I am going make a statement to which I hope will not offend anyone (well, mostly no one). After PrincetonGuy’s statement concerning the late Dr. Metzger in relation to the Church of Satan, I would no longer respond to PrincetonGuy’s comments. However, since he is somewhat ignorant concerning what I believe to be factual, I offer the following links as evidence to the contrary. Between the two links, I think you will see that I do not stand alone.
Is Inerrancy Enough? (A Defense of the KJV)
Textual Criticism: Fact and Fiction (4/4)
I will now present an excerpt from the latter:
“Verbal Equivalence. The King James Bible Translators used a translation technique that is known as "verbal and formal equivalence." This simply means that when a word was to be translated, the translator would find the "verbal equivalent" in English. This does not imply that the King James Bible is always a "word-for-word" translation, for there are many Greek words that cannot be accurately translated into one English word. Sometimes it takes two, three, four, and even five English words to give us the proper meaning of the single Greek or Hebrew word being translated. A perfect example of this is found in 2 Timothy 3:16, where one Greek word qeopneustos (theopneustos) is translated using five English words, "given by inspiration of God." Many of the so-called "scholars" love to point out that the "correct" translation of this word is "God-breathed." WRONG! The correct translation is "given by inspiration of God!" The term "God-breathed" is not action specific. In other words, when you read "God-breathed" it doesn't tell you anything about the action. "God breathed His Word" gives us very little information. Did God breath out, or in? And how did God breathing affect His Word? But when you read "given by inspiration of God," you realize that God has breathed into His Word the breath of life, making the Word of God a living thing! Everything that God breathes the breath of life into becomes an eternally living entity. When God breathed into Adam (mankind in federal headship) he became an eternally living entity (every person that was ever born is alive today, somewhere!). So also with His Word. You can see then that the term "God-breathed" focuses our attention on God, when He, in this context, wants us to focus our attention on His Word, thus the correct translation "given by inspiration of God!"
Formal Equivalence means that when a word is translated from the Greek into English, the form of the word must be carried into the new language. In other words, if the Greek word is a noun, the English word must take the same form, that is, a noun. If the Greek word is a verb, the English word must be a verb. If the Greek word is a pronoun, the English word must be a pronoun, and so on. Also, implicit in formal equivalence is the number of the word, such as singular or plural. If the Greek is singular, then the English must also be singular, if plural, the translation must also be plural. Past tense must always be translated as past tense, future tense as future, perfect tense as perfect, and so on. There is a fellow in Los Angeles who has circulated a tape in which he claims that the word "is" in 2 Timothy 3:16 is in italics, and therefore has no support in the Greek, and it is perfectly alright to change it to "was." According to this fellow's less then brilliant deduction, the passage should read "All scripture "was" given by inspiration of God." He doesn't believe the Bible which we have today is inspired. He must think it has expired. The problem with this fellow is that he doesn't have a clue about the Greek language. The reason the King James Translators added the word "is" keeping the passage in question in the present tense (as is the Greek), is that they understood that everything that God breathes into is eternal. You will notice that the second "is" before the word "profitable" is also in italics. Does anyone in their right mind suggest we change this word to "was", indicating the Scriptures are no longer profitable? All Scripture is inspired, and all Scripture is profitable.”
Jack
I recommend the reading of Dr. Cassidy's entire four part article.