Every Man For Himself Bible Versionism

[brandplucked]

Are these claims concerning the Latin Vulgate-only view scriptural? The early English translators including the KJV translators rejected these Catholic claims as unscriptural. Surprisely, KJV-only advocates seem to have revived these same warmed-over Catholic claims as "irrefutable" proof for another incorrect one-translation-only view--the KJV-only view.

Hi Jig. We Bible believers have heard these arguments from the Bible doubters many times and are not unequipped to respond to them. The whole point of this argument you present is to refute the belief in a complete, inspired and infallible Bible in any language. After all (your argument goes) if this claim was made before and it was wrong, the King James Bible believers must be wrong too, right?

Well, let's compare the two views and see the similarities and differences.

KJB Only versus Latin Vulgate Only Argument

One common complaint I hear all the time and mentioned by Mr. Norris in his book (The Unbound Scriptures) is that we who believe there is only one Bible that is the pure, complete, and infallible word of God is that this is similar to the Catholic view concerning the Latin Vulgate.

Allow me to briefly address this accusation. The Council of Trent met from 1545 to 1563 in an effort to rally the forces of the Catholic church to combat what they considered the heresies of the Reformation and their Bibles.

The Catholic church decided that the Latin Vulgate should be their official bible and none other allowed. Problem was, even when they made this decree, there was no settled text or single Latin Vulgate considered authoritative. Their own language reveals this. Here is a quote taken from the Council of Trent's own decree issued in 1556 "Moreover, the same sacred and holy Synod,--considering that no small utility may accrue to the Church of God, IF IT BE MADE KNOWN WHICH OUT OF ALL THE LATIN EDITIONS, NOW IN CIRCULATION, of the sacred books, IS TO BE HELD AS AUTHENTIC,--ordains and declares, that the said old and vulgate edition, which, by the lengthened usage of so many years, has been approved of in the Church, be, in public lectures, disputations, sermons and expositions, held as authentic; and that no one is to dare, or presume to reject it under any pretext whatever. Furthermore, in order to restrain petulant spirits, It decrees, that no one, relying on his own skill, shall,--in matters of faith, and of morals pertaining to the edification of Christian doctrine, --wresting the sacred Scripture to his own senses, presume to interpret the said sacred Scripture contrary to that sense which holy mother Church,--whose it is to judge of the true sense and interpretation of the holy Scriptures,--hath held and doth hold." (end of quote)

A papal commission worked for many years after the Council of Trent, but was not able to produce an authentic edition. Pope Sixtus took matters into his own hands and produced his own revision, which appeared in May 1590. The Sixtus Latin Vulgate was full of errors, "some two thousand of them introduced by the Pope himself" (Janus, The Pope and the Council, Boston: Roberts Brothers, 1870). In September 1590 the College of Cardinals stopped all sales and bought up and destroyed as many copies as possible. Another edition finally appeared in 1592, which became the official Bible of the Roman Catholic Church (H. Wheeler Robinson, Ancient and English Versions of the Bible, Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1940, p. 120).

There are several fundamental differences and similarities to what the Catholic church tried to do with the Latin Vulgate, and the Bible version issue as it stands today.

The Differences:

First - the Catholic church wanted to place the words of God in a DEAD LANGUAGE which most people could not read and they forbad translations into other languages to be made. Thus they were keeping the words of God out of the hands of the common people and making them dependent on a special class of priests to interpret it for them.

Second - This official bible had no settled text at the time the decrees were made. There were several competing Latin Vulgate bibles circulating at the time and one was not settled upon till 36 years later.

Third - This official bible was produced by an apostate church which denied salvation by faith alone in the finished work of Christ; denied salvation outside of this Catholic church system, and established a special group of priests who alone could interpret the Scriptures for us.

The King James Bible believer does not deny salvation to anyone who happens to read any Bible version other than the KJB. We approve of the translation of Scripture into other languages, desiring only that they attempt to follow the same underlying Hebrew and Greek texts, and the meaning as found in the King James Bible, as best as possible and not omit some 3000 to 4000 words, including 17 to 45 whole verses, from the New Testament as do versions such as the RSV, NASB, NIV, ESV. All these modern versions just mentioned also depart frequently from the Hebrew texts that underlie our King James Bible.

