"By and By" Is Not a False Friend in the KJV

My previous articles have run a bit long even for me, but this one will be much shorter. This particular “false friend” claim is so simple to refute that it wouldn’t be worth writing about except for the fact that it perfectly demonstrates the poor quality of Mark Ward’s scholarship.

The Simple Truth
 
The basic refutation of Ward’s claim regarding the phrase by and by is that he is just plain wrong in his understanding of the phrase. Ward claims that, in our present time, the phrase by and by means “after a while” or “eventually.” This is simply false. By and by does not mean “after a while” or “eventually.” It means “before long,” “presently,” “soon,” or “shortly.” Every dictionary that I’ve examined has used some variation of this definition. Merriam-Webster, Cambridge, Collins, Dictionary.com, YourDictionary, Wiktionary, the Googe Dictionary, and even the American Heritage Dictionary that Ward is so fond of quoting all say that by and by means “soon.”

But what about the Oxford English Dictionary (OED)? This is the dictionary that Ward praises in just about every video as the absolute best and most reliable English dictionary ever written. What does the OED say is the current definition of by and by? Unfortunately, Ward didn’t tell us that in his video, and I’m not wealthy enough to buy the $1,200 twenty-volume set of the OED, so I guess we’ll never know. At least, that’s the impression I’ve gotten from watching Ward’s videos. Happily, however, this is another one of Ward’s errors. The current edition of the OED is available online, and it costs a mere $10 per month for full access. Here is what the OED says is the modern-day definition of by and by:

That’s the short answer to this “false friend” claim. Mark Ward is just plain wrong when he insists over and over again in his video that the phrase by and by means “after a while” or “eventually.” The current, modern sense of this phrase is that it refers to something happening soon, not to something happening in the distant future. Now, to be fair, there are some people who use by and by to mean something like “after a while,” but they do so disingenuously in the same way that someone might say “I’ll get to it sometime soon” to mean that they’ll get to it sometime not soon at all. Apart from this kind of disingenuous use, the phrase by and by always means “soon.”
 
Ward’s Character and Abilities
 
Now, I could stop there in an attempt to please a few of my detractors who complain that my articles are too long, but I don’t want to waste this opportunity to highlight a few things about Mark Ward’s scholarship. (And my attempts to make detractors happy never work anyway.) Ward’s determination to prove that by and by is a “false friend” reveals some interesting things about his character and abilities.

1. Twisting the Truth
 
Take, for example, his statement about the American Heritage Dictionary entry for by and by. Ward said, “Inexplicably to me, the American Heritage Dictionary does say that this phrase by and by can mean ‘soon.’” There is a subtle misrepresentation of the truth in this statement. The American Heritage Dictionary does not say that by and by can mean “soon.” It says that it does mean “soon.” This is the type of mental gymnastics that I would have expected from a teenager, not from a grown man. Telling my son to drive straight home can mean that he should not stop at a drive-through and get something to eat on the way, but it could just mean that he shouldn’t drive to a friend’s house to spend the night before coming home the next day, and if he assumes the second meaning, then he can get something to eat and innocently claim that he misunderstood my instructions. A teenager determined to get his way is wiser in his own conceit than seven men that can render a reason (Prov. 26:16), and apparently, the same is true of men with PhDs in New Testament interpretation.

2. Cherry-Picking the Data
 
While we’re on the subject of dictionaries, take a moment to consider the implications of Ward’s decision to ignore what the OED says is the current definition of by and by. Why did Ward leave this out? He frequently lauds the accuracy and reliability of his favorite dictionary, and he mentioned in the video that “the Oxford English Dictionary lists multiple senses of the phrase by and by,” but he completely left out the fact that the OED only gives one modern-day sense of this phrase when used as an adverb, and that sense is defined as “before long, presently, soon, shortly.”

Now, it’s true that the OED does include a definition of this phrase which is kind of similar to the definition Ward gave it in his video. Ward’s definition of by and by as “after a while” or “eventually” could fit under the noun form of the phrase which the OED defines as “procrastination.” Ward is fond of singing a line from the 19th century hymn “The Sweet By and By” every time he talks about this “false friend,” and that hymn is also listed under the noun form of the phrase in the OED.
 
Unfortunately for Ward, all of the noun examples in the OED are actually adverbs used as nouns similar to how by and by is used as a noun in the sentence “By and by is an adverb.” Here’s one of the literary examples the OED provides of this phrase being used as a noun: “Never give credit . . . to the by and by of England, nor to the warrant you of Scotland.” The author’s point in this sentence is that one should not believe an Englishman who promises to do something soon (i.e. by and by) because Englishmen are known for their procrastination. All of the examples the OED provided of the phrase by and by meaning “procrastination” are similar to this one. They use the phrase as a noun to speak of someone else’s disingenuous use of the adverbial phrase as a synonym for soon. In other words, this phrase isn’t a noun at all, and it still means “soon” even when it is used to convey procrastination.
 
None of this was even hinted at in Ward’s video. He avoided any reference at all to the modern-day definition found in the OED. Cherry-picking the data to hide contradictory information is a major red flag, warning of a lack of integrity and revealing the possibility that Ward cannot be trusted to provide a full and honest evaluation of the facts. However, there is a possibility that Ward didn’t read the modern definition of this phrase in the OED. There are a whopping five whole definitions to filter through, and maybe he just didn’t have time to read all of them before broadcasting his ignorance to the whole world. I’ll grant that possibility and withhold judgement. Ward was kind enough to only very strongly suggest that it is a sin to give a KJV Bible to a child, so I’ll return the favor and limit myself to very strongly suggesting that Ward lacks integrity and cannot be trusted. You can decide for yourself whether that suggestion is true or not.

