KJV the only translation?

Sorry, but unles you can read original Hebrew and Greek, you're never going to get a 100% accurate interpretation of the Bible...do your research, and then decide which one is best...but none of them are perfect.

Originally posted by Clay
has anyone ever read "Touch not the unclean thing"?  at my college we are required to read that book for Bible Doctrines and it deals with the Text issue and compares the greek texts of the KJV to all other texts used by the NIV, NASB, NLT, and all the others.  it also brings up a strong point between the KJV and the NIV that i found shocking.  there are over 1,900 words changed or omitted in the NIV from the KJV and in some books there are entire sections of verses that are missing.  i was just wondering everyone's input on this issue and if anyone has ever read this book.

Click to expand...

I haven't read that book, but interestingly when Erasmus was compiling his Greek New Testament which would later be the basis for the KJ translation he was missing the last six verses of Revelation in the Greek and so he used the Latin Vulgate and translated those verses back into the Greek. He made a few mistakes such as using "book of life" instead of "tree of life" in Rev 22:19. This mistake still occurs in the KJV today.

Thus comparing all the versions (NASB, NIV, NLT, and others) that are CORRECT in Rev 22:19 against the KJV, which is WRONG here, shows they are different, but gives no indication which is correct.

The KJV uses "made up" greek text as its basis for, and changes the last six verses of the bible in the precise passage in Revelation that warns against doing so. Yet people defend it as the only correct English version. Curious.

Originally posted by Clay
there are over 1,900 words changed or omitted in the NIV from the KJV and in some books there are entire sections of verses that are missing.  i was just wondering everyone's input on this issue and if anyone has ever read this book.

Click to expand...

This has been discussed numerous times on these boards, but the main point to remember is that the NIV did not *remove* verses from the KJV, it was a completely new translation that used different (and more accurate) source texts than the KJV did. Best evidence points to the idea that those verses were *added* during the transmission process.

Consider a passage does not appear in a 2nd-century manuscript, but then it does in post-6th century manuscripts. How can that passage possibly have been removed?

Also note that the KJV translators themselves said in their introduction to the reader (which is rarely included in modern editions of the KJV) that multiple translations were good, that marginal notes were useful, that dynamic equivalence was necessary at times, that there was no perfect translation of the Greek and Hebrew words, and more. So the question you have to ask yourself if you are tempted to believe that the KJV is infallible -- if the translators themselves did not know their own translation was infallible (and in fact specifically denied it), how did anyone find out that it was?

-Chris

Originally posted by Clay
has anyone ever read "Touch not the unclean thing"?  at my college we are required to read that book for Bible Doctrines and it deals with the Text issue and compares the greek texts of the KJV to all other texts used by the NIV, NASB, NLT, and all the others.  it also brings up a strong point between the KJV and the NIV that i found shocking.  there are over 1,900 words changed or omitted in the NIV from the KJV and in some books there are entire sections of verses that are missing.  i was just wondering everyone's input on this issue and if anyone has ever read this book.

Click to expand...

 

No but I will, who is the author?  It sounds like a good one. 

Thanks, Julie

 

 

NIV

Psalm 12
6 And the words of the LORD are flawless,
like silver refined in a furnace of clay,
purified seven times.

7 O LORD , you will keep us safe
and protect us from such people forever.

© Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society
All rights reserved worldwide

KJV
Psalm 12
6   The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
7   Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.

Do the omitted words have anything to do with the way that (in my KJV at least) the translators wrote a word in italics when they added it because they couldn't figure out what the sentence meant, so they had to add a word to make it make sense in English?

Originally posted by Julie
  NIV

Psalm 12
6 And the words of the LORD are flawless,
like silver refined in a furnace of clay,
purified seven times.

7 O LORD , you will keep us safe
and protect us from such people forever.

© Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society
All rights reserved worldwide

KJV
Psalm 12
6   The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
7   Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.

Click to expand...

Ah, I see no missing words or missing truths there, only different wording, and no real difference between these passages. The convey the same message, in fact, the NIV is actually clearer in what the intent of this passage is.

The NIV does not deny Biblical inspiration or infallibility by saying the words of the Lord are flawless. In fact, it supports the concept as much or more than the KJV passage does, because "flawless" conveys inerrancy as well as purity. If I say that a painting is flawless, that does not mean there are ink drips on it and that it is full of mistakes. It means there is not even one visible mistake there.

Clay in this sense means earth. So there is no change there, on the makeup of the furnace, and refined means tried. So this is just an update on the language of 1611, which in itself was not inspired (if so, why are several KJV words in other passages now considered "cuss words"?)

Verse 7 is a promise of God's protection. In the KJV it could well be twisted to condemn "this generation" or to provide protection for a specific group against those who oppose it. However the NIV translation omits no truths and yet clears up the ambiguities and sentence structure, to convey the truth of this verse and in a way that its meaning cannot be twisted.

 

Thanks Clay!

Julie

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  Touch not the unclean thing    byDavid Sorenson

Originally posted by Cammie
Sorry, but unles you can read original Hebrew and Greek, you're never going to get a 100% accurate interpretation of the Bible...do your research, and then decide which one is best...but none of them are perfect.