The Similarities:

First - the modern versionist has no settled text, just as the Council of Trent did not when they made their decree. The Greek text that underlies the modern versions such as the NIV, NASB, ESV, ISV, Holman Standard, etc. is in a continual state of flux and constant change. Every new version changes the actual TEXT, as well as the meanings of other verses, from the previous versions.

Second - The modern versionist would likewise place the Final Authority in the hands of a special group of religious leaders - the scholars. They affirm that no translation is the inspired words of God and that we must "go to the original Hebrew and Greek texts" (which don't even exist). Thus they remove the common people from the words of God by appealing to DEAD LANGUAGES as their final authority.

However, it is painfully obvious that these same scholars cannot agree among themselves WHICH Hebrew and WHICH Greek texts are authentic. This is similar to the case of the conflicting Latin Vulgate versions that were circulating at the time of the decree of the Council of Trent in 1556.

Third - The ever changing Greek text now used to translate most modern versions is compiled by men who themselves are apostates who believe no Bible is inspired and much of what we do have is "ancient folktale, popular legend, and traditions penned by unknown authors". (See Bruce Metzger, Cardinal Carlo Martini, and the other liberal editors of the UBS Greek text.)

Satan counterfeits every spiritual truth. If there really is One true Holy Bible, then the devil will say there is only one true bible and it is the Catholic bible. Guess which bibles today generally OMIT ALL THE SAME VERSES from the New Testament as do modern Catholic bible versions. You got it.

Will Kinney

 

[Jig]

Elizabethan Old-English is a DEAD LANGUAGE too. No one has spoken or written it in over a hundred years.

 

[brandplucked]

Elizabethan Old-English is a DEAD LANGUAGE too. No one has spoken or written it in over a hundred years.

Golly, Jig, I was completely unaware just how smart I must really be. I can read and understand a "dead language". Wow! Now, how Cool is that!

The English in the King James Bible is modern English. Check out any Encyclopedia or whatever you want to find out what modern English is before you give a knee jerk response.

AV has 10 kids and they all understand the King James Bible. I know of many families whose kids understand it. Are there a few archaic words in the KJB? Well of course there are. Why not just look them up in a dictionary and learn what these good words mean? Is it really all that hard to do?

For more info, see "The 'archaic' language of the King James Bible"
"Archaic" KJB; ship - Another King James Bible Believer

Let's take a look at your modern NIV and NKJV and see if your high school kids can pass a simple vocabulary test, OK?

There is an book called, “Archaic Words and the Authorized Version”, by Laurence M. Vance. In it Mr. Vance shows how most of the so-called archaic words in the KJB are not archaic at all but are found in modern magazines, newspapers, and dictionaries. There are only about 200 words usually picked out by critics of the KJB, yet of the approximately 800,000 words in the Bible this is only .004 % of the total.

He also shows many examples of words in the modern versions which most people would have to look up in a dictionary. Here are some of those words found in the "easy to read" NIV. Archaic Words in the NIV by Dr. Laurence Vance

