BENOIST (BENOIT), RENÉ: Roman Catholic theologian; b. at Savenièrs, near Angers, in 1521; d. at Paris Mar. 7, 1608. He accompanied Mary Stuart to Scotland as her confessor in 1561; after his return to France was appointed pastor of the church of St. Eustache in Paris in 1569, and played a conspicuous part in the controversies of the Ligue as one of the leaders of the opposition to the Guises and the Ultramontanes. In 1566 he published a translation of the Bible, which, however, was little more than a reprint of the Geneva translation; it has been said that he knew little of either Hebrew or Greek. The translation was condemned by the theological faculty of the University of Paris in 1567 and by Pope Gregory XIII in 1575, and Benoist was expelled from the Sorbonne in 1572. He was reinstated by Henry IV and, to reenter the faculty, subscribed his own condemnation. He exasperated the Ultramontanes still more by maintaining that the king did not forfeit his right to the throne by professing the Protestant faith. He had influence in bringing about Henry's change of faith, and the latter made him his confessor and appointed him bishop of Troyes, but the pope refused confirmation, and in 1604 he had to renounce the office. He was a voluminous writer.