Click to expand...

and also decide which of the three older English translations of the Bible is best.

The Textus Receptus, which the KJV is based on, is based mainly on text witnesses dating from the 10th to the 12th and 13 th centuries. There are more of these witnesses in existence so the TR was based on the majority of witnesses which were in agreement with each other.
Many witnesses have been found since then that are up to 900 to 1000 years older than the text witnesses of the TR. Now it makes since that there would be more manuscripts in existence from the 10-13th centuries as opposed to manuscripts that were 1000 years older. But you have to ask yourself, whych manuscript is going to be the closest to what the original writer intended? A few manuscripts from the 2nd-4th and 5th centuries? or a lot of manuscripts from the 10-12th centuries?

We have simply learned so much since the TR was put together. We have found so much since then. Textual Criticism is not a black art of Satan. It's a tool to help us recover the original text as best we can. We don't have a problem using it with Shakespeare or the Greek classics such as Homer.
The NT manuscripts are a dream because there are so many of them compared to the Greeks or Shakespeare.

Also, the 1611 KJV had been revised 4 times by 1749. Am I against the KJV? Not really, I am saying that there is nothing special about it. You either need to bite the bullet and learn Greek and Hebrew, or you need to use several translations to help you understand the text better. To say that one translation is an "authority" is wrong and betrays a complete lack of understanding anything about language. Language is ambiguous.

The Translators To The Reader is the most damning evidence against KJV-onlyism. In this preface, the translators of the KJV say, among other things, that (a) marginal notes are a good thing, (b) multiple translations are a good thing, (c) dynamic equivalence is sometimes the best way to translated, (d) no translation is perfect, and (e) manuscript criticism is a good thing.

Because of this preface the KJV-onlyists are forced to invent explanations like "the translators didn't know they were producing an inspired edition, but that doesn't mean it wasn't inspired -- look at John the Baptist, who didn't know he was Elijah." But the question that never gets answered is this: If the translators themselves did not know they had produced an infallible translation, how did anyone find out? Why would God allow them to write this translators preface which explicitly denies that their translation is infallible?

-Chris

and let us not forget the amount of editing that has occured with the original KJV:

For example:

Without changing its name or labelling it as "revised," the KJV in fact was revised many times from 1611 to 1769, including changes in spelling, changes in punctuation, changes in wording, the removal of the Old Testament Apocrypha, the removal of marginal notes with alternative renderings. It was in 1769 that Dr. Benjamin Blayney of Oxford completed what Bruce Metzger describes as "the most careful and comprehensive revision" that came to be known as "the Authorized Version." Blayney's 1769 revision produced the text that is used by most publishers of the KJV today. (This is explained in Bruce Metzger's article on "Translations" in The Oxford Companion to the Bible, edited by Bruce M. Metzger and Michael D. Coogan, New York: Oxford University Press, 1993, page 759-760.) Metzger notes that in the 1614 edition alone, changes were made in over four hundred places.

We should avoid any "onlyisms."

Originally posted by kern

Because of this preface the KJV-onlyists are forced to invent explanations like "the translators didn't know they were producing an inspired edition, but that doesn't mean it wasn't inspired -- look at John the Baptist, who didn't know he was Elijah." But the question that never gets answered is this: If the translators themselves did not know they had produced an infallible translation, how did anyone find out? Why would God allow them to write this translators preface which explicitly denies that their translation is infallible?

Click to expand...

God had recently purchased a joke book which included a joke based on the liar's paradox - a guy who says "everything I say is false". This concept so delighted Him that He had to have one, right away, so the next time He was inspiring someone, He made them say it wasn't inspired. That God, He's such a kidder!

ROFL!

Originally posted by Mr.Cheese
We should avoid any "onlyisms."

Click to expand...

Always?

LOL!
Ya got me!

Originally posted by Clay
has anyone ever read "Touch not the unclean thing"?  at my college we are required to read that book for Bible Doctrines and it deals with the Text issue and compares the greek texts of the KJV to all other texts used by the NIV, NASB, NLT, and all the others.  it also brings up a strong point between the KJV and the NIV that i found shocking.  there are over 1,900 words changed or omitted in the NIV from the KJV and in some books there are entire sections of verses that are missing.  i was just wondering everyone's input on this issue and if anyone has ever read this book.

Click to expand...

 

Clay, do you know where they sell that book?

 

Have your read, Final Authority: A Christian's Guide to the King James Bible by Dr. William Grady

 

_______________________________________

NIV

Psalm 12
6 And the words of the LORD are flawless,
like silver refined in a furnace of clay,
purified seven times.

7 O LORD , you will keep us safe
and protect us from such people forever.

© Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society
All rights reserved worldwide

 

KJV
Psalm 12
6   The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.
7   Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.

I like to study out of the NASB.  It is meant to be a literal word for word translation (even though you really can't have that).  I enjoy it.  But I still read out of the NKJV and the NIV and will grab an Amplified too....