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Topic: The Text Behind The King James Version
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Eden
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Thanks for all that information, Carol Swenson, some of it I did not know. Thanks for being a faithful poster and Topic starter.
love, Eden
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Carol Swenson
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Textus Receptus (Latin: "received text") is the name subsequently given to the succession of printed Greek texts of the New Testament which constituted the translation base for the original German Luther Bible, for the translation of the New Testament into English by William Tyndale, the King James Version , and for most other Reformation-era New Testament translations throughout Western and Central Europe. The series originated with the first printed Greek New Testament to be published; a work undertaken in Basel by the Dutch Catholic scholar and humanist Desiderius Erasmus in 1516, on the basis of some six manuscripts, containing between them not quite the whole of the New Testament. Although based mainly on late manuscripts of the Byzantine text-type, Erasmus's edition differed markedly from the classic form of that text.
The Byzantine text-type (also called Majority, Traditional, Ecclesiastical, Constantinopolitan, or Syrian) is one of several text-types used in textual criticism to describe and group the textual character of Greek New Testament manuscripts. It is the form found in the largest number of surviving manuscripts . The New Testament text of the Greek Orthodox Church, the Constantinople Patriarchate edition of 1904, is based on this text-type. While considerably varying, it also underlies the Textus Receptus Greek text used for most Reformation-era translations of the New Testament into vernacular languages.
The majority of textual critical scholars since the late 19th Century, have adopted an eclectic approach to the Greek New Testament; with the most weight given to the earliest extant manuscripts which tend mainly to be Alexandrian in character; the resulting eclectic Greek text departing from the Textus Receptus in around 6,000 readings.
No school of textual scholarship now continues to defend the priority of the Textus Receptus; although this position does still find adherents amongst the King-James-Only Movement, and other Protestant groups hostile to the whole discipline of text criticismas applied to scripture; and suspicious of any departure from Reformation traditions.
The Alexandrian text-type (also called Neutral or Egyptian) is one of several text-types used in New Testament textual criticism to describe and group the textual character of biblical manuscripts. The Alexandrian text-type is the form of the Greek New Testament that predominates in the earliest surviving documents , as well as the text type used in Egyptian Coptic manuscripts. In later manuscripts (from the 9th century onwards), the Byzantine text-type became far more common and remains as the standard text in the Greek Orthodox church and also underlies most Protestant translations of the Reformation era.
Most modern New Testament translations now use an Eclectic Greek text that is closest to the Alexandrian text-type.
![[Bible]](graemlins/bible.gif) Most textual critics of the New Testament favor the Alexandrian text-type as the closest representative of the autographs for many reasons. One reason is that Alexandrian manuscripts are the oldest we have found, and some of the earliest church fathers used readings found in the Alexandrian text. Another is that the Alexandrian readings are adjudged more often to be the ones that can best explain the origin of all the variant readings found in other text-types.
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Eden
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Only the original (first) manuscripts/letters/books of the original authors of the Hebrew/Aramaic Old Testament and of the Greek New Testament are inspired and inerrant (error-free).
Any and all copies made of these original documents are potentially subject to copyist errors.
These errors are however minor compared to the combined volume of the books, so that even its copies and translations are still, both in substance and almost in their entirety, as inspired as the original documents were.
All copies and translations are sufficient to save people, but, depending on which underlying Hebrew and Greek manuscripts were used, the copies and translations may vary in some minor sections. But overall, they all do a fine good job in saving people.
These minor errors, however, mean that we can no longer speak of the Bible as "inerrant" (meaning, "without error"), but we can definitely speak of the Bible as "infallible", meaning that all the things that it says therein, will "come to pass without fail".
love, Eden
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Carol Swenson
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Questions for "KJV only" advocates:
1. Which KJV is inspired, since it was revised numerous times, the last being in 1850?
2. What Bible would these KJV worshippers recommend since before 1611 there was no Bible.
3. Do they realize that the apostle Paul did not use the KJV.
4. Why do KJV only advocates reject the apocrypha, since the original 1611 version contained the apocrypha?
5. If God always gives the world his word in one language (as KJV advocates say of English), then the KJV is certainly not that language, for God chose Koine GREEK not ENGLISH to reveal his New Covenant!
6. If God gave us the KJV as an inspired translation, why would God not repeat the process again in modern language in each language?
7. If God supervised the translation process so that the KJV is 100% error free, why did God not extend this supervision to the printers?
