I mean, really, why would it be encrypted?

[Mark Knowles]

Is there no middle ground then between what we should have cracked already and nonsense?

Quite honestly? No, there isn't. Because anything in between would have been a leap of genius to a level above our own 21th century knowledge.
It's impossible for a 15th century cipher - as we know it - to baffle us, yet still retain retrievable knowledge.

Prove me wrong, people!

I like the last line of the New York Times article->

Why would Heidel encode his discovery? ''It was cryptological vanity,'' Dr. Ernst said.

This is personally what I have thought for some time was the biggest, though not only, reason the Voynich was enciphered. Yes, I am sure he thought the contents of the manuscript was important and would best be kept secret, but I think above all he did it, because he could! Obviously within the context of my personal theory the author was brought up with ciphers and around enciphered, so he had more familiarity than most. So he had the background and the intelligence to do it and he was demonstrating to himself how clever he was. I think human psychology is really important here.