abashed, abominable, abutted, acclaim, adder, adhere, admonishing, advocate, alcove, algum, allocate, allots, ally, aloes, appease, ardent, armlets, arrayed, astir, atonement, awl, banishment, battlements, behemoth, belial, bereaves, betrothed, bier, blighted, booty, brayed, breaching, breakers, buffeted, burnished, calamus, capital (not a city), carnelian, carrion, centurions, chasm, chronic, chrysolite, cistern, citadel, citron, clefts, cohorts, colonnades, complacency, coney, concession, congealed, conjure, contrite, convocations, crest, cors, curds, dandled, dappled, debauchery, decimated, deluged, denarii, depose, derides, despoil, dire,dispossess, disrepute, dissipation, distill, dissuade, divination, dragnet, dropsy, duplicity, earthenware, ebbed, ebony, emasculate, emission, encroach, enmity, enthralled, entreaty, ephod, epicurean, ewe, excrement, exodus, factions, felled, festal, fettered, figurehead, filigree, flagstaff, fomenting, forded, fowler, gadfly, galled, gird, gauntness, gecko, gloating, goiim, harrowing, haunt, hearld, henna, homers, hoopoe, ignoble, impaled, implore, incur, indignant, insatiable, insolence, intact, invoked, jambs, joists, jowls, lairs, lamentation, leviathan, libations, loins, magi, manifold, maritime, mattocks, maxims, mina, misdemeanor, mother-of-pearl, mustering, myrtles, naive, naught, Negev, Nephilim, nettles, nocturnal, nomad, notorious, Nubians, oblivion, obsolete, odious, offal, omer, oracles, overweening, parapet, parchments, pavilion, peals (noun, not the verb), perjurers, perpetuate, pestilence, pinions, phylacteries, plumage, pomp, porphyry, portent, potsherd, proconsul, propriety, poultice, Praetorium, pretext, profligate, promiscuity, provincial, providence, qualm, quarries, quivers (noun, not verb), ramparts, ransacked, ratified, ravish, rabble, rawboned, relish (not for hotdogs), recoils, recount, refrain, relent, rend, reposes, reprimanded, reputed, retinue, retorted, retribution, rifts, roebucks, rue, sachet, satraps, sated, shipwrights, siegeworks, sinews, sistrums, sledges, smelted, somber, soothsayer, sovereignty, spelt, stadia, stench, stipulation, sullen, tamarisk, tanner, temperate, tether, tetrarch, terebinth, thresher, throes, thronged, tiaras, tinder, tracts, transcends, tresses, turbulent, tyrannical, unscathed, unrelenting, usury, vassal, vaunts, vehemently, verdant, vexed, wadi, wanton, warranted, wield, winnowing and wrenched.

There are many cases where the NIV uses a harder word than the KJB. Compare the following: The NIV has “abasement” in Ezra 9:5 whereas the KJB has “heaviness.” Isaiah 24:23: “abashed” (NIV) = “confounded” (KJB). Ezekiel 40:18: “abutted” (NIV) = “over against” (KJB). 2 Chronicles 15:14: “acclamation” (NIV) = “voice” (KJB). Isaiah 13:8: “aghast” (NIV) = “amazed” (KJB) Psalm 107:5 "ebbed away" (NIV) = "fainted" (KJB). A personal favourite is “squall” (NIV) instead of “storm” (KJB) in Mark 4:37.

It is funny that I can put together the phrase from the KJB which says; "The very sad green giant was hungry” and in the NIV it would be: “The overweening dejected verdant Nephilim was famished."

Well, how about the New KJV? Can you pass this vocabulary test even with a few of my "helpful hints"? Let's see.



The vocabulary of the New King James Version, along with some "helpful hints".

