 While Erasmus was revered among humanists, his biblical scholarship soon came under attack from theologians. They refused to acknowledge him as a colleague and derided his doctorate, which had been granted per saltum, that is, without fulfilling the residence requirements or passing the usual examinations. In their eyes, Erasmus was merely a “theologizing humanist”, as the prominent Paris theologian Noël Beda put it (Preface to Annotations 1526). Erasmus was not the first humanist to treat the New Testament in a text-critical fashion and to compare the Latin Vulgate with the Greek original, although none of his predecessors had dared to use their findings to publish an amended edition of the text. Erasmus had discovered a manuscript of Lorenzo Valla’s annotations on the New Testament and originally planned to publish notes of a similar nature, that is, observations of errors, discrepancies, and mistranslations. He expanded the scope of his project on the urging of his publisher, Johann Froben, and rather hastily assembled a text based on the biblical manuscripts he had been able to consult. In the resulting edition, the Greek text was faced by a lightly amended Vulgate, with Erasmus’ editorial changes explained in annotations following the text. The reception of the edition varied. Humanists generally praised it as an exceptional achievement; a considerable number of theologians disapproved of it and not only impugned Erasmus’ scholarship but also questioned his orthodoxy. Their attacks must be seen in the context of Luther’s coincidental rise to prominence and the resulting religious debate which cast a long shadow over state and church and over society at large. Erasmus’ move from Leuven to Basel in 1521 was partly motivated by a desire to escape the hostile climate at the University of Leuven, but his opponents were not limited to the Low Countries. He had critics in Italy and was formally investigated by ecclesiastical authorities in Spain and in France. In 1531the prestigious faculty of theology at the University of Paris publicly censured and condemned numerous passages in his works as unorthodox. Erasmus responded to his critics with lengthy polemics, which fill two folio volumes in the Leiden Opera Omnia. He also published four revised editions of his New Testament (1519, 1522, 1527, 1531) with corrections and expanded notes.