The Error of KJV-Onlyism

  • Christian Chat is a moderated online Christian community allowing Christians around the world to fellowship with each other in real time chat via webcam, voice, and text, with the Christian Chat app. You can also start or participate in a Bible-based discussion here in the Christian Chat Forums, where members can also share with each other their own videos, pictures, or favorite Christian music.

    If you are a Christian and need encouragement and fellowship, we're here for you! If you are not a Christian but interested in knowing more about Jesus our Lord, you're also welcome! Want to know what the Bible says, and how you can apply it to your life? Join us!

    To make new Christian friends now around the world, click here to join Christian Chat.

Sipsey

Well-known member
Sep 27, 2018
1,470
689
113
When Origen, and Aquila got their hands on it. The Masoretic has also been corrupted. You can't prove a prediction or prophecy. You can only argue that it happened.
Are there any extant portions that predate Their revisions? Do the many quotes from the LXX in the NT vary from the available current manuscripts?
 
Apr 27, 2023
538
39
28
Are there any extant portions that predate Their revisions?
Few if any. I doubt it. You can say Justin Martyr intercepted the change in the virgin birth prophecy to a forgery. But that isn't carbon dateable.
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
23,460
7,188
113
Elizabethan English is great, if one happens to be Elizabethan :)
we actually were Elizabethans until Queen Elizabeth died in 2022. Well the commonwealth nations were.

She spoke a very clipped and prim and proper English though what they call 'received pronunciation' such as heard on the BBC

What they call a cut glass accent.

But actually many English actually don't speak like that at all. Formal written prose is very different from vernacular. Most people don't have problems with reading English but if you find it an issue you can always read the Bible in Chinese.
 

presidente

Senior Member
May 29, 2013
9,160
1,787
113
Almost no Jews could read the Hebrew anymore by the time the NT books were copied. So, the NT authors quote the Old Greek because it was the Bible the people had in front of them. As a similar example, there were many pastors in the 70's that made use of the King James Version almost exclusively. But they didn't do so because it was a perfect translation. They did so because it was basically the "only game in town."
That's not what I have read. I read that Hebrew boys went to Torah school for five years. Some continued on to higher education. During those five years, they learned to read and memorized the first five books of the Bible.

Among the Hellenistic Jews who lived out among the diaspora outside of the holy land, the use of the LXX was widespread, and the idea that the translation was inspired was also widely accepted. They would debate over little details of the wording of the text of the translation like the Jews in Judea would have done with the Hebrew text. The fact that there was a lot of ceremony surrounding copying the Hebrew manuscripts that was not required for the LXX may have contributed to this Greek translation being cheaper and so widely used.
 

Sipsey

Well-known member
Sep 27, 2018
1,470
689
113
That's not what I have read. I read that Hebrew boys went to Torah school for five years. Some continued on to higher education. During those five years, they learned to read and memorized the first five books of the Bible.

Among the Hellenistic Jews who lived out among the diaspora outside of the holy land, the use of the LXX was widespread, and the idea that the translation was inspired was also widely accepted. They would debate over little details of the wording of the text of the translation like the Jews in Judea would have done with the Hebrew text. The fact that there was a lot of ceremony surrounding copying the Hebrew manuscripts that was not required for the LXX may have contributed to this Greek translation being cheaper and so widely used.
The post you use is attributed to me, but that was actually a reply to one of my post’s by 7thMoon
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
23,460
7,188
113
The Greek new testament did quote from the translated into Greek Old testament - the Septugint.

And it is commonly said that the Septugint was inspired translation , it is called the septugint because 70 translators worked on it and came up with the exact same Greek translation. They were very careful to make it word for word. I mean those scholars treated scripture like it was GOLD.

To translate Hebrew into English and Greek into English does require a bit more, and since English is such a tricky language it can't exactly be done word for word, but they try as close as they can.

Some of the more archaic phrases such as 'Verily verily, I say unto you' are to my mind, not what we say in English anymore, but it's just translating as best they can at the time.

The orthodox eastern church it could be argued had a fuller translation because they didn't have to translate the New Testament. It was already in Greek! And they had the Septugint.
The Western church did - it had to translate both Old and New Testaments into Latin. And then by that time Latin had mostly died out as a spoken, living language.
 

Lanolin

Well-known member
Dec 15, 2018
23,460
7,188
113
I think what made the KJV radical for its time is it was translating from Hebrew to English and Greek to English (two different languages)
and also it was a Bible that was readable for the English speaking public and widely available. Oh also it was approved by the monarch at the time.

And yes its widely held that the KJV was an inspired translation. Just as the Septugint was accepted.

Of course the KJV had gone through many revisions since then. People tend to be passionate about the scripture that speaks to them and the words that save them. When they read different version, it's never as good.

Some people can get quite irrational about their favoured version, but others have good reasons to choose one particular Holy Bible over another. You can't deem EVERYONE who wants to only read the KJV as a freak. Or that they are just doing it to annoy you cos you don't understand it yourself. I'm like don't mock my Bible K?

Besides...you don't have to go out and buy a KJV and its not kept under lock and key. Its free for all and in public domain. You can quote from it and people understand thats from the Bible. There's lots of good things about it and for many Christians its simply a gift that they treasure.
 