Abase, abashed, abode, adhere, admonish, adversity, aground, algum, alienate, alighting, allays, allotment, alloy, aloof, alms, amend, amiss, annihilated, anise, antitype, arbitrate, apprehended, archives, armlets, ascertain, asps, attire, austere, backbite, banishment, baths (not to get clean), bdellium, befalls, beggarly, begetting, behemoth, belial, beseech, betrothal, beveled, birthstools, bittern, bleat, booty (not modern slang), borne, breach, brandished (not drunk), bray, bristling, buffet (not a restaurant), buckler (not a belt), bulrush, (not a stampede), burnished, butress (not a chair), calamus, caldron, capital (not a city), carcasses, carnally, carrion (not luggage), cassia, caulkers, centurion (not a 100 years), chalcedony, chalkstones, chaste (not pursued by a runner), chasten, (not related to previous chaste), chrysolite, chrysoprase, circumspect, cistern (not feminine of brethren), citadel, citron, clamor, cleft, cloven (not a spice), commission (not money), commonwealth (not shared money), compound (not a barracks), concede , compulsory, conciliation, concubine (not a tractor), congealed, contemptuously, confederacy (not the South), contingents (not same as large land masses), corban, coriander, countenance (not adding up ants), couriers (not an hordourve), covert, crags, crescents, crest (not the top of a hill), cropped (not food), cubit, custodian (not the one who cleans the school halls), curds, dainties (not effeminate), dandled, daubed, dappled, dayspring, denarii, deposed (not relaxing after a foto op), deride (not same as dismount), despoiled (not really, really rotten), diadem, diffuses (not to disarm a bomb), dilapidation (not the act of standing up), dispensation, disrepute, dissipation, diviner (not a grape grower), docile, dragnet (not a detective drama), dregs, drachmas, dropsy (not clumsiness), dross, dryshod, eczema (God bless you), edict, edification, elaborate, embellish, emitted, enigma, enmity, entrails (not a short cut), envoy, eventide, epistle, ephod, exorcise (not jogging), expiration (not a date on a carton of milk), faction, fallow, famish, fare (not average and not money), fatlings (not piglets), feigned (not passed out), festal, fetched, fidelity (not good sound), figurehead (not a statue of a head), filly, flanges, foreskin, fostered, fowlers (not a baseball term), fuller (not less empty), furlongs (not cat tails), gad, garland, garrison, gaunt, gecko, graven, Hellenists, hew (not a man's name), homers (not baseball), hoopoe (not a garden tool), immutability, indignant, insolence, insubordination, intervene, itinerant, jackdaw, jeopardy (a TV show, but what does it mean?), jubilation, kors (not a brand of beer), laden, lamentations, laud (not Boston pronunciation of lard), lusty, mail (not a letter), mammon, matrix (other than the movie), mattock (not a TV lawyer show), mercenaries, mina (not a type of bird), mite (not a bed bug), moorings, nativity, offal (not terrible), offscouring (not dandruff), omnipotent, onager (Job 39:5 - you won't believe this one!) oracle, pangs, papyrus (not a fruit), paramours, parapet(not a dog and a cat), penitents, perdition, phylacteries, pilfering, pillage, pims, pins (not like needles or bowling- has to do with a chariot), pinions (not a type of nut), plaited (not dishes), platitudes, potentate, potsherd, poultice (not chickens), Praetorium (not a place to pray), prattler, principality, prodigal, proconsul, prognosticators (not people who put things off till later), propitiation, pslatery, prow, pulverize, pyre, quadrans, quiver (not to shake), rampart (not a piece of a truck), ravenous, ravished, raze (not to lift up), reconciliation, recount (not to double check your arithmetic), rend, renown, reprisal, retinue, rifled (does not have to do with guns), rivulets, rogue, salute ( does not have to do with the army), satiate, satraps, scruples, sepulcher, shamefaced, shards, Sheol, shod, shuttle (not a type of bus or spaceship), siegeworks, sistrums (not an affectionate term for your sisters), skiff, soothsayer, spelt (not anything to do with spelling words), straits (not the opposite of crookeds), superfluous, supplanted, tamarisk, tares, tarries, temperate, terebinth, terrestrial, tetrarch, throng (not a skimpy bathing suit), timbrel, tittle (not the name of a book), tresses, usury, vagabond, vassal, vehement, vermilion, verdure, verity, vestments, waifs, wane, wanton (not desiring something), warp (not to bend), wend, wield, winebibber, woof (not a dog or stereo), wrought.

So you see, besides the very serious textual matter, the modern versions also have words hard to be understood. Try giving this list of words as a vocabulary test and see if your son or daughter, or even yourself gets a passing score.

There is a huge battle going on today about the Bible. We are headed for the falling away, the apostasy, which will occur before the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ in glory and judgment. This is the most biblically ignorant generation of Americans ever, in spite of, or perhaps, BECAUSE OF the modern versions.

 

[Jig]

Golly, Jig, I was completely unaware just how smart I must really be. I can read and understand a "dead language". Wow! Now, how Cool is that!

People can still read and understand Latin perfectly.

The English in the King James Bible is modern English. Check out any Encyclopedia or whatever you want to find out what modern English is before you give a knee jerk response.