8. Why did the KJV translators use marginal note showing alternate translation possibilities? If the English of the KJV is inspired of God, there would be no alternates!
9. If the KJV translators were inspired of God in their work, why did they not know it?
10. Why were all the marginal notes and alternate readings removed from modern editions of the KJV, along with the Apocrypha, the opening Dedication to James I, and a lengthy introduction from "The Translators to the Reader."?
11. When there is a difference between the KJV English and the TR Greek, why do you believe that the Greek was wrong and the KJV English is correct?
12. If the KJV-only supporters believe fully in the word-for-word inspiration of the KJV, why would italics be necessary?
13. In defending the KJV's use of archaic language, do you really think it is a good thing that a person must use an Early Modern English dictionary just to understand the Bible in casual reading?
14. Why do KJV only advocates feel that all modern translations are wrong for copyrighting the work of each translation when they copyright the materials on their websites, tracts and books they use to promote the KJV? Do they not realize that after 100 years all books pass into public domain and that all copyrighted Bibles today will soon be public domain just like the KJV? If "God's truth should not be copyrighted" then why do they copy write their defenses of God's ultimate truth, the Bible?
15. Is it not ridiculous to suggest that when the TR disagrees with the KJV that Greek TR has errors, but the KJV doesn't? Is this not the ultimate example of "translation worship"? (Reject the original in favour of the translation)
16. Did you know that the Textus Receptus, from which the KJV was translated, was based on half a dozen small manuscripts, none earlier than the 10th century? If the Textus Receptus is the error free text, then why are the last 6 verses of Revelation absence from the TR, yet present in the KJV? Did you know that for these verses, the Latin Vulgate was translated into Greek which was then translated into English - a translation of a translation of a translation?
17. Why do KJV only advocates believe that the English of the KJV is clearer and more precise than the original Greek language manuscripts? Why should Bible students throw out their Greek dictionaries and buy an "archaic English" dictionary? Are there not word pictures in the original Greek words that the English cannot easily convey? (Jas 2:19 "tremble"; Greek: PHRISSO, indicates to be rough, to bristle. is a powerful word picture of how the demons are in such terror that their skin is rough with goose pimples. Also differences between "agape" and "phileo" love words.)
18. Why did the translators make mistakes in the chapter summaries in the 1611 version? Wouldn't God have inspired this as well? Why would God inspire the English providentially accurate, but then allow misleading chapter headings? (Every chapter of the Song of Songs is interpreted as descriptive of the church. This is wrong. SoS is God's "mate selection manual." Also, Isa 22 "He prophesieth Shebna's deprivation, and Eliakim, prefiguring the kingdom of Christ, his substitution" This is wrong and reflect the incorrect theology of the day.)
19. Why would the translators use book headings like "The Gospel According to Saint Luke" since the Greek merely says "The Gospel According to Luke". Does not this show that the translators were influenced by their contemporary theology and the Catholic false doctrine of "sainthood"?
20. Do KJV only advocates realize that they stand beside the Mormon church in that both groups believe that they were delivered an "inspired translation"? (Mormon's believe Joseph Smith's English translation of the Book of Mormon from the Nephi Plates was done under inspiration.) Do KJV only advocates realize that the most powerful and irrefutable evidence that neither were translated under inspiration, is the very first edition with all their thousands of errors? (KJV- 1611 edition; BoM- 1831 edition)
21. Do KJV only advocates realize that, to point out that all modern translations have the same kinds of mistakes we are accusing of the KJV, is irrelevant, because we maintain that all translations have errors and none were translated under the inspired supervision of God?
22. Why would the Holy Spirit mis-guide the translators to employ the use of mythical creatures like "unicorn" for wild ox, "satyr" for "wild goat", "cockatrice" for common viper, when today we know what the real name of these creatures is?
23. If the KJV is error free in the English, then why did they fail to correctly distinguish between "Devil and Demons" (Mt 4:1-DIABOLOS and Jn 13:2-DAIMONIZOMAI) ; "hades and hell" (see Lk 16:23-HADES and Mt 5:22-GEENNA; Note: Hades is distinct from hell because hades is thrown into hell after judgement: Rev 20:14)
24. Why would KJV translators render Gen 15:6 which is quoted in identical Greek form by Paul in Rom 4:3, 9, 22; Gal 3:6, in FOUR DIFFERENT WAYS? Why are they creating distinctions where none exist?