3. Swimming in the Shallow End
 
One of the things that frustrates me about how readily Ward’s claims have been accepted is the fact that his “scholarship” is entirely surface level with no real depth. I suspect that those who share his position are eager to embrace his claims solely because they share his position and not because of the quality of his evidence. The Bible tells us that we are to prove all things (I Thess. 5:21), and it warns us that we should not accept those who seem just in their cause until after their claims have been investigated (Prov. 18:13 & 17). I am perplexed by the eagerness with which Ward’s claims have been accepted, because his arguments are so shallow and easily refuted.
 
This can be illustrated in our current discussion by noting what Ward said about the Greek words which were translated as “by and by” in the KJV. Ward asserted that the “BDAG says they all mean ‘immediately’ or ‘at once.’” This is partly correct. The BDAG lexicon does say that the adverbs εὐθὺς, εὐθὲως (which are really two forms of the same word), and ἐξαὐτῆς can all mean “immediately” or “at once,” but a proper study of these words requires more than just looking them up in a single lexicon.
 
If Ward had devoted the tiniest bit of additional effort to his study, he may have noticed that the parable of the sower uses two of the Greek words that are translated as “by and by.” Both εὐθὺς and εὐθὲως are used in Matthew’s account of this parable. Εὐθὺς is translated as “by and by” in Matthew 13:21, and εὐθὲως is translated as “forthwith” in verse five. Had Ward made this observation, he could also have noted that the word forthwith in verse five does not mean either “immediately” or “at once” as the BDAG claims. The text of Matthew 13:5 says: “Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth: and forthwith they sprung up, because they had no deepness of earth.” Seeds do not spring up immediately after they are planted. Germination and growth have to happen below the ground before the first shoot begins to be seen above the ground. Ward should have seen this, and he should have realized that the Greek word εὐθὲως which can be translated as “by and by,” does not just mean “immediately” or “at once.” Sometimes it encompasses a longer period of time. Ward missed this important nuance because he didn’t take the time to study the evidence deeply before making his claims.
 
Ward’s haste to add this phrase to his list of “false friends” also caused him to overlook the use of εὐθὲως in III John 14 where John wrote, “I trust I shall shortly [εὐθὲως] see thee, and we shall speak face to face.” John was not telling Gaius, “Look up as soon as you finish reading these words, and you’ll see me in front of you.” That would be a silly interpretation of this verse, but it’s the only interpretation possible if we follow Ward’s example of blind adherence to the BDAG. What John actually said to Gaius was that he hoped to see him soon, not that he hoped to see him immediately.
 
It may seem like I am just nitpicking here, but there is an important point to be drawn from all of this. When we have a fuller view of εὐθὺς and εὐθὲως, we can see that their primary definition is closer to “soon” than to “immediately.” The LSJM lexicon gives a more comprehensive explanation of these words and draws the focus back to their root, which simply means “straight.” When used as temporal adverbs, they attach that root meaning to the concept of time to convey the sense of “straightaway” or, more accurately, “in a direct sequence.” This sense usually implies immediacy, but it is broad enough to allow for short intervening periods of time. All of this demonstrates that the proper understanding of εὐθὺς and εὐθὲως is that they mean “before long, presently, soon, shortly” exactly as the current definition of the phrase by and by.

5. Suppressing the Truth
 
One of the foundational premises of Ward’s argument is the claim that the words he labels as “false friends” have changed their meaning over time so that they mean something completely different now from what they meant in 1611. For that premise to be true regarding the phrase by and by, the modern definition of that phrase must have originated sometime after 1611. Now, I’ve already suggested (but I didn’t actually say) that Mark Ward lacks integrity and cannot be trusted because he neglected to mention that the OED presents “before long, presently, soon, shortly” as the current definition of by and by. Now let’s take things one step further and consider that this definition is not just listed as the current definition. The OED also points out that this definition had been in use for nearly one hundred years by the time the KJV was translated.
 
The definition of by and by has not changed. The definition that Ward listed is from 1526, and the definition that I listed is also from 1526. Why do both definitions date from the same time period? Because they are essentially the same definition. The phrase actually meant “soon,” and it occasionally carried the sense of “immediately” because immediacy is a subset of the range of time encompassed by the word soon.
 
Ward inadvertently acknowledged this in his video. He was attempting to demonstrate an erroneous conclusion about by and by meaning “after a while,” and in the process, he used the word soon as a synonym for immediately four different times. One of those was in reference to Luke 21:9 where Ward said, “Clearly, Jesus had to mean the end is ‘not yet’ or ‘not soon.’” Ward evidently realizes that the definition marked as obsolete and the definition identified as “the usual current sense” are essentially the same, but he studiously avoided any reference to the current definition in the OED.
 
Conclusion
 
Mark Ward’s claim that by and by is a “false friend” in the KJV is just plain wrong. Literally all of the evidence disagrees with him. His definition of this phrase is something that he just made up on his own. A viewer challenged his definition in one of the comments on the video, and Ward replied with: “I don’t advance arguments for that particular point in the video; I assume it.”

Ward claims in a separate article that his “disagreement with the average KJV defender is not actually about textual criticism, but about which authorities are worth trusting,” and I submit that Mark Ward is not an authority worth trusting. This video proves beyond a doubt that he is either incomprehensibly sloppy in his scholarship or intentionally deceptive. I’ll leave you to decide for yourself which of those two is more accurate.
 
 Click here to read about more words that are not "false friends" in the KJV.