When's the last time you said thee, thy, or art in a normal conversation?

AV has 10 kids and they all understand the King James Bible.

With the help of Noah Websters 1828 English dictionary!

 

[Gregory Thompson]

Even the translators of the KJV thought that translation was inferior to the bibles they were using and went back to using their preferred translation after the 1611 was complete .

 

[AVBunyan]

1. People can still read and understand Latin perfectly.

2. When's the last time you said thee, thy, or art in a normal conversation?

3. With the help of Noah Websters 1828 English dictionary!

1. Yes - some can. How many do you know personally that can? Does the average person read Latin? Go to China and you will find more English than Latin.

2. Not lately but that is not a show stopper - it is a more precise English then we speak today. The thee's. thou's, ye, etc. all are more precise. What is so hard about them? Will has showed you the "easier" words of the modern versions - I bet you don't use all those today!

3. No shame to that - what do you do when you find an English word that you do not understand? You go to the Greek/Hebrew! I bet those multiple variations of those definitions clear it all up!!! Or do know know all the definitions of all English words?

BTW - what is your absolute final authority?
Do you have one?
I have one - it is a King James Bible - life can be so simple.

 

[AVBunyan]

Elizabethan Old-English is a DEAD LANGUAGE too. No one has spoken or written it in over a hundred years.

And Greek and Hebrew is a living language for the average person!!!:o

Would you honestly tell the average saint today to go to the Greek or Hebrew to get "light" verses an English dictionary? Many words in a King James are defined by the AV itself. Just run the cross references of the word church. The cross rerferences tell you what the word means but one has to study the text - oh boy - that bad word study.

 

[Gregory Thompson]

God is my final authority, that way if all of a sudden i get a mental illness and cannot read the bible properly, I'll still have reliable guidance .

 

[AVBunyan]

God is my final authority, that way if all of a sudden i get a mental illness and cannot read the bible properly, I'll still have reliable guidance .

How do you know what God is saying to you?

 

[brandplucked]

People can still read and understand Latin perfectly.

Oh, sure. I know thousands of 'em. Almost every day somebody greets me in Latin and asks how things are going

When's the last time you said thee, thy, or art in a normal conversation?

Uh, Jig. When was the REAL last time somebody talked to you in Latin or Hebrew or Greek? Come on. Get real, here. Are you even vaguely aware of the important difference between "thee,thy, thou, thine" and "ye, you and your". Did you even know there was a difference and that the KJB's use of these is FAR MORE ACCURATE to the underlying Greek and Hebrew texts? They didn't even talk that way in 1611. They used "thee, thy, thine" and "you, ye and your" for a reason. Can you guess why?

With the help of Noah Websters 1828 English dictionary! [/quote]

Not necessarily. Show me an archaic word from the KJB and you can find it in any good modern dictionary.
Did you try giving that NIV, NKJV vocabulary test to a typical American high school student yet to see how they would do? No, huh. Go ahead. Give it a go. Most Americans are so dumbed down these days they can't even handle the NIV if you test them on it.

In case it slips your notice, here it is once again. Do you with all your vast education know the difference between 'thee" and 'ye" and why this difference if important?

Will K

 

[brandplucked]

God is my final authority, that way if all of a sudden i get a mental illness and cannot read the bible properly, I'll still have reliable guidance .

Mysticism is just down the road, isn't it. Once people abandon faith in the infallible words of God found in "the book of the LORD" they then go off into cloud land mysticism and the imagination of their own minds.

Apart from this Book we can know absolutely NOTHING about the true God, what He is like, the sinful state of man, the reality of judgment and hell, and the redemption God has given to His people through the blood of the Lamb. All we can know from creation is that there must be a God who created us, but we can know nothing about Him except through His Book. That is why Satan hates the Bible and wants to cast doubt upon its truth.

The first question recorded in the Bible is by Satan who asks "Yea, hath God said....?" Nowadays it the majority of Christians themselves who are asking this same question. And some here are even saying "Hey, it's no big deal. Don't worry about it. No need for an infallible Bible at all."

We do live in interesting times.