25. Why did the KJV translators have consistent rule for differentiating between the use of definite and indefinite articles? (Dan 3:25 we have one "like the Son of God" instead of "like a son of God", even though in 28 Nebuchadnezzar states God sent "His angel" to deliver the men. The definite article was also added to the centurion's confession in Mt 27:54.)
26. How can you accept that the Textus Receptus is perfect and error free when Acts 9:6 is found only in the Latin Vulgate but absolutely no Greek manuscript known to man? Further, how come in Rev 22:19 the phrase "book of life" is used in the KJV when absolutely ALL known Greek manuscripts read "tree of life"?
27. How can we trust the TR to be 100% error free when the second half of 1 Jn 5:8 are found only in the Latin Vulgate and a Greek manuscript probably written in Oxford about 1520 by a Franciscan friar named Froy (or Roy), who took the disputed words from the Latin Vulgate? (we are not disputing the doctrine of the trinity, just the validity of the last half of this verse).
28. How do you explain the grammatical error in the original 1611 KJV in Isa 6:2 where the translators made a rare grammatical error by using the incorrect plural form of "seraphims" rather than "seraphim"?
29. Must we possess a perfectly flawless bible translation in order to call it "the word of God"? If so, how do we know "it" is perfect? If not, why do some "limit" "the word of God" to only ONE "17th Century English" translation?
30. Where was "the word of God" prior to 1611? Did our Pilgrim Fathers have "the word of God" when they brought the GENEVA BIBLE translation with them to North America?
31. Were the KJV translators "liars" for saying that "the very meanest [poorest] translation" is still "the word of God"?
32. Do you believe that the Hebrew and Greek used for the KJV are "the word of God"?
33. Do you believe that the Hebrew and Greek underlying the KJV can "correct" the English?
34. Do you believe that the English of the KJV "corrects" its own Hebrew and Greek texts from which it was translated?
35. Is ANY translation "inspired"? Is the KJV an "inspired translation"?
36. Is the KJV "scripture" ? Is IT "given by inspiration of God"? [2 Tim. 3:16] WHEN was the KJV "given by inspiration of God" 1611, or any of the KJV major/minor revisions in 1613, 1629, 1638, 1644, 1664, 1701, 1744, 1762, 1769, and the last one in 1850?
37. In what language did Jesus Christ [not Peter Ruckman and others] teach that the Old Testament would be preserved forever according to Matthew 5:18?
38. Where does the Bible teach that God will perfectly preserve His Word in the form of one seventeenth-century English translation?
39. Did God lose the words of the originals when the "autographs" were destroyed?
40. Did the KJV translators mislead their readers by saying that their New Testament was "translated out of the original Greek"? [title page of KJV N.T.]
41. Were they "liars" for claiming to have "the original Greek" to translate from?
42. Was "the original Greek" lost after 1611?
43. Did the great Protestant Reformation (1517-1603) take place without "the word of God"?
44. What copy or translations of "the word of God," used by the Reformers, was absolutely infallible and inerrant? [their main Bibles are well-known and copies still exist].
45. If the KJV is "God's infallible and preserved word to the English-speaking people," did the "English-speaking people" have "the word of God" from 1525-1604?
46. Was Tyndale's [1525], or Coverdale's [1535], or Matthew's [1537], or the Great [1539], or the Geneva [1560] . . . English Bible absolutely infallible?
47. If neither the KJV nor any other one version were absolutely inerrant, could a lost sinner still be "born again" by the "incorruptible word of God"? [1 Peter 1:23]
48. If the KJV can "correct" the inspired originals, did the Hebrew and Greek originally "breathed out by God" need correction or improvement?
49. Since most "KJV-Onlyites" believe the KJV is the inerrant and inspired "scripture" [2 Peter 1:20], and 2 Peter 1:21 says that "the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost," would you not therefore reason thus "For the King James Version came not in 1611 by the will of man: but holy men of God translated as they were moved by the Holy Ghost"?
50. Which reading is the verbally (word-for-word) inerrant scripture "whom ye" [Cambridge KJV's] or, "whom he" [Oxford KJV's] at Jeremiah 34:16?
51. Which reading is the verbally (word-for-word) inerrant scripture "sin" [Cambridge KJV's] or "sins" [Oxford KJV's] at 2 Chronicles 33:19?
52. Who publishes the "inerrant KJV"?
53. Since the revisions of the KJV from 1613-1850 made (in addition to changes in punctuation, capitalization, and spelling) many hundreds of changes in words, word order, possessives, singulars for plurals, articles, pronouns, conjunctions, prepositions, entire phrases, and the addition and deletion of words would you say the KJV was "verbally inerrant" in 1611, 1629, 1638, 1644, 1664, 1701, 1744, 1762, 1769, or 1850?
