KNOX, JOHN

born c. 1514, , near Haddington, Lothian, Scot. died Nov. 24, 1572, Edinburgh foremost leader of the Scottish Reformation, who set the austere moral tone of the Church of Scotland and shaped the democratic form of government it adopted. He was influenced by George Wishart, who was burned for heresy in 1546, and the following year Knox became the spokesman for the Reformation in Scotland. After a period of intermittent imprisonment and exile in England and on the European continent, in 1559 he returned to Scotland, where he supervised the preparation of the constitution and liturgy of the Reformed Church. His most important literary work was his History of the Reformation in Scotland. Additional reading David Laing (ed.), The Works of John Knox, 6 vol. (184664), a work of distinguished scholarship containing the collected writings of Knox; W. Croft Dickinson (ed.), John Knox's History of the Reformation in Scotland (1949, reprinted 1979), Knox's own History in modern English, fully annotated and indispensable for the scholar as well as enjoyable for the layman; W. Stanford Reid, Trumpeter of God: A Biography of John Knox (1974, reissued 1982), a comprehensive biography; Jasper G. Ridley, John Knox (1968), a well-documented biography with a complete bibliography; Eustace Percy, John Knox (1937, reissued 1965), a sensitive and penetrating study of Knox and his times, but lacking in documentation; Geddes MacGregor, The Thundering Scot (1957); and Elizabeth Whitley, Plain Mr. Knox (1960), more popular studies for the general reader; James S. McEwen, The Faith of John Knox (1961), a study of Knox's religious views and their relation to those of other Reformers; and Duncan Shaw (ed.), John Knox: A Quatercentenary Reappraisal (1975), four biographical essays.