By the close of the first quarter of the 16th century, the Protestant Reformation was in full swing and Lutheranism was going strong. The English king, Henry VIII, would reject the authority of the Pope in 1534. Scotland was now about to found a state church. This was especially difficult because of the Catholic monarchs who ruled England and Scotland during that period. Nonetheless, John Knox would prove to be the leading advocate for Protestantism in his native Scotland.
Although there is no record of his date of birth, Knox is believed to have been born in 1505, in Haddington, Scotland. Ordained a Catholic priest in 1530, he studied and was influenced by the writings of theologians who stressed the Scriptures alone as divine revelation, and recommended reading the Bible in its original language rather than in Latin, the language of the Roman Catholic Church.
Knox and his friends in the Protestant movement were quickly becoming enemies of the established Church. Knox himself narrowly escaped death from Cardinal David Beaton, who was known for putting to death anyone he felt was threatening to the Church. The Cardinal did execute Knox's friend, the reformer George Wishart, in 1546. After vengeful friends of Wishart's murdered Cardinal Beaton in return, these Protestant revolutionaries took over his residence, St. Andrew's Castle. The next year, when French Catholics seized the castle, Knox and his cohorts were taken prisoner and forced to row on French galleys for a year and a half.
