princess Madeleine, daughter of the French king. When she died, he replaced her with a tall, handsome, aristocratic French widow, Mary of Guise. Relations between Scotland and England were by now deteriorating rapidly, and in November 1542 James V’s army was defeated by Henry’s at the Battle of Solway Moss. Distraught, he took to his bed and died soon afterwards, leaving a six-day-old daughter Mary, to become Queen of Scots. James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran, was appointed Regent, to rule the country for her.¹² The Lord Governor, as Arran was known, was not only head of the powerful House of Hamilton. Because there were no close royal relatives, he was also heir to the throne. Should the infant Queen die, he would become King. Personal ambition was always the principal concern of this shifty, indecisive descendant of a Stewart princess, but for once considerations of national safety had priority over everything else. Fearing that an English army would invade Scotland, Arran and his fellow noblemen made peace with England, agreeing that Mary, Queen of Scots should marry Henry VIII’s son, Prince Edward. Suddenly, the Lord Governor was encouraging the spread of Protestantism.¹³

Against the background of those events, Knox gave up his notarial appointment, started teaching William Brounfield’s son and went to hear a Protestant preacher who was visiting the area. Anxious to convince Henry VIII that his conversion was sincere, Arran was encouraging the distribution of the Bible in English and he appointed two Protestant chaplains to preach throughout the country. One of them was Thomas Guillaume, formerly Prior of the Black Friars of Inverness. Originally a native of East Lothian, he was sent there by the Lord Governor. After hearing him, Knox decided that he ‘was of solid judgment, reasonable letters (as for that age) and of a prompt and good utterance: his doctrine was wholesome without great vehemency against superstition’ (meaning Roman Catholic practices).

Not long after Guillaume’s visit to East Lothian, Arran’s other chaplain, John Rough, arrived and Knox went to hear him too. He liked him even better, for although Rough was ‘not so learned’, he was ‘more simple and more vehement against all impiety’. By now, Knox had moved from Samuelston to Longniddry, a few miles away, to become tutor to the sons of Sir Hugh Douglas. Sir Hugh had his own private chapel, and the local people came to listen when Knox catechised the boys and instructed them in the Bible. He was a priest no longer, but a Protestant teacher, and if he had any lingering doubts these were soon dispelled when he encountered a third travelling preacher, George Wishart.

Out of the pulpit, Wishart was not a particularly impressive man, tall, thin and fastidious rather than robust and forceful. When he began to speak, however, his audience listened with rapt attention, for he was a truly charismatic preacher. Wishart was about the same age as Knox. Born around 1513, in Angus, he had been forced to leave Scotland in 1538 when the Church charged him with heresy, and he had continued his studies on the continent. Travelling to England, he settled at Corpus Christi College, Cambridge but he was soon in trouble once more with the authorities. He decided that he would be safer in Scotland and returned in 1543, preached to large crowds in Dundee and Montrose, visited Ayrshire, and moved to Lothian after two attempts were made on his life. It was then that Knox encountered him and was deeply impressed. Knox swiftly became a member of the little band of friends and admirers who guarded Wishart as he travelled from one safe house to the next. It was usually Knox who carried a large, two-handed sword before Wishart, to frighten off his enemies.¹⁴

This precaution was all the more necessary because Protestantism was no longer being encouraged by the authorities. Soon after Wishart’s return to Scotland, the Regent Arran had reverted to Roman Catholicism. In a way, this was hardly surprising, for Arran was notorious for changing his mind. If he was with you before dinner, one contemporary observed, he would be against you after it. Not everyone at Court had agreed with his desire to marry Mary, Queen of Scots to Henry VIII’s son. The young Queen’s mother, Mary of Guise, was bitterly opposed to the arrangement. She could not contemplate her daughter becoming the wife of an English heretic. If she had been made regent, the treaty would never have been signed, but at the time of her husband’s death she had been in no position to oust Arran. She had been lying in Linlithgow Palace, recovering from the birth of her child. Unable to seize power, she had been forced to go along with Arran’s arrangements, but she was determined to change them.

Equally against the English match was Arran’s dynamic cousin, Cardinal David Beaton. In his one surviving portrait, Beaton is seen in his scarlet robes, with neatly trimmed beard and moustache, the very epitome of the worldly, sophisticated prince of the Church. French-educated, he had combined a diplomatic career with his ecclesiastical offices. He became a cardinal in 1538, succeeded his uncle, James Beaton, as Archbishop of St Andrews the following year, and in 1543 was appointed Chancellor of Scotland. Mary of Guise...