54. Would you contend that God waited until a king named "James" sat on the throne of England before perfectly preserving His Word in English, and would you think well of an "Epistle Dedicatory" that praises this king as "most dread Sovereign . . .Your Majesty's Royal Person . . ." IF the historical FACT was revealed to you that King James was a practicing homosexual all of his life?
[documentation Antonia Fraser -- "King James VI of Scotland, I of England" Knopf Publ./1975/pgs. 36-37, 123 || Caroline Bingham --"The Making of a King" Doubleday Publ./1969/pgs. 128-129, 197-198 || Otto J. Scott -"James I" Mason-Charter Publ./1976/pgs. 108, 111, 120, 194, 200, 224, 311, 353, 382 || David H. Wilson -- "King James VI & I" Oxford Publ./1956/pgs. 36, 99-101, 336-337, 383-386, 395 || plus several encyclopedias]
55. Would you contend that the KJV translator, Richard Thomson, who worked on Genesis-Kings in the Westminster group, was "led by God translating" even though he was an alcoholic that "drank his fill daily" throughout the work?
[Gustavus S. Paine -- "The Men Behind the KJV" Baker Book House/1979/pgs. 40, 69]
56. Is it possible that the rendition "gay clothing," in the KJV at James 2: 3, could give the wrong impression to the modern-English KJV reader?
57. Did dead people "wake up" in the morning according to Isaiah 37:36 in the KJV?
58. Was "Baptist" John's last name according to Matthew 14: 8 and Luke 7:20 in the KJV?
59. Is 2 Corinthians 6:11-13 in the KJV understood or make any sense to the modern-English KJV reader?
"O ye Corinthians, our mouth is open unto you, our heart is enlarged. Ye are not straitened in us, but ye are straitened in your own bowels. Now for a recompense in the same, (I speak as unto my children,) be ye also enlarged."
As clearly understood from the New International Version [NIV]
"We have spoken freely to you, Corinthians, and opened wide our hearts to you. We are not withholding our affection from you, but you are withholding yours from us. As a fair exchange I speak as to my children open wide your hearts also."
60. Does the singular "oath's," occurring in every KJV at Matthew 14: 9 and Mark 6:26, "correct" every Textus Receptus Greek which has the plural ("oaths") by the post-1611 publishers, misplacing the apostrophe?
61. Did Jesus teach a way for men to be "worshiped" according to Luke 14:10 in the KJV, contradicting the first commandment and what He said in Luke 4: 8?
62. Is the Holy Spirit an "it" according to John 1:32; Romans 8:16, 26; and 1 Peter 1:11 in the KJV?
63. Does Luke 23:56 support a "Friday" crucifixion in the KJV? [No "day" here in Greek]
64. Did Jesus command for a girl to be given "meat" to eat according to Luke 8:55 in the KJV? [or, "of them that sit at meat with thee." at Luke 14:10]
65. Was Charles Haddon Spurgeon a "Bible corrector" for saying that Romans 8:24 should be rendered "saved in hope," instead of the KJV's "saved by hope"?
[Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Vol 27, 1881, page 485 see more Spurgeon KJV comments in What is "KJV-Onlyism?", his & many others' views in the article, "Quotes on Bible Translations."]
66. Was J. Frank Norris a "Bible-corrector" for saying that the correct rendering of John 3:5 should be "born of water and the Spirit," and for saying that "repent and turn" in Acts 26:20 should be "repent, even turn"? [Norris-Wallace Debate, 1934, pgs. 108, 116]
Also, is Norman Pickering an "Alexandrian Apostate" for stating, "The nature of language does not permit a 'perfect' translation the semantic area of words differs between languages so that there is seldom complete overlap. A 'perfect' translation of John 3:16 from Greek into English is impossible, for we have no perfect equivalent for "agapao" [translated "loved" in John. 3:16]."?
67. Was R. A. Torrey "lying" when he said the following in 1907 "No one, so far as I know, holds that the English translation of the Bible is absolutely infallible and inerrant. The doctrine held by many is that the Scriptures as originally given were absolutely infallible and inerrant, and that our English translation is a substantially accurate rendering of the Scriptures as originally given"? [Difficulties in the Bible, page 17]
68. Is Don Edwards correct in agreeing "in favor of canonizing our KJV," thus replacing the inspired canon in Hebrew and Greek? [The Flaming Torch, June 1989, page 6]
69. Did God supernaturally "move His Word from the original languages to English" in 1611 as affirmed by The Flaming Torch? [same page above]
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Carol Swenson
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The King James Version is a good translation, but it is not perfect, and it is not the ONLY good translation.
