IntroductionPersecution for your beliefs or the desire for purity within the Church is not something most modern Christians experience. In an age when most people change churches like they change clothes (for the most casual of reasons), it is difficult to conceive of the type of dedication, conviction, and faith that our early Christian ancestors had when they arrived in America. In the pages that follow, we will briefly examine some of the causes and conditions that led to the Puritan migration of 1620, while observing the distinctions that set them apart from their contemporary counterparts. The Conditions The Puritan movement is believed to have begun to organize, into what we would recognize today, in the 1560s, during the reign of Queen Elizabeth. However, its roots go back to William Tyndale, who is probably best known for his translation of the Bible from its original languages ​​(primarily Hebrew and Greek) to the first English Bibles ever written. This inevitably led to the same radical reform of the Church that was taking place in Germany (but this time for its English counterparts), primarily due to the new ability of the common man to read and interpret the Bible through it. -even. In 1536, the English Parliament officially separated from the Roman Catholic Church to form the Church of England. The change, however, was primarily a political rather than a doctrinal one, which was the primary reason for the Puritans' desire for reform. According to William Bradford, who was a founding member of the original group of Puritans who came on the Mayflower, the Church had become "full of bitter disputes and a middle of paper... driving the Puritans to leave their families, their homes and their work to establish a community free from religious persecution. and similar in his beliefs. These beliefs or idiosyncrasies included the following: an emphasis on strong moral character, the importance of the Bible as the ultimate authority in doctrine and practice, and an uncompromising belief in the doctrines of grace. All of this distinguishes our Puritan ancestors from contemporary Christians of their day and from the majority of modern Christianity today. Works CitedMcMichael, George, James S. Leonard, Shelly Fisher Fishkin, David Bradley, Dana D. Nelson, Joseph Csicsila, Anthology of American Literature: Bradford/De Plymouth Plantation. Upper Saddle River: Pearson Prentice Hall, 2007. Ryken, Leland. Saints of the World: The Puritans as They Really Were. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1986.