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Is the King James the Only Correct Version?
A movement has become prominent in the last generation or so which insists on exclusive adherence to the King James Version of 1611 (in practice the revision of 1769), known as the “King James Version Only” movement (hereafter KJVO). Allied with this is a similar adherence to its underlying Greek Text, the Textus Receptus or “Received Text” (TR). However, the movement goes further, maintaining that the King James Version of 1611 is the version whose translators God so superintended that the resultant version is without error, and therefore should in no way be tampered with. Since this sort of language has historically been applied to the original Hebrew and Greek autographs this is tantamount to affirming that the KJV is an inspired translation, that it is in fact qeopneustoV (“God-breathed”, 2 Tim.3:16). KJVO adherents will often disown and recoil from such a position, but the logic of their argument and the language they use compels this conclusion. Indeed, only by such a process, KJVO adherents will insist, can it be affirmed that God has preserved His Word.
There is a further twist to the KJVO rhetoric: since few people understand Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, God has provided a perfect translation, which is then by nothing other than a leap of faith identified with the King James Version of 1611. Anyone who appeals to the original languages will not impress KJVO advocates, because God has preserved His Word in the KJV. Such appeals will regularly be stigmatised – and dismissed - as “elitism”.
Consequently, KJVO declares all other versions, especially the New American Standard Bible (NASB), the New International Version (NIV), and even the New King James Version (NKJV) to be “perversions”, corrupted productions concocted by villainous scholars, in turn based on the corrupt and perverse scholarship of the nineteenth century scholars B.F. Westcott and F.J.A. Hort. In order to denigrate their work, these two scholars are regularly painted in the darkest colours, slandered unmercifully, branded as scoundrels holding the vilest heresies, and even accused of involvement in the occult. Indeed, ad hominem arguments of this type appear often from KJVO advocates.
In regard to the Greek text of the New Testament there is another leap of faith: this perfect text is identified as either the Stephanus Text of 1550, or the Bezan Edition of 1589 (there is some ambivalence here since the KJV translators sometimes followed one, sometimes the other). Whatever, the Critical Text of Westcott and Hort, and the two primary manuscripts on which they based many of their textual conclusions, viz. Codices Sinaiticus (א) and Vaticanus (B), receive similar treatment to the men themselves. They are defamed as vile corruptions, as tainted with all manner of heresies, to have subtracted from the Word of God, to be respectively a piece of recovered trash and the corrupt product of the Vatican, and thus to be given no credence at all.*
Although this movement has its highest profile in the United States, where its leading protagonists reside and teach, it nevertheless has a following in Australia where it has caused disruption in several congregations, divided families, and led to the deposition of faithful pastors. Indeed, during the 1980s one Presbyterian denomination experienced quite severe disruption from the movement. Ironically, the movement here has been especially evident in very conservative Reformed circles, although the leaders and protagonists in the USA are for the most part very anti-Reformed, normally representing Independent Fundamental Baptist churches.
The basic tenets of KJVO-ism could be summarised in point form as follows:
- God gave the (written) OT in Hebrew (and Aramaic), and the NT in Greek, but over subsequent centuries some manuscripts were recognized as corrupted (Sinaiticus/Vaticanus, and Alexandrian texts generically), likewise some various translations in line with these corrupted texts.
- The true church has used pure translations in ancient languages for centuries. The true Latin Bible was corrupted into the fake Vulgate, and the deceptive name of that corruption supplanted good Latin Bibles, later suppressed by the RCC.
- In the sixteenth century God moved Erasmus, Stephanus, Beza, etc. to providentially preserve, as He has all along, the pure text and so preserved His words, so as to preserve a perfect text summarised in the Authorised Bible.
- God so guided and superintended by His providential Holy Spirit the translators of the King James Version (1611) to give a verbally perfect translation, which can be regarded thereafter as God's infallible Word, eternal and unchangeable, and without provable error in any and all of its words.
- Appeal is made to Psa.12:6-7; Psa.119:89; Matt.24:35; Phil.3:15-16 in this connection.
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These statements contain a mass of misinformation, historical howlers, and indeed departures from the historic doctrine of the Church regarding Inspiration, all of which will be dealt with on the various pages under this theme. Furthermore, the volleys of invective are cranked up several notches in the two books by Gail Riplinger, New Age Bible Versions, and, In Awe of Thy Word, AV Publns, 2004. It is not my intention to reply to every wild allegation in these, quite scurrilous volumes. Instead, while some response will be given to KJVO claims, the general approach in these pages will be more positive: to show from the very earliest manuscripts extant (the papyri) the procedure of evaluating manuscripts to discern and demonstrate the original text.
