Subject: KJV Only Help |
Bible Note: Hello G. Preston, Let me state- with no animosity toward you- that I find the claims of the KJV-only crowd spurious at best and of dubious value. We're not talking a core issue regarding salvation nor even Orthodoxy. At best I see it as majoring on minors and chasing rabbit-trails. To what end? How much closer can we get to the original Word? What do we do with the Wycliff Bible? The Tyndale Bible- first printed NT in English based on the Greek? The Coverdale Bible or the Geneva Bible? The Bishops Bible published in 1568 was a revision of the Great Bible (1539) translated by a commitee of Anglican scholars. These are all translations, and all preceded the 1611 KJV! Did we not have the real Word of God prior to that? That would be patent nonsense to assert such a thing. As EdB stated, there are no original NT manuscripts in existance. None. There are nearly six thousand ancient manuscripts or protions of manuscripts of the New Testament. The oldest extant fragment of the NT comes from about A.D. 130- the John Rylands fragment of John 18:31ff) the KJV was based on the best manuscripts- available at that time! You ask, "why is another/new one necessary...for what purpose?" Well, I'll let Dr. Robert Plummer answer that one. He states in "40 Questions About Interpreting the Bible" [Question 7] regarding the KJV. "The best Bible translations are based on the most reliable ancient manuscripts of the OT and NT. The King James Version is not highly recommended because it is not based on the best manuscripts and because the 17th-Century English is hard for most modern people to understand. While it was an excellent work for it's day, the KJV has been supassed by many modren translations in both readability and faithfulness to the original manuscripts. Some people wrongly and often passionately claim the KJV is a superior translation of the Bible. The historical and linguistic facts do not support this claim." Speaking the Truth in Love, BradK |