William Reynolds (theologian)

William Reynolds (also Rainolds, Raynolds, Latin Reginaldus) (born at Pinhorn near Exeter, about 1544; died at Antwerp, 24 August, 1594) was an English Roman Catholic theologian and Biblical scholar.

Life

Educated at Winchester School, he became fellow of New College, Oxford (1560-1572). He was converted to Catholicism partly by the controversy between John Jewel and Thomas Harding, and partly by the personal influence of William Allen.

In 1575 he made a public recantation in Rome, and two years later went to Douai to study for the priesthood. He removed with the other collegians from Douai to Reims in 1578 and was ordained priest at Chalons in April, 1580. He then remained at the college, lecturing on Scripture and Hebrew, and helping Gregory Martin in translating the "Reims Testament".

Some years before his death he had left the college to become chaplain to the Beguines at Antwerp.

Works

He translated several of the writings of Allen and Harding into Latin and wrote a "Refutation" of Whitaker's attack on the Reims version (Paris, 1583); "De justa reipublicæ christianæ in reges impios et hæreticos authoritate" (Paris, 1590), under the name of Rossæus; a treatise on the Blessed Sacrament (Antwerp, 1593); "Calvino-Turcismus" (Antwerp, 1597).

Family

He was the second son of Richard Rainolds, and elder brother of John Rainolds, one of the chief Anglican scholars engaged on the King James Bible.

References

*KIRBY, Annals of Winchester College (London, 1892);
*FOSTER, Alumni Ozonienses (Oxford. 1891);
*Douay Diaries (London, 1878);
*Anthony à Wood, Athenae Oxonienses (London, 1813);
*PITTS, De illustribus Angliae scriptoribus (Paris, 1619);
*Charles Dodd, Church History, II (Brussels vere Wolverhampton, 1737-42);
*Joseph Gillow, in Biog. Dict. Eng. Cath., s. v.;
*RIGG in Dict. Nat. Biog., s. v. Rainolds.