1. Doug Kutilek comments on KJVO-ism as follows:
“Conveniently ignored are legitimate questions: why this version and no other? And, why in this language and no other? And, what of the very numerous differences between the various editions of the KJV published since 1611? (no two being identical in all details--except for photographic reprints--which being true, how can this meet the standard of an infallibly-preserved Scripture?).”
(see http://www.christianbeliefs.org/kjv/preservation.html)
2. One leading scholar of KJVO-ism is D.A. Waite, D.A., Th.D., Ph.D., President of the Dean Burgon Society. His book entitled, Defending the King James Bible: A four-fold Superiority: Texts, Translators, Technique, Theology, typifies the circularity in KJVO argumentation, which can be summarised as follows:
The kernel of Waite's argument is that the KJV is superior to all other versions. To demonstrate this Waite shows multitudinous charts where the NIV and NASV readings depart from the KJV readings. Underlying this whole procedure is the assumption that since they differ, the KJV, being superior, must therefore be right. So one assumes superiority in order to prove superiority! That's the sum total of Waite's argument.
Moreover, facts do not matter here: that the manuscripts underlying the KJV all come from the 12th century or later; that the KJV translators were still influenced by the Latin Vulgate; that so much more is known about the Biblical languages now, especially Hebrew, than what was available to the KJV translators; or that the KJV translators themselves explicitly disclaimed any notion of a perfect translation. For all this, however, Waite sallies forth and charges modern Bibles with “serious heresy.” But in the words of NT scholar William Lane, “An ounce of evidence is worth a pound of presumption”, and what we have here is presumption.
James White pointed out in a debate with Waite in 1994 that using Waite's own logic, the NIV and NASV in Acts 4:25 are in fact superior regarding the role of the Holy Spirit in giving the Scripture. The TR there reads simply, “by the mouth of Thy servant David”, whereas the older texts (P74, א, A, B, E, many miniscules, Old Latin [L], etc) read, “through the Holy Spirit, by the mouth of our father, Thy servant David”. Doubtless if the situation had been the other way around, Waite would have charged modern versions with being soft on the doctrine of inspiration! However, here the older manuscripts are stronger on this point than the TR. Clearly the added words have dropped out of the text along the line of transmission, a fact to which the earlier manuscripts testify. However, both Waite then, and KJV-Onlyists generally, dislike and avoid discussing the specifics and totality of manuscripts and texts which may spike their assumptions.
As Waite’s insistence on the theological superiority of the KJV and its TR Greek base, one more such example will suffice. Waite in one published paper, a summary statement of his book+, writes as follows:
“Romans 1:16. Here's what it says in the accurate KJV: "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek."
The heretical Greek texts of "B" (Vatican) and "Aleph" (Sinai) remove the two words, "of Christ" in this verse. Because of this, the NIV also removes these words. So does the NASV. So does the NKJV in the footnotes. So do the other modern versions and perversions. This certainly is doctrine. "Gospel" means "good news" or a "good announcement." What "gospel" could be inserted there instead of the "gospel of Christ"? Was it the good news about a pay raise? Was it the good news about a new car, a new hat, or a new house? No! It's the gospel or good news about Christ. That's doctrine! That's theology!”
Note how Waite rails against the two codices א (Sinaiticus) and B (Vaticanus). He does not tell the reader that the following manuscripts also omit the words “of Christ”: Codices A, C, D*, E, G, plus many miniscules and early versions. The words are only included in some quite late manuscripts such as Dc, K, L, P and certain Mediaeval miniscules.++ Are Codices A, C, E, G, etc “heretical Greek texts” too? This example is typical of the disingenuous dissembling involved in KJV-Onlyism.
Added to this is the fact that the Bible texts quoted (Psa.12:6-7; Psa.119:89; Matt.24:35) are entirely gratuitous and make no link between Divine preservation and an Anglican version in the seventeenth century A.D. This is the “long jump” of the KJVO position.
Final Comment
This tight circularity whereby the KJV is from the outset assumed as the standard, such that any deviation just has to be a (wicked) corruption, underlies all KJVO argumentation, literature, and verbal debate. On one hand it is hard to refute once this assumption is tenaciously held and ingrained, but the simple fallacy involved is lost on the KJVO advocates. If this could be seen, there would be no ‘King James Only debate’.
* See e.g. the discussion on: http://www.mag-net.com/~maranath/OLDBEST.HTM
+ See Waite’s full article at http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/fourfold.htm
++ D* and Dc refer respectively to the original reading of Codex Bezae, and then to a later corrector of this manuscript from the C5th or possibly C6th.
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