The Text Behind the King James Version
The Greek text used by the translators who made the King James Version is commonly referred to as the Received Text, which in turn had its beginnings in the early 1500's when the first printed Greek texts were made . The Complutensian Bible was a polyglot Bible, published in several volumes. The fifth volume, which included a Greek text of the New Testament, was printed in 1514. However, Erasmus' Greek text, printed in 1516, was the first to be marketed. For this reason, and others, the text prepared by Erasmus surpassed the Complutensian text in popularity, and exerted the greatest influence on all the texts to follow for the next few centuries.
After Erasmus' text had seen several revisions, Robert Estienne, commonly referred to as Stephanus, published successive editions of a Greek text . His first two editions were compounds of Erasmus' text and the Complutensian text. However, the third edition (1550) was based primarily on the fourth and fifth editions of Erasmus' text. This 1550 edition gained wide acceptance in England, and for many is synonymous with the Received Text.
However, it was not until 1624 that the phrase, Received Text, or in the Latin, Textus Receptus, was actually coined, and then it was from the preface to the third edition of a Greek text published by Bonaventure and Abraham Elzevir . The words were, as described by Bruce Metzger, part of "a more or less casual phrase advertising the edition (what modern publishers might call a 'blurb')." The phrase boasted in Latin that the text presented was "the text which is now received by all." Thus came the phrase Textus Receptus, or Received Text.
The text published by the Elzevir brothers was mainly taken from a text published by Theodore de Beza in 1565. Beza's text showed its heritage from that of Stephanus, and ultimately from that of Erasmus. It is this basic text, common to Erasmus, Stephanus, Beza, and the Elzevir brothers, which lies behind all the protestant translations into English that were made from the Greek language prior to the nineteenth century, including the King James Version . According to The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, "The textus receptus...resolves itself essentially into that of the last edition of Erasmus."
As we stated before, no translation is due the reverence which many have toward the King James Version. Moreover, while the King James Version represents a scholarly translation from the Greek, because of the Greek text which lies behind it, it is perhaps even somewhat less deserving of such high esteem than some other translations. Bruce Metzger writes,
So superstitious has been the reverence accorded the Textus Receptus that in some cases attempts to criticize or emend it have been regarded as akin to sacrilege. Yet its textual basis is essentially a handful of late and haphazardly collected minuscule manuscripts, and in a dozen passages its reading is supported by no known Greek witness. (The Text of the New Testament, p. 106)
The vast majority of textual variations between the Textus Receptus and later texts (which are based to a large extent on older manuscripts that have been discovered or made available only in the last 150 years) are of no significance whatever. Often, variants are such that they are not at all distinguishable after being translated into English. At other times the variants merely represent the attempt of some scribe to supplement one synoptist's account with a detail legitimately provided in the account of another synoptist. However, occasionally the variations are more serious.
Although much credit is due to Erasmus for having made a Greek text available at all, the text which he presented was not of good quality . The half dozen manuscripts used by Erasmus were all of late origin. Most, if not all, were from the fifteenth century, while two may have been made as early as the twelfth century. He had only one manuscript which contained the book of Revelation, and it was missing the final leaf, which had contained the last six verses of Revelation. For these verses, Erasmus turned to the Vulgate, a Latin translation of the scriptures. Erasmus translated the Latin back to Greek. Thus, for those verses, it was a contrived Geek text which eventually came to be translated into English in the King James Version. Trying to discover the original Greek text by looking at a Latin translation is a little like trying to discover the exact ingredients used in making a German chocolate cake by tasting it. While your guess may be close, you will not be exactly right. Thus some words which have never been found in any Greek manuscript were incorporated into Erasmus' text, and in turn, into the Textus Receptus and the King James Version . For example, at Revelation 22:19, the phrase, "book of life" in the King James Version should be "tree of life" according to all known Greek manuscripts.
In other passages also, Erasmus took into his text words and phrases found in the Latin Vulgate, but supported by virtually no Greek manuscripts .
http://www.bible.ca/b-kjv-only.htm#smelser
For more information see also:
http://www.skypoint.com/members/waltzmn/TR.html
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