"He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." Matthew 11:15

Will K

 

[Gregory Thompson]

How do you know what God is saying to you?

how did Abraham?

 

[Gregory Thompson]

Mysticism is just down the road, isn't it. Once people abandon faith in the infallible words of God found in "the book of the LORD" they then go off into cloud land mysticism and the imagination of their own minds.

Apart from this Book we can know absolutely NOTHING about the true God, what He is like, the sinful state of man, the reality of judgment and hell, and the redemption God has given to His people through the blood of the Lamb. All we can know from creation is that there must be a God who created us, but we can know nothing about Him except through His Book. That is why Satan hates the Bible and wants to cast doubt upon its truth.

The first question recorded in the Bible is by Satan who asks "Yea, hath God said....?" Nowadays it the majority of Christians themselves who are asking this same question. And some here are even saying "Hey, it's no big deal. Don't worry about it. No need for an infallible Bible at all."

We do live in interesting times.

"He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." Matthew 11:15

Will K

Fear of abuse doctrines are of the devil.

but perfect love casts out all fear .

 

[AVBunyan]

how did Abraham?

So, you are saying that God speaks to you outside of scripture - my aren't you special!

 

[Gregory Thompson]

So, you are saying that God speaks to you outside of scripture - my aren't you special!

am I saying that?

I'm saying I am lead by the Spirit, not by the law.

for to be lead by the law is common translated as "under" the law.

 

[brandplucked]

how did Abraham?

The only things we know about what Abraham heard from God is from what IS WRITTEN in the Bible. There was no Bible in Abraham's time. If you are hearing voices in your head or out of the sky, I might suggest you get some professional help.

I'll stick to God's written words. If I trust to my own heart, it is only deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.

Will K

 

[AVBunyan]

am I saying that?

I'm saying I am lead by the Spirit, not by the law.

Abraham was led by God speaking directly to him. As Will said - there was no written word at that time.

With all the new versions around folks are hearing a lot of conflicting "voices" today!

 

[Gregory Thompson]

The only things we know about what Abraham heard from God is from what IS WRITTEN in the Bible. There was no Bible in Abraham's time. If you are hearing voices in your head or out of the sky, I might suggest you get some professional help.

I'll stick to God's written words. If I trust to my own heart, it is only deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.

Will K

Abraham was led by God speaking directly to him. As Will said - there was no written word at that time.

With all the new versions around folks are hearing a lot of conflicting "voices" today!

Well, from the bible i "hear" many conflicting "voices" on this forum alone.

what you are prescribing authors confusion .

 

[Look4him]

Ok, both of the following verses are from the KJV. Is this not an error?

Fourtie and two yeeres old was Ahaziah, when he began to reigne, and he reigned one yeere in Ierusalem: his mothers name also was Athaliah the daughter of Omri. 2nd Chronicles 22:2

Two and twentie yeeres old was Ahaziah when he began to reigne, and he reigned one yeere in Ierusalem, and his mothers name was Athaliah the daughter of Omri king of Israel. 2nd Kings 8:26

Look4him

 

[brandplucked]

Ok, both of the following verses are from the KJV. Is this not an error?

Fourtie and two yeeres old was Ahaziah, when he began to reigne, and he reigned one yeere in Ierusalem: his mothers name also was Athaliah the daughter of Omri. 2nd Chronicles 22:2

Two and twentie yeeres old was Ahaziah when he began to reigne, and he reigned one yeere in Ierusalem, and his mothers name was Athaliah the daughter of Omri king of Israel. 2nd Kings 8:26

Look4him

Well, Look, there are two ways to deal with these verses and the apparent contradiction. The Hebrew texts read the way the KJB and many others have it. If you are incapable of thinking it through and looking for an explanation as to why the Hebrew texts read this way, then you get lazy and filled with unbelief and human wisdom and you assume that the Hebrew texts have been corrupted, not only here, but in many other places as well. So, you either prove to be a Bible believer or you show yourself to be a Bible agnostic like most lazy Christians are today.

I'll post the answer in the next one.

Will Kinney