Nehemiah6

Senior Member
Jul 18, 2017
26,074
13,771
113
If that indeed is true, I wonder why about 80% of NT quotes from the OT can be traced to the Greek translation of the OT.
That too is a myth. At the same time for certain verses, different translators could arrive at the same translation separately. My own research shows that there is about 10% EXACT correspondence.

Did you take note of this comment by the KJV translators: ..."which made the Apostles to leave them many times, when they left the Hebrew, and to deliver the sense thereof according to the truth of the word, as the spirit gave them utterance."

Did you get that? The apostles were relying on the Hebrew Tanakh and the Holy Spirit was the one providing the quotes. Everything in the NT is by divine inspiration, and the Holy Spirit was going by His own Hebrew Bible, not a corrupted Greek translation.

For more on the CORRUPT LXX see The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah by Alfred Edersheim (a scholar accomplished in both Hebrew and Greek). .
 

Zandar

Well-known member
May 16, 2023
1,588
624
113
Ive always felt the discoveries of older than Erasmus manuscripts was very convenient.
 

Zandar

Well-known member
May 16, 2023
1,588
624
113
Maybe we should all learn Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic.
 

Nehemiah6

Senior Member
Jul 18, 2017
26,074
13,771
113
I haven't heard KJV-onlyists argue for such a miracle regarding their translation.
There are only a small minority of Christians who seriously believe the the KJV was "inspired" (meaning direct inspiration by God the Holy Spirit). It would be more consistent with the facts to say that the hand of God was over these learned and devout men whose sole objective was to faithfully render a translation directly out of the printed Hebrew and Greek texts so that none could take exception to it. And God has indeed mightily blessed this Bible for over 400 years. Countless souls have been saved through the preaching of the Gospel as found here.
 

Nehemiah6

Senior Member
Jul 18, 2017
26,074
13,771
113
Maybe we should all learn Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic.
That is not really necessary. With the excellent Bible study tools now available, anything that is not clear can be cleared up. See Bible Hub. In any event spiritual things are discerned by the spirit through the Holy Spirit.
 
Apr 27, 2023
538
39
28
Ive always felt the discoveries of older than Erasmus manuscripts was very convenient.
Teschendorf's discovery of Sinaiticus comes to mind. Too bad, it is one of many forgeries. I'd rather Jean Nicholus Jager's Greek New Testament; the discovery of it seems to impact me more. It has several TR readings, and a few Teschendorf forgeries. I find the coincidence not to be an accident.
 
Apr 27, 2023
538
39
28
That is not really necessary. With the excellent Bible study tools now available, anything that is not clear can be cleared up. See Bible Hub. In any event spiritual things are discerned by the spirit through the Holy Spirit.
It is necessary or you will not use the tools that well.
 

Sipsey

Well-known member
Sep 27, 2018
1,470
689
113
That too is a myth. At the same time for certain verses, different translators could arrive at the same translation separately. My own research shows that there is about 10% EXACT correspondence.

Did you take note of this comment by the KJV translators: ..."which made the Apostles to leave them many times, when they left the Hebrew, and to deliver the sense thereof according to the truth of the word, as the spirit gave them utterance."

Did you get that? The apostles were relying on the Hebrew Tanakh and the Holy Spirit was the one providing the quotes. Everything in the NT is by divine inspiration, and the Holy Spirit was going by His own Hebrew Bible, not a corrupted Greek translation.

For more on the CORRUPT LXX see The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah by Alfred Edersheim (a scholar accomplished in both Hebrew and Greek). .
So, are you saying the original LXX was corrupt, or the later revisions?
 
Apr 27, 2023
538
39
28
So, are you saying the original LXX was corrupt, or the later revisions?
KJV-centered people doubt the goodness of the LXX. Gail Riplinger even said there was no such thing as the Septuagint, though it existed in the Complutensian Polyglot before the discovery of codex fraud.
 

Bible_Highlighter

Well-known member
Nov 28, 2023
2,042
334
83
That sounds like a good process, but it does not sound like evidence in favor of the idea that these men were inspired to translate the scriptures like the apostles were to write them.
Did you ever consider you could be wrong, and that God is operating in a way that you have not thought of before?

Isaiah 55:8-9 says,

8 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord.​
9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.​

Sometimes you have to take a step back and look at the larger picture through time to see how God is moving. I would suggest watching the 1611 YouTube video by Brandon Peterson. You can check that out here.

Now, if you believe in Textual Criticism or Modern Scholarship, I can only encourage you take a step back a moment and observe how they may be lying to you and using tactics of deception to get you to not believe God’s Word entirely (see here). For example: Why would they move part of the words in 1 John 5:8 (Which say: “For there are three that testify:”) to 1 John 5:7? To me, it looks like they are trying to hide the fact from the new reader that 1 John 5:7 is missing. I am not saying KJB folks are perfect, but the heart is in the right place to wanting to have faith in what God’s Word says. They are not looking to change God’s words (whereby there are warnings attached in doing so).

You said:
the tradition about the LXX, the Septuagint, was that 70 elders working independently each translated exactly the same and that is more of a compelling argument.
I read once about how even a Textual Critic thought the LXX is a fraud.

Here is a write up refuting the LXX:

http://www.theoldpathspublications.com/Downloads/Free/The Septuagint ebook.pdf

I hope this helps and may God bless you.
 

Bible_Highlighter

Well-known member
Nov 28, 2023
2,042
334
83

Sipsey

Well-known member
Sep 27, 2018
1,470
689
113