Christian Publishing House Blog
Apologetic Defense of the faith, the Bible, and Christianity
The Hebrew text was like the Greek NT; it had accumulated copyist errors, a few intentional, a good number accidental, between the Malachi days of 440 BCE and Rabbi Judah ha-Nasi (135 to 217 CE). The same thing happened to the Greek New Testament from about 400 CE to 1550 CE, a period of copyist errors.
The King James Only movement asserts that the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible is superior to all other translations of the Bible.
In Christianity, the term Textus Receptus (Latin for “received text”) refers to all printed editions of the Greek New Testament from Desiderius (1516) to the 1633 Elzevir edition. It was the most commonly used text type for Protestant denominations. The biblical Textus Receptus constituted the translation-base for the original German Luther Bible, the translation of the New Testament into English by William Tyndale, the King James Version, the Spanish Reina-Valera translation, the Czech Bible of Kralice, and most Reformation-era New Testament translations throughout Western and Central Europe.
The King James Only movement asserts that the King James Version (KJV) of the Bible is superior to all other translations of the Bible. Adherents of the King James Only movement believe that the KJV is the greatest English translation ever produced, needing no further improvements, and they also believe that all other English translations which were produced after the KJV are corrupt. Is this true?
No book means so much to religion as the Bible. In all its forms it has greatly served religion, and in its modern forms its meaning comes out more clearly and more tellingly than ever. It has more to teach the modern world about religion than even its strongest advocates have realized. Few of them have fully explored the wealth and depth of its contribution to modern religious attitudes.
Agnostic New Testament textual and early Christianity scholar Dr. Bart D. Ehrman states, God “didn’t preserve the words, the conclusion seemed inescapable to me that he hadn’t gone to the trouble of inspiring them.”
The KJVO/TRO argues, “Because the Scriptures are forever relevant, they have been preserved down through the ages by God's special providence.”
The Christian, on the other hand, but notably the Christian, have persistently sought to make their Bible speak all languages at all times. It is a curious fact that a Book written in one tongue should have come to its largest power in other languages than its own.
The Byzantine text family that makes up the Textus Receptus, which is behind the KJV, and the NKJV is 80-85% in agreement with the Alexandrian text family that is behind almost all modern translations. The King James Version Onlyists (KJVOists) & the Textus Receptus Onlyists (TROists) call the differences omissions in the Westcott & Hort 1881 Greek New Testament (WH) and the Nestle-Aland 28th edition Greek New Testament (NA). They would argue that many of the differences are actually additions to the original texts, which have now been restored to their original form by removing spurious interpolations? Who is correct?
Some Bible critics seem, to begin with, the belief that if the originals were inspired by God and fully inerrant, the subsequent copies must continue to be inerrant in order for the inerrancy of the originals to have value. They seem to be asking, “If only the originals were inspired, and the copies were not inspired, and we do not have the originals, how are we to be certain of any passage in Scripture?” In other words, God would never allow the inspired, inerrant Word to suffer copying errors. Why would he perform the miracle of inspiring the message to be fully inerrant and not continue with the miracle of inspiring the copyists throughout the centuries to keep it inerrant?
Codex Sinaiticus and Codex Vaticanus, two of the great uncial codices, representatives of the Alexandrian text-type, are considered excellent manuscript witnesses of the text of the New Testament. Most critical editions of the Greek New Testament give precedence to these two chief uncial manuscripts, and the majority of translations are based on their text.