 Tom Balzamo co-hosts the Reason Together podcast with my friend Dan Fox, and he recently published a critique of my article "Bibles and Plowboys." I've never met Tom, but I have enjoyed listening to him on the podcast. I've found that I agree with him on many issues, but his recent critique demonstrated that we disagree on the issue of Bible translation. You can read Tom's critique at this link, and you can find my response to Tom below.
0 Comments
 At the request of several friends, I decided to read Mark Ward’s book Authorized: The Use and Misuse of the King James Bible. In that book Ward takes the position that using the KJV for anything other than personal study is a sin. Ward wrote: “For public preaching ministry, for evangelism, for discipleship materials, indeed for most situations outside individual study, using the KJV violates Paul’s instructions in I Corinthians 14.”
 One of the most frequently heard complaints about the KJV is that people don’t like reading the words thee, thou, and thy. They would much rather read a version that only uses the words you and your instead. No one has any difficulty understanding that thee, thou, and thy are second-person pronouns, but they don’t like these words because they are different from the way we normally communicate in modern society.
 An article written by Nathan Deatrick sparked a debate between myself and Mark Ward over the question of whether or not the words in the KJV really are archaic. One of my friends had shared the article. I commented, and Mark decided to risk opening communications with me once again. I suspect that he now wishes he hadn’t.
 A friend of mine, Pastor Nathan Deatrick, recently published an article calling for major updates to the King James Version of the Bible.[1] Nathan’s arguments are not new, but they have been gaining ground within my own circle of friends over the past few years. Since I’ve had opportunity to study and discuss these arguments on many occasions, I decided to write a response detailing some of the problems I see in Nathan’s position.
 One of the tests that I use for determining the validity of a biblical text or translation is the test of inerrancy. This is one of the primary reasons that I prefer the Textus Receptus over the critical text. If the Word of God is inerrant, then the critical text cannot be the pure Word of God, for it contains many errors that are overlooked simply because the compilers of that text do not hold to the doctrine of inerrancy.
 Scan of the note concerning Revelation 22:19 from Erasmus’s original 1516 publication Chapter 4: Erasmus and the Apocalypse
In chapter four, White begins his discussion of specific passages in the KJV. The first passage he presents comes from the conclusion of the Book of Revelation. His discussion of this passage is broken up over a span of twelve pages, so I’ll copy the relevant statements here before proceeding. Beginning on page 55, White writes,  This is the third installment in my series responding to James White's book The King James Only Controversy. In this article, I respond to several of White's claims regarding Codex Sinaiticus, one of the main Greek manuscripts used for the modern translations.
 As I mentioned in Part 1 of this series, I am writing a detailed response to James White's book The King James Only Controversy. I am defending the position that "the KJV is a faithful translation of the preserved text of God's inspired and inerrant Word." This article picks up my response to White in the second half of Chapter 2 of White's book.
 Over the past several years, I’ve seen a significant increase in the number of people that I know personally who have referenced James White’s book The King James Only Controversy in defense of their decision to abandon the use of the KJV in favor of various modern translations. White’s book is often presented by these individuals as a scholarly and irrefutable answer to the KJV Only position. I picked up a copy of White’s book several years back hoping to interact with a scholarly treatment of the topic, but I was sorely disappointed. I found White’s work to be childish and his arguments fallacious. I set the book aside with no plans to ever pick it up again, but with its current increase in popularity, I decided to read through it again and force myself to write a response.
|
Bill Fortenberry is a Christian philosopher and historian in Birmingham, AL. Bill's work has been cited in several legal journals, and he has appeared as a guest on shows including The Dr. Gina Show, The Michael Hart Show, and Real Science Radio.
Contact Us if you would like to schedule Bill to speak to your church, group, or club. "Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser: teach a just man, and he will increase in learning." (Proverbs 9:9)
Search
Topics
All
Archives
February 2025
|
RSS Feed